Chapter 148: The Fragile Great Wall Defense Line
While resting at the hot spring area, Yun Ce exchanged all children under eight years old from their parents’ hands.
E Ji didn’t understand. Clearly these people were all property of the Yun Clan, so why bother exchanging? Just drag them over directly; they wouldn’t dare make a peep.
However, when she saw Yun Ce hand a new Yi Tree Cloth garment to a child’s mother right in front of the child, and the mother unhesitatingly pushed the child to Yun Ce, while holding the new clothes against herself, ignoring the child’s calls, E Ji felt that exchanging with things was still more appropriate.
Back then, when Yun Ce received five thousand slaves from the Grand Marshal, he deliberately made no demands on the slaves, so many clever officials proactively stuffed in a lot of unwanted women with children, so they could save more strong slaves to sell at high prices.
The slaves obtained from Ren Zhong were the same; the strong, good-looking, and skilled ones had long been sold at high prices, and the rest were naturally the unsellable women with children and the old, weak, sick, and disabled.
If not for the order to give slaves to Yun Ce coming from the Grand Marshal’s Mansion, they would have eagerly swapped all of Yun Ce’s slaves for worthless women and children.
Therefore, after tallying, Yun Ce discovered that there were actually more than three thousand young slaves under eight years old under his command. What satisfied him most was that these young slaves basically didn’t count toward the slave quota; they were extras given free by the government officials.
Zhang Min looked at Yun Ce puzzledly as he racked his brains naming more than three thousand little kids. She couldn’t figure out what Yun Ce was up to.
“If, if you want to use these children as your foundation, I think it’s not suitable. They’re too young; the training time is too long.”
Yun Ce smiled and said, “Those over eight are called slaves.”
1 Zhang Min said, “They’re still young; they can be corrected.”
1 Yun Ce shook his head and said, “Those over eight are no longer children. They’re called slaves; self-esteem, self-reliance, independence, confidence—these things can never be poured into their heads.”
1 “You could also not recruit from slaves, like you said, good family children would work too.”
1 “Originally, I thought so too, until I showed great kindness to the officers and soldiers at Jingkou Pass, yet they thought of feeding me to beasts and hoped we would fight the beasts to a mutual destruction. After that, I stopped having high hopes for so-called good family children.
1 Because they have been educated by their own parents and teachers into people who don’t know gratitude, selfish and self-interested.
1 Although these slaves’ children have harsh living conditions, because their parents have no time to educate them, to this day they are still like blank slates who only know how to eat. I have confidence I can shape them into people like me.”
1 As Yun Ce spoke, he picked up his pen and added a character after the name of a child called Lei—ming.
1 “This child will be called Lei Ming from now on?”
1 “Yes, a Lei should thunder loudly, making the world listen attentively.”
1 E Ji clapped her hands joyfully and said, “These three thousand one hundred twenty-two children will be under my management from now on?”
2 Yun Ce looked at E Ji, grabbed her hand, and gently patted the back of it, saying, “They are very important, extremely important. You must care for them with the mindset of a loving mother.”
2 E Ji’s smile paused for a moment, then she hurriedly asked, “Can I beat them?”
2 Yun Ce said in surprise, “Why not? I’m teaching them to become useful, not raising wastes. Once any natural bad seeds appear, immediately weed them out from the group.”
2 Zhang Min then asked, “What if it’s the most excellent natural bad seed?”
2 Yun Ce shook his head and said, “That wouldn’t be called excellent; that would be a black sheep.”
2 The geothermal resources near Jingkou Pass are extremely abundant. At the same time, there is a source head abandoned by the Qing River called Qingshui River that flows through nearby.
2 With winter approaching, Yun Ce planned to start his land reclamation project from the Jingkou Pass area first.
2 The two beasts that had wailed to death before made the nearby prowling beasts unwilling to meet the same fate, so they stayed away. Only doggies don’t care; their population is vast, and losing some means nothing to them.
2 Even so, Yun Ce and Zhang Min thoroughly cleared this wasteland before lighting a fire at the upwind position.
2 The vegetation on the wasteland was extremely dense. Once lit, the fire quickly spread like wildfire. Countless poisonous insects and small beasts hiding under the vegetation immediately suffered, desperately chased by the fire line until exhausted and falling, swallowed by the blaze.
3 In Shuanghua Moon, northwest winds prevail, so the fire swept from the northwest straight to the southeast. Yun Ce calculated well: starting from the cedar forest, the fire would roll all the way to the Qingshui River before extinguishing.
3 This land totals three hundred thousand mu. Intensive farming for one hundred thousand mu, slash-and-burn for one hundred thousand mu, leaving one hundred thousand mu as replacement fields—this should be a good plan.
3 Of course, it would be even better if the garrison commander at Jingkou Pass stopped constantly coming to freeload.
3 The winters here are not extremely harsh; the freeze period each year is only about twenty days. The biggest threat during those twenty days is the legendary ‘goose feather heavy snow.’
3 Yun Ce thought it was pretty good. If the ground is turned before winter, the freeze plus heavy snow can kill over ninety percent of pests, which is very beneficial for crop planting.
3 No sooner said than done. Yun Ce harnessed the red date horse that insisted on pulling the plow with a double-headed ploughshare made in Chang’an, plowing a furrow ten li long on the blackened ground scorched by the fire.
3 Yun Ce went out early and returned late every day, leading the red date horse to keep plowing nonstop on the wasteland. This was unavoidable. Not just Yun Ce; Feng An and Liang Kun also put down their work and joined the plowing effort.
3 In the end, even E Ji, Zhang Min, An Ji, and other little girls drove great horned horses to start plowing. This wasn’t for show; most of the slaves were too stupid. Such a simple plow-holding task, after more than ten days of training, they still couldn’t plow a relatively straight furrow.
3 Therefore, Yun Ce, Feng An, and Liang Kun—the three experts—first divided the large fields into small blocks, then let the novice farmers break up the hard ground in the small blocks with plows, and finally had the women with little strength pick out and pile up the grass roots, tree roots, stones, and such things plowed up.
3 The garrison commander at Jingkou Pass, Liu Che, was an imperial family member who knew business. Seeing Yun Ce’s subordinates reclaiming land, he came to discuss with Yun Ce whether his subordinates could come to the geothermal area to help build houses for them. He also said that in another month, goose feather heavy snow would pour down; even with geothermal heat, it couldn’t block the cold winds from the Qinghe Plateau.
4 Yun Ce didn’t want to trade materials, but Liu Che said green money or gold would do; he wasn’t picky.
4 Yun Ce still had plenty of green money; it was what he kept for crafting complex weapons. As for gold, E Ji should have some left. Though when leaving Chang’an, she used gold to purchase large amounts of materials, unfortunately, the materials available in Chang’an weren’t infinite. After buying to a certain extent, they stopped selling to her, as further purchases would disrupt the Chang’an materials market.
4 Seeing Yun Ce hesitate, Liu Che tapped the table with his fingers and said, “Actually, I still have some slaves and materials you need here.”
4 Yun Ce blankly raised his head and looked at Liu Che in confusion.
4 Jingkou Pass is a very small fortress. Within a hundred li radius, there aren’t many people, and to the north is wasteland, with even fewer making a living here.
4 So, seeing Liu Che’s poor appearance the first time, Yun Ce didn’t believe he could produce slaves and materials that would satisfy him.
4 “Although Jingkou Pass is remote and beyond the emperor’s reach, allowing us to do things against the law, if what we do becomes too outrageous and offends heaven and man, you won’t be able to enjoy this peaceful and idle life anymore.”
4 Liu Che chuckled and said, “Even the Grand Governor can’t hold onto such a peaceful life; what makes you think I can? This time, I didn’t lead the army away from Jingkou Pass precisely because I don’t want to be the first garrison commander to flee the Great Wall.
4 Of course, I also don’t want to be the last fool to flee the Great Wall. Now, do you understand what I mean?”
4 Yun Ce frowned and said, “Slaves can’t serve as soldiers.”
5 Liu Che laughed heartily: “You’re too absolute. If slaves can’t serve as soldiers, who has repaired the damaged Great Wall over the past centuries? Who has built the extensions?
5 Those guys at Iron Enclosure Pass who shout slogans all day, always fighting to the death, always provoking border incidents, with brains that aren’t right?”
5 Yun Ce looked at Liu Che and said, “Give me Jingkou Pass too.”
5 “Sure, my seal and the military carrier pigeons can all be yours. If there’s news from the Grand Marshal’s Mansion later, you receive it and handle it yourself. If they insist on asking where I went, say I went north to scout enemy situation.
5 If they insist on waiting for me, say I just fell in battle. If they don’t ask, you just continue as the garrison commander of Jingkou Pass.
5 Don’t look at me like that. Over the past decade or so, you’re the first official I’ve seen who honestly comes to the Northern Territory to work, and the only one willing to put out so much money to handle court affairs.”
5 Yun Ce said, “Slaves and money all belong to the court.”
5 Liu Che laughed loudly: “Once they fall into your hands, they’re yours. I only regret the court isn’t willing to send me money. If they did, I’d have run long ago.”
5 Yun Ce nodded and said, “Tell me, how much money do you want to hand over Jingkou Pass, including its army, and everything else I need?”
5 Hearing this, Liu Che’s eyes gradually turned bloodshot. He spread his two grimy black palms, sticking out all ten fingers straight at Yun Ce, roaring, “I want five million!”
6 Yun Ce angrily said, “Five million taels of gold?”
6 Liu Che said without blinking, “I want five million cash!”
6 Yun Ce grabbed Liu Che’s dirty hand and said, “Good, deal!”
6 Next chapter after edits, nothing inappropriate said.
