It's so easy for someone to do something bad.
Jiangmo Village, as its name suggests, is located on the shore of Shaozi Lake, and a tributary of the Qiongjiang River flows into Shaozi Lake.
This area is a disaster zone for flood control, simply because it is located at a high altitude and there is no other place for floodwater to be discharged from Shaozi Lake. If a flood comes, it will submerge all the surrounding villages.
Not to mention the crops next to the village.
Due to its unique geographical location, Yan Shiren and the Crown Prince immediately blocked the tributary flowing into Shaozi Lake, saving villages and crops within a radius of hundreds of miles.
But here, it was dawn, and it was still pouring rain. There had been less rain lately, but it rained every night.
The rain in the south seems to be quite different from that in other places.
A group of men dressed in black, completely covered by straw hats, traveled through the mountains and soon arrived at Spoon Lake, beside the irrigation ditch used for farmland.
The farmland around Shaozi Lake is fed by irrigation canals from Shaozi Lake. Instead of damaging the canals, they buried some things in the soil and removed the mud blocking the water.
They moved very quickly, almost as if they had just arrived, but were gone in the blink of an eye, as if no one had ever been there.
As dawn broke, the torrential rain stopped, and the villagers of Jiangmo Village got up early. This year's rainfall was too much, and they needed to check the fields to prevent excessive water accumulation from affecting the harvest.
The quiet village was occasionally punctuated by the barking of dogs, and a cool breeze carried wisps of smoke rising from every household into the mountains.
Two or three farmers would gather together, chatting and laughing, carrying hoes to check on their own small plots of land.
Someone shouted, "The water source must have been washed away; my dry field is now completely filled with water."
"With this constant rain, things can easily go wrong if you're not careful. Mine is the same; it's all flooded."
Such situations do occur, but are not frequent. Some fields are not flooded, so only one or two people go to Shaozi Lake to check.
When they arrived at the head of the ditch, they found that the mud blocking the water had indeed been washed away and needed to be re-blocked.
The ditch wasn't very big; it could be blocked with mud. But when digging, he touched something hard.
After washing the hard object in water, it was found to be a piece of black iron with characters on it, but the characters were not recognized.
"What is this?" The group huddled together to examine it closely, but after a while, they still couldn't figure it out.
"It looks quite old. Why don't we take it to Uncle? He can read." Someone suggested that the iron block be taken to the village's wise man for a look.
The group exchanged glances. It wasn't gold anyway, so they figured they might as well give it away. Maybe it was a warning from heaven?
No one objected. After blocking the ditch, they went together to take the iron block to their learned uncle in the village.
The elderly man, though revered as a wise and virtuous elder by the village, didn't actually know much. He only knew a few words, could name the village children, and could choose an auspicious day.
Ironically, he could recognize the words on the iron block.
As he aged, his eyesight inevitably deteriorated. He looked for a while before reciting, "I swear by all the gods and Buddhas, the day I return will be the end of you foolish people!"
"Yi?" Upon hearing this, everyone was in an uproar. The end of the world? Did it mean they were all going to die?
The old man's cloudy eyes seemed to see through everything. "Yi is the name of the Crown Prince."
The Crown Prince has recently gained a good reputation. Although people dare not call him by his name out loud, they all know about him.
"But the Crown Prince is quite virtuous in his work managing the floods in Jiangnan," someone questioned.
However, out of a fear of death, superstition, and a sense of loss, many people have come to believe in the doomsday prophecy.
The speed at which they believed it is saddening.
"Could it be that the day we discover this ancient iron is the doomsday mentioned above?" Although they were superstitious, they weren't particularly stupid, but they weren't exactly smart either. Their superstition was terrifying and chilling!
"Yes, yes, very likely, Uncle. What do you think we should do?"
The old man thought for a moment and said, "Go and invite a few of your uncles and great-uncles."
"Yes." The younger one immediately understood and excused himself to invite other respected elders in the village.
Just then, on the Qiongjiang River embankment a few miles away, the embankment that Yan Shiren and the Crown Prince had been working tirelessly day and night to build suddenly broke in the middle, for reasons unknown.
The power of nature is something that tiny humans cannot resist. In just a moment, a crack appeared in the middle of the dam, and the floodwaters rushed out instantly.
You may never have seen a raging flood burst its banks, or witnessed a torrent of water sweeping across the land, and you may never have experienced the terror of a riverbed suddenly rising and roaring.
Soldiers and civilians conscripted to control the floods were stationed along the riverbank downstream, either on guard duty or doing other tasks.
It was just a sudden loud noise; you turned your head to look, and the floodwaters were right in front of you. If you think that being able to swim will save your life in a flood, then you are wrong.
The floodwaters snapped trees along the riverbanks, and the trees were carried downstream. A soldier standing on higher ground watched helplessly as his comrade below was impaled in the heart by a piece of driftwood carried by the floodwaters and died instantly.
For several days, Yan Shiren and the Crown Prince used methods such as diverting the water, building dams, and dredging to successfully reduce the devastation of the flood. However, one line of defense suddenly collapsed, and five or six other lines of defense downstream also failed to hold, resulting in a complete rout.
The flood is like a caged beast; once it breaks free, it will surely wreak havoc on the world!
Zhao Bi was nothing more than a spoiled brat raised in the palace, skilled in power struggles and with no moral bottom line. How could he know the hardships of life? How could he know the horrors of natural disasters? How could he know that the power of nature is beyond human control!
He only wanted the water to rush into Spoon Lake, to flood the villages and crops around it.
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