The child's steps were vain, but the idea of fleeing was very firm, and in the thatched house, as if something terrible was there, forced him to stagger out on his lower legs.

After a few steps, he "banged" and hit Jiang Xinghuo's thigh, if it weren't for Jiang Xinghuo's quick hand to support him, he almost fell to the ground.

Inside the house, a woman with a pale face reluctantly walked out with a hard hand on the door, and when she saw Jiang Xinghuo and the others, her first reaction was not to negotiate with them to get her son back, but to be frightened.

"You guys get out of here!"

The woman's voice was not hoarse, and it was evident that there was no shortage of water, but she was a little weak.

Jiang Xinghuo looked at her bulging belly and understood something in his heart. Either I was full of water, or I ate something that I couldn't digest.

Seeing that Jiang Xinghuo and the others were not leaving, the woman wanted to say something, but there was no need to say anything.

In the porridge shed behind him, more than a dozen green-skinned scoundrels who had eaten enough porridge walked over shirtless.

To Jiang Xinghuo's surprise, what happened next was not the face-slapping gangster plot of "the local ruffians in the village bullied the orphans and widows, and the national teachers passed by to help each other".

The scoundrel with a tiger tattoo on his head, looked at the clothes of several people, and said quite respectfully.

"I just saw a few distinguished guests from afar, and I didn't dare to come forward to disturb you, so it can be seen that a few of you came to Aunt Liu's house, but you have to take the liberty of asking, I don't know which landlord Aunt Liu still owes a debt? If it's not much, a few of our brothers will pay it back for her, and you won't have to go in. ”

After that, he pointed to the woman's house, looked through the door panel, and said "the house is surrounded by four walls".

"Passing by."

Jiang Xinghuo was very sincere: "It's really passing by." ”

The leader of the 'a tiger' called him so, and when he saw this, he was also refreshed, but he just clenched his fists and said: "Then please leave the village quickly, I'm afraid I won't be able to get out later." ”

"Why?"

Jiang Xinghuo didn't think it was a big deal, so he asked patiently.

Before the 'tiger' could answer, he heard movement in the distance, but his face changed suddenly.

Without further explanation with Jiang Xinghuo, more than a dozen green-skinned scoundrels returned to the porridge shed under the big locust tree, and drew some homemade grafting weapons, such as sickles and long sticks.

Then, under the leadership of 'a tiger', he walked to the north of the village.

The woman's complexion became more and more gray, but the next moment, looking at her son who was lying on the ground in pain, she panicked, and there was a hint of anger in her eyes.

"Miwa, bear with me."

The woman took off her son's shirt and took a twig and opened his eyes to the son, who was holding his stomach and trying to roll on the ground.

"It's coming, it's coming"

The child did not cooperate, the woman became more and more anxious, and the child who couldn't pull out the feces was even more painful.

"Just bear with it for a while, it'll be fine right away!" The woman said and pulled out with more force.

"Wow-"

The child wailed and cried, as if he wanted to shout out all the grievances in his heart.

Jiang Xinghuo couldn't stand it anymore, so he took out something from his arms and handed it to the woman.

"Use this."

The woman took it, looked at the clean and clear grease in the small bottle, and was stunned for a moment.

She had never seen such a good oil in her life.

"Hurry up and use it."

The woman did not hesitate any longer, and with the help of the fish-man ointment, the child quickly expelled the feces clogged in the stomach.

Seeing that the worry about her son's life was lifted, the woman who was not good at words kowtowed to Jiang Xinghuo again and again.

And Jiang Xinghuo at this time, he could finally ask the doubts in his heart just now.

"Those people just now, aren't they going to be desperate?"

The woman was stunned for a moment, and then said: "Your noble, you have misunderstood, they are all friends and nephews of the late husband. ”

If you can be friends with these people, don't you think it will be some kind of diligent farmer? Most of them are prodigals, or want to be chivalrous.

"Then I see that they all drank porridge."

Song Li next to him is not easy to say too much, but the meaning is also obvious.

Your mother and son are in such difficulty, why are these friends, sons and nephews unwilling to share a mouthful of porridge?

A quarrel was heard from the north end of the village.

The woman's expression was a little anxious.

Jiang Xinghuo opened his mouth and said, "Tell us what happened, maybe we can help." ”

The woman gritted her teeth and told a story about what had happened in the past few days.

——————

The woman's husband was born in the eleventh year of Hongwu, and this year is the first year of Yongle, and he is twenty-five years old, and his name is Li Liuqi.

But Li Liuqi, an old bachelor, has never married, his family is too poor, not only can he not afford to marry a daughter-in-law, but his father's own children have to be sent out, that is, stepsons or daughters, so as to reduce the burden of rations.

It wasn't until last year that she married a woman who had died of a husband, who was called "Aunt Liu" by the green-skinned scoundrels.

Originally, the whole family could barely make a living by working as tenant farmers for the landlord in the next village, but this spring there was a severe drought, and the green seedlings withered into yellow seedlings, and the yellow seedlings were washed away by a transit flood from a river diversion.

In addition to him and his mother-in-law and children, Li Liuqi's family now has parents, eldest brother, sister-in-law, nephew, and second brother, a total of nine people, and the rest of the brothers and sisters have all passed or married.

And the rice tank at home is only a shallow layer of rice crawling with dust.

The story comes to the last day of Li Liuqi.

"Squeak~"

There was a tooth-aching sound from the old unlubricated doorway, and his mother, Chen, walked in with her left hand behind her back and a clay bowl with an open mouth in her right hand.

She was very weak, and in just a few steps, she had to hold on to the window lattice for a long time.

"Shh

Li Liuqi took the mud bowl in front of him, inside was a small half bowl of turbid soup, and some meat foam floated in the middle, seeing that Li Liuqi was still stunned, Chen hurriedly urged: "Hurry up and drink!" ”

"What kind of soup is this, have you drunk it?"

Chen looked at the most distressed old man, squeezed out a smile, and said: "The yellow dog stewed at the head of the village, my father and mother drank it, you can drink it quickly." ”

Li Liuqi didn't have any doubts, he was really hungry, his body was tall and majestic, he had studied with his apprentice when he was young, practiced martial arts, and had also wandered the rivers and lakes, but he didn't mix up the fame, but he also had some prestige in ten miles and eight towns, especially he couldn't bear to be hungry, so he didn't hesitate to drink it.

The small half bowl of warm broth went down to his stomach, and even the bone residue was chewed and swallowed, Li Liuqi regained some strength and no longer had gold stars in his eyes.

"Thank you, mother."

Carefully looking at her energetic little son, as if to remember his appearance in her heart, Chen smiled contentedly, she picked up the bowl with one hand, put the other in front of her stomach, and turned her back to walk out of the house.

"Bang Dang~"

The smoke and dust rose, the clay bowl shattered and sputtered on the ground, and before Chen could cross the threshold, he fainted and fell unconscious.

"Mother!" "Mother!"

Two anxious shouts sounded inside and outside the house at the same time, and Li Liuqi and the second brother staggered to Chen's side together.

When Li Liuqi saw Chen's left hand on his abdomen, the few fingers that were broken together, he seemed to remember something, his face turned iron-blue, and his stomach turned over for a while, and he was about to vomit.

"Can't vomit! Swallow it back! ”

The second brother said viciously, and directly pinched Li Liuqi's Adam's apple with his hand, and pushed the nausea back hard.

"Mother-"

In an instant, Li Liuqi seemed to be blind, his vision was white, his ears became inaudible, and big tears fell.

"Get up, this is my mother's decision, you have to live, your nephew and sister-in-law are still waiting for you to bring rice home!"

The second brother picked Li Liuqi up, and it took a long time for Li Liuqi's eyesight to recover, he looked at the strange and familiar home, the father and the eldest brother were lying on the bed hungry and couldn't get up, the sister-in-law was holding her nephew who was a few months old, and her daughter-in-law was looking at him timidly from the door of the firewood room with her ex-husband's baby.

He helped Chen to lie down on the kang, boiled some rice soup that could be counted, and waited for a long time before Chen woke up leisurely, but he couldn't say anything weak.

"Let's go, go to the landlord's house with the second brother to borrow rice."

He and his second brother walked all the way, and they didn't go far, and they passed a village, and the other end of Guzhuang Village was the landlord's home.

The landlord's house is naturally different from his thatched house, the magnificent three-in, three-out tiled house, and the outside is also built with a thick wall, and the vicious dog at the door roars wildly at Li Liuqi, and a family member hears the dog barking and pokes his head out.

After waiting for a long time, wearing a blue printed copper coin robe cut from brocade, the fat-headed and big-eared landlord came to the door.

The landlord was carrying a heavy bag of rice in his hand, and he looked at the two brothers of the Li family who came to the door with a smile and said one thing.

After the silence, the landlord asked, "Have you decided?" Who's coming? ”

Li Liuqi held the second brother's hand and said in a deep voice: "Second brother, let the mother live." ”

"Okay."

The second brother, who was ashamed in his heart, nodded heavily, took the rice bag from Landlord Fan's hand, turned his head and strode away.

A drop of water fell to the ground and was scalded in an instant.

The family entered the door with Li Liuqi in his left and right bags, and the door of the Fan landlord's house was closed, and the sunlight was isolated behind him, forming a stark contrast between light and dark.

To Li Liuqi's surprise, Landlord Fan did not do anything to him immediately, but placed him in the firewood room, and even gave him half a black and hard steamed bun at noon.

Li Liuqi slowly licked and ate the steamed bun mixed with wheat bran and sand grains with saliva, at this time, there was a movement in the mansion of the landlord Fan, Li Liuqi hid the steamed bun that was as hard as a stone in his arms, and leaned on the window to listen to the conversation outside.

An unfamiliar voice was greeting the landlord Fan: "Huang County ordered the little one to personally thank Master Fan, he received the things, and this matter must be done for Master Fan." ”

Landlord Fan said with a smile: "Where and where, the contemptible godson has no way, so he caused a big disaster and killed the people in the town by mistake." I also want to thank Huang County for the forbearance, come, send people all the way hard, careful thinking is not respectful. ”

"Oops! Master Fan is too polite, how can this be the person who blames Ling Gongzi, can Master Fan find it? ”

After a period of fake pushing, the messenger asked.

Master Fan said with a smile: "I found it, and the slut's family agreed to a bag of rice, and it was encircled in the firewood room." ”

"Okay, then we'll take it."

Two messengers wearing soap robes broke in, and when they saw that Li Liuqi was so majestic, holding shackles and shackles, they were also a little hesitant.

The daylight was dim, and the landlord still looked like a smiling tiger, and he said softly: "Think about your family members who are about to starve to death." ”

Li Liuqi sneered, didn't say a word, and stretched out his hand to let the messenger put on shackles.

Seeing that this kid knew each other, the two poor people also breathed a sigh of relief, otherwise if they really started, with the iron ruler on their waists, it was really hard to say whether they could beat this sturdy young man.

"Master, let's stay, I'll wait for this kid to go back to the county office."

(End of chapter)