Chapter 31: Disaster Victims
Anyway, there shouldn’t be any trouble at Madam Lu’s place. In the following days, Lu Yun simply stayed indoors, focusing on his studies.
Cui Ninger became somewhat interested in him, but after going to the stern of the boat several times for fresh air, she still didn’t see Lu Yun. Although the customs were open at this time, a girl from a good family naturally wouldn’t take the initiative to chat with a man…
They passed several days peacefully like this. The passenger boat left the Huai River and entered the Tongji Canal, where the river suddenly became much narrower and the boat speed slowed down. When they reached the Bianzhou area, they simply couldn’t proceed any further.
Feeling that the boat hadn’t moved for half a day, Lu Yun finally walked out of his room to the bow to check the situation. He saw boats lined up nose to tail ahead, stretching as far as the eye could see—they were actually blocked…
“What’s the reason for this?” Lu Yun frowned and asked the boatman nearby.
The boatman helplessly explained, “Young Master, it’s said that the Yellow River has burst its banks, cutting off the waterway to Luodu.” He shook his head in disbelief and said, “The Yellow River embankment was newly repaired just last year, costing the Imperial Court so much silver. How could it burst this year?”
Lu Yun turned to look at the boats behind, also stretching endlessly into the distance, and asked, “Then what do we do?”
“We definitely can’t continue forward,” the boatman sighed. “We can only wait for the boats behind to retreat, then we’ll return to Songzhou. There’s our merchant family’s carriage and horse company there; we’ll switch to land route to escort your group back to the capital.”
Lu Yun nodded; there was no other way.
A day later, the boats behind finally began to retreat. The passenger boat took another day to return to Songzhou. In Songzhou, Lu Yun’s group switched to the merchant family’s carriages and continued along the official road.
Because there were too many passengers switching transport, and both the Lu Family and Cui Family had a lot of luggage, the carriages obtained were very limited. Lu Yun could only make do by seating the four female guests first, while he squeezed onto a cargo carriage himself.
However, the merchant family’s service was still very attentive. To ensure their safety along the way, the carriage and horse company specially dispatched twenty guards to accompany them. Of course, this was also because they were aristocrats; if they were commoners, the merchant family probably wouldn’t be so attentive…
The carriage was very bumpy, far more uncomfortable than riding a boat, but Lu Yun was unaffected. Sitting in the shaking carriage, he could still focus intently on reading. It wasn’t until they passed Bianzhou that he was shocked by the scene along the road and lost the heart to read his sage’s book!
He saw the official road crowded with disaster victims supporting the elderly and leading the young, trudging forward. Every one of them was in tattered clothes and emaciated, and corpses could occasionally be seen lying dead by the roadside…
Even more unsettling was the occasional overturned carriage by the roadside, with all valuables looted clean and the people on board nowhere to be found…
The further the caravan went, the more disaster victims there were along the way. Seeing nobles passing by, not knowing who started it, the disaster victims surrounded them. They stretched out their skinny, filthy hands and pitifully begged, “Please have mercy; we haven’t eaten for days…”
“Young Master, my child is starving to death; please give us something to eat…”
“Get out of the way!” The merchant family’s guards hurriedly blocked the begging crowd, waving their sheathed weapons to drive them off. “If you come any closer, we won’t hold back!”
“Stop!” Lu Yun could see farther from the carriage. The disaster victims ahead were so numerous it made one’s scalp tingle. He frowned and pondered for a moment before ordering, “Give them some of our dry grain, and take out some silver.”
“Young Master, don’t be naive!” The merchant family’s guard leader quickly stopped him. “I’ve seen this situation many times! You have to be tough with these people; they’ll retreat naturally if they get nothing. If you soften, we’ll never get out of here!”
“That’s a path to death!” Lu Yun gave the guard leader a cold look, showing no intention of changing his mind.
Lu Yun’s guards naturally obeyed obediently and hurriedly took out money and grain to distribute to the disaster victims, while the merchant family’s guards stood by with arms crossed, looking eager to watch the show.
The disaster victims who received the aid naturally thanked them profusely and retreated. But soon, dozens of times more refugees heard the news and surged toward the two families’ caravans like a tide. And in the distance, even more people were rushing over…
“See, I told you…” The merchant family’s guard leader sighed helplessly. Lu Yun’s guards also looked at their young master with worry. With so many refugees, they couldn’t give aid to all; if it dragged on, trouble was inevitable. If the women were harassed or the valuables robbed, it would be disastrous.
At this time, the people in the carriages were also alarmed. Lu Ying and Cui Ninger looked out through the carriage curtains and were startled by the dense crowd of disaster victims.
“How did we attract so many people? This is big trouble now,” Lu Ying said worriedly.
“He’s just a rotten good person,” Cui Ninger said, her gaze sharpening like a knife as she scanned the crowd. “But these people aren’t all brought by him.”
“My younger brother is a good person, but not rotten,” Lu Ying protested with some dissatisfaction. “You can’t say that about him!” Then she pressed, “Not all brought by him—what do you mean?”
“Look at that group…” Cui Ninger pointed out through the carriage curtain to Lu Ying. “Others are looking at your brother, but their eyes are darting back and forth over our carriages.”
“What are they going to do?!” Lu Ying said in surprise.
“Incite the disaster victims and loot while the iron is hot!” Cui Ninger said indifferently. “They’ve probably had their eyes on us for a while. Without them inciting, this many disaster victims wouldn’t have gathered.”
Cui Ninger had thought that after hearing her words, Lu Ying would be scared pale. But instead, Lu Ying calmed down and smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry, my younger brother can handle it.”
“Sister, you have so much confidence in him?” Cui Ninger didn’t believe it. “He’s clearly a bookish fool ignorant of the world.”
Lu Ying smiled without speaking.
.
Outside the carriage, seeing the disaster victims gathering more and more, the merchant family’s guard leader named Huang Ling could no longer stand by. He cupped his fists toward Lu Yun and said, “Young Master, leave this to us!” Then he shouted deeply to his men, “Clear the way! Whoever dares block, the blade shows no mercy!”
“Yes!” The merchant family’s guards drew their weapons one after another, about to drive off the disaster victims. But they truly lacked confidence; if they provoked public anger, this few people would be trampled into meat paste.
Just as they braced themselves to clear the path, they heard that ignorant handsome young master shout firmly, “Come back here!”
“Young Master! Please don’t make trouble…” Huang Ling also lacked confidence. Hearing Lu Yun still stirring things up, he couldn’t help glaring at him in annoyance.
But when Huang Ling met Lu Yun’s gaze, his whole body stiffened. He saw an irresistible majesty in those handsome eyes! Huang Ling immediately felt a fear as if facing the merchant family patriarch, swallowing the rest of his words…
“If you want to pass today, obey me honestly!” Lu Yun coldly tossed out the words, strode past Huang Ling, and walked toward the disaster victims.
“…” Unable to see Lu Yun’s gaze, Huang Ling breathed a sigh of relief, a ridiculous feeling rising in his heart. How could he be cowed by a youngster? He simply stood by sulkily with arms crossed, wanting to see how this arrogant brat would clean up this mess.
Inside the carriage, Cui Ninger also watched Lu Yun through the curtain, curious to see how he planned to handle it…
He calmly walked into the crowd of disaster victims and bowed all around to them. Seeing him about to speak, the disaster victims gradually quieted down.
“Everyone, we deeply sympathize with your plight and wish to help as much as we can,” Lu Yun said with utmost sincerity on his handsome face. “But we got off the boat midway and switched to carriages temporarily, so we have very limited money and grain. We’ve already given all we could just now; now we have nothing left to distribute…”
His voice wasn’t loud, but everyone heard clearly. The disaster victims looked dejected upon hearing this, and many turned to leave.
“This works too?” Huang Ling looked at Lu Yun in shock. With just a few words, he was pacifying the crowd—he couldn’t help but secretly marvel that scions of noble families were indeed extraordinary, like an immortal’s fart—truly exceptional.
Cui Ninger in the carriage pursed her lips, seemingly unconvinced that things would end just like this…
Sure enough, someone shouted, “Everyone, don’t leave! The young master has plenty of money; he can definitely help us!”
Many disaster victims hadn’t wanted to disperse anyway, and upon hearing this, they begged even more insistently: “Young Master, please have mercy; you can’t just stand by!” “Yes, Young Master, we’re counting on you…” “If you won’t help, we won’t leave…”
In moments, many knelt before him, taking the stance that he couldn’t leave if he didn’t help.
On the carriage, Lu Ying frowned unpleasantly upon hearing this and whispered, “Can’t those disaster victims tell someone is inciting them?”
“The easiest to incite in this world are starving, freezing common folk and power-hungry nobles consumed by desire,” Cui Ninger said with a faint smile on her lips, seemingly unworried about the current predicament. But her words were chilling: “Believe it or not, they’ll start robbing any moment now…”
“No way?!” Lu Ying paled. “But we just helped them…”
“Human hearts are like this—insidious and ugly,” Cui Ninger sighed faintly. “It seems we’ve definitely been targeted for a while now.”
.
Outside the carriage, Huang Ling saw some people pushing past the front disaster victims, closing in on the caravan. He cursed darkly, “Too naive!” and hurriedly ordered his men to protect the carriages. He himself stepped forward to pull Lu Yun back.
“But.” At this moment, Lu Yun spoke again, deliberately pausing. Everyone’s actions froze, eager to hear what the “but” was.
“But, not far ahead is Yongqiu County, where there’s definitely plenty of grain,” Lu Yun said sincerely. “Everyone, please bear with it for now and follow us to Yongqiu. Once there, I can obtain grain to fill your stomachs.”
“This?” The disaster victims looked at each other; Yongqiu wasn’t far, and following him there was no issue.
“Young Master won’t deceive us, right?” The bandits mixed in with the disaster victims worried that once in the city, they couldn’t make their move.
“Absurd!” Before Lu Yun could speak, more disaster victims rebuked them. “The young master is kind-hearted and helping out of righteousness; how can you doubt and gossip like this? Are you even human?” After all, the wolf-hearted were a minority; as long as there was a glimmer of hope, common folk leaned toward kindness.
Those disguised as disaster victims had wanted to incite everyone to rush forward. Seeing they’d incurred public wrath, how could they dare act out? They could only say resentfully, “These aristocrat masters don’t care about our lives; he’s just stalling for time…”
“Shut up!” More voices rose, drowning out the noise. “We believe the young master; he definitely won’t deceive us!”
“Fine, you said it—let’s see!” Those guys could only temporarily back down.
Thus, the caravan continued forward, with the disaster victims following Lu Yun’s group in a vast procession toward Yongqiu County.
