Chapter 1981: Qianqiu Festival (1)
It took only one day for Yinggeer to find out the truth about Liu Xi and Juhua.
After Caiwei learned about the cause and effect of their relationship, she was sincerely happy for them. Unfortunately, the capital was thousands of miles away from Tongzhou, and she couldn't go there to meet them for a while. She could only wish them well from afar...
A month later, Caiwei summoned Mo Shuya and said regretfully: "I have already found out that Liu Xi unfortunately encountered robbers on his way out of Beijing last year and has died..."
Caiwei felt very guilty for saying this about Liu Xi, but in order to stop Mo Shuya's thoughts, she had to say this. Otherwise, with Mo Shuya's impulsive personality, she might do something crazy.
Mo Shuya was so shocked by the news of Liu Xi's death that she burst into tears and almost fainted. In the end, she left Shouxian Palace in a daze, and even forgot to perform the most basic farewell ceremony to Caiwei.
However, Caiwei would not blame her for this, and only hoped that the little girl could get over this matter quickly.
In fact, if Liu Xi had not married Juhua, Caiwei would be very happy to help Mo Shuya and Liu Xi, but Juhua was luckier than Mo Shuya, and took the lead and married Liu Xi luckily. Liu Xi was a modern man, and his head was also filled with modern ideas. He would not have three wives and four concubines like the men of this era. Since he married Juhua, he would be responsible for her and the children and treat them well for the rest of his life.
Juhua's marriage to Liu Xi was undoubtedly the best choice in her life, much better than marrying Li Sheng or Mo Zili...
In a flash, more than two months passed quickly, and God still didn't rain a drop. In many places, the ground was cracked, the water level of rivers and lakes dropped, and even dried up. Crops were naturally severely affected. Although most areas planted drought-resistant crops, the severely affected areas could already see the future trend----there would be a large reduction in production or even no harvest.
Fortunately, the people have been planting seeds issued by the court in the past two years, and the annual grain output is very high. Therefore, every household has stored grain. In addition, His Majesty promised to open the warehouse and release grain when the people are short of food. Therefore, the people are very relieved. Everyone knows that His Majesty has stored a lot of grain in the past two years, so there is no panic of disaster.
In August, the drought still showed no signs of relief, and another disaster came.
The ancients said: Locusts are extremely droughty. Locusts like warm and dry weather. The long-term drought in the Great Jin Kingdom really caused a serious locust plague.
In ancient times, locust plagues were one of the three major natural disasters along with floods and droughts. In particular, locust plagues always followed droughts. The overwhelming locusts ate vegetation in large quantities, causing food production to be cut off and starvation to float everywhere. I don’t know how many peasant uprisings were triggered and how many changes of imperial power were caused. The word "locust" means "insect king", which shows how highly the ancients evaluated it.
Locusts are good at flying. They can generally migrate 600 kilometers in groups, and some can migrate thousands of kilometers. Once adult locusts take off in groups and feed everywhere, the consequences are disastrous.
It is estimated that a high-density migratory group of up to 40 billion locusts can eat 80,000 tons of various foods a day, which is equivalent to the annual rations of 400,000 people. Therefore, for locusts that can migrate, they must be eliminated before they take off.
Nangong Yi had long expected that drought would cause locust plagues, but he didn't know how to deal with it. Fortunately, there was Caiwei, a modern military advisor, who proposed some methods of killing locusts to him, such as: driving away with a gong, capturing, burning, burying in ditches, digging seeds, and using the sand king to plunder in the early morning when the locust wings are wet with dew and difficult to fly...