Son of Song Dynasty

Chapter 124 The Distressed City
The cofferdam slowly grew at a speed visible to the naked eye, and by evening it had blocked most of the river. The river became much more turbulent, and a lot of the earth and rocks put into the water were immediately washed away. The progress of the project slowed down, but in the end Still advancing little by little.

Zhao Dezhao has been standing on the bank of the river to personally supervise. He raised his eyes to the direction of the strict Guancheng.

The defenders of the Southern Han Dynasty obviously saw the Song army's move to encircle the river and were aware of the Song army's intention. From time to time, they fired stone bullets from the top of the city towards this direction, intending to interfere with the Song army, but because of the distance, , the accuracy is very poor, and it hardly causes any obstacles.

A gust of mountain wind blew, and Zhao Dezhao felt chills all over his body. Then he felt a chill on his forehead. He subconsciously looked up, only to find that the scorching sun above his head had hidden in the thick clouds at some point.

The sky quickly darkened, thick dark clouds gradually gathered together, one after another raindrops fell down, and then the rain became bigger and bigger, and it turned into a torrential rain in an instant.

Zhao Dezhao cursed secretly in his heart, and turned to look at Fang Zhengqi. This guy's forecast was obviously too unreliable. What the hell is there will be rain in ten days, but he obviously didn't wait for a day.

Fang Zhengqi looked embarrassed, lowered his head and said: "In our Lingnan area, the summer rainy season is often like this. It comes very quickly and usually goes quickly, but please rest assured, Your Highness, the rain will be able to—"

There was a loud "boom", the thunder suppressed Fang Zhengqi's voice inaudiblely, and the heavy rain hit the umbrella cover above Zhao Dezhao's head rattling loudly.

In the white rain and fog, soldiers of the Song army, like a long line of ants, were carrying earth and rocks in the river. Naturally, they had no umbrella to fight, and it was impossible for them to suspend their work to avoid the rain. Instead, they were scolded by the officer Step up cofferdams and embankments, because everyone knows that once it rains heavily, the water in the upper reaches will drop, and the river will rise rapidly. At that time, it will be much more difficult to cut the river.

Fang Zhengqi's prediction was once again outrageously wrong. After half an hour of heavy rain, not only did it not stop, but it became heavier and heavier, and the river gradually increased.

Zhao Dezhao noticed that the originally clear river water gradually became turbid, which meant that flash floods had occurred upstream. If the heavy rain continued like this and the flash floods in the upper reaches merged into the Qinshui River, it would inevitably cause the river water to surge, and then the river water would surge. It would be ten times more difficult to encircle an embankment and intercept a river, and the result would be that all previous efforts would be wasted!

At the same time, the soldiers of the Song army standing in the river seemed to be exhausted. From time to time, one or two soldiers would lose their footing and be washed down by the rapidly turbulent river. Occasionally there are those who cannot be rescued. Although the river is not deep, once submerged in the water, it can also kill the northerners who are completely ignorant of water.

In just a short time, there were as many as a dozen soldiers engulfed by the turbidity of the river, and the screams of panic continued one after another. The panic spread among the exhausted soldiers, and the speed of advancing the embankment slowed down visibly. A few places even broke through the gap, and retreated slowly behind.

Zhao Dezhao could no longer stand. He turned his head and looked at the captain of the soldiers, pointing to the umbrella cover above his head that protected the rain: "Put the umbrella cover away!"

A look of astonishment appeared on the captain's face: "Your Highness, what are you—"

Zhao Dezhao was too lazy to talk, walked out of the umbrella cover, walked into the heavy rain, and stood on a conspicuous high place so that all the soldiers could see him as the commander.

The captain of the guard was stunned for a moment, and then ran over rolling in the mud and shouted: "Your Highness is a precious person, please don't get wet in the rain here, hurry back to your tent!"

This soldier captain is by no means making a fuss. You must know that in this era without antibiotics and antipyretics, a cold after being caught in the rain can often kill a person. This is by no means a rare thing.

But now that the situation was like this, Zhao Dezhao couldn't care less about these things, and directly ignored the dissuasion of the captain of the guards, walked to the river, and jumped onto a simple raft.

This guard captain was a personal guard of Emperor Zhao Dezhao's father. He had followed Zhao Kuangyin for many years and was loyal and reliable. This person was a life-saving talisman specially sent by Zhao Kuangyin to his son just in case. The role of personal supervision.At this moment, when he saw Zhao Dezhao actually getting on the raft, he was even more frightened. He jumped up immediately and reached out to force Zhao Dezhao to the shore, but he was kicked by Zhao Dezhao.

Zhao Dezhao turned his head and ordered the stunned soldiers on the raft: "Pull up the pole! The king wants to inspect the embankment!"

The soldiers propped up the raft, and Zhao Dezhao cruised back and forth along the embankment on the raft to boost morale.

Wherever he went, the soldiers were in high spirits and their spirits were high. His Royal Highness was a rich man, but he actually went into the river in the rain. How could he have any room for laziness?
But at this moment, the water has risen very fiercely. The power of nature is beyond human power. The length of the embankment has advanced and retreated, retreated and advanced again. For a long time, there has been almost no progress. On the contrary, more and more soldiers have been washed away. Into the rapids, it disappeared without a trace.

"Your Highness, I can't stop it! The water is rising and it's almost neck-deep. It will be hard work if you persist, and it will be a waste of soldiers' lives!"

The banner officer Jiang An, who was in charge of supervising the embankment project, ran over to ask Zhao Dezhao for orders. His forehead was covered with drops of water, and he didn't know whether it was sweat or rain.

Zhao Dezhao frowned and said, "The wooden piles are already full, and if we take cloth bags and fill them with earth and rocks, why can't they be filled?"

Jiang An wiped the water droplets from his forehead and gasped: "We have used up the cloth bags. We have used the empty grain bags and empty salt bags transferred from the baggage camp!"

"Didn't I say that there are not enough cloth bags, even if you take off your pants!" Zhao Dezhao stared at him fiercely with red eyes: "Military orders are like a mountain! Do you want to be my king and tell you a joke?"

Jiang An opened his mouth wide in shock, thinking that something was wrong with his ears.

But Zhao Dezhao obviously didn't mean to joke. He ripped off the jade belt around his waist, took off the red robe three times, leaving only the thin inner clothes on his body, and threw the red robe towards Jiang An. In hand: "Use it to make a cloth bag to hold soil!"

Jiang An hurriedly took it with both hands, turned around and ran for two steps, then remembered something, hurriedly took off his own robe, and handed it to the river bank responsible for loading and transporting soil along with Zhao Dezhao's red official robe soldiers.

The commander and the generals all took off their robes to fill the river with soil, and the junior officers and soldiers had to take off their trousers where they were still wearing clothes.

(End of this chapter)