Yuan Shao, the father of Fanghua in the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 540
The continuous wars drove away the hot summer, and the autumn of the second year of Jian'an came quietly.

The autumn wind blew, and Yuan Xi, who was wearing thin linen clothes, felt a bit of coolness. What made him feel even more sad was that his heart seemed to gradually become colder with each cruel battle.

Half a year has passed since Yuan Shu established himself on his own, to the emperor issued an edict to attack him, and then to the overt and covert fights between the various princes. Recently, they have reluctantly pointed their finger at Yuan Shu and encroached on the Jianghuai area.

During this period, the number of large and small battles that broke out in Yanzhou, Xuzhou, Yuzhou, and Yangzhou areas was at least hundreds.

Along with this, frequent wars broke out in the four prefectures, people were displaced, and dead people were everywhere on the roadside. The stench spread with the autumn wind, making people sick to smell it.

The crows in the sky are circling around and delaying landing. This is because they have too many choices and are too full to eat, so they are picky about where to land.

In later generations, the population dropped sharply at the end of the Han Dynasty, from 6000 to [-] million people to less than [-] million. The most direct reason was naturally the war.

In fact, in places affected by the war, not many people died directly in the battle, but the famine and disease that followed became the last straw for them.

Yuan Xijun walked silently on the road littered with corpses. The soldiers covered their mouths and noses and carefully walked around the corpses on the ground. At this time, no one would bother to move the corpses away. After all, the unknown disease was too scary.

Yuan Xi sat on the horse and silently looked at the situation in front of him. He was also guilty of the current tragic situation.

These people did not die from his soldiers, but died from defeated bandits while fleeing.

These were soldiers who lost their generals after losing the battle, as well as gangsters who wanted to fish in troubled waters. They gathered together for reasons such as robbing food and formed soldiers and bandits.

Life and death in warring areas are uncertain. The first reaction of the people without land and property is of course to flee. However, because the rich people cannot take away their property, they will recruit refugees to protect the farm property. These bandits cannot attack the farms equipped with weapons and private armies. Then he turned around and attacked the fleeing refugees.

These refugees often have nothing but a little dry food. When encountering bandits, they can only give up everything they have to save their lives. Unless the resistance is fierce, these bandits will kill people. As for other people, the bandits are too lazy to care and let them go. To fend for itself.

So these common people, who were robbed of their clothes and food, fell humbly and died on the road while being hungry and cold, turning into dust and mud, and no one cared about them anymore.

Yuan Xi knew that if he hadn't come, all this might not have happened.

Although he firmly believed that what he was doing was right, he had to admit that there were not many essential differences between himself and Cao Cao.

Both of them wanted to end the troubled times in their own way, but Cao Cao's methods were more drastic. Although Yuan Xi felt that fewer people would die on his own path than Cao Cao, but even so, the number of people who lost their lives was a number that could not be ignored.

Yuan Xi doesn't know how many people will die because of him when the world is peaceful in the future, 100 million? 200 million, 500 million, or 1000 million?

But it’s impossible that more people died because of his intervention?

Accompanying this self-doubt is Lu Lingqi's change.

He glanced sideways at Lu Lingqi, who was on the horse next to him. She was no longer as high-spirited as when she left Huaicheng a year ago, but had a trace of weariness, a trace of weariness, and even a trace of vicissitudes of life on her face.

A month ago, after Lu Lingqi finished shooting three arrows and slashed seven or eight enemy soldiers to death with her halberds, she slowly turned to Yuan Xi's blood-spattered face and said something.

"I'm tired."

Yuan Xi supported her body that was about to fall and said softly: "Then take a good rest."

Lu Lingqi didn't leave the camp for several days after that. When she came out again, Yuan Xi found that she had changed a lot.

She is still the same person, her appearance is still the same, her movement habits have not changed, and her speech seems to be much more cheerful, but Yuan Xi keenly discovered that when she talks on weekdays, there will be a trace of deep depression in her eyes inadvertently.

Yuan Xi seemed to have only seen this kind of twilight aura on the faces of people who had experienced battles such as Ju Shou.

Yuan Xi suddenly realized that by the standards of future generations, Lu Lingqi was still just a child.

A trace of guilt arose in his heart. After fighting so many battles, even an adult military commander would accumulate anger over time and need to vent it out in time.

As for a girl of Lu Lingqi's age, he should not have exposed her to bloody killings so frequently.

So Yuan Xi forced Lu Lingqi to stay with him and stop participating in the war for the time being. Lu Lingqi agreed. Maybe she could see that if she didn't slow down for a while, she might really have a mental breakdown.

But Yuan Xi also discovered that his mental endurance was much higher than he expected.

Maybe in my heart, I still regard this journey to conquer the world as a dream?

Or maybe in his heart, he doesn't actually care at all and treats it as a game?
Yuan Xi looked at Wancheng in the distance and thought that after this battle, he didn't know how many more people would die. After Wancheng was captured, all he could do was to send troops and horses to sweep away the bandits as soon as possible so that the displaced people could return to their homes again. Return to home life.The cavalry and infantry troops arrived at a place seven or eight miles away from Wancheng, and began to set up camp, assemble siege equipment, and send letters to the city, urging them to leave the city and surrender. However, [-]% of the time the opponent would not open the city and surrender without resistance.

So what Yuan Xi has to do is to show him enough strength.

Taishi Ci led hundreds of cavalry roaring out, patrolling in all directions of Wancheng, cleaning up the spies sent from the city. Soon there were screams, and several spies were either shot to death or captured, and the remaining The people fled back to Wancheng on horseback.

The camp was built on the shore of the Wan River. To the north of the Wan River, a fleet came from the north, blocking Wancheng's escape route from the Wan River.

Now Lu Xunzhan is in charge of this fleet, relying on Yuan Xi's navy to block all the hundreds of miles of Anhui River. At the same time, he intercepted all the ships from Wancheng and detained them near the dock in the north.

When Lu Xun's navy attacked Xunyang, they entered the Wanshui River from the Jiangkou branch, and then quickly headed northward, intercepting many ships escaping from Wancheng.

After all, those who escaped on boats were the real rich. Yuan Xi spent a lot of money and food in the battle, and he was thinking about how to regain his health. The goods in these boats could just allow him to make up for some of his losses.

Among the hundreds of ships gathered at the dock now, there is a small building ship, but it is fully equipped and even has a few rooms. Da Qiao used the savings of the Qiao Mansion and asked his servants to find craftsmen to secretly renovate it. It can accommodate seven or eight people and a lot of food.

This ship played a great role in their escape from Wancheng and headed north, but it only lasted one day.

The sisters' boat sailed on the Wanshui River for a day, and after traveling dozens of miles, they encountered Lu Xun's naval force blocking the Wanshui River, and were detained as expected.

The sisters' boat, along with dozens of other boats, were herded back like sheep and detained at the dock. No one was allowed to get off the boat for a while, waiting to be dealt with.

Xiao Qiao lay stretched out on the bed. Even so, it did not affect the dangerous scenery of the mountains. She rolled on the boat and complained, "It's been three days and I still can't get off the boat!"

"Sister, what do you think will happen to us?"

"I've thought about it, women can do anything, women can't do anything!"

"Lie down, it doesn't matter what comes!"

Da Qiao sat in front of the window, turned his head and wanted to say something to Xiao Qiao, but finally turned his head silently.

Suddenly there were several loud noises in the distance, which scared Xiao Qiao and jumped up from the bed, saying in panic: "What's going on? What's going on?"

Da Qiao stood up, looked out the window, and saw black smoke billowing in the sky in the direction of Wancheng, and said: "There is a fight in Wancheng."

Xiao Qiao wondered: "What is this loud noise? It's like thunder!"

Da Qiao shook his head, "Who knows, I hope fewer people will die in the city."

She looked at Xiao Qiao's ignorant and carefree expression, and thought to herself that her sister probably didn't understand how dangerous the situation was now, right?
She had helped Qiao Rui handle official documents before, but she could tell from this that the miserable situation of the women's family members of the defeated side was miserable.

When the city is breached, the fate of the women's families is mostly worse than death. If they are lucky, they will be taken back by the enemy generals as maids and concubines, or even marry a soldier, which is considered a good destination.

The most terrifying thing is that there are many people who were kidnapped by the rebels and their whereabouts are unknown, or they died tragically in the streets, with their clothes and even their bodies mutilated.

During the war, both the nobles and the common people were treated almost equally. Because of long-standing grievances, the women of the nobles were privately tortured and killed, especially those of the common people.

Da Qiao shuddered every time he thought of the horrific descriptions in the letters.

Now she has judged that those who attacked Wancheng were the fierce soldiers of the Yuan family. If Sun Ce came to attack Wancheng, Da Qiao thought that he could still rely on the friendship between the two families to keep himself and Xiao Qiao safe, but It wouldn't be possible if it were this vicious person with a particularly bad reputation!

Da Qiao also asked Qiao Rui about Xiu Hu's personality. Qiao Rui was drunk at the time and just smiled bitterly without saying anything. This made Da Qiao feel even more uneasy. She remembered the Xiu Hu she talked about with Mrs. Liu. Hearing the rumors, he couldn't help but turn pale, and looked back at Xiao Qiao, as if he had made up his mind.

Yuan Xi stood near Wancheng. Unexpectedly and unexpectedly, the defenders at the head of the city were in chaos. Yuan Xi's soldiers took the opportunity to attack the city gate fiercely. The navy troops on the Wancheng River also began to attack the water gate of Wancheng.

The reason for this is that the second batch of gunpowder transported by Youzhou arrived.

The amount this time was not large. After Yuan Xi thought about it, he decided not to make a bamboo tube. That kind of thing is not very lethal and its power is greatly weakened a few steps away. Apart from the sound, it does not deter the enemy.

That day, he used the explosive bamboo tube for the first time in front of Cao Jun. The opponent immediately found a way to deal with it. As long as he took a few steps away and covered his body with a shield, he would hardly be injured.

So Yuan Xi decided that instead of spreading out, it would be better to have a big one.

(End of this chapter)