How to make a famous minister

Chapter 66

The south of the city was completely flooded. When Fan Xuanchao was patrolling in a small boat, he could only see a small corner of the roof protruding from the water.Some officers and soldiers were beating corpses or living people, some were hugging trees, some were squatting on their own roofs, and more were just hugging a piece of wood and soaking in the water with human and animal corpses.

The refuge in the south of the city was already full, and a lot of them were stuffed in, but they couldn’t all be put in the south of the city, and some were sent to the north of the city. To the knee, in short, sailing is more than enough.The big families have already moved to Gushan, leaving only a few servants to guard them, so there are no people in the entire north of the city.

Most of the residents in the south of the city lived in the shelters in the north of the city. There was a soup kitchen provided by the government twice a day, morning and evening.

The rain was still falling. Although the momentum was not so strong, it was not a good thing for the entire Jingjiang County soaked in stagnant water.

Fan Xuanchao went to the south of the city, which was the hardest hit by the disaster, to inspect the living conditions of the residents in the refuge.The shelter was dark and crowded with people, and the smell was not good. Hundreds of people were crowded together, and it was a problem to eat and drink.Fan Xuanchao held a child's bony little hand, met his timid eyes, and forced a smile: "Don't be afraid, the rain will pass, and the situation will get better."

The child may or may not understand, but just stares at him with a pair of big eyes in a daze.Fan Xuanchao squatted down and asked softly, "Are you still full?"

The child shook his head, "Hungry."

Fan Xuanchao frowned, "Didn't they give you food?"

"Here, porridge, one bowl in the morning and one bowl in the evening."

This is a normal amount. After all, they don't have much food in stock. Lin Xiancheng, who went out to buy food, hasn't returned yet. Even if he does, he doesn't know how much food he can bring back.So Fan Xuanchao set the standard of two meals a day from the very beginning.I think this child is hungry because he is growing up.

Even so, Fan Xuanchao also knew that two bowls of porridge a day, let alone grown children or grown men, even frail old and young women and children could not stand it.

Fan Xuanchao had no choice but to encourage him: "There are only these things to eat now. When the rain stops, we will be full. Can you eat two big bowls of white rice then?"

The child nodded excitedly, "Yes! I can eat three bowls! Just like the Dragon King!"

"Lord Dragon King?" Fan Xuanchao tilted his head.

The child pointed to a temple behind the refuge, "Master Dragon King is there! They send Lord Dragon King three bowls of rice every day, as well as meat and wine. I want to eat too, but my mother won't let me get it, saying it's For the Lord Dragon King, can the Lord Dragon King bless the sky without rain, and if it does not rain, we can have three bowls of rice?"

Fan Xuanchao sneered, "If it doesn't rain, you can eat. But it's useless to send food to the Dragon King for nothing—you might as well go and steal it."

Jingjiang County is superstitious, and there are more than a dozen temples, large and small, in one county alone, and this is not counting the sporadic and small temples of Digong.Some of these temples belonged to He Bo, some belonged to the God of the Sea, and some belonged to the Empress. There were winds and floods here every year, so naturally there would be temples of the Dragon King who could spread clouds and rain.

Fan Xuanchao didn't expect that there were so many people without food here, and someone dared to give wine and meat to the Dragon King!Fan Xuanchao brought more than a dozen officers and soldiers today, as well as two servants who can kung fu, which can be regarded as mighty, so he didn't have stage fright, and he brought his troops and killed them to the Dragon King Temple.

The temple of the Dragon Lord is just behind this Taoist temple that was used as a refuge, and it was originally designated as a refuge, but no one lived here along the way.

Presumably they drove out all the people who used to live here, and monopolized this Dragon King Temple.It was only then that Fan Xuanchao realized why there were so many people inside and outside the Taoist temple, but it turned out that there should be people from two residences inside.

When Fan Xuanchao arrived, he happened to see a Taoist priest in a big red robe leading two people to practice there.Fan Xuanchao took a closer look, isn't the leading Taoist priest Wang Daochang who watched Fengshui that day?At this time, he was wearing a Taoist uniform, wearing a Taoist crown, and holding a dust whisk in his hand. He was walking around the desk at a fixed pace, still muttering words.The two people who followed him, wearing green robes and Taoist uniforms, did not seem to be ordinary people. They also followed the Taoist priest and sang the lyrics word by word, with a sense of rhythm.

Outside the temple, there are people kneeling in the mud in the rain, praying with palms together, or bending down to kowtow as Taoist Wang did.

Seeing this scene, Fan Xuanchao was really angry.He and the officers and soldiers are working hard to dredge the river and strengthen the dam. Lin Xiancheng is actively raising food outside, and these people are doing nothing. They pray to gods and worship Buddha here, and they still take the extremely precious food to worship!

The gate of the temple was wide open, and Fan Xuanchao walked through the crowd of worshipers and went in directly, "What are you doing!"

Daoist Wang was taken aback and stopped singing. Seeing it was Fan Xuanchao, he hurried forward and saluted, "Master Fan, we are worshiping the Dragon King here. I am asking the Dragon King to spare you this storm."

"You worship the Dragon King, but you drive out the people who live here; you worship the Dragon King, but use the rations of the victims. How brave! I think you are not worshiping the Dragon King, but using the name of the Dragon King to make a fortune! "

Daoist Wang didn't expect that Fan Xuanchao didn't believe in gods and Buddhas at all, and said repeatedly: "Your Excellency, the poor Taoist is here every day, and he is the owner of the Qingfeng Temple in front of me. I even gave the whole temple to the people. What's more, since the rainy day, Pindao has led his disciples to do this, and today it is effective. Look, isn't the rain light? I must persist for two days, and I will be able to Tell the rain to stop."

Fan Xuanchao sneered, and said contemptuously: "Have you ever seen the rain that never stops? The typhoon passes by, and the days will not be too long. I thought you were quite capable, but I didn't expect you to be a swindler."

He took two steps forward and saw that there were good wines and dishes on the altar table, and a roast goose was lying in the middle, and asked, "You guys finished worshiping the Dragon King a few days ago, where did the rest of the offerings go?" ?”

Daoist Wang rubbed his hands and said, "Throw it all into the Jingjiang River and give it to Lord Dragon King."

"Then what do you eat these days?"

"Uh...we...we eat... porridge, porridge from the porridge shed."

Fan Xuanchao looked him up and down, "I see that the people around, after eating porridge for the past few days and being exposed to the rain for so many days, all of them are haggard, their faces are sallow, and their spirits are not good. Why don't you and your apprentice not look haggard, but instead look haggard? A little fatter than the day we first met...?"

Daoist Wang smiled awkwardly, "We cultivators only need some Fenglu soup every day... just... that's enough."

Fan Xuanchao glanced sideways at Daoist Wang, saw that he was flustered and dripping with cold sweat, and thought: I thought this person might be just pure feudal superstition, and I wanted to let him go.Now it seems that it is more like pretending to be a ghost to deceive.

Fan Xuanchao recruited the person in charge of distributing the porridge, pointed to Taoist Wang and his two apprentices and asked, "Have you seen them come to serve the porridge?"

The man looked at the three of them carefully, Daoist Wang tried his best to wink at him, and he looked at the offerings on the altar table, swallowing his saliva.

Fan Xuanchao looked at it coldly, and when he whipped the horsewhip, it made a crisp sound on the ground, "You tell the truth."

The man hurriedly lowered his head, not daring to look around, and said in a muffled voice: "No, Wang Daochang and his apprentices have never been here to serve porridge."

Fan Xuanchao nodded in satisfaction, pointed at him to take a plate of roast goose, and said, "The roast goose is your reward."

The man quickly went down with the roast goose in his hands.

Fan Xuanchao asked: "There are many people who practice Taoism and they can walk against the wind. I think Taoist Wang still has to eat worldly grains, not to mention, even chicken, duck and fish."

"My lord, my lord..." Daoist Wang asked Fan Xuanchao not to give him any face, and directly exposed him in front of so many fellow villagers, did not give him a way out, almost knelt down and hugged his thigh, "I am also obsessed with ghosts for a while, I am so hungry , that’s why I made such a bad move.”

Fan Xuanchao didn't want to talk to him at all, and told his left and right: "Tear down the Dragon King Temple, pull the wood, bricks and tiles to the riverside to build embankments, as for the Dragon King... move the Dragon King to the edge of the Jingjiang River, I'd like to see what happens. Was it the Dragon King who suppressed the river, or the river swallowed him up."

With this order, not only Daoist Wang was stunned, but even the officers and soldiers who were about to execute the order were stunned, and the people outside who were originally aggrieved by Daoist Wang's behavior exploded when they heard the order.

"My lord! No way!"

"No way, if the Dragon Lord gets angry, we will all die."

"My lord, the rain can't stop..."

Fan Xuanchao raised his hand high to signal the people to calm down. He had just punctured Daoist Wang's deceit. His prestige was just at the moment, and the people gradually became quiet subconsciously.

"Lord Dragon King is a kind-hearted god. If he knew that Jingjiang was going through such dangers, he would definitely stop the rain. I moved Lord Dragon King to the river to let him see clearly how much damage the rain has caused. .”

Fan Xuanchao got away with making up words that he didn't even believe, and moved the wooden and painted dragon king statue to the riverside.

——When a big wave hit, the statue of the Dragon King was swept into the river.

Fan Xuanchao gave two "tsk tsk", shook his head, and said directly to all the worshipers and spectators: "Everyone, Mr. Wang Daochang can't plead with the Dragon King, and the Dragon King doesn't plan to take care of it. We still have to rely on ourselves to overcome the flood. Officials here recruit laborers to build dams and dredge canals, and each person can get an extra meal a day. When the flood subsides in the future, the families involved in the work can also rent seeds, tools, and cattle from the government first.”