บท 28: Childish
บรรณาธิการ: Dragon Boat Translation
At night, the group rested outside the city gate.
Su Ying took out the baked pancake she had bought from her bag and shared it with everyone to eat with water. She also took out a piece of dried tiger meat. Everyone was injured today. Since Xiao Jin and Su Ying fell off the cliff, they couldn't rest well. Now that they had returned safely, they could finally have a good night's sleep.
However, it started to rain again in the middle of the night.
While leaning against the carriage, Su Ying opened her eyes and saw someone walking towards her in the dark.
Because of the rain, people in the group woke up one after another.
"Hey, look over there. Why are so many people coming over?" A prisoner pointed toward the official road outside the city gate.
The others heard his voice and looked towards the main road. Sure enough, they saw a dense crowd of people walking over.
In the night, those black figures gradually appeared under the gray moonlight.
Their faces were pale and haggard, and they came to the city gate like walking corpses. Seeing that the city gate was not open, they found a place to sit on the ground. They looked even more miserable than the exiled prisoners.
Su Ying stood up and frowned at them.
The noise woke up many people.
"They are refugees." He Shouyi looked at those people and said. As he spoke, he had come close to the side of the carriage, and his expression became vigilant.
"I'll go and ask what's going on," Su Ying said after some thought.
She walked to those people and stopped an old man walking towards the city gate. The old man stared at her vigilantly and did not say a word.
Su Ying took a piece of food and quickly stuffed it into the old man's hands. "What's going on? Why are you all coming to Yunshui City so late at night?"
The old man looked at the food in his hand and quickly hid it before saying: "There was a flood where we lived. We escaped from the village. After days of heavy rain, the dam in the upper reaches of River Wu cracked. Our village was flooded. We could only go north." With that, the man ignored Su Ying and found a place near the city gate to sit down so that he could enter the city as soon as the city gate opened in the morning.
Su Ying returned to the carriage. Other than the three children, everyone else was awake.
Su Ying told them what the old man had said.
Xiao Jin's face darkened. "Crossing River Wu is the only way to the northern wilderness."
He Shouyi's face also hardened. "If the dam upstream collapsed, we may be unable to cross."
According to the schedule, they had to cross River Wu first, arrive at Yue City, and then go northwest.
However, if they can't cross River Wu, their path will be blocked, and there wasn't another route.
This realization made the few of them fall silent. Where could their group of a few hundred people go? After a great disaster, there would be significant other threats. Could they escape?
The thought of this made one's scalp numb.
The arrival of the disaster refugees made the originally silent group even more somber.
The bailiffs also felt something was wrong and immediately picked a few strong prisoners to guard the supply carts. They even had people pull the carts to Su Ying's side, following the carriage.
Li Da had encountered such a situation once in the past. These homeless disaster refugees who had nothing to eat would not care if you were from the Imperial Court or anywhere. They could even eat you if they had nothing else!
Looking at the increasing number of refugees, Li Da immediately ordered them to get ready to set off, away from these people.
However, as they walked, they saw a steady stream of disaster refugees heading toward Yunshui City. They all wanted to enter the city to hide from the disaster. But there were too many. The government would not let them in to ensure the safety of the city's residences.
"Ah!"
Zhang Cuiniang suddenly cried out. Su Ying looked in the direction of the sound and saw a corpse not far from the group, swollen in a puddle.
Su Ying furrowed her brows and told Zhang Cuiniang not to look and to focus on the road ahead.
At this moment, the bailiff scouting the way in front came over on his horse. He ran to Li Da and nimbly got off the horse. "Boss, the dock crossing River Wu has been flooded. We'll be making a wasted trip if we go there now."
Li Da spat. "I'm truly unlucky this year. I've encountered all kinds of nice jobs."
The dock had been flooded. How could they cross the river? What was more, the rain continued to fall. Where were they going to find a place to stay?
"Boss, let's go back. There's an abandoned temple outside Yunshui City. It's big." A bailiff suggested.
They couldn't cross the river or let everyone stay in the rain. They could only find a place to rest first. Li Da nodded and led the people back in the direction of the dilapidated temple.
However, they were not the only ones who could think of resting in the dilapidated temple. When they got there, there were already many refugees inside.
When the refugees saw many people come in, they stared at them warily.
For the convenience of management, Li Da asked the bailiffs to take the refugees to the side hall next to the main hall, and the prisoners were grouped in the main hall, which could accommodate hundreds of people.
Su Ying stopped the carriage in the courtyard and carried Ji and Ling down. She also took the things from the carriage.
Jiang Yang took Xiao Jin and chose a relatively quiet place to settle.
Su Ying carried the two little ones inside and was immediately greeted with a pungent, foul smell. It was so strong that her eyes started to swell.
Although the hall was large enough, it was still packed to the brim with a few hundred people.
Su Ying put the two children down. "There are too many refugees outside. We'll just eat simply for the next few days." She meant that they wouldn't start a fire to cook for the next few days so as not to attract attention.
Everyone agreed with Su Ying's idea.
Su Ying took out some medicine and handed it to Ji. "Ji, come here. This is the medicine you have to take today. Although your injuries are much better now, they haven't fully healed. You have to continue taking medicine before you recover."
Ji opened his eyes, precisely the same as Xiao Jin's, and looked at her. He felt that Su Ying was evil. But this bad person had saved him. Ji's feelings were very complicated now. He wanted to continue hating Su Ying, but he felt that wasn't right.
As a result, his small face was wrinkled, almost like a dehydrated cucumber.
Su Ying looked at his conflicted expression and decided to tease him. "If you don't take medicine, your injuries won't heal. If they don't heal, you won't be able to protect your father and Ling. Aren't you afraid they'll be taken away by bad people?"
When Ji heard her words, his eyes widened. "I will definitely protect daddy and Ling! Hmph!"
He took medicine from Su Ying and swallowed it.
"Oh!" After the pill's sugar coating melted, the boy's brows furrowed together for bitterness.
"Hahahaha." Su Ying chuckled at his adorable look.
Ji wasn't in a good mood. He turned around and burrowed into Xiao Jin's arms.
Xiao Jin coldly glanced at Su Ying. "Childish."
Su Ying's smile didn't falter. She raised her eyebrows for provocation. "That was for the child."
Xiao Jin took a water bag and fed Ji water. He didn't even spare her a glance.
Su Ying smiled in amusement. Like father like son. Of course, Ji was still much cuter than Xiao Jin.
"Sir, please give us something to eat. We haven't eaten for three days."
"Get lost! Get lost! There's no food for you here. Get lost."
Su Ying turned around and saw that many refugees stopped the bailiffs outside the door.
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