Chapter 61

Wen Yi received the documents from Pingyi, which contained several letters addressed to her. She was a little surprised to see the names on them. After finishing the work at hand, she simply took the stack of letters and returned to her temporary residence.

A desk has been added to the room, and things that are not used temporarily are stacked in boxes for easy transportation.

The box beside the desk contained a variety of miscellaneous items from the past few days, as well as various drawings and drafts from the past few days. Wen Yi took out the box containing the bamboo sword and began to open the sealed letters.

In fact, bamboo tubes were used at the beginning, but even if they were sealed with mud and baked, they were still easy to forge. Wen Yi simply made a batch of paper envelopes, stamped them with seals and used them to deliver documents. After a long time, Pingyi Chong also sold them. After all, everyone always had relatives and friends in other places. Although there was no proper way to deliver letters, it was okay to ask a caravan to take them over.

Next to the paper shop, there is also a document writing stall, and people can make a good living from this.

There are many people in Wen Yi's caravan who take on this type of business, but they can't always find the people. Sometimes there are omissions, and the letters and the small boxes that come with them have to be returned the same way.

Despite this, there were still people willing to spend money to pass on messages. This provided more possibilities for contact than before. In the past, even if it was a neighboring city, many people would never have the chance to meet again unless there were special circumstances, and would have lived in a small area their entire lives.

In fact, it makes no difference now. Unless you have extraordinary martial arts skills or a wealthy family and are able to hire enough people to protect yourself, traveling is still difficult.

Many unofficial caravans have to hire some people to protect their goods every time they go out, otherwise they will be robbed by refugees or bandits on the road before they reach the place where they are going to trade, and their lives and property will be in danger.

Wen Yi took out Song Jin's letter, carefully opened the seal, and took out the papers inside.

Most of the things mentioned were things that were not convenient to talk about openly, including but not limited to the resettlement of the group of people originally in the mountains. When Wen Yi set out earlier, he had a premonition that he would not be returning in the short term, so he simply handed the people there to Song Jin. Now it seems that he really did the right thing.

Although it rained in Xinyi, the roots of the plants in the mountains and forests were not greatly damaged, and their ability to consolidate water and soil was much stronger than here. Apart from the rising river water that accidentally flooded a few buildings, there was no other damage.

The damaged areas were quickly repaired. When the river flooded the original bridge, Xinyi rebuilt a wooden suspension bridge to facilitate people walking or transporting goods on both sides.

"It turns out that we should accumulate more things." Wen Yi nodded.

Of course, we must also work hard to improve construction, but food is still the most important thing. In years of famine, even gold, silver, cloth and silk cannot buy enough food.

Copper served as a general equivalent because it had value in itself, and caravans would collect it as they traveled. However, in years of disaster, food prices skyrocketed, and the money earned might not even cover 30% of the food sold.

The increase in food prices is different from that of daily necessities. If there is a 10% food gap, the food price will not only rise by the same percentage, but will continue to rise endlessly until this 10% of people can no longer afford food.

If this panic is not regulated or replenished in time, people who cannot afford food will go to the wild to look for prey, or peel tree bark and grass roots to fill their stomachs in order to survive. After losing their minds, they will engage in robbery or even more cruel acts.

Fengyi and the surrounding cities faced this situation. Many people still had some copper coins, but they couldn't buy enough to eat. If the situation continued as usual, the outcome would be exile, and countless people would die along the way.

They now relied on the trust these people had built up over the winter. Daytime labor consumed most people's energy, leaving few to think carefully. But this wasn't a stable foundation. Wen Yi and the others needed to complete the spring plowing as quickly as possible, while also earning enough money and food to offset the risks.

The population was sufficient with the captives, and they could use caravans to exchange the ingenious gadgets they had made for some food in the southwest or southeast areas that were not affected by the locust plague.

The date of Yao Wenjun's letter was a long time ago. Probably when she wrote this letter, she had just learned that Wen Yi had set out for the newly captured city in the south. In the middle of the letter, she also asked Wen Yi whether he had enough people and whether he needed to send more soldiers to protect him.

Of course, he also wrote about the situation on his side, and even asked someone to bring back a few bags of dried fish and shrimp. However, it happened that the road here was broken and it was inconvenient to transport them, so they were temporarily stored in Pingyi, and he would make plans after the road was repaired.

Jidi borders the sea to the east, and although Yao Wenjun hasn't yet conquered the coastal cities, he can still buy goods that have been dried and transported. After realizing that Yao Wenjun and his men wouldn't directly rob them, many merchants in the cities gradually emerged and tried to sell their goods.

For those who have lived inland for a long time, these things are still fresh, but for the locals, they are not as valuable as the same weight of grain. Seafood is a good food for people with high body fat, but nowadays, being able to eat enough is a good condition. Very few people have fat accumulation. Eating only seafood will only make the body weaker.

However, humans still need to consume some foods like dried kelp. Wen Yi had previously stated that certain ingredients in it are crucial for the body, and many doctors reached similar conclusions. Therefore, Yao Wenjun purchased it at a low price and arranged for a caravan to transport it back to supplement the diets of Pingyi, Shangyong, and other places, while also exchanging it for some food.

The letter also mentioned the mineral deposits accidentally discovered by the soldiers while capturing the city. They had already collected some minerals from the open air and transported them back to the city. If they were useful, they would arrange for people to mine them here. In addition to these, there were also some complaints about Ji Di, and even some funny things they encountered. Wen Yi couldn't help but laugh out loud.

Yao Wenjun often wore outer clothes similar to those of ordinary soldiers. One day, when he was walking on the street, the manager, who was short of staff and looking for people everywhere, asked him to do labor to help distribute the newly delivered food.

Fortunately, the man had nothing to do, so she followed the manager. Finally, when she passed by the city gate guard on duty, she found something wrong. She stopped to observe and found that it was not her hallucination, and was shocked.

I don’t know what the steward’s expression was like when he found out the truth. It would be very interesting to think about it, like conscripting men and catching one’s own general.

The remaining letter was from Sang Yu.

Wen Yi even thought for a while before taking the knife to cut open the seal, but after recalling for a long time, he really couldn't understand why this person would send a letter. Usually, this person would leave a few words of official business with the clerk, and the account books were mainly handled with Song Jin. Although they were in the same office, the two had very few opportunities to communicate, and sometimes they only said a word or two after several days.

Originally thinking it would be about Pingyi, Wen Yi leaned against the soft pillow at the back after opening it. As he read on, he gradually sat up straight, and his expression became much more focused.

After a long time, Wen Yi put the paper back on the table, leaned back on the soft pillow, and sighed.

There wasn't much in it, just a thin piece of paper, but the content was clearly concise and completely different from the casual chats of the other people.

Thinking about it carefully, it seems that I haven't thought about what I want to do in a long time. Those memories that don't belong to the present have gradually blurred with the passage of time, replaced by the people and things around me now.

Various emergencies always keep people busy, and at the same time, the sense of nothingness that should exist will be temporarily suppressed. Perhaps this is why the unknown is so exciting.

Sang Yu was puzzled as to why he always chose to do it himself. It was obvious that things would be much more peaceful and stable in Pingyi, and he could leave the outside matters to others. Even if there were some mistakes, they could be made up for.

"Everyone in the academy has been through a lot of training and will definitely be able to handle this properly. We can also help each other in an emergency."

"I've thought about it over and over again, and I think there must be a reason, so I'm asking."

The letter did not mention Yao Wenjun, but some of its contents also had the shadow of that person. These behaviors seemed to puzzle Sang Yu. Perhaps at the beginning he thought that the words of Pingyi would not have a big impact on how to act, but now it seems that both of them are going to stay away from home.

If she thought about it carefully, if she took on Sang Yu's role, her boss would always be nowhere to be seen. Even though most things did not necessarily require her boss to make decisions, she might feel distressed.

But Pingyi has Song brocade, and Wen Yi is also confused about his own positioning.

"So, the real intention is to clarify who is in charge?"

Due to the ambiguity of the game and the constant wars, few people would notice that such a large country as Pingguo did not even have a clear rule like those forces with only a few cities.

In a sense, the plains are scattered and not concentrated in the hands of any one party; but they are also concentrated. Those who can control them have similar ideas. Wen Yi and Yao Wenjun, as well as Song Jin, all work towards the same direction.

For ordinary people and soldiers who care more about their own lives, these are not important. As long as they can be sure that they will live a richer and more comfortable life by following this group, they will not care about these things.

Haven’t you seen how many people didn’t even know that the people in charge of them had left when their cities were captured, let alone the specific names of the people with higher status?

Although there is no saying nowadays that "a son worth a hundred gold coins should not ride a horse", similar ideas are still shared by many people. Sang Yu's letter also has such a meaning. The backbone of a force cannot easily put himself in a dangerous situation to prevent the morale of the army from being shaken.

According to this logic, the behavior of both Yao Wenjun and Wen Yi was inappropriate.

But from the very beginning, neither of them wanted to rule like the other powers. Perhaps Yao Wenjun still had some ambitions, but Wen Yi chose to do this from the beginning, simply because he didn't want to disappoint anyone. From the beginning with Amu, to the longing eyes he saw later.

If the goal was to establish a new dynasty, the last thing Wen Yi should do was to join Yao Wenjun. Those soldiers were all commanded by Yao Wenjun herself and only obeyed the general's orders. Yao Wenjun also shouldn't let Wen Yi control the rear supplies. If something went wrong, controlling the logistics and food supplies could trigger a revolution. Only by concentrating all the troops and supplies in her own hands could she possibly control the situation.

"But you're right. Since I have no intention of doing this, why should I be so hesitant and always thinking about danger instead of doing what I should do?"

She didn't see herself as any different from the other people in the city, or even from the millions of people living on this land. Life wouldn't be shortened or shortened by achievements. Just being here was a miracle; if things didn't go smoothly, it would be a waste.

Thinking of this, the things that were originally weighing on my heart seemed to be moved away a little, and I felt a lot more relaxed.

Although Wen Yi hadn't shown it during this period, his nerves had indeed been on edge, constantly worried about the consequences of doing something wrong. But as Sang Yu had said, he should have believed that those people could do it.