Meanwhile, a woman holding a child who was nothing but skin and bones knelt on the sand. She stared at the fragrant, snowy-white steamed bun before her, also hesitating to take it.
She looked up, gazing at Pei Du. “Are... are you here to capture us? You won't take my child, will you?”
As she spoke, her eyes were filled with sheer terror.
“Last year, a group of people came saying they would give us food, but they ended up binding and dragging away over a dozen men from our village...”
And her husband had been one of them.
Pei Du fell silent for a moment upon hearing this.
Then, he squatted down and pulled open the mouth of the sack, revealing a bag filled with soft, white steamed buns. “Auntie, if we were here to capture people, we wouldn't need to distribute such good food to everyone in your village.”
“Then what are you after?” The woman stared at the bag of white buns, swallowing hard. But when her gaze brushed past Pei Du to the armored, sword-bearing soldiers behind him, she instinctively shrank back, tightening her grip on her child. “We don't have money to buy your food, and we have nothing to trade for it.”
Pei Du placed the bun into the woman's hand. “Our Divine Lady is merciful. This food is yours to keep. You don't need to buy it, nor do you need to trade anything for it. If you truly feel uneasy receiving it for free, you can help wash the clothes of the soldiers in our army. Of course, I won't make you work for nothing. I will pay you wages accordingly for the work you do.”
“Young Master, we can earn wages just for washing clothes?”
The woman's eyes were filled with utter disbelief.
In the past, she had heard that embroidery could be sold for money in the city. But now that times were hard and people couldn't even afford food, who would spend money on things that could neither fill their stomachs nor keep out the cold?
Pei Du said, “In the north, regardless of gender, as long as you work, you can earn wages. No workshop or employer is allowed to withhold wages.”
The woman could no longer hold back her tears. “It must be so wonderful to be a believer of the Divine Lady, to be able to work and earn wages.”
Working to earn wages was an incredibly difficult thing for ordinary commoners like them. Unless they sold themselves into slavery, if they worked for those landlords, the landlords would pay them if they felt like it, and if they didn't, the commoners had no recourse.
In the end, they would be dismissed with a bag of moldy rice at best.
“Young Master, can I choose not to take wages?” Her eyes were glued to the buns in the sack. “I... I want food instead. Don't worry, I won't ask for too much. Whatever you are willing to give is fine.”
Nowadays, grain prices in the city were terrifyingly high.
Even if she had money, she might not be able to buy any grain.
It was far more practical to ask for grain directly.
Pei Du naturally would not refuse the woman's request. Every city in the north had several granaries; they truly did not lack grain.
Considering that the woman might feel uneasy about such a sudden stroke of good fortune, he added another reassurance.
“Auntie, if there are others in the village who want to work in exchange for grain, you can bring them over too. We won't enter the village. For the next few days, we will be camped here on the rocky beach. You can just take the clothes back to wash them and bring them back when they are clean.”
The final trace of worry in the woman's heart vanished. Holding her child, she knelt on the ground, weeping as she kowtowed several times.
“Thank you, Young Master. Thank you...”
“Please, there is no need for this!”
Pei Du quickly helped her up. “You don't need to thank me. I am merely acting on the orders of the Divine Lady.”
Seeing the actions of Feng Chunya, Pei Du, and the others, Zhu Guyu said to Zhu Jingzhe, “Brother, they really seem to be here to help us. But why are they helping us?”
Just like before, when she had misunderstood that the Divine Lady wanted to burn her to death, she hadn't understood what she had done wrong to deserve being burned.
At this moment, she understood even less what a tiny fishing village could possibly have that was worth the help of these believers of the Divine Lady.
“Guyu, I don't know either.” Zhu Jingzhe reached out and gently stroked his sister's hair, his voice low and hoarse. “Just take it one day at a time. Don't overthink it.”
“Brother, I can't eat anymore.” Saying this, Zhu Guyu handed the half-eaten bun in her hand to Zhu Jingzhe.
Having starved for so long, how could she possibly be full after only half a bun? She simply didn't want to see her brother starve while saving food for her, just like their parents used to do.
“Then eat it later when you are hungry.”
Zhu Jingzhe was about to carefully put away his sister's leftovers along with his own bun, but Zhu Guyu forcefully stuffed the half-eaten bun into his mouth.
“Eat up. You said it yourself, we just have to take it one day at a time. If you don't eat, how are you going to live?”
Zhu Jingzhe felt a wave of warmth in his heart.
Yun Shu stood on the balcony on the top deck of the tower boat, watching Feng Chunya and the others set up camp while providing relief to the villagers.
The little fox asked, somewhat puzzled, “Host, why didn't you go straight to the nearest Wuling City? There are way more people in the city, so you could farm a lot more Shock Value. This fishing village has so few people.”
“The villagers in the fishing village are people too.”
Yun Shu stood very high up, giving her a clear, unobstructed view of the entire fishing village ahead.
The village wasn't large.
It looked to have only several dozen households.
At most, she could only harvest a few thousand Shock Value.
But her primary purpose in coming to the south was not to earn Shock Value, but to save lives.
Harvesting Shock Value was just a side benefit.
If it were purely for Shock Value, she wouldn't have had to consider any consequences at all. She could have just created all sorts of massive spectacles to max out her Shock Value in a matter of minutes.
“Tongzi, since we have some free time over the next few days, let's make some preparations so we can stir things up in Wuling City.”
*
Night had fallen.
In the largest ancestral hall at the east end of the village.
In truth, it was merely a drafty mud brick house with half a tile missing from its roof, but it was currently packed with people.
Young and old gathered around a freshly lit bonfire, the firelight illuminating their thin, sallow faces.
A wrinkled old man was the first to speak, his voice tinged with emotion. “I've lived for over sixty years, and this is the first time I've ever seen soldiers handing out steamed buns to commoners. In the past, whenever those rogue armies entered the village, which of them didn't rob and kill?”
Someone nearby chimed in, “But they didn't steal a thing. And the buns they gave us were incredibly filling.”
“I saw just now that they set up a lot of strange tents on the rocky beach. They said they wouldn't enter the village, and they really didn't...”
“I spoke with that young gentleman today,” the woman holding the child said. “He said that if we wash clothes for the Zhenbei Army, we can earn wages. I told him I didn't want money and wanted grain instead, and he agreed without a second thought.”
“He really agreed?” An older woman nearby leaned in, her eyes wide with anticipation. “How much grain does he give?”
“He said we get a bag of rice every three days. High-quality rice!”
Everyone's eyes lit up with eagerness.
“Can we go too?”
“Yes. The gentleman said that if anyone in the village wants to do this washing work, they can go to them to pick up dirty clothes to wash. Once we wash them clean and send them back, we can exchange them for grain.”
“Good, let's go check it out tomorrow!”
Rate on N.U.
