Seeing that it was his eldest son who had been seized, the old man’s face changed drastically. He hurriedly reached out to stop them, “Not him, not him! He’s the family’s main laborer, he cannot go…”

Before he could finish speaking, the soldiers had already searched the house and found half a sack of grain, which they directly shouldered and carried away. But this was still not enough—one shi and two dou meant one shi required a large hemp sack, and this was only half.

The soldiers rummaged everywhere. Finding some finished shoes, they stuffed them into their pockets. After searching for a long time without finding more, they simply grabbed another person and threatened, “If you don’t provide enough grain, we’ll take it out in heads.”

This meant they would have to serve an additional military service.

Seeing his younger son also seized, the old man hurriedly chased after them. Just as they were about to leave the courtyard, he finally grabbed hold of his leg and cried, “I’ll give it, I’ll give it!”

He turned back and called to his elderly wife and eldest daughter-in-law, urging, “Quick, quick, go get the grain!”

The daughter-in-law hurried back toward the kitchen. Moving aside the firewood, there was a hemp sack in the corner of the wall. The soldier who had followed her in saw it, pushed her aside, and directly dragged the sack out.

The daughter-in-law chased after him, saying, “This is one shi. The earlier half sack had at least six dou. Please return four dou.”

The soldier glanced at her and completely ignored her. The lead soldier said coldly, “This half sack has six dou? I’d say it’s only two or three dou at most. You refused to pay taxes and wasted so much of our time—we haven’t even demanded compensation from you yet.”

The soldier had someone shoulder both sacks of grain, then asked the old man, “You have two sons. Which one do you want to keep?”

The old man pleaded, “Officers, take both sacks of grain completely, but please leave both children. They only know how to hold hoes, they’ve never held swords or spears! They really can’t serve as soldiers.”

“Who’s born knowing how to hold swords and spears? Choose or don’t choose—if you don’t choose, I’ll take them both.”

The old man’s heart ached so much he nearly curled up. Under the gaze of his two sons, he painfully chose his eldest son, telling his younger son, “Your nephew is only two years old. He can’t be born only to lose his father.”

The younger son understood. He knelt down and kowtowed to his parents. He wanted to say a few words to his older brother, but the soldier holding him had already lost patience and dragged him outside.

The eldest son’s anger immediately flared. He rushed into the kitchen to grab a cleaver and was about to charge out, but his mother and wife embraced and stopped him. These people killed without blinking—they were even more vicious than bandits. In a neighboring village, when they resisted during conscription, several people were killed.

Seeing the soldiers looking over fiercely with their blades raised, the old man hurriedly kowtowed on the ground. “Young people are hot-blooded, and the brothers are close, so he acted foolishly. I’ll beat him, I’ll beat him severely. Please, officers, don’t take offense.”

With that, he crawled up and swung his arm to viciously strike his eldest son’s face. After two consecutive slaps, both his eyes and face swelled up. He scolded him for a while, and only then did the soldiers calm down, leaving with the people and grain.

On the village’s main road sat ox carts loaded with grain. The grain they had requisitioned was placed on the carts, while the able-bodied men they had seized were tied together with rope in a string. Only when they reached the military camp and officially became soldiers would they be released.

The soldiers weren’t afraid they would escape. After all, their families were here—the monks could run but the monastery couldn’t. If they ran, their entire families would be punished.

This was also why thirty soldiers could plunder an entire village, and why soldiers ranked ahead of bandits.

If bandits came, they could kill them, and the bandits might not dare come again. But if they killed soldiers, that would bring endless trouble.

Therefore, in the hearts of the common people, soldiers were even more wicked than bandits.

The thirty soldiers swept through the entire village. The five ox carts they brought were loaded full, and the seized able-bodied men were divided into three groups and bound before they led the ox carts and conscripts back.

Once they reached the main road, they could rendezvous with their larger force. Several teams had already stopped on the official road—all had been requisitioning grain and fodder in nearby villages. Gathered together, there were three teams totaling over three hundred soldiers.

Everyone looked at the grain each group had collected. All could be considered fully loaded.

“Jiangnan is truly wealthy. This is the second requisition and we can still collect so much grain. In our Qingzhou, the first time we couldn’t even search out three dou per household.”

“After this search, there won’t be much to find next time. When will we actually head south? The main army has already left, leaving just us to gather grain and fodder. This really isn’t work for humans—my ancestors eighteen generations back have all been cursed out.”

“If you don’t take the cursing, you’ll lose your head. Do you dare not complete the quota assigned from above?”

While chatting idly, suddenly the sound of galloping hooves arose. Everyone turned their heads to look, and their scalps immediately went numb. Under the blazing sun, the character “Zhao” on the banner fluttered sharply, piercing to the eyes.

Already some soldiers’ legs were trembling, and the hands holding their blades also shook. The young men with bound hands became excited instead, and someone couldn’t help but shout loudly, “It’s the Zhao Family Army! The Zhao Family Army has come to rescue us!”

Zhao Shi hadn’t come specifically to rescue them. He was just heading to Yinling County and was originally going north, but scouts reported that there was a requisition team here that had seized many people.

Thinking of the miserable state of the villages that had been requisitioned these past few days, Zhao Shi directly brought troops over.

Since it was a requisition team, naturally two thousand men weren’t needed. Zhao Shi only brought one thousand men, but this was still enough to crush the opposition.

The battle quickly ended. He cut the ropes and let them untie themselves, then touched the grain sacks on the cart and said, “Each person take two days’ rations from these. Return the rest.”

The soldiers complied and immediately pulled out the cloth bags they carried, which were specifically for holding grain. Since they were light cavalry, each person could carry at most three days’ rations at a time.

Coincidentally, the rations they had brought today were finished.

Each person evenly scooped two handfuls of grain from each cloth bag, then tied the bags properly. Zhao Shi’s soldiers had already separated the able-bodied men by village, having them take back the grain from their own villages.

Whatever grain was requisitioned from which household, that household would reclaim it themselves.

The conscripts were deeply moved and kowtowed to Zhao Shi one after another.

A young man asked Zhao Shi, “I wonder if the Zhao Family Army is still recruiting soldiers? I, I want to become part of the Zhao Family Army.”

Hearing this, Zhao Shi smiled and patted his shoulder, saying, “Hurry home. Being a soldier isn’t so easy—people die.”

“I’m willing to die for the Zhao Family Army, and willing to die for General Zhao!”

“Me too, me too! I also want to enlist!”

A seventeen-year-old youth pushed to the front and said loudly, “General, please accept us! They robbed my family of all our grain. If you hadn’t come, even though I had obediently gone to serve, without grain at home to get through winter, survival would have been difficult. You saved my entire family.”

Of course Zhao Shi couldn’t recruit new people, but seeing their enthusiasm, he thought for a moment and said, “In a few more days, the Zhao Family Army will definitely come to recover this area. You should go home and endure for a few days. When the main army arrives, you can go to the military camp and petition the Grand Marshal. If he’s willing to keep you, you can naturally stay. If not, please help out by reporting information about Wang Dun’s rebel army. That will be enough.”

He continued, “Please tell your fathers and fellow villagers that if they encounter Wang Dun’s rebel army forcibly conscripting military service, don’t resist stubbornly to avoid losing your lives. Better to go along. Rest assured, on the battlefield, our Zhao Family Army doesn’t indiscriminately kill opponents. We all know that many new soldiers in the opposing army are forcibly conscripted able-bodied men. When the time comes, as long as they put down their weapons and surrender, we can take them in and then release them.”

The conscripts hadn’t expected there was such an operation. Their entire beings brightened.

—