What happened hundreds of miles outside the city, the people inside the city had no way of knowing. In fact, they simply have no channels to understand the outside world. Even for the cousin's magnates, if they left the carrier pigeons, they had no way to know what was happening outside the city.

But I don't know when it began, the gentry, soldiers and civilians in Jingnan City looked forward to the arrival of the rescue day and night. Perhaps this is the only hope for the people trapped in the city.

Help!

Although the imperial court never said that there would be rescuers, almost everyone believed that the flag soldiers stationed in the south would definitely come, and they even felt that the flag soldiers stationed in the south would definitely be able to defeat the Ming army, because the soldiers stationed in the south were all elite in a hundred battles, and they had been fighting with the mountain people for several years, all of them were very brave, as long as they arrived in Jingnan, they would definitely be able to kill the Ming army.

It is precisely because of this that the defenders in Jingnan City always look at the south, looking hopeful, and pin a glimmer of hope on a rescue army led by Prince Li.

"Prince Li will definitely come!"

The officials and people in Jingnan City cheered themselves up in their hearts, but for several months, there has been no news about the reinforcements. Despite this, the officials and citizens of the city still hoped for reinforcements from the south.

For people in desperate situations, all this is like the last straw. From the bottom of their hearts, they hope that this line of life will save them.

January, February, March......

From midwinter to midsummer, Jingnan has become a dead city under heavy siege. A dead city completely isolated from the outside world. For the people in this dead city, they say wait. It is not so much hope as waiting for death, and the only difference between them is when they will die, early or late.

That's all.

In August, after four and a half months of siege, the days of the officials and people in Jingnan City who were looking forward to rescue were becoming more and more difficult, and the rice and grain distributed by the imperial court had been decreasing in the past four months, from 24 catties to 12 catties, and then to 6 catties, and each person could only get a few taels of grain every day. Even this little grain is mixed with soil. If it weren't for the fact that the people planted potatoes in their homes, I am afraid that before the Ming army came in, all the people in this city would starve to death.

Despair and hunger. It has always shrouded everyone in the city. After that, everyone fell into a desperate situation, struggling in a desperate situation.

In the afternoon of that day, after noon, Li Yulin walked out of his cousin's house, although he did not borrow food, but he carried ten taels of silver in his arms, and carried a small bag of potatoes in his hand, that is, ten catties. He hadn't come out for a while, and the personable jinshi in the past was now hungry and skinny, not only was his legs and feet weak when he walked, but even looking at his appearance, as long as the wind blew, people would be blown up to the sky.

As a jinshi, he is a banner man. There is no need to be an errand boy in the barracks, which is the privilege of being a scholar, but on the other hand, because the official positions of the imperial court are limited. So even now he is still only a supplement, and during the siege of the city, the supplement officer had no food. Because there is no need to enter the camp as a soldier. So after the siege, he stayed at home, but now it seems that by going to the camp on an errand call, he can not only save the rations of one person, but also eat half full in the camp. His father had starved to death, and the rest of the family would starve to death at any time, so today he had to come to his cousin's house again and ask for some almsgiving.

As the only Jinshi of the Li family, he has high hopes for his Li family, after all. In everyone's opinion, as long as the siege can be lifted in the future, he will definitely be able to be reused, and after this battle, I don't know how many officials will die, and naturally there will be a seat.

Although he was only a cousin, when he came to his uncle's house, his cousin still promised to give him some silver, but he didn't have much food for him. In fact, not many people have food in store now, at most they have some home-grown potatoes.

When Li Yulin went to his cousin's place just now, he had just returned from the city - in order to save food, the city guards went home every two days, so that the court could produce less food. The cousin saw that Li Yulin was so hungry that he couldn't look good, so he asked him about the situation at home, only to learn that his father had starved to death, his mother was also starving to death, and his sister only had one breath left.

Li Yulin is a filial son, and he couldn't help crying when he told these encounters. When Uncle Cousin heard this, he praised Li Yulin's filial piety and comforted him and said:

"This Jingnan City will not be lost for a while. Don't look at the current life in the city is very difficult, in fact, the Ming army also has difficulties. Their grain, grass, and ammunition are all transferred from thousands of miles away, and they must not be stationed in Jingnan City for a long time, you just have to stay in the city with peace of mind, and don't go to the city, after all, once the fight starts, the sword and gun have no eyes, you are the hope of our Li family, and when the Ming army is defeated in the future, the court will definitely employ a large number of people, and after you come out, the Li family will be able to prosper. ”

After saying this, he instructed the servant girl to take ten taels of silver and hand it to Li Yulin, and then asked the servant girl to take ten catties of potatoes, then looked at him and said:

"You can take these silver and potatoes back and use them first, and if you have difficulties in the future, Uncle Wei will give you a little silver."

These things are usually unnoticeable, but now they are life-saving. That's the sentence, and when you have difficulties in the future, I will help you a little. is telling him that he will continue to help him in the future.

Uncle Tang's generosity made Li Yulin very grateful, and he kowtowed to his uncle at the moment, shed tears of gratitude, and then swallowed his farewell.

When he left his cousin's house, the streets were still as deserted and desolate as before, and in some cases there was not even a single pedestrian on the street. Jingnan City, which was once quite prosperous, has now become miserable and miserable, like hell.

He walked fast along the way, because he knew that the whole family was waiting for him to come home. Waiting for him to bring home something to cook and eat.

Just walking on the deserted street, I suddenly saw a group of officers and soldiers using ropes to take an old man and a young man, and they came towards him. Li Yulin hurriedly flashed on the side of the street, and saw that the faces of these two people were blue and swollen, obviously they had been beaten, and the soldiers who escorted them saw Li Yulin and shouted deliberately.

"See, these two dog slaves are actually going to escape from the city, flee to the Ming Dynasty, and behead according to the law, and take a look at the execution ground in a while, maybe they can buy a piece of meat to eat......

The soldier's words made Li Yulin tremble in fright, he had long heard of the sale of human flesh in the execution ground, but he didn't expect it to be sold so directly, and there was no concealment at all. When the old man and the young man listened, they were even more frightened, and the children who followed behind them cried loudly.

"Dad, I don't want to die, I don't want to die......"

Listening to the cries of the father and son, Li Yulin shrank his head in fright, and watched the two of them being taken away, perhaps someone heard that the execution ground was going to kill people and sell meat again, and a few more people came on the originally empty street, and they followed the soldiers to the execution ground together. Some people are still shouting as they walk.

"Human flesh and human flesh are delicious, especially half-sized meat, which is delicate and ageless, and it doesn't cost firewood to eat......"

The laughter of the people made Li Yulin speechless in fright, looking at the laughing people in his eyes. It's no longer a human being, but a devil, a devil who looks like a human dog.

How can they eat people? How can you eat it?

It wasn't until the crowd disappeared that he breathed a sigh of relief. Then he continued to walk, and when he went further, he passed by a dung field, and there was a potato field next to the manure field, full of potato seedlings, for the soldiers and civilians trapped in Jingnan, potatoes were their life-saving rations.

A few people squatted on the edge of the puddle next to the manure field, poured the small bucket of manure that had just been scooped out of the manure pit into the bamboo sieve, and then they put the bamboo sieve into the puddle and shook it despite the stench, as if they were washing something there, and finally they left the white maggots in the sieve, and then carefully put them up.

Li Yulin has hardly been out recently, but even so, he has heard that someone scooped maggots out of the dung to satisfy his hunger, at first, he didn't believe it, but now this scene has been seen by him with his own eyes. The scene in front of him only made him feel nauseous, and the whole person almost vomited.

He didn't expect to see such a scene, and although he agreed to be very hungry, he couldn't imagine what people would do when they were hungry. Just the thought of what these people are eating can't help but be disgusting.

The nausea in his heart drove him to hurry on, and it also made him feel the danger and walk faster.

Not far further on, Li Yulin saw a middle-aged man with a **-year-old child, who was using a hoe to dig open the dung heap, picking up black maggot shells there, and he had already picked up a small pile. As Li Yulin approached, the child hurriedly protected the maggot shell with both hands, while glaring at him with hostile eyes. The thin middle-aged man also stopped what he was doing, and looked at him with a hoe and a wary look. That person's eyes made Li Yulin feel a chill in his back, and he even felt that when this man was looking at him, it was like looking at his prey.

Although he had never hunted, he was no stranger to such looks. After all, when I was young. He had seen his father look that way before. It's just that at that time, my father was looking at a woman, and for my father, that woman was the prey.

Now that they look at themselves with this kind of look, they don't mean that they are the prey in their eyes.

Prey!

Doesn't that mean they're going to eat themselves? After this thought came to his heart, he felt an inexplicable fear all over his body. This fear made him can't help but speed up his pace again.

"If you come out later, you have to come out with a handle......"

Thinking like this in his heart, Li Yulin continued to rush in the direction of home.

By this time, twilight had fallen, and the outer city was much wider than the inner city, and many of the open spaces had been turned into potato fields, and in the fields, there were occasionally people guarding there, apparently fearing that someone would steal the unripe potatoes.

Now for the cost of people, these potatoes that were not worth mentioning in the past. Now it is equivalent to life, it is equivalent to the life of a family, young and old, and when there is no food, those potatoes they grow have their only hope.

The afterglow of the setting sun shone on the potato fields and on the gray roof tiles, but even so, the city was gloomy. In particular, many houses are now empty, people have moved away to live with relatives, or families have starved to death. The doors, windows, beams and beams of these vacant houses have been torn down, and in some cases, entire houses have been torn down. But all the wood that was removed, whether good or bad, was burned as firewood.

In the gloomy city, there seemed to be no life, a gust of wind blew, even when the weather was hot, Li Yulin still felt a chill on his body.

The wind was blowing, but the leaves were not heard. Because of the lack of firewood, all the trees in the city were cut down and cut down. Even the sun-dried potato seedlings were not willing to be used to raise the fire, and the women who could keep the house would cook the dried leaves and potatoes. The roots of the trees on the side of the road were also hollowed out and brought home to be used as firewood.

Food is important, but so is firewood. At this time, people will always try to fill their stomachs by any means.

Continuing to walk forward, when passing through some alleys, Li Yulin couldn't help but look at some of the houses, which were gloomy, but there seemed to be a figure moving there.

Is it a human figure or a ghost?

After this thought came out, Li Yulin's heart trembled, and the whole person became more frightened, he only felt goosebumps suddenly appear all over his body, and the hairs on his body also stood up.

He thought of the rumors he had heard at home that there were people in Jingnan City who had begun to eat people. This is not an ordinary anecdote, but a fact. It's like human flesh sold on the execution ground.

Thinking of this, Li Yulin hurriedly quickened his pace, just as he quickened his pace and rushed home, he heard footsteps behind him, and the moment he turned around, a black shadow fell directly on his head, and when his head was hit by a wooden stick and the person fell down softly, he vaguely heard someone talking.

"Oh, you can also pick, how did you pick such a thin person, how long is this enough to eat......"

Li Yulin, who was lying on the ground consciously, didn't even figure out what was going on, he felt that he was being lifted up and dragged to the side of the road, and when his consciousness became more and more blurred, there was only one thought left in his mind.

Mother, little sister, what should they do?

Then, Li Yulin, who was lying on the ground, felt that something was stabbing his neck, and before he felt the pain, the person lost consciousness, I don't know why, when the person lost consciousness, he did not feel sadness, but felt a relief......