Free Web NovelChapter 93: Chapter 93: The Drought Has Arrived
"Hah!"
Tang Wen rode Wuzhu, charging toward the Hunting Team’s outpost like a black bolt of lightning.
"Whoa!"
He had just started when he suddenly pulled to a halt.
There were more people behind the group attacking the hunting outpost.
Tang Wen’s heart skipped a beat. ’Such a small outpost, yet they’ve deployed so many people. The enemy must be determined to take it!’
’But what’s the use in attacking a hunting outpost?’
He didn’t want to rush over before getting a clear grasp of their strength.
But then, something even more shocking happened.
SWOOSH!
The Hunting Team loosed a volley of arrows.
The attackers parried the blows, but after deflecting the arrows, they actually raised their weapons high above their heads.
Shouting something, they assumed a posture of surrender!
Both Tang Wen and the Hunting Team were stunned.
The members of the Hunting Team were cautious. Suspecting a trick, they didn’t open the gate.
The attackers went even further, tossing their weapons aside and standing at the gate, refusing to leave.
Tang Wen urged his horse forward.
On the stone wall, Captain Liu had a baffled expression. "Who are you people? What is your objective?"
"We have been defeated. We are your prisoners. Your Flame Camp should take us in."
Captain Liu: ???
Tang Wen, arriving on horseback: ’I suspect you lot came here with the express purpose of becoming prisoners!’
CLIPPITY-CLOP!
Seeing Tang Wen approach, Captain Liu jumped down from the stone wall and asked, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, "Commander Tang Wen, what should we do about this? I already requested reinforcements from the camp, and now... this?"
In his twenty or thirty years of life, this was the first time Captain Liu had ever encountered such a thing.
People showing up on your doorstep to become prisoners.
Tang Wen didn’t want to get involved. He pointed into the distance. "There’s another group of people hiding over there. They should be with these ’prisoners.’ I originally thought it was an ambush, but after a closer look, it seems to be their families."
Seeing the two of them discussing, an old man and two middle-aged men stepped forward from among the "prisoners."
They shouted their willingness to submit, become prisoners, and join Flame Camp.
Tang Wen smiled. "Tell me, which village are you from? Looking at all of you, so strong and healthy, it can’t be that you’re unable to survive, can it?"
The three didn’t argue. They exchanged a look, then dropped to one knee, pressing a clenched right fist to their left chest.
Performing some sort of rite of submission.
The old man said, "Exotic Beasts attacked us and occupied our village. Black Mountain Camp is slaughtering villages everywhere, and they’ve already found our trail. We lost over a hundred of our people before we made it here. We truly have nowhere else to go! We beg you two sirs to take us in. All we ask for is a bite to eat."
"Get up and talk! I’m not the one in charge, so it’s useless telling me."
After Tang Wen spoke, Captain Liu pulled the three men to their feet.
Tang Wen asked with great interest, "What kind of Exotic Beasts attacked your village?"
’Judging by their numbers, it must have been a large village of nearly a thousand people.’
’They might have even had Martial Master Level experts.’
’What kind of Exotic Beast Group could force them to leave?’
The old man dejectedly uttered two words: "Tyrant Bear."
There wasn’t even a trace of hatred in his voice. Clearly, faced with such an Extraordinary Magical Beast, he didn’t dare even think of revenge.
Tang Wen fell silent.
He dismissed any thought of going hunting—no, of going to deliver himself as a snack.
He had witnessed the terror of the Tyrant Bear. Back then, if Commander Zhao, a Peak Martial Artist, hadn’t risked his life to lure it away...
...Flame Camp would have suffered devastating losses.
The old man continued, "Besides Farming, our village also grew date trees and kept bees. It was probably the honey that attracted that bear."
Captain Liu asked, "Did you not try to negotiate with it? If you had offered it the honey as tribute, it might have even protected you."
In this world, humans are not invincible, nor are they necessarily the strongest.
There are many examples of humans and Exotic Beasts coexisting.
The Exotic Beasts protect humans with their powerful combat abilities.
The humans labor to provide the Exotic Beasts with necessities like salt and minerals.
The two sides live in symbiosis.
Of course, this kind of relationship is often fragile.
Because the diet of powerful Exotic Beast species originally includes humans.
Things are fine in normal times, but when disaster strikes and the Exotic Beasts can’t find enough to eat, the human collaborators might just become delicacies.
The old man was silent for a long while. "Our maize seedlings got sick, a black blight. They withered and died, patch by patch. Our village already had many martial practitioners, so our grain reserves were low. The honey was what we used to trade for food..."
Captain Liu didn’t know what to say, so he could only curse, "What a world!"
After a while.
From the direction of the camp, a large force of several hundred men and horses came thundering over.
The one leading them was General Zhao.
Tang Wen relaxed and gestured for Captain Liu to take the three men to greet them.
As for himself, he naturally took a detour home.
He didn’t have the spare time to deal with this kind of thing.
"Lord Tang Wen! Your mount is truly magnificent!"
"What a beautiful black horse!"
"Commander Tang Wen, you aren’t riding an Exotic Beast, are you?"
At the gate of the Inner City, the Guards all greeted Tang Wen.
But their eyes were glued to Tang Wen’s mount, practically glowing.
This world had no sports cars, SUVs, or heavy motorcycles, but it did have all sorts of Exotic Beasts.
A man’s love for his mount is practically a lifelong passion.
When Tang Wen was a child, frolicking in the fields, he’d had experiences slapping his own rear and yelling "Giddy-up, giddy-up!"
He deliberately stopped to chat with the Guards for a bit before riding through the street.
Passersby quickly made way, their gazes filled with envy, longing, and even adoration as they watched the magnificent black Exotic Beast horse.
"That must be Lord Tang Wen, right?"
"Such a young Commander."
"Yeah, they say he’s a Martial Arts prodigy!"
"..."
The passersby discussed him with admiration.
Tang Wen rode his horse and turned onto another street.
The street was lined with two rows of Red Houses.
At the entrances, some scantily clad women, their pale legs bare, giggled as they watched Tang Wen.
Perhaps because they recognized his identity, no one tried to block his path.
A trace of regret flickered in Tang Wen’s heart.
’Not very enthusiastic at all.’
Suddenly, a vaguely familiar face appeared by the roadside.
"Commander Tang Wen, you must be tired from your hunt. Come inside and rest for a while!"
All the women were shocked.
Although they all wanted to invite Tang Wen in to have some fun, he was a Commander, after all. They didn’t dare.
"It’s that hussy Liu Niang!"
"How dare she? The nerve!"
"Hmph! She’s just lusting after Commander Tang Wen’s body."
"Sister, aren’t you?"
"Pah! This sister loves his talent more."
The group of women burst into laughter.
After speaking, Liu Niang curtsied gracefully, revealing a flash of snowy-white, rosy skin.
Her eyes were even bolder and more fiery.
It looked as if, were it not for the people on the street...
...she was ready to pounce.
Tang Wen averted his gaze. "Next time."
"My lord, when is ’next time’?"
Seeing she was trying to push her luck, Tang Wen quickly urged his horse forward. "You’ll know when the time comes."
Liu Niang called out plaintively from behind him, "Don’t make a girl wait too long!"
Tang Wen spurred his horse. ’Next time, I’d better come back late at night.’
’Also, I should try to avoid this road in the future.’
’Women, how can you be allowed to disturb my heart of Martial Arts?’
’I must reach the Extraordinary realm as soon as possible!’
’No rest tonight.’
’I’ll head back to the wilderness.’
Arriving home, Tang Wen took a bath as usual.
The three women, Xiaoliu, Peach Blossoms, and Cui Lian, took Little Taotao with them and went to wash his clothes.
It was a job one person could have finished, but the three women insisted on doing it together.
Underwear, socks, boots, an outer coat, a leather duster—seven items in total.
Peach Blossoms was quick and snatched three items, her face beaming with joy.
Xiaoliu pouted unhappily. "Sister Peach Blossoms, you’re so cunning! Last time you also washed one more item."
Cui Lian nodded in agreement. "That’s right, Sister Peach Blossoms. This time, you should let the two of us wash them."
Peach Blossoms quickly wiped the smile off her face, picked up the wooden basin, and walked away. "Hurry up and wash, hurry up! After we’re done, we can go do our Martial Arts Training! Becoming a Martial Artist as soon as possible is what’s important!"
"You’re just all talk."
Recently, the water from Tangtang’s medicinal baths was being given to the three women afterward.
The three’s strength had increased considerably.
Whether it was daily chores or the work of growing vegetables in the next yard, everything became much easier for them.
On normal days, they could free up more time to study the Cultivation Technique Tang Wen had given them.
Tangtang also enjoyed playing the teacher, giving them pointers every day after she returned from the Martial Arts Hall.
Of course, that was on the condition that she had sold all the roujiamo first.
That night, Tang Wen once again rushed out into the wilderness.
The days passed in this back-and-forth routine.
Tang Wen’s various skills slowly grew, steadily tempered through each experience.
A month or so later, the weather grew warmer.
The time for harvest had arrived.
But the maize in the fields was all yellowed and scorched.
After the farmers harvested, threshed, and bagged it, the weigh-in showed it was less than thirty percent of previous years’ yields.
The camp collected half of it.
Leaving the other half for the farmers who tilled the land.
The proportion they were allowed to keep was higher than in previous years, but the actual amount of grain they had was less than half of what they used to get.
The situation was dire. The people of the Outer City—how much surplus grain could they possibly have at home?
What was even more critical was, how were they going to plant the next season’s crop?
As Tang Wen passed through the fields, he saw that the earth was parched and the ground was cracked open with deep fissures.
A ladleful of water, once poured, was instantly swallowed by the ground.
Heaven didn’t let a single drop of rain fall.
’This is going to drive people to their deaths!’
Farmers, women, and children knelt by the roadside, weeping.
Tang Wen hurried past. He was powerless to help.
On this day, after more than a month of hard work, Tang Wen finally finished filling the top level of the ice cellar in his courtyard.
He finished his work and accepted a roujiamo from Xiaoliu.
Suddenly, he heard someone shout from outside the gate, "Is Commander Tang Wen present? If so, please come to the General’s Mansion for a council!"
Tang Wen, who had enjoyed a few months of peace and quiet, called out an affirmative.
He had long expected this. With the great drought’s arrival, emergencies were bound to increase, and it was inevitable that they would be short-handed. As a mid-to-high-level combatant, it was impossible for him to remain idle forever.
General’s Mansion.
As Tang Wen stepped into the Council Hall...
General Zhao was in the middle of issuing a series of orders: "First, tell the people in the Outer City that all rent is waived starting today. Let them live in peace. We’ll only start collecting rent again when the grain harvest is bountiful!"
"Second, tell them they are forbidden from drawing water from the lake! If they don’t want to die, they’d better stay away!"
"Third, the camp will soon be conscripting them for work. Meals will be provided..."
Just then, General Zhou came in from outside. He clapped Tang Wen on the shoulder and, without a word of nonsense, said directly, "There are problems everywhere right now. I need you to lead a merchant caravan on a trip to Five Families City."
"Me?"
"Qian Sanduo will go with you. The roads are getting more and more dangerous. An extra Martial Artist is an extra layer of security."
