Chapter 73
Shu Wanxiu, Chen Sanhe, and others were considered the women's army in this chaotic battle.
Due to the disparity in physical strength, the men of Qiugu Village did not use excessive force against them.
Shu Wanxiu and her group's opponents were the women of Qiugu Village.
In this situation, women tend to be more rational than men.
They all knew that if they were to use a hoe or other heavy object, they would easily become exhausted after swinging it for a while, and if they were not careful, they might accidentally hit their heads and bleed, ruining their appearance.
Therefore, the women unanimously chose to drop their weapons and fight each other directly.
Shu Wanxiu has little experience in this kind of duel.
She did get into a few fights on the way to escape famine, but those were against bad guys who were trying to steal her food, and she didn't hold back when she attacked.
Chen Sanhe and the others protected her, keeping her within a protective circle.
Isn't Shu Wanxiu angry?
Of course I'm angry!
To put it bluntly, this farce was an undeserved disaster for the entire Wupai Village.
Looking at the men and women around her, who were fighting and pulling each other's hair, her head was buzzing and she felt an indescribable sense of annoyance.
The dam, everyone is saying we should destroy the dam.
But no one has ever been able to get close to that area.
If the people from Wupai Village got even slightly closer, the people from Qiugu Village would immediately swarm them like mad dogs, determined to drive them away even at great personal cost.
Without anyone noticing, Shu Wanxiu broke away from the circle protecting her and approached them with a hoe.
She was petite, and most men wouldn't consider her a match, so she managed to get close to him quite easily.
Upon closer inspection, it becomes clear that the dam is very high, ruthlessly dividing the stream in two.
On the left, the streambed was muddy from being trampled, but you couldn't scoop up a handful of water with your hands.
To the right, the water flowing down from upstream has piled up high, overflowing to half the height of this embankment.
The difference is so great, even though they are separated by just a dike.
Shu Wanxiu realized that she truly couldn't understand people's hearts.
That's enough.
She shook her head and raised the hoe high in her hand.
"Bang!"
The hard iron collided with the soil, and the thick earthen embankment, built at dusk, withstood the first blow, with only a small piece of soil being dug away.
Qiu Shude's eyes flashed with ferocity as he pointed a finger at the two Qiugu villagers closest to Shu Wanxiu, roaring with a ferocious expression, "Stop her!"
Shu Wanxiu heard Qiu Shude's voice, but she didn't want to hide.
With this dam blocking the way, she and Shu Shouyi won't even have water to cook with tomorrow.
The air felt stifling, as if someone had placed a towel soaked in hot water over her mouth and nose.
She was almost completely soaked in sweat, with beads of sweat dripping down her brow bone and onto her eyelids, but she didn't bother to wipe them away.
This is a race against time; we must get the stream flowing again!
Even though she caught a glimpse of two unfamiliar villagers from Qiugu Village rushing towards her out of the corner of her eye, she still seized that moment, thinking of digging one more shovelful and one more digful.
She used all her strength and finally managed to create a breach in the embankment.
At the same time, the people from Qiugu Village who were trying to stop her arrived.
One man held a stick, his face menacing, while another raised a hoe at her, accompanied by foul language and insults.
Shu Wanxiu instinctively picked up a hoe and held it in front of her.
But this little action is like a mantis trying to stop a chariot.
In the blink of an eye, a thick stick struck two villagers from Qiugu Village hard in the back of their knees.
In an instant, the two burly young men who had charged menacingly at Shu Wanxiu collapsed to the ground.
Xun Yi held back his strength in this attack, so it was inevitable that the two would fall to the ground in pain, and they might even be unable to stand up for a while.
But at most, the soreness will last for a few days, and it won't cause any lasting problems.
He grabbed the two of them by the back of their collars and tossed them aside as easily as if they were two chicks.
After clearing the way, he spread his legs, slightly assuming a horse stance, and held a wooden stick in both hands, blocking Shu Wanxiu's path, exuding an aura of one man guarding the pass against ten thousand.
“Cutting the water is unreasonable for your village, and injuring people is making matters worse. This stream must be opened to water today!” Facing the menacing villagers of Qiugu Village, Xun Yi spoke tough words without backing down.
"Keep digging."
This was said to Shu Wanxiu.
Xun Yi was exceptionally tall, and he easily blocked everyone's gaze from falling on Shu Wanxiu.
That broad, towering back gave the person being protected a sense of security they hadn't felt in a long time.
The task of destroying the dike was not yet completed. Shu Wanxiu suppressed her momentary emotional turmoil and began to work hard on the thick dike again.
Qiugu Village's repeated failure to learn its lesson fueled the anger of the people of Wupai Village. Those who were already exhausted found even more strength, and those who hadn't used their full strength before were now determined to fight them to the death.
Xun Yi was originally protecting Shu Wanxiu, but after the villagers' emotions ran high, someone in the crowd threw a hoe at Xun Yi.
"You're strong, let's help destroy the dike!"
The people of Qiugu Village blocked people like madmen, and many people from Wupai Village were injured. Xun Yi knew that only by destroying the dike could the chaos be stopped, so he picked up a hoe and swung it with Shu Wanxiu.
The breach gradually widened, and water began to overflow.
Shu Wanxiu stopped paying attention to anything else and just kept digging.
"Boom!"
Perhaps it was her, or perhaps it was Xun Yi; in any case, after another hoe fell, the dam finally collapsed.
The accumulated water poured out, soaking half of Shu Wanxiu and Xun Yi's clothes.
"You're worse than pigs and dogs! Your whole village is like that!" A thin, disheveled young man with a swollen, red lip stumbled to the stream.
Looking at the overflowing stream, tears streamed down my face.
"Our village's fields are all ruined by drought! We had no choice but to divert the water!"
"I told you I just wanted to borrow some water for one night, why won't you listen! Why won't you budge an inch?!"
Through the man's choked sobs, the people of Wupai Village finally learned what had happened.
Generally speaking, Qiugu Village has a lot of farmland, and even if people are sent to irrigate day and night after the streams are reduced, some of the more distant fields still cannot be irrigated.
"Your Wupai Village has so little land, how could you possibly know our difficulties?! Your villages below Wuli Village, Qili Village and Bali Village, already had their water diverted once more than ten days ago!"
"It's not like our village is the only one doing this kind of thing!"
His words were full of grievances; those who didn't know better might have thought that the people from Wupai Village were the real villains.
Chen Sanhe is a reasonable person and cannot tolerate those who distort the facts.
"You only learn bad things, don't you? Your village has more people than Wuli Village, right? Do they do such heinous things?"
"Everyone has a hard time during dry years. No one owes anyone anything, and no one is born to give way to anyone else!"
She walked through the crowd to the thin man and said, "You have made two major mistakes."
"First of all, you shouldn't have blocked the water without saying a word. There are several villages downstream from our village. Even if our village doesn't come looking for trouble tonight, people from other villages will come looking for you later."
"Secondly, you are all confused! You heard that Qili Village behind you has blocked the water supply, and you immediately followed suit. But do you know that Wuli Village built a canal a few years ago? It was specifically used to divert stream water into the fields?"
The water has not dried up naturally, but there are areas in Qiugu Village that cannot be irrigated.
Aside from water interception, another effective remedy is to dredge the channels.
For fields that are difficult to irrigate, one or two channels can be dug to allow water to flow directly from the streams into the fields.
To be honest, Chen Sanhe couldn't be bothered to argue with those idiots anymore.
However, after Qiu Shude's deception and scheming today, and the uproar of the entire Qiugu Village, the feud between the two villages has finally been formed.
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