Zhu Yu, not far away, seeing this scene, quickly pulled the reins and stopped the horse.
The other workers seemed unfazed by such incidents; they silently unloaded the burdens from their shoulders. A few of them went forward, hoisting the man who had collapsed into the mud with difficulty, and carried him to the roadside. Finding a spot where the water hadn't completely submerged, only soft, soggy mud remained, they laid him there facing upwards. They then returned to pick up their heavy loads again, continuing their struggle forward, one foot deep in mud, the other barely finding solid ground.
Other than the addition of a lifeless figure lying on the ground by the roadside, about whose life or death nothing can be said, everything returned to its previous state. The sounds of labor chants even rang louder than before.
