Of course, some refugees were "forced" to leave Perth. Most of them were lazy and stubborn individuals who lacked the courage to rebel and the will and energy to work. Andrew did not try to retain them. He gave each of them a small bag of coarse rice, enough for two or three days' worth of food, and then instructed the soldiers to send them away from Perth.
Nurrent's face also looked unwell again after a few days. He also appeared somewhat sickly. It was truly heartbreaking to see him like that.
Andrew finally breathed a sigh of relief. While he admired Yun Zhe, he also became more wary of him. Serena was even more direct, subtly probing several times where Yun Zhe had learned all this. Yun Zhe pretended not to hear, refusing to answer directly. This caused Serena to also begin to distance herself from Yun Zhe.
While the adults were quite satisfied, the children might have had a different experience. Nearly three hundred children, aged five to ten, were gathered on a sloping area enclosed by a makeshift wooden fence. They sat on the ground, watching a long-eared villain draw and write on a blackboard every day. From dawn till dusk, although they had plenty of rest time, they were confined to this fence all day, a prospect that filled them with resistance.
The children were extremely unhappy, and Yun Zhe was also frowning. In his previous life, he had spent summer and winter vacations with children. He thought he could handle it, but he had hit a brick wall. He had tried everything—coercing, pleasing, even pleading—to reason with the children, appealing to their emotions, desperately trying to get their attention on their studies or the funny experiments, but the children continued to cry, urinate anywhere, play, and fight every day. In short, their attention was completely elsewhere. Yun Zhe was exhausted from dealing with them all day long. Every day, as the sun set and the children cheered and ran back to their parents' arms, Yun Zhe sat exhausted by the blackboard, a look of helplessness and relief on his face. Gao and Caroline, who came to report on the day's training, looked on with curiosity and concern. For five whole days, Yun Zhe still couldn't gain even the slightest bit of the children's approval. He should have spent more time training his two armies, but now, he was trapped in this fenced-off area with a group of children.
Yun Zhe hadn't initially anticipated that he would be trapped in his own web.
Seeing Yun Zhe constantly outwitting and outmaneuvering these children, yet never gaining the upper hand, and still persisting every day, Serena and the others finally realized that even Yun Zhe had things he couldn't handle.
With this in mind, everyone started to become friendly with Yun Zhe again. Even Newton began to chat with Yun Zhe. Yun Zhe was very unhappy about this and repeatedly hinted, both openly and subtly, that if anyone had time, they could cover for him for a day or two. However, when people heard Yun Zhe's request, they would usually just laugh it off and then make excuses.
Yun Zhe taking care of the child became the most cheerful topic of conversation among Serena and the others during their leisure time. Even the refugees gradually grew fond of this Aruru man who, despite his daily disheveled appearance, still insisted on caring for their child.
But jokes aside, everyone knew in their hearts that there were roughly ten thousand refugees from the direction of Donic City, with nearly seventy percent of them heading towards Pass. Given Pass's strength, this was a force they were unable to handle and feared. Although the propaganda said it was all thanks to the Duke of Donic's benevolence and the Lord of Pass's wisdom that the refugees were handled so perfectly, the higher-ups in Pass knew the real heroes behind it all. If it weren't for Yun Zhe's swift and decisive actions in the first few days, which prevented these refugees from turning into a swarm of locusts and instead transformed them into an enviable force, the state of Pass today would be unimaginable.
The refugees also understood that under the city of Paz, they not only no longer lived like locusts, but also finally regained a shred of human dignity.
Another day, the sun was setting, and Yun Zhe sat slumped beside the blackboard as usual. Today, he had dealt with no fewer than ten fights, stopped twenty children from urinating indiscriminately, and rescued over thirty heads stuck between fences. The only thing that made Yun Zhe happy was that a little girl had voluntarily reported to him that a boy was always bullying her. This finally gave Yun Zhe a sliver of feeling that he was being trusted.
Gao and Caroline were used to Yun Zhe's mannerisms. They suppressed their laughter and finished reporting on today's training. Yun Zhe waved wearily at them, "Come on, let's go get a drink."
Gao and Caroline's eyes widened in surprise; this was the first time Yun Zhe had invited them for drinks. They exchanged a glance, both sensing that something big might be about to happen.
"Don't overthink it, don't overthink it," Yun Zhe walked between the two and patted them on the shoulders. "If you want a drink, have a couple with me."
Recalling Yun Zhe's "painful life" over the past ten days, the two understood immediately. Gao, who knew Pas intimately, confidently recommended a small, affordable bar. Gao added with a mysterious smile that the bar's snacks were incredibly spicy, filling Yun Zhe and Caroline with anticipation.
The tavern's snacks were indeed outrageous—various kinds of fried insects. Yun Zhe was overjoyed. He hated insects, but fried insects were a different story. Yun Zhe happily drank eight large glasses of beer, making Gao and Caroline extremely nervous.
The two men helped Yun Zhe, who was drunk, out of the tavern. All three of them were staggering, but fortunately, it was late at night and no one saw their embarrassing state.
The alley was long, and the moonlight was bright. Yun Zhe swayed as he loudly complained to his two captains about the misbehavior of those unruly kids, to which his two captains mumbled in response. Neither of them noticed that at that moment, a dark figure appeared at the end of the alley, standing in the middle of the alley, watching the three of them stagger towards him.
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