Chapter 234

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Protagonist:

Chen Yi

Like any kingdom with a long history and culture, since its founding, the Saint Qiao Kingdom had its own functioning laws and ways of survival, with sound political, economic, and military systems. Due to different environments and leaders, it was sometimes strong, sometimes weak, but always stubbornly survived.

To Chen Yi, such a polity was like the Qing Dynasty encountered by Europeans in the 19th century. The latter, though backward, was extraordinarily huge and stubborn. But from another angle, even though he could not fully control the country, by exerting indirect influence on its rulers to achieve his goals, he spent little effort and gained much. Especially when the latter needed him, forming a win-win was easy.

Only, the Saint Qiao Kingdom won the future, while Chen Yi won the present.

Years of war were no easy matter for any country, even for the victor.

Like the European colonists of old, Chen Yi likewise preferred the way of trade, which was always much easier than being a builder. For example, right now, notifying Timothy to procure household goods was far less troublesome than cultivating natives to produce goods.

Moreover, the latter's cost might be even higher. If he had a choice, Chen Yi would not bother opening a settlement on the West Continent.

If things had been different, Yu Weichao could still be working peacefully at his unit, blaming heaven and others while resisting elitism. She Lei would have had it worse; being exiled to the Western Frontier would have been a relatively comfortable punishment.

A full half-subway's worth of supplies, only one-third was delivered to the Saint Qiao Kingdom. The rest, to the envy of Mage Timothy, was transported to the West Continent.

The subway's capacity was almost unlimited. Loading twenty tons of cargo was simple. As for loading and unloading, Chen Yi, now at Combat Skill Level 8, could lift over a ton in each hand without much difficulty.

While transporting goods, he thought: if one day he reached the level of Holy Knights, when short of money he shouldn't run around aimlessly, but go to the wharf to work as a human gantry crane temporary worker. Moving one container for 20 yuan, moving 100 in a day would be enough to eat two sheep. He just didn't know if animals like Superman consumed so much stamina daily that the energy from two sheep would be enough to replenish it.

Stepping out of the Light Gate, the sunlight outside was even more glaring. The mud on the ground was slightly less, but weeds two or three people tall were even more lush—it was a scene of midsummer.

"Summer is truly annoying." Chen Yi drove his transformed small lizard out of the Light Gate and immediately sank into the mud.

Today's Phantom Dragon transformed into a heavy-duty truck. The Oshkosh Company's M977 Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck, claimed to be the most mobile transport vehicle of the United States Army. Chen Yi spent much effort to get a disassembled big one from the Jiangning Military Region, then didn't even assemble it—he just ate it by counting the parts, only because there were too many non-metal materials, he ate very slowly. Just its extremely famous central tire inflation system alone coaxed and threatened the small lizard for a week before it went into its belly, and it cost over two tons of copper, which was not cheap. But the land of the West Continent was obviously harsher than Kosovo. An overloaded heavy truck facing two meters of standing water was also helpless.

Chen Yi wiped his sweat hard and crawled out of the cab. He complained in his heart that the weather in the West Continent was already hot enough, and now the light was even more intense. He didn't know if Yu Weichao could survive.

"Fortunately, I brought some medicine. I hope this cargo is fine." Chen Yi didn't want to change people every few days. Every time a new person in charge was replaced, the plan would have to be disrupted again. And someone like Yu Weichao, with no ties, voluntary and conscious—at least semi-voluntary and semi-conscious—was a rare "four-haves" newcomer from another time and space.

The small lizard sang in the style of Feng Gong, whom he had seen on some unknown day: "Ghost place, this is a place even ghosts wouldn't want to come to..."

But no matter whose style it was, it exerted all its strength and still couldn't crawl out of the mud pool. It had no choice but to helplessly say, "I can't."

"Swap in a higher-horsepower engine."

"You can't just swap it like that." Even so, the small lizard still swapped in a higher-horsepower engine. Before coming, it had eaten a lot of equipment. However, being able to swap a high-horsepower engine was thanks to it now being at Combat Skill level. If it were a Phantom Dragon at Body Technique level, changing equipment would require starting over, and it couldn't be freely combined. Unlike now, where if there wasn't enough space, it could open up a bit, and if the pipes weren't suitable, it could enlarge them a bit. Of course, using original fitted parts was still better...

It was said that top-tier Phantom Dragons, once they could configure the most suitable body structure, could become existences like dragons. But all that was baseless, just rumors spread on the Magic Continent.

Focusing on the present, the future dragon with a 500-horsepower engine swapped in still couldn't drill out of the mud pool. The wheels slipped severely, and it wasn't something that could be solved by having more horsepower.

Chen Yi thought: next time he should let the small lizard eat some triangular tires, like snowmobiles, to avoid such a predicament.

But thinking was one thing; since the truck couldn't get up, he had to push and pull it himself, padding hard objects underneath. He was sweating profusely before finally crawling out of the mud pool.

"If the pit is too deep, will I drown?" the small lizard said with a mouth full of worry.

"When you're about to drown, I allow you to abandon the things on the truck," Chen Yi said, patting the steering wheel, ordering it to continue forward.

The small lizard felt valued and was very happy. It didn't understand: when about to drown, whether to abandon the things on the truck was decided by it, but when exactly was "about to drown" was decided by Chen Yi or the heavens.

In less than two minutes, the overloaded truck pulling 20 tons of cargo sank into the rotten leaves again. This time, leaves as long as a person's diameter were tangled together, wrapping around the tires.

Chen Yi had to get out of the car to tear them, and commanded: "First turn into feet."

The Phantom Dragon shouted "Apollo Transform," and one tire turned into a thick elephant leg—it hadn't eaten an elephant, but just simulating the appearance was fine as long as there was enough Combat Skill level flesh.

Chen Yi tore off the rotten branches and decayed leaves from the leg and foot, then had it turn back into a tire. The M977 was claimed to be able to ford 1.5 meters deep, but on the West Continent, this height was truly not enough.

A short two kilometers took two hours. When they saw a somewhat better hard road, not to mention Chen Yi, even the small lizard itself choked up: "If I become a dragon, I'll definitely use dragon breath to bake all these mud pits here into hard pavement."

Chen Yi said without a shred of hope: "You'd better eat a bulldozer, eat a steamroller, and struggle here for 50 years..."

Struggle for 50 years in a world without metal? The Phantom Dragon laughed heartily, declining politely: "I still want to serve my master you."

Chen Yi "humph"ed, stepping on the accelerator and steering wheel to get onto the main road.

The reason it was "down" was because the road surface was full of large footprints left by transport beasts. These thirty-ton monsters were like steamrollers, stepping the soil deep into the ground until the soil on both sides flipped over, then stepping in again. These trodden roads naturally formed a shape low in the middle and high on both sides.

Compared to transport beasts, the truck's height was much lower, and the view from the middle of the road wasn't good. But compared to struggling in the mud pool, it was much more comfortable.

Roaring all the way, the truck first arrived at Yun Village.

After more than a month, the Yun Village seen today was already a scene of prosperity. First was a tall stone village wall replacing the log wall. About forty or fifty people were commanding unknown giant beasts to work, and their movements were not slow at all.

Outside the village, four villagers holding weapons, fully equipped, were inspecting passersby. And the endless flow of people, following the rules, queued to enter the village. Among them, some villagers not from Ma La had to pay something at the gate to enter. The city gate taxes they collected were of a wide variety, from grain to meat and leather, oil and shells were all acceptable. Chen Yi found it strange. If this were Yun Village a few months ago, they would be happy if even one person came a day. How could there be such a constant flow of people like now?

His truck also attracted the villagers' attention. The West Continent had plenty of strong giant monsters, but it still drew everyone's discussion. A transport beast curiously poked its head out from the beast pen, using its 10-meter-long neck to cross space and sniff above the truck.

It seemed it couldn't understand why such a small thing could carry so much.

Only when Chen Yi got out of the car did he attract a villager from Yun Village.

"Chen Merchant, you've come."

"Hello."

"I am Yun Shisan." The men and women of Yun Village were still used to wearing similar clothes. Previously they wore beast skin outfits, now they were all camouflage suits. At first glance, it was as if they had arrived at a military camp in South America or East Asia.

However, compared to familiar villagers like Yun Wu and Yun Ba, Yun Shisan was a thin and small young man. He looked excitedly at Chen Yi. Unlike those strong peers of his age, in earlier times, a weak young man found it very hard to survive on his own. They couldn't go hunting, and picking wild fruits was equally dangerous. In the thickets forty or fifty meters, even over a hundred meters high, lived completely different animals from those on the ground. Those agile creatures either had strong lower limbs or strong upper limbs, patrolling their own territories in groups, like urban management officers with temporary worker licenses. Once they discovered anyone intruding into their territory, they would immediately bare their teeth and pounce, not caring at all about the other party's interests, nor even their own.

But although the thin young man didn't have a strong body, his language talent was not bad. When most adults couldn't fully express their meanings, he could bargain with people in the market. This was quite difficult. Before education became widespread, there were many people in the countryside with speech impediments. Not many could skillfully master words and various meanings.

It was precisely this skill that allowed the young boy to barely survive until today. He also had to thank that the forest had always had enough food in recent years. Otherwise, he would have been a variety eliminated first by natural selection.

However, after the rise of commerce in Yun Village, Yun Shisan had the capital to make a living. He was also the first professional sedentary merchant in the village—completely different from traveling merchants.

Chen Yi didn't know any of this. He just nodded and went in.

The village had great changes too. Not only were new houses built, but also two-story new buildings. They were made of hollow material similar to bamboo, with green branches and leaves on long poles, indicating their freshness.

On the stone bench in the center of the village, many different faces began to appear. When Chen Yi stood there, everyone's expressions changed.

Nervous? Excited? Hopeful? Worried?

"This is the village's Merchant Office," Yun Shisan, following behind, introduced proudly.

"Merchant Office?"

"It's where the traveling merchants stay, and behind it there's a merchant house for them to live in for free." Once Yun Shisan started talking, he couldn't stop, chattering on: "Only Shang Yun Village has a merchant office. I've been there once. Every time they transport goods, they give the merchants a free ride to the village, and even give them a free lift further on, so the merchants are all happy to go... We're really something, the merchants come on their own initiative, and even some villagers from other places stay with people they know."

In this era, the most expensive cost for traveling merchants should still be logistics costs. They're not like lone traveling merchants; they have many expensive or heavy goods, and to match the hardship and risk they put in, they often demand three times or five times the profit.

Shang Yun Village being able to eliminate the biggest transportation cost naturally attracts many traveling merchants.

Yun Village is different; what attracts merchants there is probably cheap goods costs.

Chen Yi looked around; there were both merchants selling goods and merchants buying goods, or rather, every merchant was in the process of both buying and selling, and most notably, they were willing to take out money and shell-like currency to pay... In other places, barter is normal, but using currency to pay purchase fees means the merchants' main purpose in coming here is to purchase, and they came prepared.

For everyone, this is good news.

Chen Yi smiled slightly.

"Pa pa" two sounds came from behind.

Chen Yi hurriedly turned to look, but it was the Village Chief who had come rushing up, and he slapped Yun Shisan twice across the face.

He was heard scolding in an angry tone: "What did you bring Chen Merchant here for? You, you traitorous bastard..."

It would have been fine if he hadn't scolded, but once he opened his mouth, the merchants who had still been hesitating all knew Chen Yi was the legendary Chen Merchant; how could they stay seated? They all swarmed over, making all kinds of sounds.

"I have cash on hand!"

"Chen Merchant, double the price for swords."

"Triple the price for swords..."

"I'll pay double for clothing too."

"I'll take all your goods!" This voice was particularly striking; it was precisely the merchant who had traded with shells earlier.

The people around gradually quieted down; they could see the quantity of goods on that strange transport beast, piled so high, who knew how much money it would take to take it all?

"Why didn't you go buy from Yu Weichao?" Chen Yi looked at him curiously.

"I am Lanier, a merchant from Ma La." Following custom, the other party announced his name, then said: "What you speak of is the fish from Shuizhai?"

Chen Yi, who had eaten konjac, also found this way of speaking hard to understand; he thought for a moment then smiled: "It's fish."

"His goods are too few, we need large quantities." Lanier said with certainty, taking out a piece of shell: "For each sword, I'll pay you 10 conch shells."

Chen Yi thought to himself, only 10? But when he received that shell, his hand suddenly sank.

It has weight!

Weight is good.

He covered his fingers with a layer of Pocket Qi, then carefully rubbed it — not gold.

That's even better.

On Earth, there are plenty of metals more valuable than gold. Slightly rare ones all dare claim prices higher than gold, the rest all say they're more precious than gold.

... (Unfinished, if you want to know what happens next, please log in to www. qidian. com, more chapters, support the author, support genuine reading!)