Chapter 267: Busy

Dawn has broken.

After the common folk in Luolong County woke up and washed up at home, they lined up to eat at the canteen.

Breakfast was very simple: a large bowl of porridge, a palm-sized piece of dried Monster Beast Meat, and a small portion of pickled vegetables. This was provided for free and was enough to be half-full; if one wanted to eat other good things, one had to spend points to purchase them.

However, points were very precious, and the average commoner could not bear to waste them. People who had experienced hardship all understood that there was no need to eat too full in the morning; just enough was fine.

After eating, the students carried their books and went to school to study.

Usually, they would go in groups of three or five, talking and laughing, or even chasing and playing, but this morning, almost all the students were listless, each one like a cucumber wilted by frost. Some children had bloodshot eyes, which was clearly from staying up late.

Zhang Mancang was even more pitiful; not only were his eyes bloodshot, but there was a purple bruise on his right leg. This was because his mother wanted to follow the example of others and make him hang his head by the hair and prick his thigh with an awl, but she couldn't bear to actually use an awl to pierce his thigh, so she took a step back and used the sole of her shoe to whip his thigh instead.

Zhang Mancang cried loudly from the beating, yet he still had to hold back his tears and continue studying. He read until past one in the morning, and only when he truly couldn't hold on anymore did Zhang Shagen and his wife let him go to bed.

Before dawn in the morning, Zhang Shagen woke him up and told him to recite the multiplication table he had memorized the previous night.

Zhang Mancang had slept all night and had long since forgotten what he had memorized the night before. Seeing that he couldn't recite it, Zhang Shagen was so angry he cursed, pulled out his belt, and gave his buttocks a "belt stir-fry," beating Zhang Mancang's buttocks until the skin was torn and the flesh was mangled.

There were many students like Zhang Mancang. Seeing each other's limping gait, they smiled at one another, knowing their companions had suffered the same fate, and everyone felt a bit more balanced in their hearts.

The students went to study, and the adults went to work, being assigned to different work posts according to their abilities.

Those skilled in farming went to tend the crops in the fields; the potatoes and sweet potatoes had already sprouted crisp leaves, looking lush and green.

According to Lord Meng, sweet potato leaves could be eaten as vegetables and tasted quite good, but the potatoes and sweet potatoes growing underneath were everyone's future life-saving food, so no one dared to secretly pick sweet potato leaves to eat before the harvest.

Most of the men who were strong and sturdy but lacked specialized skills joined the construction team.

Meng Yifan ordered them to build a barbican near the four outer city walls so that if the Demon Race attacked the city and the front could not hold, they could lure the Demon Beasts into the barbican, close the city gates, and stand on the city walls to attack from all four sides, quickly eliminating the Demon Beasts inside the barbican.

The walls of the barbican were to have concrete blockhouses, crenellations, giant Wolf Tooth Boards, and other defensive fortifications built on top.

To guard against air raids by the Demon Race, Meng Yifan also ordered the construction team to build structures on the city walls with shooting ports and concrete slab protection on all sides, structurally similar to a concrete blockhouse.

When the time came, the soldiers responsible for air defense could hide inside the concrete blockhouses and shoot outward, which would be much safer.

In the Manufacturing Department, everyone was working with great enthusiasm. Their primary task now was to manufacture flintlocks and Tiger Crouching Cannons to fully replace the bird guns and Elm Cannons originally used by the soldiers.

As the enemies Meng Yifan faced grew stronger, the bird guns and Elm Cannons were becoming increasingly insufficient.

Meng Yifan prepared to have the Salvation Army fully re-equip with flintlocks, so that their rate of fire would be greatly increased, allowing them to fire more bullets and eliminate more enemies per unit of time.

The replaced bird guns and Elm Cannons would not be wasted; Meng Yifan planned to arm the able-bodied men in the city with them.

Usually, in addition to doing their respective jobs, the able-bodied men would also take time to organize training, with Salvation Army soldiers teaching them how to form ranks, fire guns, and fire cannons.

They were the reserves of the Salvation Army; if the war became intense, these able-bodied men would also participate in the fighting.

Even the students at school, besides learning knowledge in class, had to participate in military training. When the critical moment truly arrived, these students would also have to carry guns and join the battle.

Everyone in Luolong County understood that to survive in this cruel, late-dynasty apocalypse and avoid being eaten by Demon Beasts, they had to fight. Therefore, everyone was very diligent when participating in military training, and not a single person was lazy or shirked their duties.

Meng Yifan also had Liu Dengke, a Confucian scholar, organize everyone to hold regular "grievance-airing meetings" to recall past bitterness and think of present sweetness, using the recounting of their own tragic experiences on the road of fleeing to reflect the happiness and beauty of their current lives.

At the grievance-airing meetings, the stage and the audience were often a mess of tears. Many people had relatives who had starved to death, some whose relatives had been eaten by Demon Beasts, and others whose relatives had been driven to their deaths by the corrupt officials of the Great Wu Heavenly Dynasty. Every person who had fled here had many unbearable pasts.

Through the grievance-airing meetings, everyone's loyalty to Meng Yifan soared once again, and they cherished their hard-won happy life even more. Without the need for supervisors to urge them, they all worked desperately hard.

The refugees had already treated this place as their home. Their experience of fleeing also let them know that if Luolong County were breached, they would lose their home, and their entire families would be eaten by Demon Beasts.

Within Luolong County, a collective system was currently being implemented. For refugees who once had nothing, having food to eat, clothes to wear, work to do, no officials holding whips to bully them, and children who could read and write and have a good future when they grew up—this was already a rare, good life.

Everyone was busy, and Meng Yifan was not idle either; his main task now was to help Meng Shuangdao advance to the Fourth Rank.

Meng Shuangdao had already reached the edge of a breakthrough and could go through the Thunder Tribulation at any time, but for zombie-type life forms, the success rate of surviving the Thunder Tribulation was very low. Meng Yifan had him suppress his cultivation first, not trigger the Thunder Tribulation, and use high-voltage electricity to adapt to the Thunder Tribulation in advance.

On this day, the two Wind Power Generator Units were still rotating twenty-four hours a day, and the electricity generated was prioritized for Meng Shuangdao.

Inside the Practice Chamber, Meng Shuangdao stood in the middle with five wires plugged into his body, and 380V industrial power was continuously flowing into him.

As Meng Shuangdao continuously adapted, Meng Yifan would gradually increase the voltage: 660V, one thousand volts, two thousand volts, and so on. The higher the voltage was raised, the more the electricity generated by the two Wind Power Generator Units and the photovoltaic panels seemed insufficient.

Meng Shuangdao's body was already as hard as steel and iron, very tough, yet it was still scorched black by the electricity, his whole body trembling, his hair standing on end, and black smoke rising from his seven orifices, looking very disheveled.

However, Meng Yifan could perceive that with the electric shocks, some wonderful changes were taking place within Meng Shuangdao's body. Strands of vibrant, life-filled Qi were being generated from his scorched flesh and blood, like a spring breeze, moistening things silently, quietly transforming Meng Shuangdao's body.