touchnovel Chapter 102 Night of the Snowstorm and Massacre
Chapter 102 Night of the Snowstorm and Massacre
Chapter 102 A Night of Slaughter in the Snow (Part 4)
In Fufeng County, herbs, monster meat, monster materials, and even precious timber are also among the local pillar industries. Once they can be sold to the rich inland regions of the Great Yin Kingdom, the price can increase several times over.
For example, Wang's Pharmacy. This pharmacy belongs to a second- or third-tier branch of a powerful family.
Even for second- or third-rate forces, the monthly expenses for offerings, official posts, and guards would exceed 200 taels.
Therefore, most of the medicinal herbs received by the pharmacy underwent simple processing before being sold to wealthier regions in the interior by caravans. The price was at least three times higher.
Otherwise, if they only sold some over-the-country medicines in the county town, the pharmacy would not be able to make any money at all.
Therefore, a powerful mountain bandit represents a stable supply channel and an important source of wealth. Various factions will generally try to win them over.
Since the goal is to win people over, marriage alliances become a common tactic. Isn't it simply about abandoning an unimportant woman from the family?
This reveals the strict distinction between insiders and outsiders within powerful families. Those like Zhou Ye, who were outsiders and served as retainers, received generous rewards but were never allowed into the family's inner circle.
Even the best outcome would be nothing more than a marriage alliance, ultimately turning them into a minor household dependent on a powerful and influential family.
Of course, since you can't enter the inner circle, meaning you have no power, there aren't many constraints. So, holding multiple positions isn't a problem. Absolute loyalty isn't demanded. Being able to do things for money is already considered a good service!
To put it bluntly, if Zhou Ye had become a guest of Mingjin Mountain, he could provide more and better monster meat and monster materials.
The He and Gu families could each send a woman to marry him. There wouldn't be any real relationship between them.
Back to Zhou Ye. He would definitely welcome being courted. Who wouldn't be happy to receive an extra sum of money for a temporary post?
The occasion doesn't seem quite right, does it? If I remember correctly, weren't we supposed to be in the county town to quell a rebellion? How did it suddenly turn into a business meeting? And a matchmaking event too?
He Jing and Gu Jiu finally recovered. They even had the mood to gloat.
"Uncle Jing, actually our two families don't do mining business; at most, we've shared a few small mines. So our losses aren't that big. The most unfortunate ones should be the Li and Qian families, right? Those mining thugs have taken over the management of their mines..."
The guards were all wiped out, and several manors outside the city were destroyed, right? I heard that several members of the family were killed or injured?
"It's because they usually exploit people too much. I heard that with the increase in the number of migrants, they even want to lower their wages."
"That's true. People are becoming less and less valuable these days. Even the people market in the south of the city is almost overflowing."
"By the way, Xiao Jiu. Your Gu family suffered so many losses this time. How are you going to explain this when you get home?"
"It's alright. Most of them are household slaves. If we really need more manpower, we can just take a few baskets of cakes to the labor market and recruit enough people."
.
"Hmm. Well, you've done a good deed then. You've given those homeless people something to eat."
"that is."
'
At that moment, Zhou Ye suddenly had a strange thought—actually, things weren't so bad as they were. He might as well stay here and get through the night without any trouble. Then, when dawn broke, everyone could go home.
However, fate had other plans. Just then, the person who had gone out to gather information finally returned—
More than half an hour later, everyone present had strange expressions. The news they had just heard was simply too unbelievable.
According to the original plan, the new prefect and the powerful families would join forces to quickly take control of the prefecture, wipe out the miners who were causing trouble, and quell the chaos in the prefecture as quickly as possible.
It should be said that there is nothing wrong with this plan.
Although there were relatively many miners, they were scattered throughout the county town, with some even wandering outside the city. There were also relatively few experts among them, making them essentially a disorganized group.
However, no one expected that the new prefect would suddenly cause trouble.
It should be widely known that the new prefect's position is not very secure. Therefore, he has to sell out a lot of benefits to powerful families, and even betray the miners who originally supported him, all in order to seize the position of prefect.
However, the new prefect has a major threat—another guerrilla general!
Since the soldiers can elect you as the guerrilla general, why can't they elect another guerrilla general? And if the prefect's position is overthrown, not only will he die, but his whole family will also be wiped out.
Therefore, whether the other guerrilla general would rebel or not has become irrelevant. The only thing to do is eliminate him. Taking advantage of tonight's chaos, the first priority is to kill that guerrilla general.
However, powerful families would certainly not support such an assassination. Furthermore, to prevent leaks, the new prefect ensured complete secrecy among the powerful families. In any case, once the die was cast, those powerful families would have no choice but to accept it.
The new prefect is unlikely to seek the miners' support either. They were already planning to wipe them out tonight, so how can they possibly unite?
They didn't even dare to seek support from the army. Since the two guerrilla generals had roughly equal military power, a major internal conflict was clearly out of the question.
So it's quite interesting that the new prefect could only mobilize a small number of his trusted men, and they prepared to launch a night raid to directly breach the home of the other guerrilla general. A decapitation strike.
But no one expected that no one would be a fool!
There is no doubt that the new prefect had this idea, so how could the other guerrilla general not know it?
Perhaps it was just a coincidence. On this very day, that guerrilla general also summoned a group of his trusted confidants to his home for a secret meeting.
The content of this secret meeting is also unimportant. Perhaps they really intended to launch a rebellion and overthrow their superiors?
But here's the problem: when the new prefect stormed the guerrilla general's house, the guerrilla general's core elite confidants were all there.
After a fierce battle, the guerrilla general not only defeated the new prefect, but also escaped back to his own camp.
However, it was only at this point that the powerful and wealthy families began to act according to their original plan. In reality, they had no idea about the new prefect's shady dealings.
But the guerrilla general had no idea. Imagine, from his perspective, tonight there was a new prefect, powerful families, and even a portion of the army loyal to the new prefect—?
Isn't this making me an enemy of the whole world? I still want to live!
At that moment, the guerrilla general went berserk. He simply sent someone to notify the miners. He also opened the armory in the military camp and distributed large quantities of armor, weapons, crossbows, and other equipment to the miners free of charge.
The miners were equally alarmed. Thanks to the guerrilla general's notification, they weren't caught off guard and quickly organized themselves, acquiring a large quantity of armor and weapons. At the same time, the miners sent messengers to inform those still outside the city to hurry to the county seat to regroup—
Good heavens! Now there's a chaotic melee involving four factions: the new prefect, powerful families, guerrilla generals, and miners.
Furthermore, these four groups distrusted each other. Although two major camps had vaguely formed, in the midst of the chaotic battle, it was impossible to distinguish friend from foe.
What's even more ridiculous is, do you really think that's all? No! No, no!
There is another force – the relatively neutral military leaders and soldiers within the army.
The neutral troops were stunned to discover that a large-scale battle had suddenly broken out in the county town.
Put yourself in their shoes, what should these neutral armies do? They would immediately flee the vortex of the city and escape the chaos outside. As long as they can preserve their troops, regardless of who wins, they'll eventually have to surrender. They might not dream of wealth and glory, but they'll certainly enjoy a life of luxury.
I refuse to join. Anyone who dares to block my way, they'd better die!
That was exactly what happened with the previous heavy cavalry unit. They were a neutral force, fleeing for their lives with unstoppable momentum!
At that moment, everyone looked at Gu Jiu and his group with pity and sympathy. In truth, most people wanted to laugh. Their Gu family was indeed incredibly unlucky.
But then again, what should we do now?
"Master Jing! The patriarch instructed us to get to the inner city as soon as possible and proceed according to the original plan. So many unexpected events have occurred tonight, the original distribution plan agreed upon by each family is definitely no longer suitable. Our He family doesn't need to be greedy; let's secure what we can get first."
"But—but we only have a little over 100 people!" He Jing asked, dumbfounded.
"The patriarch said that every extra person is a good help in times like these. Also, Master Jing, if we can complete the mission, everyone will receive a great reward tonight!"
"Oh well!"
Judging from He Jing's expression, he looked as if he had just swallowed a mouthful of hot excrement. Perhaps he was filled with regret. If he had known it would turn out this way, he wouldn't have bothered sending anyone to contact the family head.
However, to their surprise, when the group cautiously approached the inner city gate again, they nervously passed through the gate and entered the inner city, only to find that everything had returned to normal.
They didn't encounter any enemies at all. There were only corpses left on the ground, all of which had been stripped naked by some unknown person.
There wasn't enough time to register these people. He Jing gazed anxiously at the distant, dark, snowy night, the sounds of fighting occasionally drifting in. He asked Zhou Ye uncertainly, "Xiao Tian, what should we do?"
"Uncle Jing, let's bypass those fighting areas and go straight to the shops the He family wants to acquire. We'll set up defenses there. Defending from buildings is easier than fighting in the streets, right?"
"Yes, yes! That's what we'll do!"
Having made their decision, everyone immediately set out in the right direction and ran quickly towards the shops.