The room goes through the late Ming Dynasty, and the back door leads to North America at the beginni

While the team of hungry people paused, their son Zhao Jian went to defecate again.

A few days ago, their family found some edible grass roots and bark in the wild. Zhao Jian ate a lot, and miscellaneous things accumulated in his stomach. He hadn't pooped for several days, and his stomach was swollen and round.

This time Zhao Jian didn't pull him out again, and the teenage boy couldn't help but cry anxiously.

His mother, Zhao Chen, wanted to help, but it was inconvenient because her son had grown up.

Zhao Zhenwen saw this and found a thin wooden stick to help.

After a while, Zhao Jian, who was squatting in the field, suddenly shouted: "Dad, it hurts!"

At the same time, a foul smell was released.

But it was Zhao Jian who finally pulled it out.

Zhao Zhenwen was also tired and sweating profusely. He subconsciously wanted to wipe his forehead with his hands. When he saw something stuck on his hands, he quickly stopped with a look of disgust on his face and prepared to wash his hands in the middle of the river.

At this time, a rumble of horse hooves came from far to near.

Those hungry people who still had some strength and energy immediately looked over nervously.

"It's not like horse bandits are coming, is it?"

"Everyone, hide now, or be caught and eaten by horse bandits!"

"Quickly, hide!"

These days, the life of horse bandits is also very uncertain. Some horse bandits cannot rob fat sheep for a long time, and sometimes they capture hungry people and use them as food.

Although they had heard about the horror of horse bandits, most of the hungry people were already so hungry that they had no ability to think and could not run away at all.

So he simply lay down by the cracked river and waited to die.

Some who wanted to escape or hide could not move quickly, but instead caused the hungry people to become chaotic.

Zhao Zhenwen threw away the wooden stick, pulled up Zhao Jian who didn't even have time to wipe his buttocks, and said: "Hurry up and join your mother and the others and find a place to hide!"

The father and son staggered to join three other family members in the chaotic group of hungry people, but it was too late to find a place to hide.

Because the cavalry team has already come.

However, the cavalry did not rush to kill or arrest anyone, but stopped aside.

The leading knight said loudly: "My Mr. Liu is giving out porridge to the hungry people outside Jiaoxi County. If you want to survive, go to Jiaoxi!"

After saying that, several knights opened the grain bags on their horses.

What was inside was dead-faced steamed buns the size of pigeon eggs.

These knights did not waste time to slowly divide them, but grabbed them by the handful and threw them away.

The originally numb hungry people suddenly became motivated and started grabbing the steamed buns.

Because there were only a hundred or so hungry people, and the area where the knights threw the steamed buns was large enough and numerous, no stampede occurred during the scramble.

It's just that a few people are so hungry that they lose their minds and stuff the steamed buns into their mouths, which could cause them to choke to death.

But there are only a handful of such people, and most of them can barely restrain themselves, nibbling on the steamed buns bit by bit and swallowing them with the water they carry with them.

Some hungry people who still had energy to grab the steamed buns did not forget to thank them.

"Thank you so much for your life, my benefactor!"

"Benefactor, please leave your name, and we will erect an immortal archway."

"Does my benefactor take slaves? I want to sell myself."

The leading knight ignored these people, left a message, "If you want to thank me, thank my master," and rode away with the team.

The ten knights slowed down after they were a little further away from the hungry people's team.

A young knight sighed: "The people of Dachu are so miserable. I don't know how many of the hungry people we greeted along the way can make it to Jiaoxi."

The captain of the reconnaissance cavalry said: "Our main task of going deep into the inland is to investigate the situation of the people in various prefectures and counties and the situation of the Chu army. If we encounter hungry people, we can only let them go to Jiaoxi."

"Whether they can reach Jiaoxi depends on whether they have that fate. As for how miserable they are, they are a little worse than the hungry people and refugees in the late Ming Dynasty."

This reconnaissance cavalry comes from the Royal Guards.

The captain of the reconnaissance cavalry was forty years old. He had experienced the troubled times of the late Ming Dynasty. He was still deeply impressed by the tragic scene of large-scale cannibalism during the great famine in the late Ming Dynasty and could not forget it. Thanks to the Supreme Emperor who led them to quickly bring peace to the world, the people were able to live and work in peace and contentment.

···
Zhao Zhenwen's family grabbed more than a dozen small steamed buns, and each of them ate one with Qing Shui.

It's summer now, and these dead-faced steamed buns are not too hard, but have a slight smell of horse hair and sweat.

But for the Zhao family, who have not eaten rice and noodles seriously for many days, it is already a rare "delicious food".

At least after eating, the five members of the family recovered somewhat.

Zhao Zhenwen looked at the direction in which the knights were leaving, remembered what the leading knight said, and made an immediate decision.

"We are not going to Gaomi anymore, we are going to Jiaoxi!"

Zhao Chen said in surprise: "Jiaoxi is further away than Gaomi."

Zhao Zhenwen said: "Those knights are not only our benefactors, but also good people. Since they said that there are people in Jiaoxi giving porridge, it must be true."

"If we go to Gaomi and there is no one to help us, we won't be able to enter the city, and we will still be dead. Only by going to Jiaoxi can we survive!"

Zhao Zhenwen made a decision and took his family to Jiaoxi.

Many hungry people had similar ideas, so they traveled together to increase each other's sense of security and avoid being robbed by small groups of thieves.

Although people like them have nothing, their flesh and blood will be coveted by jackals, humans and beasts.

Zhao Zhenwen and other hungry people came from cities in Qingzhou and were now in Laizhou, which was actually not too far from Gaomi and Jiaoxi.

With the death-faced steamed buns given by the knight and some other ingredients such as grass roots and bark to satisfy their hunger along the way, a group of people finally arrived outside Jiaoxi City two days later.

Relying on his status as a scholar, Zhao Zhenwen asked a few knowledgeable refugees to find out the situation in Jiaoxi.

Dachu extends from the southeast of Laizhou Prefecture to Jiaozhou, and governs the three counties of Jiaozhou, Jimo, and Jiaoxi, as well as Fushan and Lingshan.

Jiaoxi County is a small coastal county located on the west bank of Jiaozhou Bay.

The circumference of the city is only eight miles, and the wall height is less than two feet.

There is a severe drought in Shandong, and Laizhou naturally also suffers from drought, but the situation is milder than that in Qingzhou, but Jiaozhou is a place with severe drought in Laizhou Prefecture.

As a small coastal town, a large number of people in Jiaoxi are fishermen or make a living from seafood, so the impact of the drought is not that severe.

But there are also some refugees and hungry people (the hungry people are more serious than the refugees).

Yan Qing, the magistrate of Jiaoxi County, was greedy and incompetent. When refugees were born in the county, he not only did not try to provide relief or rescue, but instead added checkpoints in the county and raised taxes, especially the city gate tax.

According to news from the city, Yan Qing did this to prevent refugees and hungry people from flooding into the city.

Therefore, during this period of time, thousands of refugees and hungry people gathered outside Jiaoxi City.

Only three large households in Jiaoxi City were willing to give out porridge, but they only gave out porridge every few days, and each time they gave out not much.

This is already an act of kindness.

More large households not only had nothing to lose, but took the opportunity to sell grain at exorbitant prices outside the city, or to collect handsome boys, girls, and young men and women at prices far lower than the normal market price, preparing to sell them to the south to earn huge profits from human trafficking.

The victims who gathered outside Jiaoxi City were either separated from their wives or children, or starved to death. The situation was extremely miserable.

But three days ago, a good man named Liu Sheng came here. It is said that he was a maritime merchant.

After he came to Jiaoxi, he saw that there were many hungry people outside the city, so he sent people into the city to buy food for relief.

Although the price of food in the city is nearly ten times more expensive than usual, compared with the sky-high prices outside the city which are dozens of times higher, it is still considered cheap.

On the first day after entering the city, Liu Dashan sent people to buy thousands of stones of grain in one go without the attention of several grain merchants and major grain storage households in the city.

Then they began to distribute porridge outside the east, west and south gates of Jiaoxi.

Unlike those three big families who put out porridge every few days, they only put it out for an hour at a time.

Mr. Liu Dashan served porridge twice a day. As long as the victims registered with him, they would definitely receive a bowl of porridge every time.

When Zhao Zhenwen learned this, he was not only secretly surprised, but also thought to himself: There are probably more than 5,000 people outside Jiaoxi City now. Even if each person has two bowls of porridge per day, they will consume a lot of food in a day.

Mr. Liu has been providing relief for three or four days in a row. He is really a good man. (End of chapter)