Chapter 1434: Letters from Afar

Yishang is not doing well this year either; it took nearly a year to nurse Yishang's body back to health, and if he had to go through such an ordeal again, it is truly uncertain whether he could survive this year.

Therefore, this year, Baifeng brought a rejuvenation to the team; from those leading the team to those participating, they were all of the younger generation. The team leaders were also young officers; Baifeng simply wanted to give them the opportunity to build merit and establish a career, as these old fellows had already accumulated enough merit and no longer needed it.

Moreover, Yishang is not necessarily more capable than those young people; it is just that Yishang was born at the right time and followed the right person, Baifeng. Placed in the present, would a small, wandering tribal Tribal Chief be qualified to stay by Baifeng's side? Absolutely not.

For a tribe as large as the Suiren clan, only someone like Baoxi could speak with Baifeng; as for the great Leaders under him, Baifeng does not even know their names, nor does he want to. This is the importance of opportunity, so Baifeng gave them this chance.

Their team still set out from Huaxia City, passed through Lema City, and then entered the wilderness. The road they took was the main road that had been opened up, but because this road had hardly been traveled by anyone for an entire year, some problems had appeared to a greater or lesser extent, so their team also needed to perform some maintenance; this is the responsibility and duty of every Huaxia person.

They also had another task, which was to use pens to record the conditions of every section of the entire road, just like the milestones of later generations. On this road, at every distance interval, there would be an erected stone carved with a number to record the distance.

One of the reasons for recording the situation was the need for meticulous maintenance in the later stages; another point was that this road used two different construction methods. Now that a year has passed, wind and rain have certainly caused damage in many places, and now is the time to compare the two situations to see which one is better.

Then, based on the damage and the construction difficulty, they would determine whether it was truly necessary to use this more arduous and labor-intensive construction method. Of course, this recording process might need to continue for several years; after all, one year of time is still not very obvious.

They traversed the entire road and arrived at the Western Development Group. Before reaching the Western Development Group, they also saw the silhouette of the Noble Herding Group from afar, with cattle and sheep everywhere, looking very busy and prosperous, though they could not be certain of the specific situation.

Upon arriving at the Western Development Group, they were naturally greeted with enthusiasm, because for a very, very long time, they had not been able to receive news from Huaxia. A long-distance team like this would certainly be able to bring important news from Huaxia City, as well as some things that had happened recently.

Ce and the others living here at the Western Development Group needed to determine the current situation of Huaxia City through the news brought by these teams, so as not to be left behind by Huaxia City. If they could not even know the situation of their own home, they would truly feel as if they had been abandoned.

Although they were living and residing here now, this was not their hometown after all; this was a place to build merit. Trading a few years of youth for the merit to be enfeoffed and granted a surname was very worthwhile, but every year was extremely agonizing and very difficult to get through. Ce did not know how many more years he would need to stay here; he had already achieved certain merits here, and he felt he could achieve more, but he truly wanted to go back.

For the residents of the Western Development Group, it did not matter who managed them. What the current situation in Huaxia City was or what had happened did not really matter, as it did not have much to do with them; in any case, they were prepared to survive the rest of their lives here.

It was just that this year the team did not bring any major news to Ce and the others, because nothing particularly significant had happened in Huaxia City this year. The construction of the two cities had already been mentioned at the meeting, and now they were just telling Ce about the progress.

This made Ce feel very emotional; he had obtained this opportunity, an opportunity that could allow him to gain enough merit, but looking at it again, there were really quite a few such opportunities in Huaxia. If one were to speak of it, the conditions in Xiao Town seemed better than his place, and it was closer to Huaxia City; not only did news arrive faster, but because of the need to transport Saltpeter, Xiao Town was not lacking in any supplies, unlike his place.

Now there were even two new cities. With Baoxi at Suiren City, one certainly could not intervene, and it was also a very troublesome matter. Now Weicheng was also under construction, right at the gates of Huaxia City; Huaxia would certainly invest a great deal of energy and resources. If someone could become the City Lord of Weicheng, not only would the future be bright, but one would not have to suffer much hardship either.

The Western Development Group also had good news and great progress; the division of the Pasture was proceeding rapidly, the construction progress of housing in the Pasture was also fast, and there had been very great progress regarding the communication and coordination matters with the Guizu Muchang.

As of now, they had already stored a large amount of grain there, and had also sent their children to the Western Development Group to study. Although they did not understand what studying was, they felt they could get rid of a burden, so they agreed to this matter very readily.

They now also had a very convenient way of communicating, which was using smoke. The land here was relatively flat, though there were rolling mountains with low vertical heights. The Western Development Group was situated on a mountaintop, and the view was very good.

Therefore, those noble herdsmen, as well as the herdsmen in various pastoral areas, would light signal fires to transmit information when they encountered emergencies.

Different numbers of smoke columns represented different degrees of urgency. If there were four smoke columns, it meant that there was an invasion by an external enemy. As for what was used to produce the smoke, it was, of course, the Grass and tree branches that could be seen everywhere. Wet cow dung and wolf dung could produce more smoke; of course, wolf dung was the best, as the smoke was black and straight, but collecting wolf dung was more troublesome, and they were too lazy to carry wolf dung with them at all times.

Cow dung was so simple, it was everywhere, and they discovered that after cow dung had been dried for two or three days, it was a good material for starting a fire—flammable, with a strong flame, and it was everywhere, making it much easier than finding firewood.

Therefore, in various pastoral areas, another rather peculiar thing appeared: dung walls. They collected cow dung, dried it, and piled it together, and then it piled up more and more. Of course, there was no need to worry too much about it; if it was not used up for a period of time, just let it lie there. When they came to this Grassland next time, it would be best if it was still there to be used; if not, it did not matter, they would just find more.