Chapter 45
This year seems to be hotter than usual, and even the horses that went out felt a little tired. They rested under the trees and refused to move forward.
There are more tea stalls in the shady places in the city. Many people simply sit nearby when returning to the city, and continue their journey after they have recovered a little.
The caravan would store the grain in the warehouse at the city gate, and the price charged was not high. The grain could be traded with a sign, saving the consumption during transportation. When leaving, the grain could be withdrawn with the sign and the receipt of the transaction, which was quite convenient.
Many people were carrying shoulder poles, which contained things they had purchased, as well as some rare items they had exchanged for things, which were always good to take home.
Pingyi has expanded a lot nowadays, and several surrounding cities have also gradually developed. After discussion, Song Jin and others gradually opened up the restrictions. Although registration and inspection are still required to enter the city, pedestrians can also come in to buy things and stroll around the city.
Of course, several important places, such as the city or the parade ground, are not accessible, and patrols and guards are usually concentrated in these places.
Wen Yi used a fan to block out the light. At this time, she was wearing the most common thin shirt in Pingyi. She carefully distinguished the figures of people resting at a tea stall under a tree not far away.
The heat was truly scorching these past few days. Even with the ice left over from the winter, it was still stuffy in the office, so we decided to move to a building near the water. There was a ventilation system connected to a converted waterwheel, and by placing the ice in the vents, the heat was finally bearable.
The caravan sent out to look for and purchase saltpeter returned a few days ago, and some was produced and stored in the ice cellar. However, how to make the most efficient use of these things is still under experimentation, but it should be able to be put into use before the stored ice is consumed.
Fans have become a must-have item, and bamboo products and all kinds of things that can provide coolness are also extremely popular. Put two on the mat and take turns holding them, and you can always hold on.
Some time ago, Wen Yi bought a bamboo basket from a street stall for her cat who was overheated. After covering it with a thin cloth, the cat's hair wouldn't be trapped.
The seats at tea stalls are mostly made of similar materials. If you sit for a long time, you need to stand up and get some fresh air, otherwise your clothes will stick to your body.
After the people around him changed, Wen Yi finally saw the man's face. It turned out that only his eyebrows and eyes seemed familiar, but he was not someone he knew, so he stood up and walked back slowly.
"Are you back?"
Song Jin was wiping his face and arms with a wet cloth. Seeing Wen Yi coming over, he handed one to him. He would feel much better after wiping.
Wen Yi took it and said, "I went for a walk outside. It was really hot outside, so I came back."
Song Jin put the things back on the shelf next to her and said, "The weather this year is really abnormal, and the river water is much shallower." She has had people watching it in real time these days. Many workshops need to relocate their water wheels, and the wells in the city are also having trouble getting water.
The situation here is relatively good. It is said that many cities further south have run out of water, many people have fled to the mountains, and many crops have died.
Wen Yi and the others did send in more people to help irrigate the crops, but that wasn't always the solution. They just hoped for some rain soon. Irrigation was only a temporary fix; the soil would quickly absorb the moisture, and even laying down grass would be difficult to rehydrate.
According to those with experience, it seemed likely that rain would come soon, but this only made the group even more worried. The drought had allowed insect eggs to survive in large numbers, and if rain brought the right humidity and temperature, these eggs would hatch quickly.
"Assign more people to dig out insect eggs."
Wen Yi picked up the documents beside him. The weather was really hot now, and everyone preferred to escape the heat in the city. After thinking for a moment, he said to the soldier who came in to report, "Well, let's go to the treasury and get some stuff out. Distribute it according to how much we've unearthed."
The most important things are ice cubes and some new utensils. These cannot be kept in the treasury, so it is better to find an excuse to distribute them, which can also increase enthusiasm.
We stored quite a bit of grain last year. If the harvest was good this year, we were planning to process some new food. Now it seems like it was a good idea to store it.
Every year, the old rice is sold at a lower price or made into food for sale. Therefore, the grain in the granary is still fresh and can be stored for a longer period of time than the old grain. Even if the harvest is poor this year, it can still be eaten next year.
It’s not a problem if the food doesn’t taste good and you can’t fill your stomach.
"Also, this letter should be sent to various places." Wen Yi handed over the letter he had written earlier. The sealed letter would be put into a bamboo tube and sent to where it needed to go as quickly as possible.
The soldiers took orders and left.
Wen Yi searched through the collected books for records on pest control, but the weather was so dry now that even if they controlled it well here, they would still have to face this problem once all the food in other areas was eaten up.
Insect plague.
To be more precise, locusts.
Locusts have always been an extremely serious natural disaster and can still have serious consequences later on.
The best way is to combine chemical control and use different methods to reduce insect density as much as possible to avoid the formation of populations, but it will still cause damage to fields and crops from time to time, and now it can only be dealt with manually.
Compared with waiting for adults to be captured, directly dealing with larvae or egg masses is the most labor-saving method.
Birds love locusts very much when they live alone, and they can be considered food after being processed and dried. However, when they gather in groups, not only will their color change, but they will also secrete phenylacetonitrile in their bodies to resist foreign enemies. When threatened, it will turn into hydrogen cyanide, which can cause poisoning to humans or birds that accidentally eat it.
During this period, the poultry raised in the city were driven to the dry areas of the river bank to peck at the insects that were not yet poisonous, thereby reducing the insect density in Pingyi and its surrounding areas and avoiding serious consequences.
Song Jin also knew that disasters would occur after drought. In fact, they were busy with these things during this period, but they were more concerned about food storage. After all, this was not something that could be prevented by human power. They could only try their best to accumulate food that would allow people to survive the year.
In fact, many people have had a premonition during this period. There are always a lot of people lining up to buy food at the grain stores in the city every day. You know, many people have become accustomed to eating in restaurants where the prices are not too high.
People who can survive in this era always have a strong sense of crisis.
Seeing Wen Yi's frown, Song Jin sighed and tried to comfort her:
"Wenjun has also made preparations. There are still many nets, and most of the bonfires and pits for burning insects have been prepared. Everything that can be done has been arranged." The rest depends on fate. The preparations are already thorough.
Wen Yi pressed his aching head and nodded to show that he understood, but he always felt like something was weighing on his heart. He didn't know if it was because the weather was too hot, or if there was something important that he had accidentally overlooked.
The river bank originally in the mountains has been completely reclaimed. Through years of hard work, a large amount of grain has been accumulated there and stored in natural caves as a last resort.
These things go through Wen Yi and Yao Wenjun, and do not go through Pingyi’s accounts.
"By the way, did the caravans sent to other places bring back any news?"
Wen Yi asked the person in charge, who rummaged through the pile of documents for a while, put all the things from the past few days into a wooden box, and had the person next to him hand it to him.
Sure enough, there were reports of sporadic insect infestations in many places. However, at this point, the insects were not yet poisonous, so many food-starved city dwellers and refugees would use them as food. Compared to the locusts that were reduced to a mere skin, they could still be considered food.
The only good news is probably that the neighboring forces to the south of their city have also discovered these things, and due to the "accidental" leakage of Wen Yi and others, they have obtained the current prevention and control measures in various places. Although the progress is not as smooth as theirs, it is still better than doing nothing.
*
Yao Wenjun soon received this latest letter.
In fact, since the roads between cities were renovated and auxiliary roads were left for horses to travel, the transmission of news has become much faster than before, which often took half a month.
She is now leading her soldiers to dig out egg masses in the dried mud. There has been a light rain in her area these days, which has alleviated the drought in the fields, but many insects have begun to appear.
Yao Wenjun drove all kinds of poultry to the places where the situation was reported to be bad, but the extent to which he could solve the problem was limited. Fortunately, the temperature dropped slightly, so he simply took the soldiers to deal with it.
Residents of the city also came along. These unhatched eggs were excellent feed. It had just rained and they had some free time, so many people came along with the idea that they would be wasting their time digging. There were also soldiers protecting them, so they were very safe.
The collected eggs were also baked uniformly and then put into different uses. This was no longer Yao Wenjun's job. Amu and the others had already listed many uses for them, which were just waiting to be tested.
"General, today's plan has been completed. What to do next..." The person in charge, who was taking notes with a pen beside him, asked.
Yao Wenjun saw that it was still early, "There's still plenty of time. Let's take advantage of the cooler weather today to deal with more land. Time waits for no one."
Even if they had not experienced it personally, the soldiers had heard about the tragic locust plague from their family or friends. They could not help but shudder when they heard it, and their eyes became much more fierce as they looked at the excavated egg masses, and they quickened their movements.
Moreover, these things will be recorded by the manager nearby, and accumulating a certain amount can be exchanged for many things.
Naturally, no one objected to what Yao Wenjun ordered. It was not until dark that everyone packed up and began to return to their homes in the city.
Only then did she unfold the information attached to Wen Yi's letter. Most of it contained secrets that person had passed on or collected through the caravan or other channels. Some were known only to Wen Yi, while others were gathered by Song Jin and others, and all were compiled and sent to her by this person.
Yao Wenjun would do the same, ensuring that Wen Yi, far away in Pingyi, would be aware of the latest developments. Many important decisions and intentions were usually kept to themselves, revealed only in the intermediaries of letters, or rather, revealed without concealment.
This seemed to be a tacit understanding. Yao Wenjun smiled, put the letter into the box and locked it.
*
Six days later, Pingyi and other places finally welcomed the first rain after a long drought.
The land in the south had more rain earlier than the cities here. Not only did people finally have enough water and no longer have to endure sleeping due to thirst, but the creatures that had been dormant in the land also gradually revived.
Wen Yi has been walking outside these days and has seen many green figures appear, but they are not very lethal. Thanks to the previous excavation, the poultry raised and the birds outside can control their numbers.
The speed of locusts flying will exceed the speed of information transmission, so Pingyi, Xinyi and other places must be prepared from now on.
In addition to the nets and leather armor distributed to the soldiers, machine-woven square nets with extremely small holes were also placed where they could be used immediately. The garrison soldiers' daily drills after basic training were also changed to rehearsals for catching flying insects. Nan Xun and others led them in continuous practice of attacking formations to deal with changes in direction.
In addition to the dug ditches near the fields on the south side, an eight-shaped wall was built, in which fires could be lit at night to kill insects.
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