Chapter 457: Grabbing Coins, a Discussion Under the Big Tree

"Let's make a formal introduction. I am Filina-Brisiman, a Church Pastor of the Agricultural God Church, and I am responsible for the Agricultural God faith here in Big Tree Cunzi." Priest Filina stood still, opened her arms to the sides, and introduced and presented herself.

Everyone else present already knew Priest Bata'er, so he had no need to introduce himself.

Jier, meanwhile, struck his left chest again with his right fist, performed a simple Warrior's salute, and introduced himself: "Qiao-Jier. A man from Kendall County in the Northwest Province. I was originally heading south with our Baron's army to support the Southern Province against a military incursion by a neighboring country, but while at Mengtuoka City in the Western Province, the Agricultural God Church sought me out, asking me to assist Priest Bata'er in rescuing the faithful villagers of Changmai Cunzi. They seem to have been attacked and plundered by a group of our own country's defeated soldiers who have been roaming about since their defeat last year, and they are hiding in the mountain forests near Changmai Cunzi."

The female Priest quickly understood the content of what Jier said, and she directly asked about a part that Jier had not explained in his words: "Then what about the caravan under your command? I saw a group of at least twenty mounted Warriors; did you hire them with money? If they are hired, then you need to be careful that they don't look for trouble and cause conflict with the villagers while staying overnight in Big Tree Cunzi tonight. Those mercenaries are always so fond of making trouble and looking for issues."

Priest Bata'er hurriedly explained: "No, no, those are not mercenaries or anything like that. They are the subordinates of Warrior Jier. Sigh, they were originally refugees who had left their homes. Later, Jier and I encountered them at Baishi Pass and took them in. We fought against Bandits and trained along the way. These people brought here have all been obedient to Warrior Jier's orders after several rounds of screening."

"Wait, wait, wait, refugees? There were refugees at Baishi Pass? What is all this about? Luosa, you must tell me carefully what has been happening outside. You know, we are too remote here; to know information from the outside world, we have to wait until the annual return to Yemei Town to report for duty to know what major events have happened in the outside world."

Thus, Priest Filina pulled Priest Bata'er and Jier along, and the three of them sat on a stone chair beside the trunk of the ancient big tree named Bio, talking about various news heard from the outside.

As the two talked, Jier supplemented at appropriate times. Seeing that it would not be finished for a while, Jier returned to the backyard of the Nongshen Church and instructed everyone in the yard to stay in the yard for the night.

"Knight Jier, can we stay inside the Church? We don't need beds, as long as there is a building roof over our heads, that will do," someone suggested.

Jier waved his hand: "Forget it. It's only for one night; I don't want to disturb the people here too much. Besides, when we cleared space for the carriages just now, didn't we move aside quite a few children's small clothes? There are still some children from Changmai Cunzi brought here by Priest Bata'er; what if you scare those little children?"

He pointed to the open large wooden gate of the backyard and said to the gate: "It just so happens that on the way here, I saw what seems to be the only tavern in the village. Although it is just a village tavern, if you want to relax, go out to the tavern and have a drink."

Jier had Xueya Site take the money jar out of his carriage and placed it directly next to the newly lit campfire. After opening the jar and stirring the copper and iron coins inside, making a crisp sound of coins, he said to the people looking over: "Those who want to go to the tavern, consciously close your eyes and grab a handful of coins. There are both copper and iron coins inside; however much you grab is how much you get. If it's a lot, eat and drink well tonight; if it's a little, drink one cup of alcohol and come back to train consciously."

As soon as Jier said this, everyone swarmed over excitedly. The hardworking Warriors who originally didn't want to go out and only wanted to train more extinguished their thoughts of training, wanting to see how many coins they could grab.

"Who is coming first? I'll make it clear beforehand: going to the Big Tree Cunzi tavern to drink and eat meat is fine, but don't cause trouble for me. If someone looks for trouble, let them come find me, or go to the Church to find the two Priests. I see that Priest Filina has great prestige in the village; if something happens, bring up the Agricultural God Church. After all, we are currently going to rescue the believers and villagers of the Agricultural God Church; if a mess is made, the Church will help smooth it over."

After Jier finished speaking, the Captain of the Warrior team, Aoni, strode out, smiling and indicating that he would be the first.

Having him close his eyes, Jier moved his hand that was covering the jar opening, and Aoni immediately reached his right hand into the money jar.

His pair of large hands were truly large; even with his hand in a fist, he grabbed quite a few coins out.

Jier glanced at Aoni's harvest and sneered: "Aoni, oh Aoni, your luck is not good. Open your eyes and take a good look at how many copper coins you actually grabbed."

The people around gathered to look closely, then let out a burst of laughter: "Hahaha, they are all iron coins, just two copper coins."

"Aoni, you should have stirred the coins in the money jar with your hand before grabbing, letting them mix evenly. This is just like cooking; you have to use a spoon to stir, stir hard, and the food made will be delicious."

Aoni looked unlucky, but he still gathered the coins he grabbed and put them into his leather pocket, treasuring them immensely.

"Watch me, Knight Jier, I'll be the second!" This was a driver. Jier shrugged, signaling for him to try. Because the Kingdom coins of this other world were much larger than the most common one-yuan coins of his previous life, if one really let a person grab with one hand, they couldn't grab too many at once.

This driver was much smarter. After his right hand reached in, he first tried his best to stir the heavy and tightly packed coins, then grabbed a handful of coins he considered satisfactory.

Taking them out and counting, well, one copper coin, and the rest were all iron coins.

"Hahahaha, not even as good as me!" Aoni was extremely proud; seeing that other companions' income was not as good as his own, he was no longer annoyed.

"Hey, you should look clearly before grabbing. Just near the jar opening, there are a few copper coins you can see; just grab those few copper coins!" Someone also offered a new suggestion.

The third person was a Warrior. He moved his arm, and this time he went straight for the few copper coins visible from the outside at the jar opening. He grabbed them, and after counting, well, four copper coins and several iron coins.

Now everyone became lively, feeling they had found the trick, and one by one they squeezed forward, trying to get a few more before the copper coins were all grabbed away.

Jier saw that Weier did not come over, so he asked: "Why? Not coming over to try your luck?"

Weier shook his head: "Forget it. After eating, I will practice Sword Technique here. I still haven't figured out those moves you proposed."

"Alright, you work hard."

Jier handed the money jar to Xueya Site to manage, while he found the long-haired cat Beast-men who were peeking out from the last carriage at this time.

"Hi, guys, you don't need to stand guard for everyone tonight. And since we are currently staying overnight in a Human village, in order not to cause panic, I hope you won't run out of this yard tonight, how about that?"

Facing the request made by Knight Jier, Yongqi Maomao jumped out of the box, first stood on the highest box to look left and right, then nodded to Jier, and shook his head: "Jier, can agree, Jier's request. But, Maomao, no self-hunting, environment. Need, Humans to provide food. Just, today, one night, food."

Jier realized: "That's right, I don't usually take care of your food, and I forgot that you would find food in the wild to fill your stomachs. What do you want to eat? I'll have the Shop Assistants make it for you."

"Meat!"

"Meat!"

"Pork!"

The Maomaos had been craving the wild boar meat that Jier and the others had hunted in Shichui Cunzi for two days. Because they were not a large Maomao tribe, it was basically very difficult to hunt an entire wild boar family using only crude things like Stone and wooden arrows, so they rarely got to eat the meat of wild beasts that were huge to the Maomaos, like wild boars.

At this moment, when Jier mentioned it, the Maomaos ignored Yongqi Maomao's face and scrambled to shout that they wanted to eat wild boar meat.

Jier shrugged and said to Yongqi Maomao, who felt his subordinate had lost face: "No need to be angry. I have plenty of wild boar meat here, and I am also worrying about how to finish it off before it rots. After all, the weather is so hot now; even cooked meat with the moisture roasted out won't last many days."

But Yongqi Maomao was concerned about face. Feeling that eating the wild boar meat hunted by Humans was taking advantage of Humans, he actually gave generously for once, took out a few shiny copper coins from his box, held them up, and handed them to Jier: "Spend money, coins, trade. Maomao has money, not take, advantage."

Jier smiled and took these few copper coins, then shook Yongqi Maomao's small hand up and down.

In his view, these furry little things were particularly cute, and their skills were not weak, but they preferred to work hard to earn metal and coins. In Jier's view, these Maomaos could completely break into a remote Human village on a dark, moonless night, and take away all the metal objects in an entire Human village under the cover of night. Such a mysterious and bizarre action would only make the farmers in the village terrified and afraid to step out of their homes to investigate. After dawn, they would only think it was a rare mysterious event.

And consider themselves unlucky.

After arranging the caravan side, Jier walked toward the courtyard in the center of the Church. As soon as he turned the wall, he saw Priest Bata'er being surrounded by eleven or twelve children of all sizes; some were crying around him, and some were holding his hands and jumping up and down laughing.

And Priest Bata'er showed the most brilliant smile Jier had seen since he knew him.

These little children, most of whom could not speak clearly, were asking the Priest one by one in clumsy common language where he had gone during this time and why he had left them alone.

Half complaining, half acting spoiled.

Priest Bata'er had no choice but to tell the story again of how he left Big Tree Cunzi for Mengtuoka City and met Warrior Jier.

Jier came to Priest Filina's side and said to this sturdy, tall female Priest who was smiling at the moment: "Who are they?"

"They are the village children that Priest Bata'er protected on the day the defeated soldiers attacked Changmai Cunzi. There were originally more than twenty; half were entrusted to Lanse-Qingting Cunzi, and half were entrusted to me. Don't listen to these little boys complaining; they actually eat well and sleep well here. I had the village Carpenter make more than ten new small beds for them, one for each. Heh, when I was little, I shared a small bed with my sister who hadn't married yet."

The female Priest proudly pointed to the children's new clothes again: "I also organized the farm women in the village to donate old children's clothes that were no longer needed at home, altered them, and made them into new clothes for them to wear. It's not even the Harvest Festival yet, and they have new clothes to wear; it's really enviable."

Jier smiled. Seeing the red and chubby faces of these children, he knew they were doing well with Priest Filina, not worrying about food, drink, housing, or clothing, but where could this be warmer and better than the company of their own family?

Thinking of this, Jier had a sense of responsibility for rescuing the villagers of Changmai Cunzi for the first time. He looked at these little children gathered around Priest Bata'er wanting hugs and felt that he must rescue these children's parents.

"When bad people do evil, do they ever think about how much trouble they are causing?" Jier asked Priest Filina.

The female Priest raised her eyebrows: "Are you testing me? Heh, then I will try to talk about it."

She began to walk slowly around the big tree Bio, one hand behind her back at her waist, and one hand reaching out to stroke the mottled bark surface of the big tree.

"This helps my thinking, Warrior Jier. You can try it too; this big tree is really very different. It is not an ordinary big tree; it has far more wisdom than most people imagine."

The female Priest walked around the big tree while talking. After walking a full circle, she had the answer: "Bad people are also different. Depending on their education, personality, knowledge, interpersonal relationships, and other reasons, some are the hateful guys in traditional stories who are bad to the bone, while others are numb people who follow others to do bad things. There are also people who do not realize they are doing bad things, thinking that what they are doing is the right thing, although it is indeed a bad thing in the eyes of outsiders. There are also some people who, regardless of whether they are bad people or not, when the outside world considers them bad people, the good things they do will also be considered bad things."

"What you're saying is so convoluted," Jier said with a bitter smile.

Priest Feilina spread her hands: "This is just an analysis of the types of evildoers; what follows is their subjective perception when committing evil acts, and their perspective when reflecting on their behavior after the evil is done."

"Let's start with the traditional evildoers. They know they are doing evil, they know they are bad people, and most of them take pride and pleasure in it. These evildoers have their own standards of value judgment; to them, causing trouble for others and committing more evil acts better demonstrates their own ability and power. Most evildoers commit evil to gain something—be it financial gain, mental pleasure, or physical satisfaction. Therefore, these people never care, nor do they ever reflect on, the trouble their evil deeds actually bring to others."

"That's true," Jier nodded in agreement.

"The second type, however, are the numb people who commit evil. This type is actually the most common, because the world is full of organizations and groups that do bad things. Some people within them either don't realize they are doing evil, or they realize it but are restricted by the organization's rules and speech, making them unable to change anything. Most organizations and groups will also distribute a portion of their wealth to their members after committing evil acts. Once they have received this reward, these numb people have not only stained their hands with blood but their pockets as well, making it even harder for them to criticize or betray their organization. Therefore, these people will likely reflect on the trouble they cause, but can the condemnation of their conscience after reflection ever overcome the Gold Coins in their pockets?"

"It's highly likely they cannot overcome the temptation of Gold Coins," Jier sighed. He had encountered many such people; most Bandits were of this type, and the defeated army he was currently facing as an enemy was likely made up of such people as well.

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