Defeat natural disasters with farming

Originally, Ye Yu thought that nothing would happen in their village throughout the winter. After all, everyone stayed in the house obediently now, and there were no people who went out to visit.

However, things did not go as planned, and soon another big event happened. At least one-third of the villagers in the village ran out of salt in their homes.

It’s okay without other seasonings, but it’s impossible without salt. A lack of salt can lead to fatigue, lack of energy, and even death in severe cases. Therefore, these people began to visit villagers who still had salt at home, and wanted to use food and the like in exchange for food. Take it with a pinch of salt.

Many people came to Ye Yu's house, but there was actually not much salt left in their house. This was because salt was a food controlled by the imperial court, and selling salt in private was a felony for merchants, ranging from beheading their heads to implicating the entire family.

At that time, their family bought all the salt they could buy when they went to stockpile salt. Even so, they could only use it for two or three years if they saved it.

After discussion, the Ye family decided to exchange some of the remaining salt. After all, they also have a variety of miso, which can also be used as salt.

But this can only treat the symptoms but not the root cause. There is no way to make salt. After a while, their village will still face the dilemma of salt shortage.

In this regard, Ye Yu read many books in the space, and he learned from the books that salt is divided into sea salt, lake salt (pool salt), exposed rock salt, well salt, etc. according to the way it is obtained.

It stands to reason that sea salt is the most suitable for large-scale salt production. However, the ocean is far away from them. It may take several months to walk, and the gain outweighs the gain.Lake salt also requires a special terrain, and Ye Yu determined that there is no such lake near their village.But there is some hope of finding rock salt and well salt.

When Father Ye called the villagers for a meeting, he divided up the task of finding rock salt and well salt. Because this matter was related to the life of the village, all the villagers listened carefully.

Someone asked: "How can I find rock salt and well salt?"

Ye Yu took two steps forward and explained: "There is the easiest way to tell the difference, that is to see if the animals lick the stone collectively, if there is, it proves that there should be salt near the stone, you can dig down to see .”

Of course, this method is not absolute. After all, animals may simply lick stones, but this is better than looking around like headless flies.

The villagers can pay more attention when they go hunting in the mountains, in case the blind cat encounters a dead mouse.

If they can't find it all the time, they have to make preparations to go to the seaside. The road is afraid that they will sleep in the wind and sleep, and if they are not careful, they may die on the road. Fortunately, when Chu Xufeng came, he brought two horses with him, and there were donkeys in the village. A car is much better than walking all the way.

The rest of the people kept Ye Yu's words firmly in their hearts, and some of them didn't remember them, so they turned their heads and asked the people around them to repeat them.

The ancestral hall was in a mess, and it didn't calm down until Ye Zhouyuan suddenly spoke.

He said: "We can go to Heihe County to have a look first. According to Uncle Qin, half of the county town had collapsed when they left, but we don't know what's going on now."

Father Ye pondered for a while, and said: "This is a good idea. If someone might give us some salt, the county has more salt than us."

The other villagers nodded their heads in agreement.

At the meeting, it was finally decided to send six people to the county to explore the way first, namely Father Ye, Ye Zhong, Ye Zhouyuan, Master Wu and Chu Xufeng, and the remaining one was Jia Yi, Chu Xufeng's bodyguard.

Ye Yu also wanted to go outside to have a look, so he was added to the team that went out at the end.

At the end, there were seven people. They sat on two sledges pulled by donkeys. The sledges are a kind of driving tool unique to their side in winter. They have shafts and bottoms, but they don’t have wheels. Smooth wooden poles glide across the snow.

Today is a fine day. The sun, which had been covered by overcast clouds for a month, finally showed up slightly. Although it failed to raise the outside temperature, the sun always gave some warmth to the body.

Ye Yu was wearing a mink fur vest and an ermine jacket. He was bulging, with ear protection on his head, and a pair of woolen gloves on his hands. He looked fully armed. Even so, he still felt a little cold, but fortunately he was on the sledge With a layer of woolen blankets and water bladders to warm his hands, he can still hold on.

However, the group of people was forced to stop just a quarter of an hour after they set off, because a deep pit suddenly appeared in front of them. According to Ye Yu's visual inspection, it was two to thirty meters deep. Standing on the edge of the pit and looking down, even he is not afraid of heights I felt heart palpitations when I looked at it.

It's dark, and the sides are still very steep, and you can't go down or go up.

Master Wu said in surprise, "When we came here, the pit wasn't as deep as it is now." After speaking, he looked to the side again, "It doesn't seem to be so wide."

They couldn't see the boundary of the pit at a glance, it seemed to extend all the way to the horizon.

Jia Yi said: "It seems that we can only bypass this pit."

This detour increased the journey that originally took only one hour to two and a half hours.

Halfway through the circle, the two donkeys were exhausted. At this time, Father Ye looked far away and could vaguely see the boundary of the pit, so he said, "Let's rest for a while, eat something before continuing."

When they got off the sledge, Father Ye took out a jug filled with goat's milk, and poured the goat's milk into a pot on top of a small stove heated by coals.

Seeing this, Ye Yu threw the milk tofu in the cloth pocket. These milk tofu are freshly made, with a little sugar added, and the mouth is smooth and sweet. As soon as the hot milk slipped down her throat, her body instantly became hot stand up.

Not afraid of the heat, Ye Xu poured the goat's milk in two or three mouthfuls, and then walked over to feed the two donkeys to eat bean dregs cakes.

Seeing that Chu Xufeng finished drinking a bowl quickly, Ye Yu said, "I still have a few pieces of milk tofu here."

He handed the hard frozen milk tofu to Chu Xufeng, and ate a small piece himself, "The hard milk tofu has a special taste."

Chu Xufeng took a bite of the milk tofu, and then praised: "It's delicious."

Ye Yu chatted with Chu Xufeng while eating, "Do you think there are still people in the county?"

Chu Xufeng replied: "There must be some, but I don't know how many people there are."

At this time, he changed the subject and said: "Since Dilong turned over, the imperial court has not sent officials to collect taxes. In such a chaotic situation, it is worth pondering who will be the master of Heihe County."

Master Wu, who was listening to them, nodded in agreement and said: "That's the reason, the capital has become like that, if someone has a heart, it is very likely that he will have the idea of ​​becoming a king on his own."

All in all, the world has changed.

-

The group only rested for a quarter of an hour before getting up and continuing towards the county seat. After some time, everyone was blown through by the cold wind. They finally saw the gate of Heihe county seat, but this surprised Ye Yu. Most of the originally majestic and mighty city walls collapsed, the city gates were wide open, and there was silence everywhere, without any sound at all.

Could it be that there is no one in the county?

With such doubts in mind, they continued to walk inside vigilantly. To their surprise, there seemed to be no one inside, and the ruins of the collapsed house had been buried by a thick layer of snow.

Jia Yi stepped forward and gestured twice, then said seriously: "Looking at the thickness of the snow, I'm afraid no one has shoveled it since it started snowing this year."

The cold wind whizzed by, making it even more desolate.

Just when they thought they were going to return in vain, Jia Yi suddenly heard small movements from the side. He looked over like a torch, and saw a man in a patched jacket crawling out of a ruin .

The man was startled when he saw them, his eyes were extremely vigilant, he held the stick tightly with one hand, and protected the cloth bag on his chest with the other.

Father Ye standing behind happened to be blocked by Master Wu. The more he looked at the man, the more familiar he became. He was speechless for a while before shouting in surprise: "Brother Chen!"

The man was Chen Yuan, who was obviously taken aback when he heard the call, and when he saw Father Ye's face, he suddenly relaxed a little, "Brother Ye!"

The two could be regarded as reunited after a long absence, and immediately patted each other on the back excitedly.

After the filming, Chen Yuan asked: "Brother Ye, why did you come to the county?"

Father Ye sighed and replied: "Oh, it's not because Dilong turned over, many people died in our village because of this, and there is no news from outside in the past few years, so I wanted to go to the county to see what happened. .”

Chen Yuan also sighed, "It's the same here. At that time, Dilong turned over and half of the county collapsed. Well, did you see any cracks on the ground? It was caused by the earthquake at that time, and I don't know how many people died. "

Father Ye then asked, "Then you don't live here now?"

"I can't stop. At that time, some people said that since the ground was cracked, we didn't know what would happen if we continued to live, so we all moved to other places." Chen Yuan replied: "As for the outside world you want to know In terms of the situation, I can only say that we were probably abandoned, and the county magistrate Zheng's family ran away early."

When Ye Yu heard the name of County Magistrate Zheng, he subconsciously glanced at Chu Xufeng, only to see that his expression was calm and calm.

"Then why are you coming to the county now?" Seeing that Chen Yuan's lips were chapped, Father Ye quickly handed him the water bag, "Drink some water to moisten your throat before we talk."

Chen Yuan took the water bag and was not polite to him, raised his head to drink water, wiped his mouth and said: "I am ashamed to say, I only know how to make wontons, and now I have gone to other places to open up wasteland and farm. I really can't do it. Therefore, there was not much food harvested last year, so in order to exchange food with other people, I could only go to the county town to find out if there is any usable food in the ruins so I could pick it up and exchange for some rations."

He asked again, "What about your village?"

Father Ye revealed quietly: "Our village is backed by mountains and rivers, and we can still live on, but there is a lack of salt. I came here to see if I can buy salt."

Chen Yuan's eyes suddenly lit up when he heard the words, "Master Shen is in charge of us now, and there seems to be some salt in his place, why don't you go with me and see if we can exchange some salt."

He thought for a while and added: "We are very short of food here."

Father Ye exchanged glances with the others, and seeing that they had no objections, he nodded in agreement.

The group of them followed Chen Yuan out of the county town. Ye Yu was almost dizzy before arriving at the destination after twists and turns along the way.

It was a piece of gravel houses, and there were not many houses at first glance, scattered around a more solid stone house in the middle.

Chen Yuan pointed to the stone house in the middle and said, "That's where Master Shen's family lives."

After speaking, he beckoned to his youngest son, handed him the cloth bag in his hand, and asked him to take it home.

He himself led Father Ye and the others to the stone house. In fact, the Ye family and the Shen family were related. Back then, Father Ye rescued Shen Qingyu, Shen Fu's son, from the kidnapper. Therefore, Shen Fu would bring Shen Qingyu with him every New Year's Eve. Happy New Year to Father Ye, they didn't disconnect until Dilong turned around.

I don't know if Master Shen that Chen Yuan is talking about is Shen Fu's father or himself.

It was Shen Fu himself.

After getting permission, Father Ye opened the door and went in. He saw Shen Fu sitting in front of the desk in thick clothes. He was much more haggard than the last time he saw him. white hair.

"Brother Ye!" Shen Fu stood up in surprise.

"Long time no see." Father Ye clasped his fists.

"It's been a long time." Shen Fu said somewhat wistfully, "The last time we met was a few years ago."

Several people were ushered to sit down on stools, and someone brought tea and snacks.

"I don't have anything good to entertain you here, only a little old tea and mung bean cake." Shen Fu sighed and said, "Don't be disgusted."

Father Ye said, "It's already very good."

After drinking a cup of tea, Father Ye really explained the purpose of his visit, "I wonder if you have any extra salt?"

Shen Fu thought for a while and said: "There is salt, but part of it can be divided."

Speaking of this, he smiled wryly, "You can also see the situation here now. There are not many households. When I planted the fields last year, for some reason, many seeds did not germinate. Coupled with the weather, the harvested food was very little, so Many families have chosen to leave."

After the bedding was completed, he said, "Grain can be exchanged for salt."

Father Ye asked, "How much salt do you have in exchange?"

"It's actually not much. The salt is all picked up from the county town, and it can provide about fifty catties." Shen Fu's words revealed a message, that is, the county town is really in chaos.

"One catty of salt is exchanged for fifty catties of grain. It doesn't matter if it's sorghum noodles or corn noodles. Of course, I don't mind if you give me white noodles or white rice." Shen Fu joked.

In fact, this is a normal exchange rate. After all, sometimes a catty of salt can even be exchanged for a hundred catties of grain, and even at low times it can be worth twenty catties, and a total of [-] catties of salt is really not a small amount.

Therefore, Father Ye just calculated in his heart, nodded and said, "Yes."

The grain harvested by Yejia Village in recent years is basically not enough to eat. There are old grains every year, and some of them are exchanged for salt. They should be happy to see the result.

Father Ye said, "We'll bring the food over by this time tomorrow."

"Okay." Shen Fu breathed a sigh of relief in his heart. With these grains, they will have a much better life. They will start farming again after the snow melts, hoping to have a good harvest then.