C85

After walking along the river for half a day, Zhuang Li felt as if all her internal organs had changed places. Even though she was still sweating profusely on the carriage, it was only until noon that she finally stopped to eat under the shade of a tree.

The water here was already turbid and could not be directly drunk. Furthermore, the water that was brought out had already been completely drunk, so Yun Duan went to a relatively distant mountain and found a spring that was still considered clear. He filled a water bag to the brim and brought it back. A fire was built, and a pot was set to boil before it was given to the Emperor.

The weather was getting hotter, and the bumps on the carriage made people not have much of an appetite. Zhuang Li and Wang Su did not eat much, but they both had a lot of things on their minds, and Yun Duan just seemed to be the same.

This time around, the road became more difficult to walk and it was full of potholes. They had lost count of how many puddles they had made on the road, and it was only after the moon had reached the top of the trees that they finally saw a small village in front of them with a shabby lantern hanging at the entrance.

The river wind continued to blow, and after being blown past a few gusts of cold wind, Zhuang Li could already feel the waves of the chilly wind invading her body, waiting for the horse carriage to steady itself, before following Yun Duan out of the carriage in a sorry state.

Yun Duan found a family that had an owner only a few days ago who had suffered from the flood. Although the water had already retreated, the house was not too damaged. The family was composed of two old people. The old man had been a fisherman all his life and the old lady had a leg disease. Now he could only sit on the bed.

The old man lit up a little oil lamp. The light was dim, and because Yun Duan had been sitting and driving the horse outside the carriage, he was naturally splashed all over his face by the mud and water on the ground. Then, he used his sleeves to wipe his face.

Zhuang Li couldn't help but want to laugh.

Yun Duan gave the rest of the steamed buns in their bags to them for them to cook and eat together. The old granny's legs were inconvenient, the old granny was old, Zhuang Li received them, and also received some wild vegetables from the old granny, sitting on the table and starting to clean them.

When Yun Duan saw that there were still some time before the meal, he quickly asked the old man where there was water.

"There is a well at the entrance of the village. A few days ago, there was a hole in the well, and it was flooded by a lot of mud, but now it is clear, this well is magical, every year, no matter how big the flood is, it will clear up after a few days after the flood. This river is connected to several fishing villages, and they also have wells, so it is more convenient to get water from the village." "It's good to have water as soon as possible after the flood, but they can use the wells they've dug, but they won't be able to dry them if they encounter a flood. It's different in our village when the river becomes clear, because a day after the flood, the water in the well can already be drunk …"

What seemed to be a miracle to this old man seemed simple to Zhuang Li. The well at the entrance of the village was for drawing water from this water system, so whether the river water was turbid or not did not affect it. The other villages that the water source came from had the same origin as the river, so naturally it also turbid along with the river water.

When Yun Duan heard this, he immediately grabbed two buckets of water and went to the village entrance to fetch some water. Not long after, he filled two buckets full of water, one for Zhuang Li and the other for the horse outside to brush.

"The flood came earlier than in the past, and a few villagers who were fishing in the river were moved away and moved to the higher mountains to deal with it temporarily. It's a pity that the two of us are old and have no children, and the old woman's legs are not convenient for us to carry. She doesn't want to trouble others to carry us up, not to mention the mountain is cold and wet.

The old granny's meaning was the same as ours. If she were to die, it would be best if she died at home.

"So we stayed, and when the flood came, I took the old woman to the tallest loft in the village, but I didn't expect to survive."

The arrival of the flood was too sudden, to be able to hold onto his life while thanking the heavens, he didn't even manage to preserve the salt and oil, thus Zhuang Li could only add some water to the wok and cook it.

That type of food that didn't even have salt and oil made Zhuang Li sick. She felt like she was a horse outside, the steamed bun was actually much more delicious, and she steamed it inside a pot to steam it. After Zhuang Li ate one, she thought that there wasn't much left, after all, and the remaining tomorrow would allow the old man and woman to deal with him for one more round, so she stopped eating and drank a few mouthfuls of the slightly bitter wild vegetable soup. She was already full. Then Wang Su and Yun Duan did not eat much. It was unknown if they were thinking the same thing as Zhuang Li.

When the flood came, they had already soaked the quilt and other things in the water. The old uncle and the old lady stayed in the village and after the flood came, they pulled up the quilts from the water. They were all mud, and this time, the quilts were piled at the door. Fortunately, there were still a lot of dry clothes on the pavilion. The uncle moved them down and placed them on the aunt, allowing them to pass the night by the river.

After all, Zhuang Li and the others were young, they could still barely endure it. It was still a little cold to unload all the clothes in the carriage and put them on.

The flood had come and gone quickly but the uncle's two rooms had not fallen down yet. Zhuang Li and his aunt slept together while her uncle, Wang Su and Yun Duan slept in the other room. Although the straw on the bed had been left in the sun by the uncle during the day, it was still a little wet. The aunt lay on the bed and couldn't move. After all, she wasn't as old as she used to be.

Zhuang Li then took off the clothes on his body and covered the aunt's body, but there did not seem to be any use in having a cup of water and a cart of firewood. At night, when Zhuang Li was extremely cold, she curled up on the corner of the bed and trembled. She could vaguely see a little fire outside the window. She then got off the bed and walked out.

It was Wang Su.

He built a small fire at the edge of the yard, and when the flood came, the firewood was soaked. It was not easy to light it up, so he could only light a small fire first before slowly drying the wet firewood. Although it was just a very small and weak fire right now, it felt as warm as hope when she saw it. She quickly moved a chair over and sat down beside it, imitating Wang Su's actions of roasting firewood.

Those tree branches released a slight heat from the fire, and when the white steam rose, their bodies finally felt a little warm.

Zhuang Li looked at Wang Su who still had a serious expression and asked.

"Your Majesty, what do you intend to do with such a small fishing village? They couldn't go up or down where they were. They relied on self-sufficiency every day. Does the county really remember them? "

"I can only send another trusted messenger. He specifically urged them to do so. This was just where the flood had started. There were still dozens of counties at the back, and they were all along the river. "Regardless of whether or not I can take care of him, I must …"

In this era, if there was a flood, many people would die. The green bricks used for construction were not strong, and they could not afford to soak in the flood. To them, a single flood was equivalent to encountering a tsunami. It was impossible to find their corpses. Basically, it was as if his family had been destroyed and he had lost all of his family members …

Without good water conservancy and rational planning and utilization of the river's resources, compared to the modern era, the people here simply didn't have the ability to fight against nature …

Above his head was still a crescent moon. When he reached the fifteenth year, the moon would be at its most round. But this mid-autumn period, how could those people who had lost their families in the flood spend it?

When she opened her eyes, the sun had already risen and the bonfire had just extinguished. There was still smoke rising from it and Wang Su's clothes were draped over his body, but she suddenly felt a little warmth in her heart. When Zhuang Li entered the room, only the old lady was still lying on the bed.

"You guys came too late yesterday, so we can't let you go, our village doesn't have any dried food, and you guys still need to hurry, in the morning, the Young Master Wang will already have to go. We can't let you guys eat the vegetables that aren't as hungry, so the old man took Brother Yun and went to the river to fish."

"The river... Isn't the water in the river still murky? "

"Miss, don't worry. This old man has been fishing for a lifetime, and he knows every rock in the river well. Although this river is different all year round, the fish are still here, but in different places. She laughed out loud.

Zhuang Li hurried over to help her, and then carried her to a rattan chair by the door. She was very light, so light that it made Zhuang Li feel sad, and her clothes were not too clean either. Last night, she heard her mention that her child had suddenly disappeared when he was young, and she didn't know if he had fallen into the river or not. They searched for a long time, but to no avail. The two of them had been supporting each other until today.

After Zhuang Li heard this, she felt as if something had moved her heart. If a person died, he would not be able to keep them back, but if he disappeared for no reason, it would make people sad.

You don't even know if he is or isn't. That kind of torture could almost make a person collapse.

Perhaps his mother was suffering in this state as well. Where had his daughter gone to? Or dead?

She went to the room that was flooded and messy by the flood and found a wooden bucket and a washboard and a club. After that, she went to the well at the entrance of the village to get some water, she first filled up the water vat in the room, then filled the wooden bucket in the courtyard with water. Only then did she hang a pile of wet quilts on the fence to wait for the sun to rise, before being soaked in the water.