Since Yuan Shu took control of Yuzhou, he has been dying year after year and levying massive taxes, which has caused deep suffering to the people of Yuzhou. During natural disasters, ordinary farmers are busy working for a year, and their income from the yield per mu is often no more than three or four bushels of dendrobium, barely enough to satisfy their hunger. But Yuan Shu only cared about personal enjoyment and recruiting troops to expand the army, and took away two or three of them. How does this allow people to live?
By the time of the Battle of Ruying, Yuan Shu had hundreds of wives and concubines, all dressed in beautiful clothes, countless grains for daily use, and more than 200,000 soldiers under his command. But beneath this splendor are the bones of the people of Yuzhou. The people had no food left, and they were hungry and cold. They had no seeds for spring plowing, so they had to exchange seeds for food. After the Battle of Ruying, the Baibo Army again plundered the remaining wealth and elites of various counties. The victims were incalculable, and various human tragedies also occurred.
When Liu Bei expelled Bai Bo's army from Yuzhou, he saw no human beings for dozens of miles, and he was extremely shocked. An urgent order was given to Huangfu Li, the governor of Yuzhou, to rectify civil affairs and appease them. Then he sent letters to Guanzhong and Jinyang, asking Chen Chong to allocate 800,000 stones of grain and rice for disaster relief. He also knew that distant water could not relieve nearby fire, so he transferred half of the military rations to provide emergency relief first.
After Huangfu Li received the military rations, he distributed them to each county. The plan was to distribute them to each county by the governors of each county. The county officials were responsible for gathering the victims and eating in the county. However, the officials appointed by Yuan Shu died or dispersed, leaving many counties without officials and many government offices without officials. Liu Bei had no choice but to hurriedly appoint county magistrates and arrange assistants from the Bafu to deal with the matter temporarily. Even though disaster relief efforts were underway, many sad things still happened, which made those who heard about it move to tears.
Wei Kang was admonished and appointed by Liu Bei as the Jianping Order. When he received the order, he was quite hesitant and said to his friends: "I am going to Jianping, which is adjacent to Taiqiu. In those days, Duke Taiqiu (Chen Shi) was in charge of the county. He was good at inducement and guidance, benevolent and loving, and the people returned as close as relatives. . Now that I’m leaving, I shouldn’t make it more beautiful than before.”
However, he first traveled westward for forty miles from Xiang County. The further he went, the more desolate he became. Even the official road was invaded by grass. Only the bones along the road showed that he had not lost his way. He traveled further west for forty miles, and there was no human habitation along the road. At night, they rested in a deserted pavilion, and the howling of jackals could be heard outside the pavilion. Wei Kang stayed up all night, and as the sky grew dim, he continued westward with his entourage. After three hours of light riding and fast horse riding, he finally arrived at Jianping City. But no one was seen outside the city, and no one was seen inside the city. Only wild foxes were scurrying among the ruins.
Compared with Jianping, which has been reduced to a wasteland, Taiqiu's deeds are even more shocking. After Sun Meng, the new Taiqiu sergeant, took office, he sent officials to the village pavilions to inform the people and asked them to gather in the county town to eat. There are fourteen townships in the county, so scholar Sun Meng sent fourteen people to make an announcement, but only thirteen came back.
The county government thought it was a tiger or wolf encountered on the road, so it had to send a team of five soldiers to make an announcement. After waiting for another day, only two people came back on horseback and hurriedly reported to the county government that the villagers had gathered to attack the messenger. They had just entered the countryside and one person was killed on the spot. Two people were captured. He was the only one who ran away. Come back.
When he learned that the villagers had gathered to rebel, scholar Sun Meng was shocked and hurriedly contacted the county government to mobilize troops to conquer. Before the county soldiers could gather, the situation changed again. The three elders who rebelled against the villagers came to plead guilty, saying that the previous attack on the governor was not intentional, but because there was no food stored in the village, so they had to attack passers-by to survive. When the envoys sent by the county government first arrived in the countryside, they cooked and ate them. When they used force for the second time, they captured prisoners. Only then did they realize that they had made a big mistake and came here to apologize.
The place that was once famous all over the world for being the most benevolent place has actually seen active murder and cannibalism. The impact is so bad that it is hard to overstate. Liu Bei personally intervened and ordered the execution of the ten culprits, whose heads were displayed to the public, and then all the villagers involved were moved to Yingchuan to eliminate surrounding comments.
Liu Bei talked about this matter in his reply to Chen Chong and wrote: "Although the villagers are very intolerable, but the hunger and cold are so great, what is the fault of the villagers? What is Yuan Shu's fault? Up and down Yuzhou, it has been difficult for people to live for a long time, and not only A place like Taiqiu? The suffering in Guizhou is so great that it is hard to describe."
In early June, Liu Bei's government tried its best to control the famine. But there is a famous saying: Good fortune never comes alone, and misfortune never comes alone. Under the hot and humid weather, corpses rotted in the wilderness and diseases grew, gradually spreading from the countryside to the county, and then from the county to the military camp. Soldiers in the army began to fall in the wind and were covered with abscesses. But before we had been mourning for a few days, we heard the news about the epidemic in Yanzhou. It turned out that the epidemic was not limited to Yuzhou. There were corpses lying in the ground due to the epidemic everywhere south of the river and west of the Huaihe River.
For some reason, the epidemic was particularly severe under Cao Cao. Not only ordinary people fell in droves, but also many well-known scholars in the prefectures and counties were infected with the disease. What's worse, famous scholars such as Xi Zhicai, Deng Zixiao, and Zao Zhi, even though they were knowledgeable, Gao Bo, who was magnanimous and generous, walked faster in front of the god of plague, and died in three or four days.
These people were all Cao Cao's loyal ministers and relied on him to achieve great things, but they died of illness one after another due to a cold. Cao Cao couldn't let go for a long time. Then the headache recurred and he fell ill. He lay on the bed for several days and could only barely drink some soup.
Cao Ang was worried and sent people around to find doctors for his father. The hard work paid off. Hua Tuo, a famous doctor from the northern country, happened to be practicing medicine in Yongqiu. Cao Ang even sent a troika to take him to Puyang. Hua Tuo's medical skills were indeed superb. He used acupuncture. By pricking the acupuncture points, Cao Cao's headache was relieved in one day, and he felt no pain in four days.
On this day, Hua Tuo completed the acupuncture. After applying a hot towel to Cao Cao's head, he began to pack up the medical tools. Cao Cao closed his eyes and rested, and couldn't help but admire: "My head is so painful that when it hurts, it is like a mountain cracking and rocks are shattering, and it feels like my soul is flying out of the sky. But sir, you don't see rare treasures, and you don't use precious treasures. Just acupuncture on acupuncture points can relieve such severe pain, sir, your medical skills are truly magical."
When Hua Tuo heard Cao Cao's compliment, he just smiled silently, and then slowly said to him: "Your illness is only 80% cured. No matter how much more, there is nothing I can do. At least within half a year, the headache will not recur. If you pay more attention, If you eat more and eat less fishy and smelly things, it will be better. Maybe you won't get sick again in two or three years."
Cao Cao was startled, opened his eyes and asked, "Can't even your husband cure my disease?"
Hua Tuo stroked his beard and shook his head and said: "Shijun is extremely smart, and his thoughts are like knots. His mental worries are hard to get rid of and accumulate in his blood. This is the root of the disease! No matter how brilliant my medical skills are, I am only a mortal. I can only cure Shijun. This is it.”
Cao Cao was quite satisfied with the first half of listening, but after Hua Tuo finished speaking, he hurriedly sat up, holding the hot towel on his forehead and asked: "Sir, do you mean to go far away?" Hua Tuo handed over the medical tools. He packed his bag and got some water to clean his hands. Then he wiped his hands and said with a smile: "There is a big epidemic in Henan now. As a doctor, how can I just watch?"
Cao Cao had been troubled by headaches for a long time. Now he finally met a good doctor who could relieve the pain. How could he want to let him go? But when he heard what Hua Tuo said, he couldn't stop him. He simply lay back on the couch and sighed: "Sir, you have a benevolent heart as a doctor, and you can save lives from ghosts and gods. I heard from Zixiu that many people made sacrifices for you." I’m so envious of this monument! I believe that my husband’s medical skills will be remembered in future generations.”
Hua Tuo glanced at Cao Cao and said with a smile: "Your Majesty is ridiculous. We doctors are like treating your illness. Although we can relieve the pain, we can't eliminate the root cause of the disease. Your Majesty is the governor of a state, and he is in charge of it." In a territory thousands of miles away, as long as the people can live and work in peace and contentment, cultivate their crops and have food and drink without worries, how can there be any serious diseases? Our medical skills are just a small way, and your governance is the way to eradicate people's diseases!"
Cao Cao was silent for a long time, and then said slowly: "If things in the world were as easy as what Mr. said, there would be no disaster like today."
The reason why Cao Cao sighed was because he thought of many major events caused by the epidemic.
During these days, Cao Cao ordered all cities to dig large pits outside the city and fill them with corpses layer by layer, with only a thin layer of loess covering them. If more people died, they would continue to be piled on top. The state was extremely afraid of this, so Cao Cao invited some Taoist priests to hold soul flags and sing sutras by the pit for days to save the souls of the dead. The rituals continued for days, the bells and gongs rang, and the sound of the Taoist priests filled the wilderness like smoke. When travelers hear this, they all stop. Even the chirping of the magpies around him seemed sad.
The epidemic has become so serious that a large number of fields in Yanzhou have been abandoned, and this year's harvest is about to be greatly reduced. Therefore, Cao Cao ordered people to go to various counties and villages to move out all the villagers who showed signs of being infected, and to build camps outside the counties, hoping that this could reduce the epidemic somewhat.
However, after the sick people were relocated, the counties had neither medicine nor food to support them. Instead, they sent troops to guard them, intending to let these people wait to die in the camps. Under the combination of hunger and cold, some people tried to break out of the camp, but they were all killed by the garrison. When the sick people in the camp died of illness or starvation, Cao Jun buried these people in large pits. Many of them were still alive, but they were also buried alive. Only a few people survived the disaster, crawled out from the mound, and fled back to their hometowns with difficulty.
When the news reached the ears of the person responsible for the case, Bian Rang was shocked. He immediately sent a message to Cao Cao, demanding a strict investigation into the matter and the officials involved. Cao Cao agreed, but he actually did something different. He sent people to eradicate the sick people who escaped and killed them all. In return, he said that nothing had happened.
Bian Rang was extremely angry and personally led people to verify it. However, the officials along the way were colluding, so what they got were only rumors and no solid evidence. But this did not allow him to give up, so he simply changed the charge and used the excuse of investigating corruption. He patrolled the counties in Yanzhou and arrested more than 40 corrupt officials in a row. There was solid evidence for everything, leaving Cao Cao speechless.
Bian Rang wrote a sarcastic letter: "Rang Su heard about the name of Lord Cao's rule, and he could make the Yellow River clear again from turbidity, and the universe clear again. It was promised to Yi Yin, but it was nothing more than this. Unexpectedly, there were eyeless rats in Yanzhou. I don’t realize Lord Cao’s outstanding virtues and scorching beauty. If he is caught by a small investigation, he will be deeply despised and must be killed to show Lord Cao’s righteousness. I guess Lord Cao thinks the same.”
So all these corrupt officials were sent to Puyang with letters, which caused a huge earthquake in Yanzhou.
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