Great Warriors of Sui and Tang Dynasties

Chapter 1236
July.

There was a severe drought in the Central Plains, and thousands of miles of red land.

Drought spread across more than ten roads in Guanzhong and Guandong, even in Jingxiang, Bahan, Jianghuai and other places, there were no harvests for thousands of miles.

It was supposed to be the joyous harvest time after the summer harvest, but now the cracks in the dry ground can be stuffed into fists.

The counties and counties under the Great Qin rule in the Central Plains are fine. After all, the imperial court has predicted that there will be a severe drought this year and there may be locust plagues since last year, so they have to deal with the arrangements early.

All localities have prepared grain early, coupled with the control of grain, generally implementing quantitative distribution to prevent panic buying and hoarding, and to prevent grain merchants from taking advantage of the opportunity to stockpile and raise prices. In addition, the imperial court promoted work relief in various places to take advantage of the vacancy of people's power that has emerged after the disaster , So the people were organized to build some water conservancy facilities, build roads and bridges, repair the city, transform the underground canals in the city, and so on.

Although the people were affected by the disaster, they could still earn wages by going to work, and the wages were paid directly with food. The whole family went to battle to catch locusts, and they could get food back in exchange for more or less.

For the imperial court, it is still possible to save up for several years to deal with a catastrophe. After all, drought is actually much better than flood, and it is easier to deal with than plague.As long as there is food, he is not afraid of drought.Even if the drought is severe and the people have difficulty drinking water, people will walk, and they can even temporarily leave the place where water is scarce.

A major drought did not cause a major famine, nor did there appear to be any great refugees.

The people in all counties and counties stayed at home, and everyone had no fields to cultivate, but there were still government-organized projects to do, such as building roads, bridges, cities, embankments, dams and reservoirs, digging canals, dredging rivers, clearing ponds, and underground ditches, and even City renovation, new streets and more.

During this period, the grain in the warehouses of the imperial court became the strongest currency and the most stable guarantee for the people.

If it weren't for the dry and cracked fields, people would even mistakenly think that there was no disaster at all.

However, Jingxiang, south of the Han River, and Jiangdong and Jiangxi, south of the Yangtze River in Huainan, are different.

The severe drought that swept across the country did not escape the land of San Francisco. Lin Shihong, the largest lake in Jiangxi Province, Poyang Lake was originally vast, but now it has become a prairie.

Dongting Lake in Jingxiang also shrunk by two-thirds.

In the land of Jiangdong, nearly half of the rivers stopped flowing.

The worst thing was Xiao Xian's Nanliang, where a plague of locusts broke out.

In the land of Jingxiang, there are many lakes, and the drought has caused the Dongting Lake area to become a hotbed for locust outbreaks. When all parts of the Central Plains were busy digging locust eggs, catching jumping locusts, and catching migratory locusts, there was no movement in Nanliang.

Even in a somewhat stable environment, the internal struggles among the Nanliang monarchs and ministers became more and more intense.

The struggle between Xiao Xian and his commanding generals of the various counties became more and more intense.The generals of the various counties are all armed with heavy troops, and they don't pay much attention to the emperor Xiao Mian, so Xiao Mian is naturally dissatisfied.But at the beginning, except for the princes and generals like Dong Jingzhen and Zhang Xiu, he also relied on driving tigers and devouring wolves, and he himself did not have the real strength to suppress these generals.

So I used this to get rid of that, and immediately that was too big to lose, and it still couldn't change anything.

In the small imperial court of Nanliang, there are only a dozen or so counties left, but there are dozens of military towns, large and small. The large ones unified the two counties, and the small ones unified the two counties.

In this situation, there was no invasion from the Qin Dynasty, so the Nanliang monarchs and ministers were busy cutting and counter-cutting the vassals, and there were constant wars and small battles.

The army leaders are busy recruiting troops and buying horses to grab territory, how can they have time to rescue disasters and exterminate locusts.

Even the Great Qin court issued an imperial edict to Xiao Xian and others early on, reminding them to fight drought and eliminate locusts, so as to prevent catastrophe and famine.

But no one paid attention to it.

Now, the consequences are finally apparent.

In normal times, Nanliang's army chiefs, big and small, were busy consolidating their territory and recruiting troops. As a result, many young and strong men were in the army.Most of the grain grown by the common people has to be handed over, with very little left over.

This year, the counties in Nanliang had a summer harvest of less than two, and the vast majority of the people had no harvest.

But at this time, another plague of locusts broke out, and even the autumn seeds could not be helped.

The common people had no surplus grain savings, and the military leaders in the counties and counties faced this catastrophe, but they kept guarding the granary even more and refused to release grain.

The people were so hungry that there was nothing they could do, so they could only start to move.

In many places, hungry refugees have even attacked the manor houses of rich landlords and looted food.

In the next step, after all the landlords in the countryside have been robbed, they may attack the county town to rob the official storehouses of food.

Many refugees began to move north.

Their purpose is to cross the Han River and go to the border of Daqin to avoid disasters and ask for food.

Countless hungry people shouted the slogan of going north to vote for Qin, dragging their families and children, supporting the old and the young.

But at this time, whether it was Xiao Xian or the military leaders of the counties and counties, they did not pay attention to the disaster relief, but they all started to intercept the refugees and forbid them to go out of the border and cross the line.

For them, the people are also a resource, a precious resource, a source of soldiers, a farmer of food, and a manufacturer of ordnance. If the people are all gone, how can they maintain it?

As for the starvation of the people, they don't care.

Hankou.

On the Han River, a building boat is moored in the middle of the river.

On board, Mianyang prefect Zhang Zhenzhou of Nanliang and Jiangxia prefect Zhou Faming met with Anlu prefect Zhai Mohou.

"Duke Zhai, we all want to change our flag and join the Great Qin!"

But Zhai Mohou said, "The time has not come yet."

"But we can't take it anymore."

Zhang Zhenzhou and Zhou Faming sighed together, the disaster situation is getting worse and worse, now let alone disaster relief, they can't even get supplementary military rations.

The disaster victims in the county have now developed into thieves and have begun to attack the city and besiege the county. The situation is really out of control.

The two had flirted with Da Qin a long time ago, and even if Da Qin hadn't always disagreed with their surrender, they would have led their troops to surrender to Qin.

Now they once again proposed to change the banner and return to Qin.

But although Zhai Mohou has been in charge of contacting the two counties, he dare not agree.

"Since the saint made an appointment with the San Francisco at the beginning, and the princes of the counties of the San Francisco have been granted for several years, the well water has not violated the river water. If you join, this hard-won stability will be broken, and the war will start again."

"Duke Zhai, Xiao Xian has already betrayed his relatives. Even if we return to Qin, he will not dare to say anything. Even as long as we take the lead in returning to Qin, there will inevitably be many counties and counties that will return to Qin. At that time, as long as the saints join us With the edict, Xiao Xian can be summoned to Luoyang, and Nanliang will perish without attack."

"This is not the gain or loss of one city or one place. It is related to the whole chess game of Daqin. Although the three feudal clans often attack each other, they are attacking and defending together when facing Daqin. Once something happens in Nanliang, the other two feudal clans will inevitably affect it." , then it will be a global change.”

Zhang Zhenzhou said helplessly, "If Duke Zhai still refuses to accept our surrender, then we will have to lead our troops and bring the people to abandon their land and cross the river to surrender."

(End of this chapter)