"The last general also sent people to Zhejia and Yangjiajie towns to buy grain and grass, but the state capitals under the jurisdiction of these two Jiejie towns are all small and have many people, and the people have no grain in stock, and military food needs to be borrowed from the adults and the Zheyang family. Chase looked at Wu Yingying, who was frowning, and felt very uncomfortable, Wu Yingying handed over the important task of buying grain and grass to him, who knew that he was incompetent, and in the end he had to let the adults come out and ask others for it.

"Okay, I'll repair the book and borrow food from the Zheyang family. Wu Yingying nodded, looked at Chase who turned around and retreated, his mind turned, and he stopped him again: "At the same time, contact the Shuozhou Khitan, and say that my Lanzhou has prepared the gold that is still owed to redeem the Han people, and I will buy another batch of wintering grain from them." ”

Ten days later, the news from Daizhou and Fuzhou confirmed Wu Yingying's worries, Liu Jiye and Zhi Yuqing both regretted the food crisis in Lanzhou, although they are Jiezhen, there is no problem in sheltering a Jiangyang thief who is an outlaw in the rivers and lakes, but it is very difficult to disobey the will of the imperial court to restrain Lanzhou, and the grain and grass in Fuzhou and Daizhou also depend on the imperial court.

In their letters, Zhi Yuqing and Liu Jiye explained the reason why they could not borrow grain, and at the same time each euphemistically suggested that Lanzhou had better make some kind of submission to the emperor of Song or Han in exchange for the understanding of the imperial court, after all, the lifeblood of the border towns was in the hands of the imperial court.

"Let all the people in the city go out of the city to collect wild vegetables from tomorrow. After reading the letter, Wu Yingying ordered Chase with a blank face, "Also, select the soldiers and people who are good at pasture, draw a figure, and let the people collect the grass seeds and hand them over to the baggage camp to hide properly." Deliver all the gold that is still owed to the Khitan in Shuozhou, and at the same time inform them that in addition to grain and grass, I will also buy a large number of livestock. "Xindao, there is a shortage of grain this winter, and there is no grain seed left, and in the spring of next year, I can't say that I have to plant grass to raise cattle and sheep.

In the afternoon of the same day, more than 10,000 households went out of the city to dig up rat food and collect wild vegetables and grass seeds; in order to increase the enthusiasm of the households, the rations of each household were reduced from two liters to one liter, and the rest were replaced by wild vegetables and rat food dug by themselves. For this kind of treatment, the people have no complaints, after all, there is no free food in the world, the Lanzhou army can distribute a liter of rations every day in their eyes is already a great good deed, just survive this winter, everything sprouts in spring, no matter what, you can find something to eat in the wild.

In order to prevent the households from making trouble outside the city, the commander of the left army, Xin Gu, took fifty cavalry soldiers to patrol outside the city, and when they arrived at a place, people were sleepy and horses were tired, so they rested in a forest, and the soldiers drank water and ate dry food, and watched with great interest a female household digging rat food in the fields on the hillside outside, they could see the situation outside the forest, but the people on the hillside could not see the inside of the forest, the wind on the hillside was very strong, blowing the woman's skirt and flying, it seemed slim, so that the soldiers looked very interested.

At this moment, Zhu Huilan was kneeling on the slope not far away, carefully digging a rat hole with sharpened thick branches. She is a woman, although she is close to the city gate on that day, her foot strength is far inferior to that of a man, and she only won a thin piece of land far away from Lanzhou City, but the area is very large, and there are several rat holes in the ground. Rats are smarter than humans, and in autumn they can always find a lot of food and fruit to store in their burrows.

In the beginning, Zhu Huilan, like all other women, was very afraid of rats, let alone digging for rat food. She just went out of the city to collect wild vegetables and grass seeds, but it was late autumn, the grass and trees were withering, and there were too few edible wild vegetables, and even if there were, they were dug up by those men who were the first to get there. One liter of grain a day, even porridge is not enough. One day, she saw a household digging a large rat hole, and in addition to the young children of a few rats, the grain and wild fruits were actually half a cloth bag. Looking at the heavy cloth bag, Zhu Huilan made a heart, and also began to dig up the rat food, while digging, she was terrified that the mouse would suddenly run out of the cave, not to mention biting herself, just imagining the furry appearance, feeling that there were a pair of dark and bright eyes staring at herself hatefully in the rat hole, Zhu Huilan felt cold all over her body, and wanted to give up several times, but the hunger in her belly forced her to persevere, and continued to dig little by little, sweat trickled down her forehead, and fell on the cold ground one by one.

After all, the imaginary rat did not rush out of the rat hole, but quietly slipped away from another hole. In the face of the strength of human beings, rats can only dodge. Looking at the granary full of voles, Zhu Huilan cheered and jumped up happily.

At this moment, a mysterious voice came from behind her: "The little lady dug up the rat food, should it be handed over to the owner of this land?" ”

Zhu Huilan looked back, but it was a hateful-looking male household, holding an empty cloth bag in his hand, staring viciously at the dug rat hole under his feet. She immediately sneered at each other: "This piece of land belongs to the old lady, what are you pretending to be here?" subconsciously waved the branch in her hand, trying to scare the person away.

The man smiled shyly: "How can the little lady see the outside world like this, you and I might as well cooperate with each other, what do you share with each other?"

Zhu Huilan didn't want him to be strong, so he had to take a step back and watch this man put all the food in the rat's hole into the cloth pocket in his hand. Who knew that after this man tied his pockets tightly, he still refused to leave, but took a step forward, and said with a smile: "Why does the little lady go out of the city alone to forage for food, why don't we be companions?"

Zhu Huilan secretly regretted that she shouldn't go out of the city alone, and with a thought, she took two steps back, and said in a loud voice: "If you mess around like this again, my man will know, but he will settle accounts with you with a knife!"

The man saw that her face was awe-inspiring, and he hesitated for a while and didn't dare to step forward, Zhu Huilan was afraid that he would violate him, so he only held the branch tightly in front of him. The man thought for a while, and said with a smile: "The little lady is not coaxing me, if you have a man, how can you be willing to let a little beauty like you come out alone?" Zhu Huilan was used to seeing all kinds of people, listening to his words, he knew that he had already believed three points in his heart, so he sneered: "My man eats military rations, and he is on duty today, there are dozens of men under his hands, all of them are fierce and vicious, and they don't blink an eye when they kill people, if you dare to come nonsense, you will definitely die an ugly death!" The woman in the wind and dust is the best at hypocrisy, or how to deceive the happy guests to happily offer money, the man eats her scared, to really believe seven or eight points, now all the households in Lanzhou are strictly controlled by the soldiers, offending the officers' families is not a joke, now it is about to enter winter, is to flee from Lanzhou with a heart, I am afraid that there is only one way to die of cold and starvation.