Chapter 160 The Passerby Who Died Before the Famine Even Began (16)
Once the teacher was chosen, the private school began enrolling students. The village provided the teacher with free housing, and the Jiang and Bai families also gave the teacher an additional salary. The tuition was very low, and families in the village with children sent them to the private school. Even if they didn't participate in the imperial examinations, learning some arithmetic and literacy would make it easy for them to find work.
Five years have passed in the blink of an eye. Jiang Yue is 20 years old this year. In today's world, she would be considered an old maid. In previous years, her father and mother-in-law had been trying to find her a husband. But when Jiang Yue told them that she didn't want to get married, her father and mother-in-law stopped pressuring her to go on dates, as if they had accepted her decision.
Jiang Yue was completely baffled, not knowing what her father and Chen were thinking. Neither of them told her, and she didn't press them for an answer. Gradually, her father and Chen began to arrange her family's assets, building a house and registering some land in her name. Her younger brother, Jiang Xuan, had no objections when he found out, let alone her younger sister.
That day, Jiang Xuan and his father brought back news from the capital: the northern barbarians had launched a large-scale invasion. The family looked worried and said, "Sigh, we finally had a few years of rest and recuperation, and now we have to fight again. Why can't we ever get rid of these barbarians?"
"Does this mean they're going to levy taxes again?"
"Pretty much. Every war has its taxes. I just don't know how much they'll be added this year. If the war continues, the Chen Kingdom will really be destroyed. And I heard that this time it's not just the barbarians invading; the two princes who escaped a few years ago have also rebelled."
"What! This is going to plunge the world into chaos!" Chen Shi jumped up after hearing what Jiang's father said.
"Pretty much. I wonder if the Ninth Prince can hold off the barbarians. Hmph! Those two princes are truly beasts. Perhaps they even orchestrated the barbarian invasion. Do people who collude with foreign tribes deserve to be rulers?"
It must be said that Jiang's father was right. Seeing that the sixth prince's throne was becoming more and more secure, the two princes knew that if they didn't raise an army, they would have no chance at all. So they began to collude with foreign tribes.
Chen, who was standing nearby, slapped Jiang's father's arm to stop him from talking nonsense. Then, after thinking for a moment, she said, "We need to make some preparations. We need to buy more grain and other things, because it will definitely be difficult to buy them in the next few years. The court will also exploit us, the common people, when it is at war."
"The village's defensive fortifications also need to be completed as quickly as possible. There are still people living outside in the back mountain area, right? We need to hurry up and get them moved into the village."
"Yes, I remember. A while ago, Brother Bai Ze said he wanted to train the patrol team so that they could protect the village if any refugees or defeated soldiers came. The days ahead will definitely get harder and harder."
When news of the barbarian invasion spread, most of the powerful and wealthy people in the capital secretly fled to the Jiangnan region. Although there were also rebellions there, they were not as brutal as the barbarians. Almost no one believed that the Ninth Prince could stop the barbarians.
In fact, without the female lead's help, the Ninth Prince would not have been able to stop her. After all, gunpowder had not yet been developed, and the female lead still had some concerns. It wasn't until many people died that the female lead softened and couldn't bear to watch anymore, so she developed the bomb, which decided the fate of the world in one battle.
As Jiang's father had predicted, official taxes increased to 70% in the days that followed. Many people were still in debt to the landlords after a year of farming. The taxes were now collected for twenty years, which truly highlighted the people's plight. Fortunately, Jiang's father had now waived the land rent, otherwise, everyone would have been unable to survive.
Taking advantage of this time, Jiang's father bought several shops in the capital to sell vegetables and peaches. The prices were so low that they were almost the same as cabbage, so he wouldn't lose much money. During this period, the village's defensive fortifications were also completed. The road at the village entrance was blocked off with wood and stones, and a gate tower was built between the two mountains. Arrow towers were also built on both sides of the gate tower, and a sentry post was added to the top of each mountain for early warning.
The sentries were mostly puppets. Bai Ze assigned the normal villagers to patrol duties, so that if Bai Ze discovered anything, he could prepare in advance and sound the alarm without any disputes. Fortunately, despite the fighting, they didn't find much of a shock, mainly because no one had been able to reach the capital yet.
The main thing to guard against now is bandits and hooligans who want to take advantage of the chaos. In the past five years, the villagers have been idle and have not gone to the city to wander around. They buy supplies in bulk, buying a lot at once. Those who have survived are those who know what they're doing. In the past five years, the population has not decreased but has actually increased.
Actually, it wasn't just Jiang Yue's village that did this; almost everyone with a brain did the same thing. Those who were reckless had long since died. A few days later, news of the barbarian siege also came from the capital. News takes time to arrive, so by then the female lead had probably already developed explosives. The barbarian cavalry was numerous, and when the bombs exploded, the warhorses were frightened. Before the battle even started, many people were trampled to death. Then, the Ninth Prince led his army to battle and utterly defeated the barbarians.
While most of the villagers were worried and afraid, Jiang Yue breathed a sigh of relief. Jiang Yue remembered that after the Ninth Prince defeated the barbarians, he unified the country and established the Great Wei Dynasty in just a few years. Although Jiang Yue didn't know why the country's name had been changed.
After gunpowder was invented, wars became like grandfathers fighting grandsons. If it weren't for the Ninth Prince's steady and methodical approach, building up while fighting, it probably would have been unified in just a few months.
As Jiang Yue had predicted, the domestic turmoil was quelled by the Ninth Prince three years later. The following year, the Ninth Prince ascended the throne and changed the country's name to Wei, with the reign title Dingbang. This year is the first year of Dingbang.
Then came a general amnesty for the officials, and the female protagonist became the first woman in history to hold an official position. The Ninth Prince established a special Academy of Sciences, and the female protagonist became its first dean, holding a position equivalent to the Ministers of the Six Ministries. It wasn't that no one objected, but the objections were futile. In the past three years, the Ninth Prince had killed countless aristocratic families, making them tremble with fear. There was no other way; having cannons made one tough.
The recruitment of new students for the Academy of Sciences was not going smoothly. Although no one dared to openly oppose it, there were still quite a few people who were secretly making trouble.
But who is the female lead? She directly petitioned His Majesty to build new primary, secondary, high schools and universities throughout the country, which instantly overturned the very foundation upon which aristocratic families stood.
During this time, countless people opposed the project, and the assassins of those aristocratic families went crazy trying to assassinate the female lead. She almost died, but Jiang Yue secretly pulled a fast one, arranging for the female lead to have all sorts of poison-resistant pills, body-strengthening pills, and indestructible bodies.
Then those powerful families discovered that the more they poisoned the female lead, the more energetic she became, and assassinations couldn't even break her skin. Realizing that the female lead was unable to move, they didn't think of sitting idly by and waiting to die; instead, they directly planned to assassinate the emperor.
After Jiang Yue discovered this, she arranged another round of events for the Ninth Prince, which caused all the noble families to break down. The Emperor and the female lead even thought it was a divine intervention and held a special ceremony to worship him. Jiang Yue was laughing so hard she almost died.
Even so, they did not give up and wanted to start a rebellion, but the Ninth Prince's soldiers were all northerners who had suffered from foreign invasions and were extremely loyal to the Ninth Prince. Loyal men, coupled with cannons and rifles, directly slaughtered people in droves.
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