Many cavalry guards from Guangwu and Xiping came to the damming and water storage site reported by the sentry post, and Li Yanzhao raised his eyes and saw that the Huangshui River meandered down from the valley of the two mountains, from high to low. The narrowest part of the river is only five or six zhang wide, and it is indeed an excellent natural place to store water. Ma Ping couldn't help but be excited when he saw this, and said to Li Yanzhao: "This is really an excellent place to store water. Li Yanzhao looked at the five or six zhang wide river and nodded his head incessantly.

Ma Ping turned his head and asked the sentry who had reported the situation earlier, "What about the people who are hiding here?" Hearing the captain's question, the sentry raised his hand and pointed to the woods beside him: "Those people are sheltering from the rain in the woods. Ma Ping waved his hand: "Take them out, what rain can be avoided in the woods." ”

Immediately, Ma Ping took off the oilcloth cloak and hat he was wearing, stood in the rain and shouted to the more than 100 cavalrymen of his Guangwu Army: "Brothers, take off the rain gear and distribute it to the people!" ”

More than 100 horsemen quickly took off the rain gear and concentrated it in Ma Ping's hands. And the hundreds of cavalry soldiers outside the Guangwu Army were all watching this scene, but they did nothing. Li Yanzhao was also busy taking off his hat and handing it to Ma Ping, but he said in his heart that Ma Pingguo was strict in governing the army, and as soon as the order came out, he would not obey it. Although Ma Ping has only a few hundred people, if he can command tens of thousands of troops in the future, he will definitely be a king's army.

Ma Ping held a large stack of hats, cloaks and other things, turned around, and saw a group of people trembling and walking out of the woods, all dressed in thin clothes, dragging their families with them. Seeing that Ma Ping came up and wanted to give those rain gear to his own people, he saw more than 100 rain-drenched sergeants standing beside him. An old man with gray hair hurriedly walked out and knelt down in front of Ma Ping: "Master Jun, I can't help it." ”

When Ma Ping heard this, he handed a stack of rain gear to Li Yanzhao beside him, ordered him to distribute it, and then took a hat, stepped forward to help the kneeling old man, and then buckled the hat on his head without saying anything, and said loudly: "Uncle, why can't you do it?" These sons and daughters under Ma are all kings. The king should love the people. Now that Linqiang City is broken, it is our dereliction of duty that we can't rescue and fail to protect your people. In this case, how can I wait for the king to watch you suffer in the rain? If you can't do it, you won't mention it again. ”

When the old man heard this, he was so moved that he shook Ma Ping to the ground again and again, but he was already in tears: "The county town was attacked by thieves, and we waited for a life because we were outside." These days, I hid in the nearby mountains and forests, looking forward to the king day and night, but only last night there was a branch of the king who attacked the camp of the thieves on the other side at night. Who would have expected that it would rain heavily today, and we are finally looking forward to the king! God won't give up on me! ”

Ma Ping heard the old man's tearful words and sighed. said: "It was also us who attacked the bandit camp on the other side yesterday. ”

When the old man heard this, his spirit suddenly lifted: "When the morning dawned, I waited for the people to look at each other across the bank, and saw that the king on the other side had dug two big pits, and threw the corpses of thieves and horses into the pits to bury them. Densely packed with corpses. With such a brave sergeant as the general's subordinates, why worry about the injustice of the thief! ”

I heard the old man's praise. The pride of the hundreds of horsemen beside him spontaneously arose, and he couldn't help but puff up his chest with great pride.

Ma Ping saw that Li Yanzhao had finished distributing the rain gear, and immediately stepped forward to appease the people for a while. Then ordered Fan Ting to order his subordinate horsemen to build a shelter for the people to shelter from the rain, and the rest of the horsemen dismounted, leaving a few people to take care of the horses, and the rest of the people took shovels and pickaxes and other tools, quickly dug the soil and bagged it, and prepared to fill the river and build a dam.

Everyone has no objection to Ma Ping's arrangement. Although Fan Ting was ordered by Ma Ping to leave the brigade to engage in engineering. However, this time, everyone is engaged in engineering. Fan Ting was not dissatisfied, and after the order was issued, the various departments quickly gathered, assigned tasks, and each received tools to work.

Li Yanzhao also led ten of his subordinates to take a stack of cloth bags, went to the river to find a place with softer soil, and then wielded a shovel and pickaxe, and even dug it with knives and guns. Every time a pile of soil was dug out, Cao Jian and Liu Jiwu propped up the mouth of the bag, and Niu Erzhuang and Qin Dayong took small shovels and shovels and put them into the bag. The rest of the people are struggling to dig up.

Hundreds of people in the field were wielding shovels, pickaxes and swords, struggling to dig the soil, this scene looked a little spectacular, and the more than 100 people who watched it were also puzzled. The crowd had no time to care about anything else, but they were just digging up the soil and bagging it. The same action is repeated one by one, like hundreds of machines, over and over again.

Seven or eight hundred sergeants were busy from dusk until it was getting dark. They were all tired enough, and they had already packed more than a thousand bags of sand. Ma Ping saw that the sergeants were already tired, and the more than 100 people belonging to the Guangwu Army were even more working in the rain, and their bodies were soaked at this time. So he ordered the army to rest for a while, go to the woods to cut some firewood, and try to light a bonfire. But it will be ignited, and it will be extinguished by heavy rain. Seeing this, Ma Ping was dejected. In desperation, he had to order the troops to wash their hands in the river and eat the dry food. He also ordered the soldiers to divide their rations for two days, and collected them and distributed them to the people who had lived in their huts. The people were all moved when they saw this, thanked them again and again, and praised the royal division in front of them.

After eating some dry food, Ma Ping ordered everyone to continue to load sand, and at this time the sky was already dark, but everyone was anxious to work harder. Even Ma Ping himself took a shovel and ran to the river to dig hard. After all, the sin of carrying bags of sand in the rain is not pleasant. Forcibly enduring the discomfort, everyone worked for two more hours, and when the time was approaching, more than 4,000 bags of sand were finally loaded. The soldiers were tired, and many of them had fallen into the muddy water.

Smelling a sigh of sighing all around, Ma Ping was helpless. He couldn't blame the soldiers. I didn't have a good rest last night, and today I marched all kinds of things, digging up the earth and filling the bags. Mo said that he was a soldier, and even he himself felt extremely tired. But things have to be done, and tasks have to be done. In desperation, he kept encouraging the soldiers beside him: "it, don't pretend, I'll throw these dirt bags into the narrowest river over there, fill the river, and then go back to set up tents and rest. ”

After speaking, Ma Ping himself had already picked up a bag of sand, rushed to the narrowest river, and threw the bag of sand on his shoulder. Seeing that the general was doing this, all the sergeants could not help but get up one after another, and each of them carried sandbags and went straight to the narrowest river.

For a while, I could only hear the sound of sandbags entering the water. Everyone struggled to carry sandbags back and forth, and they all had a simple belief in their hearts: "After filling the river, go to rest." ”

There are more than 4,000 sandbags, which is just four or five bags per person. When the sand bags on the shore were swept away, Li Yanzhao rubbed his hands full of dirt and looked at the river with his eyes.

It didn't matter if he rubbed it, but Li Yanzhao felt a hot pain in his palm, and then looked down and took advantage of the night to see that there were several blood blisters on his hands.

The pain of breaking the blood blister made Li Yanzhao grin his teeth. However, looking at the river, which was almost filled with bags of sand, he applauded with satisfaction.

The big project by the riverbank was basically completed, and all the soldiers breathed a sigh of relief, and approached each other to look at the faces of the mud monkeys beside them, and then they all laughed at each other.

After completing the shack project, the Fan Ting engineering team, which was in charge of building the shacks, was ordered to find another place and set up tents for hundreds of horsemen.

The horsemen limped into the tent with each other in their arms, and they were so tired that they didn't even have much strength to stand. After entering the tent, they sat or lay down, unable to care that the ground inside the tent was still wet. A few unbearable sergeants lit small piles of fires in the tent in order to dry their wet clothes, and when Captain Ma Du saw it, he put out the fire and reprimanded him when he entered the tent.

Everyone took off their wet clothes, and each found a place to squeeze together before falling asleep. The ground in the tent was damp, but it was much better than just being covered with sand in the rain. So in this contentment by comparison, hundreds of horsemen, with the exception of a few sentry horses and sergeants guarding their horses, quickly fell asleep and fell into a deep sleep.

Thinking about the big project that this cadre and soldier, including himself, rushed to complete overnight today. A smug smile appeared on the corner of Li Yanzhao's mouth. In a few days, the effects of this major project may cause a sensation in the whole of Liangzhou.

In the imagination and expectation of future achievements, Li Yanzhao closed his eyes and fell into a deep sleep.