Early the next morning, the sky was gloomy.
Beside the old well at the South Cross Street in the inner city, there was a crowd of common people who made a living by carrying water.
The north wind was still howling, and it wouldn't take long for the water stains on the well - railing to freeze into a hard white ice crust.
People had already lined up beside the well. People from the north of the town were used to queuing up before dawn.
Among them was Liu San, a vegetable vendor.
He was carrying two empty buckets on a pole, hunching his back and rubbing his hands constantly, trying to warm them up.
Last night, he was conscripted to carry broken bricks at the North Horse Path.
Logically speaking, getting three liters of brown rice should have been a happy thing, but since he came down from the city wall in the middle of the night, he had always felt something was wrong with his left forearm!
When he got home, at first there was just a small red mark. Although he took a look at it when washing up last night, he didn't take it seriously.
But by this morning, the mark, along with his entire abdomen, had started to swell and burn.
Liu San looked down and saw a fingernail - sized yellowish - brown stain on the edge of his left sleeve.
He guessed in his heart that it might have been caused when he was carrying the bricks last night?
As a subject of the Great Qian Dynasty, it was normal to have some skin problems. Who hadn't had a skin infection before.
But just then, a stabbing pain shot through his skin and into his internal organs.
"Ouch!"
Liu San's legs went weak. He casually dropped his carrying pole and slumped to the ground.
Everyone was startled by Liu San's reaction.
Chen Si, an old neighbor who was fetching water beside him, quickly asked, "Sanzi, what are you acting crazy about so early in the morning?"
But Liu San couldn't answer.
He curled up like a shrimp, making short gasping sounds in his throat. Beads of cold sweat rolled down his forehead in strings.
He could feel the burning pain on his abdomen, and it seemed as if his intestines were churning violently.
He couldn't control his hands and randomly tore open the coarse cloth of his chest.
Suddenly, the eyes of the seven or eight people standing by the well platform all fell on his exposed abdomen.
There was a chorus of gasps.
That shouldn't have been the abdomen of a living person!
The skin of his entire abdomen had bulged high and was stretched extremely thin, showing a decaying black - purple color.
Dense blue veins intertwined and coiled under the translucent skin, wriggling rhythmically.
A few drops of yellowish - brown liquid were oozing out from the ulcerated red patch under his left rib. The blisters under the skin burst, and the yellowish - colored fluid overflowed.
The bucket toppled over, and the well water splashed all over Liu San.
"Dear husband!" Liu San's wife came around the street corner with a vegetable basket in her hand and saw this scene. She shouted anxiously and rushed forward.
Chen Si often hung around the city gate, and he had heard a bit of the rumor about the poisoned corpses at the North Horse Path last night.
This yellow fluid, this black - colored skin, it matched!
Oh no! This is terrible!
He stepped forward in one stride, grabbed Liu San's wife by the arm, and roared, "Liu San's wife, don't go over! It's poisonous!"
The woman was so anxious that her eyes were red. She struggled desperately and said, "Brother Chen! Let go of me! He's writhing in pain!"
"Deadly ointment was dropped on the north city wall last night! Whoever touches it will have their flesh rot! If you want to die, don't drag the whole street down with you!"
Chen Si kicked the water - carrying pole out of the way with a sideways kick and then turned around and ran in the opposite direction.
The crowd immediately panicked.
The people fetching water pushed, shoved, and trampled on each other, scrambling to get into the alleys.
Liu San's wife was pushed by Chen Si's brute force and fell to the ground two zhang away.
She watched as her husband dug at his blackened abdomen in the muddy water, his fingers covered in blood - stained yellow mud, and his wails were so miserable.
She watched this terrifying scene and her legs went weak. She collapsed on the ground and didn't dare to take another step forward. She could only cry and tremble in place.
Just then, Lao Sun, who was on standby, carrying a medicine box, followed by two medical officers carrying hemp sacks, was escorted by a team of patrolling soldiers and rushed to the well platform.
Lao Sun stopped three steps away. He pulled the cloth soaked in medicinal vinegar covering his face up to his nose.
His eyes fell on Liu San's high - bulging black - purple abdomen, and then swept over the yellowish - colored pus between his fingers.
Lao Sun turned his head and asked a soldier beside him, "Have you checked his travel permit? Where did he work yesterday?"
"Report to the doctor, this man's name is Liu San. He was transferred to the North Horse Path to clean up the bricks at the Xu hour last night and returned to the inner city in a group at the end of the Zi hour."
Lao Sun's eyelids twitched violently.
The venom had penetrated the cloth, and within less than twelve hours, it had rotted into his internal organs.
Lao Sun immediately turned to the leading captain and said, "It's the plague poison. There's no cure!"
"No... no! There must be a cure! Doctor, please have mercy!" Liu San's wife, who was sitting two zhang away, was struck like a thunderbolt. She didn't care about the poison anymore and crawled and knelt towards Lao Sun, immediately kowtowing.
"Your Excellency! Please show mercy and save him! He was fine before he went out last night. We have three hungry children at home..."
Lao Sun looked at the woman kowtowing on the ground like a pounding garlic. A complex look flashed across his eyes, but instead of stepping forward, he took half a step back.
"You have three children at home? Then you can't touch him even more now!"
Lao Sun's heart trembled, and he raised his voice.
"This poison is deadly once you touch it, and there's no medicine to cure it! If you rush up now, do you want your three children to become orphans tonight?!"
The woman was stunned by the shout. Her desperate cries got stuck in her throat, and her whole body trembled violently.
Lao Sun turned his face away and didn't look at her anymore. He waved his hand at the soldiers behind him and his tone became cold and numb again:
"Put an iron hook on him. Don't touch his flesh. Drag him to the 'Living Dead Yard' in the west of the city. Also, seal this old well and sprinkle quicklime on the area within three zhang around it!"
"Go and find a deep - trough wheelbarrow used for transporting soil."
"Spread a layer of quicklime on the bottom of the wheelbarrow, put him in it, and push it directly to the empty house in the west of the city! It is strictly forbidden to carry him by hand. Use long wooden poles to lift him!"
Then, turning around, he pointed at the old well and the puddles on the ground:
"All those on this street who have come into contact with this man shall be detained and sent to the west of the city together!"
...
In the main hall of the General's Mansion, the silver - silk charcoal in the charcoal brazier was burning red, but it still couldn't drive away the cold in the hall.
Tie Lanshan was sitting behind the large desk. He was holding a hemp - paper roster just presented by Lao Sun. There were still wet ink marks on the edge of the paper.
"Zhao Da, a civilian laborer from the Drum Tower Street in the north of the city, is dead."
"Three of his family members have abdominal pain."
"Xu Er, a foot soldier of the auxiliary army from the Carriage and Horse Depot in the south of the city, has black spots on his abdomen."
"Liu San, a vegetable vendor, has a swollen and pus - filled abdomen at the well platform in the inner city."
Tie Lanshan's eyes scanned down along the dense, tiny characters.
Seven cases.
In just half a morning, seven cases of the epidemic had broken out in the inner city.
All the infected were either the military and civilians who were on duty at the North Horse Path last night or those who were responsible for transporting soil to fill the pits under the city wall.
Tie Lanshan put down the roster and slapped it heavily on the table.
"Quicklime can't suppress the stench of the dead made by these scoundrels!"
Xu Qinghuan was sitting on the right - hand side in a grand master's chair. Her eyes were fixed on the last page of the roster and she calmly prescribed a solution.
"Marshal Tie," Xu Qinghuan's voice was steady and without a hint of fluctuation. "The poison has entered the city. This is not the time to get angry and assign blame. If you hesitate, you will surely suffer from it."
Tie Lanshan looked at her and said, "Magistrate Xu, do you have any good strategies? The morale of the troops in the city is already low. If we don't suppress this quickly, we'll have a mutiny in our camp before the enemy's siege guns from outside even hit the city."
"First," Xu Qinghuan held up a finger. "Impose a city - wide curfew."
"Establish a quarantine zone bounded by the more than a dozen empty mansions left by the former salt merchants in the western part of the city."
"All those infected with the disease on the roster shall be forcibly sent to the western part of the city. All family members and neighbors who have come into contact with the patients shall also be sent to the western part of the city and detained in separate wards for observation. No one is allowed to enter or leave. Those who violate this order shall be beheaded on the spot."
Lao Sun hesitated to speak at the side:
"My lord, the mansions in the western part of the city are in disrepair, and the cold wind in winter is bone-chilling. Sending them all in there, I'm afraid..."
"Leaving them on the streets will mean the death of tens of thousands of living people in the northern pass of the whole town." Xu Qinghuan cut off his words without hesitation.
"Secondly." Xu Qinghuan held up her second finger. "Collect all the heat-clearing and detoxifying herbs from all the pharmacies in the city. Scutellaria baicalensis, isatis root, forsythia suspensa, and raw licorice, all shall be confiscated by the government."
"Set up large iron pots at each street corner and keep the fire going for twelve hours to boil the medicinal soup. Order all the military and civilians in the city to drink a bowl each in the morning and evening. This medicine cannot remove the deadly poison of the plague, but it is enough to sustain the pulse and delay the onset of the poison."
Tie Lanshan nodded. "Lao Sun, you go and handle it personally. If there aren't enough herbs, rummage through the private stockpiles of the wealthy families! Whoever dares to hide them, put a knife to their necks!"
"Thirdly." Xu Qinghuan stood up and walked towards the defense map of Zhenbei City hanging on the screen.
"Water source. Liu San fell ill at the well. Although there was no poison put into the well, the poisoned water can easily seep through the ground. " Her fingertips landed on several water vein marks on the defense map.
"Conduct a strict inspection of all the wells and river inlets in the city. If the water drawn from the well has a strange color or smell, or if there are dead birds or rats around the well, seal the well immediately! In addition, dispatch military engineers to dig new wells at a high place in the eastern part of the city."
"Moreover, strictly enforce the order that no one should drink unboiled water. The water must be boiled before drinking! There must be no mistakes in the matter of water supply."
Tie Lanshan suddenly stood up and took the sword from the sword rack.
"Then follow the words of the imperial envoy!"
The old general strode out of the main hall and shouted at the messenger outside the courtyard: "Go and call Yang Cang here!"
...
Half an hour later, in the former salt merchant's old residence area in the western part of the city.
This used to be the most affluent area in the northern pass of the town. Later, several big salt merchants were involved in a court case and their properties were confiscated. These continuous mansions were completely abandoned and overgrown with dry grass.
Yang Cang wore an iron helmet and carried a sword on his waist. He led 300 fully armed soldiers of the personal guard battalion with their mouths and noses covered with medicinal cloths, surrounding these more than a dozen mansions tightly.
The harsh sounds of sawing wood and hammering echoed on the long street.
The engineers carried thick logs and nailed deep stakes along the street, pulling up three ropes as thick as an adult's thigh to block horses.
Several huge wooden signs painted red with paint overnight were stuck into the soil, with eight big characters written on them: "Plague Area, No Trespassing. Violators Will Be Beheaded".
A creaking wheelbarrow was pushed to the door of the dilapidated Courtyard A by two masked soldiers.
The cart was filled with thick white lime, and Liu San was curled up in the lime pile.
The black spots on his abdomen had spread to his chest, and he was barely breathing.
The two soldiers picked up two long bamboo poles with iron hooks and hooked Liu San's tattered collar and belt from the left and right respectively, then exerted force at the same time.
"Lift!"
Liu San let out a extremely weak groan, rolled half a circle on the ground, and then stopped moving.
Yang Cang stood outside the door, looking inside through the half-open door.
This spacious front yard was no longer empty.
Dozens of ragged people were lying haphazardly under the eaves and beside the corridor columns.
Some were rolling on the ground clutching their stomachs, and some were already silent with their bellies burst.
In the corner, a teenage boy was holding a female corpse in his arms, staring blankly out of the door with a lifeless look in his eyes and muttering something that no one could understand.
"Close the door!" Yang Cang withdrew his gaze and ordered coldly.
The two red-lacquered doors were closed by the soldiers.
Several craftsmen walked forward with thick pine boards and pressed the crossbeams on the joint of the two doors.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Half - foot - long iron nails were deeply driven into the solid wood of the door frame by the hammers.
One heavy door, two locks, nine boards.
The exit of the entire mansion was completely sealed.
Only a small side door was left for entry.
A young soldier of the personal guard stood under the wall with a halberd in his hand. Listening to the shrill sounds, he couldn't bear it and closed his eyes.
He bit the linen cloth stuffed in his mouth tightly, and his palms were full of cold sweat. He couldn't even hold the spear steadily.
