No one could care about so much. Holding things, they just rushed up.
The nets, no matter how many were caught, were put under feet to trample to death, and then continue fishing.
Those holding sheets and bedsheets worked in pairs. They stretched them out and covered the ground to stomp on, and then stomped around wildly.
More and more locusts swooped in. Some were blocked by the people, some jumped into the bonfires and burned to death, and many more riding the terrain wanting to fly directly over the col tried to avoid the smoke and dropped to the ground, only to be eaten by the excited chickens and ducks.
No one remembered how many locusts were killed today, no one remembered how much firewood was moved, and no one remembered how much toxic smoke they inhaled.
Everyone only knew that if these locusts were not blocked here, the crops of the whole village would be doomed.
He Xiaoya directed several women to carry large buckets of homemade sour plum soup up the mountain. Later, when the sour plum soup was gone, they started delivering cool well water.
Everyone's clothes had been soaked with sweat at least dozens of times, and sweat beads kept dripping down their hair like rain.
Even the blacksmith Xia Xian came over to help, propping himself up with a cane, incessantly slapping at the locusts with a large wooden board.
But no one complained of hardship or fatigue. Everyone repeated the same actions. Wherever the locusts came from, everyone went together to stop them there.
Looking at the still endless stream of locusts flying from the mountains, Song County Magistrate felt both afraid and somewhat relieved.
Fortunately, the locusts came from the big mountain behind He Wan village, and He Wan village had a Li Yao. Otherwise, the commoners of the entire Baichuan County would probably only be able to flee this year.
It was almost dark, and everyone was exhausted and bitterly tired. Their clothes were covered with dozens of layers of white frost, but the locusts were still coming wave after wave, and had successfully climbed halfway up the mountain from the col.
Li Yao's more than 100 mu of sweet potato fields were also plagued, and had long been trampled beyond recognition. But now there was no time to feel heartache about this. This amount of damage was completely bearable.
"Is there any more firewood?"
"People have gone to get it!" Wang Jiafu was so tired he was about to collapse, but his lean body still persisted. "It will arrive soon!"
"I went back there to take a look," Li Yao said. "This should be the last wave. Take advantage of the darkness to make the fire blaze and lure all the locusts here."
More than a dozen carts of dry branches were transported over and piled into more than a dozen huge bonfires in Li Yao's sweet potato field.
The flames rushed to the sky, illuminating a large area of the sky red. The surrounding locusts were attracted by the firelight and all flew towards this side.
"Everyone hold on, this is the last wave!"
Wang Jiafu's voice was inspiring. They started to catch around the bonfires, but even so, they were busy until midnight before the surrounding locusts were reduced to sporadic numbers.
Li Yao tidied his hair, which had been soaked countless times, and sat down in the sweet potato field.
Song County Magistrate followed suit, and regardless of dirtying his official uniform, sat down directly.
The more than a thousand villagers, young and old, even more exhausted, lay down directly on the spot.
"Li nobleman," Song County Magistrate said, "Your He Wan village is really amazing. This is the first time I've seen people completely conquer a locust plague."
"To win this time requires the right time, location, people and harmony," Li Yao said. "If it hadn't rained today, if the locusts hadn't come from the mountains, if the route hadn't been this mountain col, if the villagers hadn't been so united, we might have lost."
"Yes, it seems that the heavenly god is blessing He Wan Village."
This time even Li Yao felt very surprised. The villagers of He Wan Village were unprecedentedly united and worked together to overcome this locust plague.
In fact, everyone had a little money now. Even if the crops in the fields were eaten up, they wouldn't starve.
But everyone still desperately protected the crops and resisted the locusts. This was probably the peasants' obsession with crops.
"Let's have a few people stay here with me on guard," Village Chief Wang Jiafu said. "The rest hurry to the schoolhouse to eat. Li nobleman has prepared a lot of delicious food for everyone today."
Before even entering the yard of the schoolhouse, all kinds of meat and vegetable aromas could be smelled.
He Xiaoya had led several women to be busy at home all afternoon, cooking enough food and dishes for over a thousand people.
Li Yao was so hungry his chest was stuck to his back. He filled up a whole bowl and didn't want to go find a stool. He squatted in the corner and started eating. Seeing this, Song County Magistrate shook his head. This was a 7th rank nobleman. If others saw him like this, who knows what they would say.
But in He Wan Village, there were no outsiders.
So he also carried his food and mimicked Li Yao by squatting in the corner.
Just as everyone was silently eating, news from other villages also came back one after another.
The other villages had also appeared large numbers of locusts, but the scale was far smaller than He Wan Village. They had all been completely eradicated.
Several neighboring counties were the same. Fortunately everyone had made preparations early on, and had not suffered huge losses, preserving at least 90% of the grain.
Hearing this news, everyone was very happy. The people under heaven are one family. As long as people in other places don't go hungry, there will be peace under heaven, and the people of He Wan Village will be able to live truly peaceful days.
And all of this was brought to everyone by Li Yao.
Without Li Yao, everyone in He Wan Village would definitely have had to flee famine in a few years.
"I think we can erect a virtue stele for Li nobleman now."
"Right, right, later we'll talk to the Village Chief about this. We must erect a stele for Auntie Li!"
Li Yao: ...I'm still alive and well, what stele needs erecting?
"Prefect sir, Song County Magistrate has sent someone again."
Li Prefect, who was eating breakfast, couldn't help but frown slightly.
This Song County Magistrate really had a lot going on, coming to bother him every other day. He had just taken office not long ago, and had already sent people over several times, and sent several handwritten letters.
"Go ask what it's about."
"He said," the servant replied, "that a large-scale locust plague occurred in Baichuan County yesterday."
"What?" Li Prefect dropped his chopsticks on the ground. "What's the situation?"
"No major issues. All the locusts have been eradicated."
Eradicating all the locusts from a locust plague?
Li Prefect was actually relieved. Since people could eradicate a locust plague, it must not have been large-scale. Song County Magistrate was probably exaggerating things to curry favor.
But before he had even finished breakfast, several other counties also sent people to report that they had experienced locust plagues of varying degrees.
Now Li Prefect could no longer sit still.
He knew these counties had carried out prevention and control measures together with Baichuan County in advance, but the problem was that several other counties had not taken any action at all.
If those counties had also experienced locust plagues, the consequences would be...
"Come, hurry and send people to order all counties to actively prevent locust plagues!"
But now that the order went out, it was already too late.
