The time had just reached cinnabar time, it was pitch black outside, the moon overhead was bright, and the sky was full of stars blinking in the sky sleepy-eyed.
All was silent, everything in heaven and earth was sleeping.
“Crunch.”
The door to the main room of the back house of the Jingnan County Yamen opened, and Zhu Pingan walked out of the house with a cloth bag slung over his shoulder.
“Auntie, this is the cake that was cooked yesterday, it hasn’t had time to warm up yet. Wait for me for a while, Auntie, I’ll go heat it up.”
The bun little maid, Painter, chased up from behind, holding a packet of pancakes wrapped in greaseproof paper in her hand, and said to Zhu Pingan with a puckered mouth.
“No need, it’s stronger when it’s cold like this.”Zhu Pingan waved his hand, reached out and took the pancake from Painter’s hand and put it into the cloth bag. Inside his bag, there were also folded rice paper, charcoal brushes and other things lying around, separated from the flapjacks by lotus leaves.
“Auntie, everyone else returns with the stars and the moon, but you’re not only returning with the stars and the moon, you’re also going out with the stars and the moon, you’re just like an iron body that can’t take it, you don’t know how to care about yourself. When Miss and the others come, if they find out that you’ve lost so much weight, they’ll peel off the servant girl’s skin.”
Baozi little maid painting child bulging mouth, walked behind Zhu Ping An, padded his feet to sort out Zhu Ping An’s clothes, through the clothes feel auntie lost so much weight, originally just good clothes, now are a little loose, tears immediately can’t help but flow down, auntie these days is really too hard.
“It’s good to be thinner, don’t you feel that Auntie I’ve become much more handsome after I’ve lost weight? When Shu’er comes back and discovers that I’ve become so much more handsome, she won’t even be able to reward you, where would she peel your skin.”Zhu Pingan pretended to be narcissistic and laughed.
“Auntie, getting down to business.”The bun little maid, Painting, was amused and broke into laughter, and couldn’t hold back her anger.
“It will soon be time to implement food for work, so I must go down there and walk around, checking out the areas where work can be done, and finalising the addresses for projects such as rebuilding villages and houses, building water conservancy facilities, constructing anti-Japanese sentry forts, and reclaiming land. Jingnan is not small, if I don’t go out early, I won’t be able to finish the day today, and I can’t afford to delay reconstruction after the disaster. Once I’m done with this rush, I’ll take a good rest and sleep until I wake up naturally every day.”
Zhu Pingan explained to Painter with a smile.
“Painter doesn’t believe it, Painter hasn’t seen Auntie sleep a day’s laziness ……”The little bun maid, Painting Er, bulged her mouth, not believing at all Zhu Pingan’s words of sleeping until she naturally woke up after a busy day.
Soon, the doors of the compartment rooms on both sides of the courtyard were also opened, and Liu Mu, Liu Dazhou and the others were also up.
“Go back and rest.”Zhu Pingan waved his hand at Painter and led Liu Mu, Liu Dagger and the others out the door.
“Auntie, the rooster hasn’t even crowed yet ……”
The little bun maid, Painting Er, leaned against the door frame and looked at Zhu Pingan’s back, murmuring in a small voice with red eyes.
Over the mountains and trekking ……
By the time the morning sun erupted in the eastern sky, Zhu Pingan and his party had already walked dozens of kilometres continuously.
Because Jingnan had repaired a number of flood control and flood prevention facilities before the flood, these water facilities had blocked the flood from outside Jingnan’s gates, but now that their effects had manifested themselves, the floodwaters in Jingnan had receded faster than in places like Taiping County.
Zhu Pingan walked through several townships and found that the floodwaters had already receded by 70% to 80%, and he could not help but feel better.
Zhu Pingan had to carefully survey the terrain and landscape of every place he went, and from time to time, he used a carbon stick to write and draw on the rice paper, circling the address of the project of the food-for-work, and doing preliminary planning, and then going back in the evening to draw the detailed drawings, formulate a detailed plan, make a good constitution, and finalise the details, so that he could implement the food-for-work in the next day.
When Zhu Pingan was outside on his hooves surveying, a group of mountain thieves turning refugees within the northern suburb of the flood avoidance area gathered together without a trace, but it was not conspicuous because there were a lot of people like them gathering together to bask in the sun within the flood avoidance area.
“Old proprietor, young proprietor, brothers, I’ve been stepping outside for the past few days, but I couldn’t find any suitable fat sheep. However, what does that old saying say, what iron shoes can’t be found, what gets a little bit of no effort ……”
Mountain thief Hu Lao San left and right look at what this no one attention, whispered to everyone said.
“Cluck cluck cluck ……That’s ‘stepping through the iron shoes without looking for place, get all without effort’. You a mountain thief to learn what sour Confucian tugging text, will not be don’t show, shame not shame ah.”The Young Master cackled and rolled his eyes.
Although her face was smeared with pot-bottom grey and she was wearing men’s clothing, the young proprietor’s smile still brightened people’s eyes.
Although the crowd of mountain thieves all knew that their own Young Master was a murderous female nightmare, they still couldn’t help but look twice more.
Abruptly, the young proprietor’s hand appeared in the centre of her hand with a glittering cold light piercing butterflies, and the crowd of people couldn’t help but clamp their legs together and retracted their eyes.
“Ahem, Ruo Nan, don’t always laugh when you’re a girl. Also, put away the fish dagger, don’t let anyone see it.”
The old proprietor first glared fiercely at the group of mountain bandits like a lion, then coughed and lectured the young girl.
“Laughing is also wrong ah, well, well, I know ……Pops ……I put it away is it.”The young proprietor rolled his eyes, saw the old proprietor blowing his moustache, immediately squinted his eyes and smiled pleasingly at the old proprietor, obediently put away the dagger, and then reached out his foot and lifted Hu Laosan, glared at him, and said in a bad mood, “Hu Laosan, what were you going to say just now, go on and say it ah, how did you become a mute.”
“Yes, yes, I am saying that I have been stepping on the county town for the past few days and have not been able to find a suitable fat sheep. The rules set by the old proprietor and the young proprietor, it’s not easy to find both fat sheep and those that aren’t good people. When I was downcast, I suddenly heard two passers-by cursing, my eyes immediately lit up, from which I found a super super big fat sheep, or the kind of bad no edge of the fat sheep! I tell you, let’s do this job, not to mention the rest of our lives to eat good food and drink hot water, even if we begged the mother-in-law, give birth to seven or eight pups, the pups of the whole life will be able to eat good food and drink hot water.”
Hu Laosan was kicked by the young proprietor, hehehe smiled and went on to say, talking about the fat sheep when the eyes are all glowing.
“What fat sheep can be so fat? We have come here to the royal relatives not?!”Next to the bandits do not believe what Hu Lao San said.
“Imperial relatives you dare to rob ah! Stained with the word ’emperor’ don’t even think about it, you have a few heads enough to cut the emperor’s old man ah!”
The old proprietor sniffed and glared at them without any goodwill, a few mountain thieves who spoke kindly shrank their necks back.
“Not an imperial relative, this fat sheep ah ……”Hu Laosan said and lowered his voice, “It’s the governor’s son.”
“What? Zhixian?!”The surrounding mountain bandits couldn’t help but be surprised when they heard this.
“Shhh! Keep your voice down!”Hu Laosan glanced around vigilantly, seeing that no one was paying attention, he then relaxed.
