Chapter 182: With Enough Sand, Some Gold Is Always Hidden
Yun Ce looked at those refugees, women and children huddled in the camp. There were a lot of them, fully over ten thousand people, and they had all sorts of strange, destitute appearances.
It made sense. The women and children who could wander to the Yun Clan Villa had basically all been carefully selected through layers.
The good-looking women and children had long been picked by the Lang Clan to sell.
The strong men had long been selected by the Cao Clan and dragged off to repair the Great Wall.
So what was left for Yun Ce were just these people with no real value, right?
Yun Ce wasn’t surprised by this. It was similar to what he saw when he went to the countryside in the northwest region on Earth. The good-looking ones, the strong ones, the educated ones—all left their hometowns to make money elsewhere. The people left in the village looked about the same as these refugees.
On Earth, Yun Ce never expected to revitalize the countryside relying on these people. Similarly, here, Yun Ce didn’t expect to build his hoped-for Yun City relying on them.
E Ji couldn’t bear to watch over ten thousand people get devoured by wild beasts, nor could she watch them freeze to death or starve to death.
Similarly, Yun Ce couldn’t either…
Not being able to meant their open conspiracy had succeeded.
1 However, such an open conspiracy—no matter who it came from—Yun Ce planned to take it on.
1 But those people had better not let him survive the hardest time ahead. Once he did, those bloodsucking bastards wouldn’t have good days anymore.
1 Because, as long as he survived it, these people would become the Yun Clan’s basic support base, an unshakable one at that. And this base would generate tremendous appeal.
1 In the crowd, an unattractive woman was likely the beloved of some equally unattractive man. The skinny, monkey-like child in her arms had probably once been lovingly held and kissed countless times by an equally skinny man.
1 Which family’s son did that elderly couple belong to as parents? Which family’s children were those homeless little kids?
1 Yun Ce believed that as long as they treated them well, this place would surely become the spot north of the Great Wall that best gathered hearts.
1 The Deep Winter Month was already nearing its end, and the Twilight Month was about to arrive.
1 The remaining snow on the sunny slope had begun to melt. Even the thick ice layer on the Qingshui River had separated from the river surface. If you looked closely, you’d see countless water droplets falling into the river water from under the ice layer.
1 This was a sign that spring was about to arrive.
1 E Ji sat in front of the low table, gnawing hard on a bird leg. Her teeth were formidable, making the bird leg bone crunch and crackle.
2 While gnawing the bird leg, she swore to Yun Ce that she could eat a little less from now on.
2 Zhang Min, also gnawing a bird leg, glanced disdainfully at E Ji. Seeing her eat fast while she ate slowly, she quickly lowered her head and ate fiercely. She knew well that if she ate slowly, E Ji would definitely come rob her food.
2 The two finished the roasted bird almost simultaneously. Just as E Ji was considering whether to suck the fat off the bones again, she heard Zhang Min say, “So you’re saying the Fire Tribe has fallen into the hands of the Cao Clan?”
2 Yun Ce nodded and said, “Cao Kun was very clever. He stirred up internal opposition in the Fire Tribe, so all the killing could be pushed onto the Fire Tribe’s own people. The current Fire Tribe seems independent, but in reality, it follows the Cao Clan’s lead.”
2 Fairly speaking, what Cao Kun did at Danwang Mountain this time was brilliant and beyond reproach.
2 Zhang Min wiped her oily mouth and smiled, “I’ll pass this news on to Wu Tong.”
2 “What use is passing it to him? Does he still have the ability to reach north of the Great Wall?”
2 Zhang Min sighed and said, “I’ve heard even worse news. Of the Great Han’s three hundred military prefectures, less than half now obey the central authority. As for the remaining three hundred protectorate prefectures, if they weren’t afraid of the Shehuo being swallowed by the Ancestral Fire, they’d probably run even faster.”
2 Yun Ce shook his head, “Maybe they’ve had too many peaceful days and everyone wants to experience some turmoil.”
2 Zhang Min said, “It should be that the unchanging days have gone on too long, and everyone wants some change, so they’re recklessly acting out regardless.”
3 Yun Ce said, “Knowing full well their actions are improper, yet acting recklessly from top to bottom—this is the path to death.”
3 Zhang Min leaned into Yun Ce’s arms and whispered, “The more chaos, the more opportunities for a talented and virtuous man like you, Young Master.”
3 Yun Ce raised his hand and smacked her buttocks, saying, “You don’t need to keep stirring up my ambition. I have no ambition myself, just some things I must do.”
3 Ever since Yun Ce took in the refugee fugitives, refugees from the east side kept coming to join the Yun Clan Villa. For this, Yun Ce’s policy toward refugees was to accept them all without exception.
3 It was just that each person got only three taels of grain per day, and the shortfall had to be found by the refugees themselves on the wasteland.
3 To expand the refugees’ range for finding food, Yun Ce had no choice but to start driving away the wild beasts again.
3 Three taels of grain per person per day—that was half a bowl of wheat grain, or half a bowl of beans. On better days, they might get half a bowl of fodder grain.
3 Cooking wheat grain with grass roots provided some lubrication to the originally coarse, hard-to-swallow wheat grain. Not only was it easy to swallow, it also came with the fresh scent of grass.
3 Of course, if you wanted to eat well, it depended on your luck. If you happened to catch a fish from a nearly melting ice hole right then, your dinner would be rich: beans and fish, cooked together. If you rationed it, it could last two days.
3 Seeing people constantly devising new recipes, Yun Ce was quite pleased. Though this was part of self-rescue, later, when times got better, if someone refined these haphazardly pieced-together recipes, they might create unique Great Han gourmet dishes.
4 Chaotic hummed folk songs, haphazardly pieced-together meals, handily made tools, and casually voiced sentiments—after the baptism of time and people’s persistent improvements, these things would ultimately blend into the Great Han’s civilization and culture, with no trace of their original crudeness and panic.
4 Yun Ce himself was a gourmet expert, but he never bothered to teach these refugees how to make delicious food when he had nothing else to do.
4 If food was made delicious, people would eat more. In these times of food scarcity, eating should be for staying alive—that was the right principle. Absolutely not the twisted idea that living was for eating.
4 As long as you didn’t care about color, aroma, or taste, there was actually quite a lot to eat on the wasteland. Many grass seeds contained plenty of starch. Strip them from the grass ears, crush them, carefully blow off the shells, then boil them nonstop in an earthenware pot overnight, and you’d have a pot of fragrant yet slightly astringent grass seed porridge.
4 After Yun Ce tried it, he thought it was actually quite filling, just low in yield. Gathering enough grass seeds for one pot of porridge might take two or three days.
4 Compared to other places in the Great Han, the Yun Clan Villa was undoubtedly a very poor place. Yet strangely, in this poor place, the brilliance of humanity shone like the aurora, illuminating this barren land.
4 Relations between people were extremely friendly, whether the slaves who came earliest with Yun Ce, the convicted prisoners who came later, or the refugees who arrived last—their relationships were extremely harmonious.
4 Yun Ce attributed this phenomenon to poverty.
4 Truth be told, in a place where everyone was generally dirt poor and saw no quick path to getting rich, relations between people were naturally excellent.
4 Because everyone ate the same, lived the same, wore the same—with nothing to compare—people naturally became tolerant and generous toward others and themselves.
5 However, Yun Ce had left a special channel open. This channel was for talented people in the camp. As long as you could show real ability—even a single skill—you could go try it with Yun Ce. If you passed his test, you could immediately become a camp manager.
5 Your daily ration would go from three taels to half a jin, and you’d manage a group of people.
5 Ever since a man who claimed he could fire bricks passed Yun Ce’s test and became the camp brick and tile factory head, many people started coming forward to find Yun Ce.
5 Most didn’t make it, like those really good at catching fish, or running fast, or having great strength, or able to understand bird calls…
5 These people naturally couldn’t become managers, but Yun Ce still recorded their skills. When needed, he could use them.
5 There was a young man with a broad upper body and short legs who had secretly observed Yun Ce for several days. Finally, just as Yun Ce was about to lose patience, he came forward and claimed he wanted to treat him to a bowl of grain and shell porridge.
5 In the refugee camp, fodder grain—the most filling food—was hard to get. In a camp of over ten thousand, only about thirty jin was distributed daily.
5 When this uniquely built young man said he wanted to treat Yun Ce to grain and shell porridge, Yun Ce was initially unwilling. After all, the young man only had three taels of grain, and even adding shells he found by smashing ice, it wasn’t enough for two people.
5 Only when the young man told Yun Ce he was from the Fire Tribe did Yun Ce reluctantly take a bite of the so-called grain and shell porridge.
5 This stuff was hard to swallow. The shell meat probably wasn’t cleaned well, with plenty of sand inside that could easily chip teeth.
6 If Yun Ce didn’t have high hopes for this Fire Tribe person, he absolutely wouldn’t have had the resolve to finish half a bowl of this fishy, sticky mess.
6 After the young man likewise forced down half a bowl of grain and shell porridge with great resolve, he saw Yun Ce looking at him with a smile. His not-so-dark face flushed completely red.
6 “From the first day I entered the refugee camp, you already knew who I was, right, Lord?”
6 Yun Ce nodded and said, “The Fire Tribe’s unique build and appearance is something basically all Great Han people know.”
6 “Why didn’t you come find me? You must have heard the rumors—I’m the Fire Tribe Young Master who escaped from Danwang Mountain, Huo Youming.”
6 Yun Ce eyed the young man before him and said, “The Fire Tribe Young Master is named Huo Liao, not Huo Youming.”
