Chapter 15 Chapter 15 Accomplice
"Lin Shu! Why are you giving out porridge again?"
Sui Qing was in a panic. She was still worried about the nightmare of the porridge distribution at Baiwang Mountain.
"I'm so bored." Chu Xian held the heavy iron spoon tightly and stirred the thick millet and vegetable porridge with great effort.
"Lin Shu, the porridge stalls arranged by the court will start distributing porridge in two days. Why should we join in the fun?"
Chu Xian smiled before she spoke, and handed the spoon to Sui Qing: "I'm not a good person, just wait and see, I won't suffer any loss."
But we can’t just give out vegetable porridge and steamed buns. What will we do if we run into an ungrateful person later?”
Sui Qing was so anxious that her face turned red: "Lin Shu..." Sui Qing was frightened by the girl's eyes and dared not to persuade her anymore.
"Oh, Lin Shu, how can you give out porridge so extravagantly? Porridge, steamed buns, and eggs! I feel like I'm starving."
Su Peisheng stared at the boiled eggs sticking out of the iron pot with a smile, and asked quietly, "Does the young lady of the master family know about this?"
"As the manager, I can handle this little thing. Otherwise, why do you think Bao Sanchun dared to distribute porridge? Su Sheng, come and lend a hand. Let's go distribute the porridge."
Su Peisheng turned around and looked at the Fourth Master who was sitting in the rocking chair. Seeing that his master nodded in agreement, he followed Lin Shu to distribute porridge.
At dusk, Su Peisheng returned to the west wing with a strange look on his face.
"Master, this girl Lin Shu is very strange, very evil, and very cold-hearted. I have never seen such a mean-spirited and evil servant in my life."
"What a wicked slave! Fortunately, she is only a lowly servant, otherwise who knows what kind of trouble she would have caused."
"Why?" Yinzhen was surprised. Su Peisheng had a gentle personality and was usually friendly to everyone. There had never been anyone who could make him lose his temper and curse.
"Master, you don't know that Lin Shu wasn't there to provide disaster relief or porridge. She...she was there to take advantage of the situation, using low wages to persuade the disaster victims to reclaim the wasteland on the Nara family's farm."
"She's making a killing."
"She takes advantage of me and doesn't do anything..." Su Peisheng was so angry that his breath got stuck in his chest. He slapped his chest to relieve the breath, but he heard the Fourth Master chuckling.
"Oh."
"Master..." Su Peisheng looked at the Fourth Master in confusion.
"Not bad." Yinzhen smiled in appreciation. Lin Shu was very smart and knew how to use work as relief.
At her reminder, Yinzhen's eyes lit up, a plan came to his mind, and he immediately wrote a memorial.
"Su Peisheng, have this memorial delivered to Yuqing Palace, and secretly order the Ministry of Works to cooperate with the Ministry of Revenue in disaster relief efforts."
Su Peisheng took a quick glance at the memorial with wet ink and saw that the Fourth Master was requesting the Crown Prince to arrange for the Ministry of Works to recruit hungry people to clear the silt in the canal, using work as relief to alleviate the urgent shortage of disaster relief food.
"Sir, Lin Shu is not as kind-hearted as you. She...she is just messing around. She is picking and choosing among the disaster victims, and only exploiting young and beautiful women. I don't know what dirty thoughts she has."
"Go and have a look."
Yinzhen was furious, recalling the horrifying rumors he had heard that Nara loved to kill slaves, especially those with good looks.
Lin Shuding followed Nara's order to select beautiful victims for Nara to kill.
If this is true, Lin Shu and Sui Qing are unforgivable and must be put to death.
When the master and servant arrived at the gate of Tanzhe Temple, they could hear sharp and harsh insults and quarrels from afar.
"You little bitch, which brothel are you from? You dare to challenge me, I will tear your mouth apart today!"
"What do you care who I am? If you don't get out of here today, you'll be buried here. Sui Qing, hit me!"
"Ouch, murder!"
Su Peisheng hurriedly helped the Fourth Master to the crowd, but saw Lin Shu and Sui Qing wrestling with several heavily made-up old women who looked like brothels, pulling each other's hair.
It was really pulling. Didn't you see that the seemingly gentle Lin Shu could violently pull out a large lock of hair, and the madam was wailing in pain.
It was even more shocking when he turned his face, as it was covered with shocking blood marks from fingernails.
Looking at Lin Shu, he was not much better, with disheveled hair and a mad woman, and his sleeve was torn.
Sui Qing was like a female tiger. She kicked the burly and strong Gui Nuer to the ground in a few kicks and stepped on the Gui Nuer's forehead. The Gui Nuer's head was immediately broken and bleeding, and the blood was all over his face.
"Listen up! Tanzhe Temple is a pure Buddhist place. It has no place for evil people. Anyone who dares to come here to buy a prostitute will end up like this!"
After a few strange and crisp crackling sounds, everyone screamed in fright.
But the old procuress's legs were broken alive, and the broken bones pierced through her red silk pants, stabbing towards everyone with her pale face.
Chu Xian panted as she smoothed her messy hair. When she raised her eyes, she saw Chi Zheng standing quietly in the setting sun with dust flying everywhere. He was holding down a howling turtle slave with his crutch.
Chu Xian smiled, and nodded slightly towards Chi Zheng across the crowd of refugees: "Thank you."
The martial monks who came to Tanzhe Temple to maintain order arrived late.
Chu Xian kicked the wailing old procuress hard, suddenly pulled out Sui Qing's sword, and stabbed a tall and strong refugee around the neck with the sword.
"Get out of here!"
She glared at the slaves and old women who were among the disaster victims, trying to trick them into selling their wives and daughters: "And you, and the old hag sitting on the stone bench! Get out!"
After cleaning up the pimps and brothels who had forced women of good families into prostitution, Chu Xian walked with her hands on her hips toward the refugees huddled in the corridor.
"Everyone, I only give porridge to women under 30 years old. Do you understand? There are many dignitaries and nobles who give out porridge on the official road at the foot of Tanzhe Mountain. You can go to other porridge stalls to queue up."
"Girl, please be kind. My grandson has been hungry for two days. Woo woo woo..." An old woman hugged her frail grandson and begged bitterly.
The porridge provided by the porridge stalls at the foot of the mountain was so thin that there were hardly any rice grains in it, and the porridge was occupied by tall and strong male disaster victims, so they had no chance to get any.
She would rather wait in front of the gate of Tanzhe Temple. If she cried more miserably, there would even be a little monk who would give her some vegetarian food.
Chu Xian's gaze fell coldly on the skinny five or six-year-old girl lying on the ground behind the old woman.
"Is that your granddaughter?"
The old woman turned her head to take a look and nodded repeatedly: "Yes, yes, you only need to give me one portion. My granddaughter is not hungry."
"Oh." Chu Xian turned around and brought half a bowl of thick rice porridge. She walked up to the little girl and helped the ragged little girl up.
"Girl, my granddaughter is not hungry. She just ate..." The old woman reached out to grab the bowl anxiously.
"Get out of the way!" Sui Qing stood in front of the old woman with a ferocious look.
The little girl stared at the steaming rice porridge, licked her cracked lips, and said weakly: "I'm not hungry... I'm not hungry. Give it to my brother."
"If you're not hungry, I'll give it to someone else."
Although the little boy was weak, his face was still rosy. On the contrary, the little girl was so weak that she was covered in cold sweats and her life was hanging by a thread.
"Ah...I'll eat. I'll eat."
The little fellow held the bowl tightly with trembling hands, gulped down the rice porridge in three or two mouthfuls, and licked the bottom of the bowl before he was willing to let go.
"Where's your mother? Call her over to eat some steamed buns."
"My mother... was sold. Dad said she was going to eat meat and didn't have to starve to death with us."
Chu Xian clenched the egg in her hand and choked for a moment. She peeled the egg and stuffed it into the girl's mouth. After watching her swallow it, she tore off half of the steamed bun and handed it to the little girl.
"This steamed bun is for you. Tomorrow I will bring you porridge and eggs. My porridge and rice are only for you. Remember that."
"Thank you, sister, for saving my life." The little girl clenched the steamed bun and knelt down in gratitude.
Chu Xian stood up, but before she could leave, the old woman, who was staring at her hungrily, had already snatched the steamed bun from the little girl.
Chi Zheng's cold voice came from behind: "The suffering people in the world are as numerous as the grains of sand in the Ganges River. You can't help all the people in the world."
Chu Xian never stopped distributing porridge.
"Chi Zheng, working for the common people and their well-being is the business of His Majesty and the imperial court. How can a weak woman like me help the world? If I really harbor such thoughts, I will be accused by the world of being a hen crowing at dawn."
"I only do what I can, regardless of the gains and losses. Even if it's a drop in the bucket, even if it's futile, so what? To stand by and watch is to be an accomplice."
After Chu Xian finished speaking, she leaned over, grabbed a handful of incense ash from the bowl, and smeared it on the face of a pretty girl of twelve or thirteen, and gave her instructions in a gentle voice.
"If you don't wipe the incense ash off your face, you can come to me tomorrow to get steamed buns and porridge."
Chu Xian reached out to Sui Qing behind her, but saw Chi Zheng handing a peeled egg to the girl.
"Oh, this old man is really pitiful."
Seeing Su Sheng handing the steamed bun to the old man who was kneeling on the ground begging, Chu Xian rushed forward with a cold face and snatched the steamed bun back.
"Su Sheng, if you dare to give me food without permission again, I will deduct one month's wages and tell you to go back to the farm and make porridge!"
"Lin Shu, why are you so hard-hearted? Are you helping the disaster victims or participating in the beauty pageant?"
Su Peisheng was so angry that he jumped up and down.
Chu Xian narrowed her eyes and squinted at Su Sheng: "Su Sheng, if you were a disaster victim, and you had parents, a wife, and two children, and you had to sell one of them to survive, would you sell your parents, or your wife and children?"
"Of course it's selling..." Su Peisheng was suddenly speechless.
At that moment, he had almost no hesitation and immediately thought of selling his wife first and then his daughter.
If anyone else thought the same way, he wouldn't think there was anything wrong with it.
No wonder... No wonder Lin Shu only helped young women, and they had to be beautiful.
Su Peisheng lowered his head in guilt. In a poor family, a girl's beauty would only be a disaster, and her beauty would become original sin.
"I can't save the world, but I can save as many people as I can. Women have a harder life than men, so I only save the weak. If you still can't tell the difference, then... the hem of a cow's skirt... the hem of a horse's skirt."
Chu Xian glanced at Sui Qing guiltily.
Suddenly, a low, clear laugh came from behind me.
"The hem of the horse is tied with the collar of the cow." Yinzhen pursed his lips and suppressed his laughter.
"Ahem... Let's divide the work. Sui Qing and Su Sheng will go to the east, and Chi Zheng and I will go to the west."
Chu Xian embarrassedly covered her sleeves with her wrists in front of her eyes, but it failed to hide her blushing cheeks. Later she realized that her sleeves had been torn off at some point, revealing a slender, white wrist.
She hesitated and decided to go back and change her clothes before coming back. Suddenly, her eyes blurred and she saw the dark blue short coat tightly covering her exposed wrists.
Yinzhen smoothed down his blue shirt and, seeing her looking at him, nodded with a smile and replied, "If you don't mind, you can use it as a cover first."
"Thank you very much."
Chu Xian tied Chi Zheng's jacket around her wrist, and the two of them did not dare to stop for a moment to give porridge to the refugees who flocked in.
At this time, Nanny Zheng rushed to Chu Xian with an anxious look on her face.
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