In the first year of Chongzhen, in April, the weather was slightly cold, and occasionally cold winds blew.

Wang Zezhi shuddered, looked around, and saw the sparse bare trees and desolate loess.

"Ahem~"

Wang Zezhi coughed twice, licked the hard steamed bun in his mouth twice, and continued to hurry.

The current Wang Zezhi has crossed over, and the original Wang Zezhi has starved to death.

Wang Zezhi occupied the body of this person in this world, and also gained his memory.

The people of this world are also called Wang Zezhi, sixteen years old, fled from Shaanxi to Shanxi.

Shaanxi has been apologized due to successive years of famine, the officials are tyrannical, the government has increased the land tax many times, and the poor peasants have sold their children and daughters, and their families have gone into exile.

Wang Zeyi's family had no choice but to flee to become displaced due to the inability to pay the land endowment and the drought for many years.

They crossed the Yellow River from Shaanxi to Shanxi via Shenmu.

I wanted to beg for some food in Shanxi and beg to live, but I didn't think that Shanxi was not optimistic, but it was slightly better than Shaanxi, and there were always some kind-hearted people who were willing to give some food.

As for Wang Zezhi's parents, due to the long journey and the lack of good food, they fell ill on the road and unfortunately passed away.

At this moment, Wang Zezhi was hungry, but this steamed bun was too hard to bite at all, so he had to put it in his mouth, slowly soften, and eat a little when it softened.

It has been three days since he came to this world, and in just three days, he understood that he could not get anything delicious in the county seat, but he could beg for a lot of food in the mountains and villages.

Wang Zezhi also learned that it was April 13 of the first year of Chongzhen.

In memory, this period of history can be described as internal and external troubles, and disasters have been continuous for decades, which has led to endless outbreaks and wars, until finally the entire Ming Dynasty fell apart.

"In a few months, Shaanxi will revolt."

Wang Zezhi thought silently for a while, put the remaining half of the hard steamed bun into his arms, and looked at a small village not far from Shouyang County, he planned to go over and beg for some food.

The houses here are unique to the Loess Plateau, that is, the caves dug out of the mountain wall, and the courtyard wall is a half-person high earthen wall.

Wang Zezhi came to the earthen wall and saw a woman chopping wood and collecting grass in the courtyard, and two children running around.

"Fellow, can you beg for a drink?" Wang Zezhi said with some embarrassment.

"Okay, come in." The woman put down the axe in her hand, took the ladle back into the house, and scooped it up.

Wang Zezhi went in, picked up the scoop and drank it like a cow drinking water.

After Wang Zezhi drank the water, his stomach began to growl, and he smiled a little embarrassedly.

"Here, eat a cake." The woman took a loaf of bread, gave it to him, and began to chop wood again.

"It's not easy to be in chaos these days, so let's eat."

Wang Zeyi didn't know what to say, so he could only bow and thank him.

"Thank you!" After Wang Zezhi finished speaking, he took the cake into his arms and turned to leave.

Wang Zezhi smelled the fragrant flatbread in his arms, and took out half of the steamed bun and put it in his mouth, he felt that the steamed bun had the fragrance of the flatbread.

This village is not big, you can see the end at a glance, Wang Zezhi looked at the left and right of the road, and estimated that there are less than 100 households in this village.

"Official, there is only so much food at home, and it is really gone."

"Just half a bag of grain, what about sending it to Hanako?"

Wang Zezhi didn't go far before there were five servants, who were ordered by Zhixian to go to the woman's house to collect Liao's salary.

"Official, there has been a great drought in recent years, and there is no harvest."

"Damn, the old lady is not honest, search for me." The servant kicked the woman away, led the people to rummage through the cabinets, and in a short time found four or five bags of grain from the cave, under the kang and in the cellar.

"Official, I can't help it, I can't help it, there are still two babies at home to eat, his father went to fight gold, and he never came back, and now there is no man in the family, and he can't live if he takes it all." The woman hugged the leg of the leading servant and wept heartbreakingly.

His two children were timidly hiding in the cave, and they were about to cry.

"Diao Min, you dare to deceive me and others, you haven't paid all the fields last year, you two children should be able to sell them for a good price, or don't you sell them?"

The woman hurriedly got up, hugged the two children, and said in a panic, "I can't do it, I can't do it." ”

"Hmph, let's go."

The servant turned around and put the grain he had found on the wagon parked on the side of the road, and took the people to the next house.

Although the tax system of the Ming Dynasty was very problematic, it was not so that the people could not survive, and it was not drought that made the people unable to live, after all, the imperial court also had disaster relief.

What really made it impossible for the people to survive was the collusion of the gentry and officials to evade taxes and pass on the tax burden to the yeoman peasants.

Then there was the exploitation of the bones, the gentry bribed officials, annexed good land, and then passed on the land to the yeoman farmers.

Eventually, people went bankrupt and were displaced, and local officials concealed and increased taxes to yeoman farmers who did not go bankrupt.

This dynasty not only had internal troubles, but also external troubles, and the external troubles were because the Jin people were eyeing the Ming Dynasty, and the imperial court had to go north to fight, and further increased the taxes of yeoman farmers for food.

Eventually, the peasants were forced to rebel.

Wang Zezhi looked at the woman holding her two children and crying sadly, and the villagers who kept crying in despair after being scavenged for food, he didn't know what he could do.

He wanted to get coal, steel, cannons, and muskets, but after only three days in this world, he knew that this was unrealistic.

He had seen the cannons on the walls of Taiyuan Mansion, the sight of a troop of musketeers walking by, the truckloads of high-quality coal, and the finest steel smelted from coal.

That is to say, in the Ming Dynasty, the mining and smelting of coal and iron ore already had relatively mature skills, including the casting of muskets and cannons.

Wang Zezhi also thought about making soap and glass, but finally found that he could only continue to beg.

First of all, it takes money to do all this, and secondly, if there is no backstage, if you make a fortune in this troubled era, there will be no bones left that will be eaten by the gentry and officials, and in the end, he will be a first-class citizen, hungry, and clothed, and it would be good to survive, let alone make soap and glass.

Wang Zezhi hid to the side and watched silently, until these servants left, he listened to the cries of the peasants in the village, and suddenly a sentence appeared in his mind, lingering.

"Rather than sit and starve, why not steal and die."