. It's raining.
The cloud layer was a little green, and the sky seemed to be only half clear. The heavy rain rolled the yellow mud in the courtyard, beside the ruins, and between the streets and alleys into turbid currents. Immersed in the rain, there were still all kinds of clean-up sounds. A worker in a cloak pushed a cart and dragged a wooden basket. He was still removing the ruins and transporting away the earth and stones that needed to be discarded. Streets, lanes and courtyards are all like this.
In the courtyard that originally belonged to the Su family in Taiping Lane, many sheds had been erected at this time. In the rain, the water droplets leaking from the eaves formed a curtain, and a small figure ran for a short distance wearing or should say holding a hat. It was only after the rain curtain reached the rainless eaves that a small figure looked into a room holding a hat. It was a little girl of four or five years old with a wound on her head and a bandage.
It was only a few days after the earthquake, and the environment was not necessarily good everywhere. 1 The little girl was looking at the room where various objects were piled up in a mess. It's pretty good. She glanced timidly at the door, and the man inside saw her and waved to her.
"Uncle Uncle..."
The little girl screamed and entered the room. The man then checked the bandage on her head and tapped it with his hand: "Does it still hurt?"
"It hurts a bit..."
"Then count the interest in the room and don't run around."
"No one is in the room. It's so boring. What are uncles and uncles doing? Can Xiaorou help you?"
"This is very dangerous. You can't touch it yet. You have a wound on your head. I'll give you a candy. Sit by and watch."
The man called Uncle Uncle was naturally Ning Yi, and the little girl was the daughter of a banker of the Su family, named Chen Jirou. On the day of the earthquake, he was hit on the head and bleeds, but after checking the injury, it was not serious. It was really fatal. It's only been two or three days at this time, and it's already alive and kicking everywhere.
Although it was raining, because the shed was built solidly, there was no leakage of water inside, and the ground was dry. Several wooden baskets and sieves were placed on the ground in the room, large and small, and some were erected with benches. These containers are basically powders that have been mixed in rainy days, and the weather is humid at the beginning of autumn. These powders are not very dry. Ning Yi took some and placed them in a line on the ground next to them.
"Be careful and stay away."
After he finished speaking to the little girl, he picked up the fire stick and touched the "Peng" on it. The flames rose, and then turned into smoke and dispersed. 1 The little girl suddenly shuddered, and her body almost shrank beside her
A circle, but his eyes widened after blinking several times, trying to see the scene in front of him clearly.
Su Tan'er, who came in from the door, was also taken aback. In addition, Chan'er and Juan'er followed Chan'er curiously, and Juan'er adjusted her position behind Su Tan'er, as if trying to make herself rounder. Trying to form a line with his uncle and Miss 1, the ultimate goal is to prevent Ning Yi from seeing him.
"Xianggong is this... gunpowder?"
Su Tan'er frowned slightly and walked over, picked up Xiao Jirou and looked at the bandage on her head, but her eyes still stayed on Ning Yi's side. When she and Ning Yi got married, she would ask the wise man she knew about everything. It was because of her sense of responsibility. At this time, she didn't care much about what Ning Yi was going to do and what she did unexpectedly. It was Ning Yi who blew up the house, burned it down, and demolished it. As long as she saw that Ning Yi did it, she would not be angry, and she would probably study with her husband how to demolish it faster. But at this time, there was naturally still some curiosity and hesitation, after all, gunpowder seemed dangerous.
"Well, I made some while I was free. This thing is dangerous. I'll take it to the back later, let people watch it, and I can't touch the fire."
Ning Yi put the gunpowder into the small wooden barrels and hammered them tightly. Xiaochan squatted and watched, then went over to help: "It's the bucket that Xianggong ordered to drag from the Qian's house a few days ago."
"Added something." Ning Yi looked at Su Tan'er, and then smiled, "I'm planning ahead, I hope it won't be needed. If not, it's not really worth it."
Afterwards, several members of the family carefully packed the gunpowder into small buckets one by one, and then called someone to move them to a slightly remote room where things could be stored. Ning Yi put on a scorpion and went outside, Su Tan'er hugged the little girl, Chan'er Juan'er followed with an umbrella, and by the road outside the courtyard, Xing'er, who was mostly wet, was holding an umbrella in the rain. Instructing everyone in the family to move the things in the ruins, to throw away or to take in and put away, even Geng Huyuan and others listened to her instructions. It looked like a girl with a leadership temperament similar to Su Tan'er.
Seeing Ning Yi and others, she gathered up her wet hair and trotted over with her skirt in hand.
On the street at this time, there were also people from several other families in Taiping Alley, who pushed their carts or carried their frames and passed by in the rain. When they met Ning Yi, they respectfully called him Uncle Su, Uncle Ning, or Master Ning, Master Ning. , This is called ting chaos, but it can be regarded as a greeting.
After all, the reason for everything has to be attributed to the honesty that occurred on the night of the earthquake and in the next two or three days.
Ning Yi has no specific implementation experience for earthquake relief, but in later generations, he has been immersed in a lot of information, and he always understands many basic measures. He led the crowd to figure out what happened to his family, and then went to help other people in Taiping Lane.
At the beginning, it was naturally just a gang, but in such an emergency, many things naturally cannot be hidden. Ning Yi instructed everyone to dig and save people. When the ability of operations planning and commanding and controlling the overall situation was revealed little by little, others often obeyed his arrangements involuntarily, and then the whole scene operated very smoothly. After many people were rescued and several disasters caused by recklessness were avoided, everyone naturally remembered him.
This is not something that can be tricked by taking a slant of the sword, and it cannot be called very amazing. As soon as it comes out, it shines brightly. It was originally the temperament developed by the decision-making level for a long time. If it is an otaku who is present, even if he is given the position of leader, this person will inevitably be flustered and have no confidence, and issuing an order will also make people involuntarily distrust and feel that this person is unreliable. However, even if Ning Yi casually said an order "this should be done", others would involuntarily feel that "this person has a good mind" and very few people would question the kind of momentum Ning Yi showed in an emergency, so Makes the whole scene in order.
After all, this is a kind of self-confidence that a person who has been responsible for for a long time naturally develops. When he really grasps some basic points, the rest after he can make people obey the order will appear simple.
Then he moved things and rescued people, scolding the people who moved the ruins not to cause a second collapse, especially with the cooperation of others, the body under the ruins was moved away from Taiping Lane for burning at the first time. obstruction. This was even enforced by soldiers in other parts of the city, and almost a major conflict broke out.
Afterwards, several families in this lane were more or less influenced by the couple Ning Yi and Su Tan'er. To be honest, when Ning Yi joined the Su family, he was supposed to be called the uncle of the Su family, but some people knew his surname Ning, so they used the surname Ning as the name. The maids also did their best under such circumstances, but they were women, and it was natural for people who were not familiar with them to take the liberty to speak.
On the first day after the earthquake, Ning Yi asked people to bring enough grain from the Qian family to store it. By the way, he also asked the Qian family to get two barrels of gunpowder. Today was the third day of rain, and Ning Yi was free, and further processed the big gunpowder. At this time, black gunpowder was actually used in the military, but it was not the best in terms of xing performance. Ning Yi made certain changes to the ingredients of the black gunpowder, adding and subtracting. After all, there is no very fine processing environment at this time, but he can always increase the xing, and it is barely usable after that.
No matter how good pyrotechnic powder can be, compared to smokeless powder that requires chemical processes, it is not enough. Ning Yi's enthusiasm for gunpowder is actually due to his thinking, and he can simply use it for things like mines and bombs. In fact, sulfuric acid and other things have already been available these years. He has been fiddling around in Jiangning for more than a year. If he is there, he needs to get some smokeless gunpowder, or the prototype of smokeless gunpowder, nitrocellulose, etc. Yes, but the initial smokeless powder was really too dangerous, so he kept it on hold, and he was unwilling to hand over these crafts to others, otherwise a lot of people on Kang Xian's side would be waiting to be killed. And at this time in Hangzhou, if I just want to respond to an emergency, I can't do that much.
After all, it was difficult for the ancient economic system and social system to give Ning Yi a sufficient sense of security. The first thing to do is to stock up food for disasters, and gunpowder is also to prevent disasters. It does not mean that something is going to happen. In the past few days, the Hangzhou government has initially controlled the situation in the city, but various unpleasant things are still happening.
Because of the turmoil, some people in all corners of the world took risks, competed for property, and then various conflicts caused by the burning of corpses. Fangzheng on Taiping Lane had died in the earthquake, and Deputy Fangzheng had no backbone. In the past few days, he also asked Zi Ningyi to discuss repairing the surrounding wall near Taiping Lane and organizing youth patrols.
In the city, there have been several incidents of people on one street hitting people on another street, usually due to small disputes caused by individuals, or friction caused by people organizing to excavate the ruins, and then it quickly expanded. There are also beggars and thieves who have lost their homes, taking advantage of the night to search for money and things in the ruins.
Before the rain, it gave everyone a buffer for a day, but a considerable number of people in the city still did not have enough food and money to move out. Large households like the Qian family have sufficient staff, and the overall food reserves in Hangzhou will not suffer too much loss. However, due to the losses of small households, the price of food in the city has soared these days - even if there is a disaster , After the initial control, some people still took the opportunity to open a store and take the opportunity to raise prices to make huge profits.
After seeing the situation of his own house in the heavy rain, Fu Fangzheng came over and dragged Ning Yi to visit the families of some deceased people in the alley, and Ning Yi also followed.
At the end of the alley, a wealthy businessman's mother surnamed Tang was crushed to death by a collapsed house, but his son was rescued by Ning Yi later. At this time, he simply built a mourning hall, dressed in linen and filial piety, and pulled Ning Yi to express his thanks while crying. That Fufang was about to recommend him to be in charge, and then mentioned various connections with the government, and he couldn't help but talk about his status as a child. Dongzhu, the driver of the incident, had also returned, and was taking off his clothes, and then began to report what he saw and heard.
"I don't know why, although the rain is heavy, there seem to be more and more refugees from outside the city. The fallen city wall is already being repaired, and the military men of Wude Camp sealed the city. If it wasn't for the post from my uncle, I would I'm afraid they won't be able to get in. Those refugees can't get in, they are making trouble outside. Although the people in the yamen are also putting out food for disaster relief, the people in Chengli can't get enough to eat, and the refugees outside the city are about the same..." Let Dongzhu go out, mainly to observe the situation outside the city. Su Tan'er listened and sighed.
"There is a war going on in the west, and the refugees are all running here. When the earthquake hits, all the people who are affected by the earthquake will come here."
Ning Yi thought for a moment, then smiled: "We were in Jiangning before, and there was a little misfortune, and the people nearby also gathered in the city, right?" , after all, he didn't know what the situation in the past was like. Su Tan'er glanced at him, thought for a while before nodding: "Yes, in fact, there is always more in the city than in the countryside, and the government is in charge. In order to reduce the number of people who starve to death, they always have to put food... Xianggong is here. What are you thinking?"
"The rice is about to ripen. It will take a month and a half at most, and this season's rice will be cut. Earthquakes are big things to say, but except for people who were crushed to death after their houses collapsed, the rest can always be Find some surplus food to survive this time, how come so much all of a sudden..."
"Xianggong thinks there is a problem?" Xing'er over there also widened her eyes: "Fang, Fang La? What does the uncle mean?" Ning Yi smiled and shook his head: "No, I should have thought too much. The refugees who came from the west were originally It's just too much, we've only been here for two months, and we don't know how many refugees there will be in the past. It's not very responsible to say too much without reference. I think so now, but it may be because we are not locals, so No matter how you think about it, it's just sensitive. There is no shortage of powerful people here in Hangzhou, so there should be consideration and prevention for these things. But... It's a pity that the river has collapsed, otherwise I'd rather get a boat and return in a few days. Jiang Ning, anyway, I was prepared to go from the beginning. Now if I want to go by land, it is not necessary when the refugees are scattered. By the way, is there something going on in the city?" Dongzhu thought for a while: "Oh, the Qian family, Mu There are several others in the family that started selling grain this morning, and the price is three times as much as before, but it's much cheaper than others. Besides, it has been raining for a few days, and I have to dig a lot. The matter of burning the corpse is not as urgent as a few days ago. This morning, this person in the north of the city fought with the soldier who was dragging the corpse. Yay…”
Ning Yi frowned, the big landlords would start to level the grain prices, which is to be expected, although most people regard businessmen or landlords as heinous, but such a chaotic Hangzhou city is not in their interests at all. The best way is naturally to carry out a new round of mergers and embezzlement during the whole recovery process. However, the matter of the corpse is "it's raining so much, it shouldn't matter if it's buried later." Su Tan'er Thinking about it, she smiled. Although she also knew the need to burn corpses, as a person in this era, there is always a certain rejection of burning people directly after death. Relatively speaking, this heavy rain gave everyone a good idea. chance of buffering. However, seeing Ning Yi frowning, she asked in a low voice, "Xiang Gong?"
Ning Yi smiled and said nothing.
That night, the heavy rain seemed to have a tendency to weaken. The couple stood by the window of the shed and looked out. There were candles in the room. Passed by, or came the sound of trivial conversations. She was also tired all day. After taking a bath, she put on a single shirt and held Ning Yi's hand: "What is Xianggong thinking?"
"If the rain stops tomorrow, I want to go to the city gate to see what it looks like outside. Dongzhu said there are many people, but I don't know how many people there are."
Su Tan'er put her chin on his shoulder: "Do we still think it's dangerous here when we go to Xianggong together?"
"I can't talk about it." Ning Yi took her by the shoulders, "I would think that if I were Fang La, I would take the opportunity to attack Hangzhou's idea. But the strength and deployment of the Wude Camp, the Hangzhou government's control over this side, and even Fang La's I don't know the situation over there at all, and I have no basis for saying this. Intellectually, the command, speed, and strength of the peasant army must be problematic. Those people are not scumbags. They were able to block Fang La in the past, and they will definitely be more vigilant now, so from this point of view, I am more inclined to go to Hangzhou to see if there is nothing wrong... Take a step back, if Fang La really Prepare to take it here, the reaction should not be so fast..."
Su Tan'er nodded. She was in a lazy mood at this time, and she didn't want to think too much about Ning Yi's side. Then she heard Ning Yi say: "It's a corpse, it's a problem."
"What?"
"If I were Lu Tuizhi, I would arrest someone today and kill a group of people. It was announced to the public that this group of people colluded with Fang La, deliberately left dead bodies, stirred up conflicts, and plotted to seize the city during the chaos. This matter After the announcement, everyone in the city will no longer have any objection to the disposal of the corpse, and there will be less trouble in the future..."
"But there will be chaos in the city..."
"If there is no chaos, no one believes that Fang La will not attack Hangzhou. With the power of this murder, he can justifiably strengthen the control inside and outside Hangzhou, and prepare for war. In this kind of chaos, the situation in the city can be faster. Control it, and secondly, prevent it from happening before it happens, and eliminate the possibility of real turmoil. In this situation, a high degree of centralization and resolute action are the best policies.”
He then laughed again: "Of course, if you really want to do this, the prefect will encounter a lot of trouble, and the officialdom is intrigued. This extreme method of constricting power will definitely encounter great resistance. I just think about it. .
The wife gave a "hmm", and then said softly: "It's Xiaochan's business, which has been postponed again, and the poetry meeting. Xiang Gong clearly wrote such a good poem, and the earthquake shook in a blink of an eye... "
For this, this wife who loves her husband's reputation as a talented man has always been a little bit worried.
…, …, …, …, …, …,
It was also at night, on the other side of the city, there were people looking at this rain screen in the dark. There was light on the other side of the rain screen. Among the ruins, there was a hastily built mourning hall thatched hut, but half of the mourning hall had collapsed.
There were two people talking.
"It looks like the heavy rain is about to stop. When the rain stops tomorrow, the Hangzhou government will no longer be able to ignore those corpses that haven't been dug up... Haha, I'm afraid the smell will come out by then..."
"If it had been hot, the bodies would have been dug up at this time, but the heavy rain has helped me to wait. It's just a matter of luck, but they won't stop tomorrow. next day."
"That's just right, we'll be more prepared. One more day later, the people like Buddha Shuai, Xin Xingzong, Liu Dabiao should also come. Stone chisel, you seem to have said something before, God does not take it, and you are to blame, right? Is that what you're talking about? Haha, as I see it, this Hangzhou should be given to us by God... But unfortunately, it's been shaken like this..."
"Heaven doesn't take it, but it's to blame: when it doesn't work, it suffers from it. We were about to go this way, and it made an earthquake. It's probably God's will...
Once they are here, Brother Shisang and Brother Daoan will respond everywhere, and the matter of the southeast should be settled. "
"Haha, you're always well-crafted. I said stone-cutting. You are so knowledgeable. Why did you always cut stones in the mountains before? You might as well be a teacher when you come out."
"I can't do it, I'm floating on the sea, I'd rather hide in the mountains and chisel my rocks than come out and teach a bunch of boys to read their books..."
"I'm knowledgeable, but I don't understand. But it doesn't matter, I'm Shi Bao, I'm a rude person, I'll do whatever you say, and I'll kill whoever you say. Haha, as you said, the Southeast is set, Saint The prince will be the emperor, let him give you the equivalent, and I will be a general. When I go to the brothel, I don’t want to go to the brothel. I heard that there are many beautiful girls in Hangzhou, and I hope they will all survive. Don't bully them, I'll give you money, hahahaha..."
The laughter drifted away a little arrogantly, and the shadow standing in front of the window looked at the rain curtain for a while, and then laughed: "Oh, if it wasn't for making money from cutting rocks than teaching, who the hell would cut rocks. Good question. "He sighed and cast his eyes farther, shaking like a babble in the rain.
"I've been waiting for this day..."
…, …, …, …, …, …,
The next day, it was still raining, just a little less. After breakfast, Ning Yi, Su Tan'er, and Chan'er still drove the carriage, left Taiping Lane, and walked towards the city gate, ready to see the situation outside the city at this time...! .