Chapter 504: Big House, Imprisoned Women, Poison Mushroom Powder

Jier weighed his words and said, "I speculate that the critical turning point will be when the Southern Province coalition army launches its attack. No, it should be a bit earlier than that; only then can we create the time and space needed for Knight Hate's 'return.' Calculating the time—hiss—it won't be long now! At most, one month. Even if the villagers of Changmai Cunzi can still mine ore, they won't have any use for it. I estimate they will be slaughtered in the mine by the enemy, and as for the remaining Defeated Soldiers, I suspect they will also find a clever way to kill them all, leaving only a few of the most reliable confidants to escape."

Bata'er Jiaoshi widened his eyes: "If that is truly the case, then we must hurry! Even if I die, I will not let them slaughter the villagers of Changmai Cunzi! I hereby swear an oath to the great Nongshen; I absolutely will not allow such a thing to happen!"

Jier nodded at Bata'er Jiaoshi, who had just made a solemn oath: "Besides this, I have also roughly guessed that the mineral ore being extracted in the mine is likely high-purity iron ore, and it must be transported to the enemy army in the south by an unconventional method, quickly crossing the Southern Mountains. Although the other side defeated the Southern Province coalition last year, I heard that last year's coalition was only spontaneously formed by a portion of the Noble Lords. This year, not only is the Provincial Noble Council exerting its full strength, but they have also widely requested aid from the entire Saint Hors Kingdom. The scale of the army will inevitably far exceed what that enemy country in the south can imagine."

"The strength of the enemy country is said to be far inferior to the Saint Hors Kingdom, and its land area is only about the same size as the Southern Province. That they were able to win for a while earlier was because they were well-prepared for the war in advance, but when facing the entire Southern Province that has become serious, they will inevitably have to use all their strength to fight!"

"Sufficient metal materials are also a military priority! And this war was originally triggered by these newly discovered large iron ore veins. The enemy will inevitably take advantage of this to collect sufficient metal minerals on the spot, smelt them into metal, and then quickly forge them into various weapons and equipment that the soldiers can use. This will reduce, or even narrow, the gap in the scale of the huge army that the nobles of the Southern Province have pulled together since they got serious."

"So, is that why they secretly sent people to mine the deposits? Is that what triggered all of this?"

As Bata'er Jiaoshi said this, he looked left and right at this dilapidated, deserted village, a look of sadness appearing on his face: "Under such a massive situation, can even a tiny village in a marginal corner like Changmai Cunzi not avoid being dragged into the struggle between two giant war monsters?"

He knelt on the ground powerlessly, pounding the earth hard with his fist: "Why, why can't everyone just live well, farm the land, cultivate fields, and experience the satisfaction and joy of a harvest? Why must they fight over mineral resources and push thousands upon thousands of young people onto the battlefield, letting them slaughter and kill each other, letting them watch helplessly as powerful Knights knock away their tiny selves, or be burned to ashes by terrifying flames, eventually to be buried as ashes in the wilderness that serves as a bullshit battlefield?"

Jier frowned and sighed: "In war, everyone will be implicated and involved; no one can escape its influence. War is a giant monster that tears everyone's precious life into pieces. Hmph, even I, who am far away in the Northwest Province of the Kingdom, didn't I follow our Noble Lord Baron from the Northwest Province all the way here, join this monster, and become a part of its body?"

"This giant monster will not easily be satisfied and stop unless it devours the lives of ten thousand people. The only thing you and I, these tiny people affected by it, can do is to live—not only to live ourselves, but to pull more people to live, avoiding being devoured by this giant beast."

Jier just leaned against the wall in the shadows, watching Bata'er Jiaoshi pound the ground with his fists, venting his hatred for the war that destroys lives and destroys everything. After he finished venting, Jier stepped forward to pull him up.

"Let's go, there is still one place in the village that needs to be Scouted. After that is done, I still have to explain to the others how to fight tomorrow morning when I go back. Time is tight, don't waste any more."

After Jier urged him, Bata'er Jiaoshi also patted the mud and dust off his body and nodded heavily. There were still undried tear stains on his face, but he seemed like a different person than before.

Jier couldn't say what was different, but he understood that tomorrow morning, those Defeated Soldiers were going to be in trouble!

The two were still led by Bata'er Jiaoshi, who was familiar with the route and terrain. They passed through the courtyards of the farmers, climbed over the houses of the villagers, bypassed the Nongshen Church in the center of the village, avoided the possible line of sight of the enemy sentries on top of the church, and carefully arrived at the north side of the village.

Most of the villagers' houses here were similar to other parts of the village, but only one villager's house, which was built quite large, was brightly lit in this withered and silent village.

Not only was there someone on guard at the gate of this villager's courtyard, but unlike the absolute silence elsewhere, this household's courtyard was raising quite a few poultry, as well as several of the villagers' dogs. There were even two black-skinned Farm Pigs locked in a wooden fence, currently fast asleep in feces and mud.

Because they were raising many of the original villagers' dogs, the barking of dogs could be heard here from time to time.

Every time the courtyard gate opened or closed, the dogs would bark a few times; once one started clamoring, the other dogs would follow and bark incessantly.

At this time, the Defeated Soldiers walking in the courtyard would often kick those dogs that wouldn't stop barking, hitting them until they whimpered and shrank back, only then swaggering into the three-story big house of the villager.

"This family's house is really big!" Jier exclaimed. Unlike other households in the village that had at most ten people, one could guess just by a rough count that this family had at least twenty or thirty people; it was a large family with many members.

"Yes, this family is the one with the largest population in Changmai Cunzi. This is even after they have already split the family twice; otherwise, they would have at least fifty people. Since the generation before last, they have had many births, and even though some died young, every generation in their family has had several brothers and sisters. By intermarrying with other families in the village, this family's influence in the village is not small."

Bata'er Jiaoshi sighed when he said this: "But these are all things of the past. Some annoying things that I used to think were incredibly important don't seem like big deals now. Heh, compared to these things that affect life now, the things I worried about before were really just small, insignificant trifles. No wonder Old Priest Ruiduokasi always laughed while watching the complaining and worried past me; it turns out I was really that ridiculous before."

Jier shrugged and comforted him: "A person's life stage naturally has things that they worry about at that time, and a person's ability and means to solve problems also grow with life's accumulation. Of course, the current you feels the past you is ridiculous, but is it possible that the future you will look at the current you and also feel it is ridiculous and easy?"

But Bata'er Jiaoshi did not think so: "Warrior Jier, I think this current event is already the biggest event I can participate in in my life. If I follow your words, I really hope to let the fifty-year-old me handle the current situation."

The two stopped talking and carefully peeked at the big house with many lights on from the surrounding uninhabited houses.

They saw that even though it was past the evening meal time, because of the need for rotating patrols and setting up sentries, smoke from cooking fires kept rising from the house's kitchen, and occasionally Defeated Soldiers would come out, grab a piece of poultry, slaughter it on the spot, and take it into the kitchen.

"How rude, they eat so casually when it's not poultry they raised themselves. They are clearly hens that can keep laying eggs, yet they just slaughter them directly..." Bata'er Jiaoshi sighed after seeing this, feeling it was a pity.

In fact, the villagers in the village would only select one or two elderly poultry or livestock from the animals they raised to slaughter and eat during the annual festivals; at other times, they mostly consumed the eggs laid by the poultry, or the milk produced by the ewes and cows at home, and other dairy products made from this milk.

Villagers rarely slaughtered the animals they raised at home. Most of the time, they sold these animals to Merchants or peddlers who came to the village, letting them take them to the towns to be slaughtered. After all, for the villagers, eating the poultry and livestock they worked hard to raise was still a bit too luxurious for them.

If they ate them themselves, it was a complete loss of money. After all, eating these animals didn't bring any other benefits besides getting meat. Selling the livestock, however, could exchange for precious coins, and these coins could be used to purchase essential supplies that the village could not produce.

For example, salt is not produced locally, so the salt that Humans must eat every day has to be transported and purchased by Merchants. But the Merchants selling goods would not accept small-scale barter; they only wanted coins. So for the villagers of some small villages, the livestock raised at home had to be sold for money, and then daily necessities were purchased.

Besides salt, some high-quality cloth also had to be bought with money. After all, for the flax plants that the villagers planted sporadically themselves, the best flax fibers would be used to make clothes to wear, while the coarse flax fibers would be twisted into strong Rope, or fine thread, and woven into large bags for grain.

In areas without iron mines, the influx of local metal items also had to rely on these Merchants. They transported various agricultural tools forged by craftsmen from afar and metal tools necessary for daily life, selling them in turn; likewise, they only accepted coins and did not accept small-scale barter.

Because for small-scale Merchant Guilds, they did not have the ability to transport large amounts of grain obtained through barter to other places and then turn it into capital flow. Therefore, small-scale Merchant Guild traders only accepted coins during transactions.

The edible livestock produced in villages everywhere were the few things that could be taken out to replace coins in some villages. Because these edible livestock could be transported to larger towns nearby, if those livestock were not slaughtered, they could move with the Caravan themselves; after slaughter, they could be sold to the citizen class in the towns, various shops, and even local Noble Knights.

These edible livestock sold in towns could exchange for direct coins for the Merchants, avoiding the important conversion process from goods to cash.

Back to the present.

Because it was already summer, the windows of the house were opened by the Defeated Soldiers for ventilation in the gradually rising temperature. Jier and the other carefully judged the number of enemies in the house through these windows.

And on the third floor of the house, the sharp-eyed and quick-eared Jier noticed something different.

It was the sound of women being assaulted; some rude Defeated Soldiers were assaulting, cursing, and beating some women who should not have been there.

Jier frowned, but after thinking about it, he still informed Bata'er Jiaoshi of this situation, even though he knew that after saying it out loud, tomorrow's battle would become even more complicated.

"What? You discovered some women are locked on the third floor of the house? And are being assaulted by those soldiers? Damn it! It must be the women and girls from the village; what a shameless bunch! I knew it, these degenerate soldiers all deserve to die! We must find a way to save them, Warrior Jier, Warrior Jier! Please, only by relying on you can we save them now."

Bata'er Jiaoshi pleaded in a low voice, even though he knew this was a very difficult thing.

Because the enemy was gathered in large numbers in the house, at least ten or more, and they were fully equipped with weapons. And as for those assaulted women, not to mention how much torture they had suffered in body and spirit these days, just the fact that they would be used as human shields and hostages during an attack was a very tricky matter.

If the enemy used hostages to threaten them to lay down their weapons or give those soldiers a way out during tomorrow's battle, what should they do?

But when Jier told Bata'er Jiaoshi about the discovery, he was already prepared to be begged by the other party.

He nodded, not saying anything for certain: "I will try my best to save them, but I cannot guarantee that I will save them completely. You know, in battle, do not trust the possible mercy and kindness of the enemy. In tomorrow's battle, any terrible situation is possible."

Bata'er Jiaoshi obviously understood this point, so pleading was pleading, but he himself knew the difficulty of such things, so he did not hold very high expectations for it.

But Jier took out a bag of things at this time, pointing to the thing similar to wheat flour in this bag and said: "Speaking of which, it is also a help. Before rescuing a large number of Changmai Cunzi villagers from the mine, we have an experimental opportunity to rescue some female villagers."

Bata'er Jiaoshi immediately understood that the thing similar to wheat flour in this bag might be a possible solution brought out by Warrior Jier. He curiously leaned his head over, but Jier immediately tightened the bag.

"Be careful, Priest, this thing cannot be inhaled into the body with breath; it is poisonous," Jier explained carefully.

"Then what is this?" The Priest was very curious, looking like wheat flour, but it was not wheat flour, and it was poisonous. Did Warrior Jier want to use this poison powder to rescue the imprisoned and assaulted villagers?

How strange, how is that possible?

Jier chuckled: "This is the powder ground from dried Poison Mushroom from the grasslands of the Western Province. I heard it tastes delicious, but delicious is delicious, yet after eating it, it causes great harm to the body."

Bata'er Jiaoshi's eyes lit up, and he immediately pointed to the kitchen of the house in front, where they were still cooking in the middle of the night: "Could it be?"

Jier smiled: "That's right, that's it."

But the Priest frowned: "But in this way, won't those imprisoned village women also be poisoned because of this? Unlike the physically strong enemy soldiers, they have suffered so much torture; I am afraid their bodies cannot withstand the toxic torment of this Poison Mushroom Powder."

Jier reached out and pointed to the sky, saying proudly: "That's why I said this is a good opportunity. It is night now, and generally speaking, it is past the time for a normal meal. I don't think those Defeated Soldiers will kindly feed the imprisoned women five meals a day. They themselves, on the other hand, because they occupy Changmai Cunzi, which is not short of food, can eat however they want, as many times a day as they want."

"So, if we go to poison them now, there is a high probability that the imprisoned village women will not be poisoned; on the contrary, those Defeated Soldiers will be poisoned because they eat the night's food. In addition, these Poison Mushroom Powders originally had several different poisoning effects. Because I found it troublesome to distinguish them, I mixed them together. Although this will make the poisoning situation of the eaters more complicated, it is not without benefits; the enemy will experience diarrhea, dizziness, vomiting, and hallucinations, all of which they will have to endure. But because they are not all fatal Poison Mushrooms, they will not die instead. They will only think it is simple food poisoning."

Jier patted the pouch in his hand and said affirmatively.

"I'm going to poison the food in the kitchen now; you wait here for me and help me keep an eye on the surroundings." After saying this, Jier tidied up his equipment; he didn't need to take much, just two Steel Daggers and a pouch of Poison Mushroom Powder would suffice.

He was dressed in neat casual clothes and did not need any further protective gear, so he vaulted out of the Villager's window, landed lightly, and then, using the shadows, stealthily approached the courtyard of the Farmer's house ahead.

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