Chapter 243: Laying the Groundwork for the Future

Baifeng had been suppressing the excitement in his heart, and by this time, footsteps were slowly appearing outside. Because Baifeng had moved Sui to the delivery room, many Soldiers had already been stationed outside, guarding the delivery room in shifts day and night without rest. Baifeng had also given them Tea Leaves so they could stay alert during the night.

The moment they heard the baby's cry, the Soldiers outside could no longer suppress their excitement. After they had ascended to a tribe, the Tribal Chief was no longer a position held by the most capable, but was instead inherited by the Tribal Chief's children.

They hadn't known about such things before, but as their exchanges with other large tribes became increasingly frequent, these matters gradually became known to them, and they also accepted this rule. After all, since those large tribes did it this way, they could not be as casual as they had been in the past.

Doing this also made sense. After all, in such a large tribe of tens of thousands of people, how could one know which person was talented? Furthermore, in such a case, the transfer of power would easily lead to all kinds of disputes and chaos, which was not a good thing for the tribe. A powerful Tribal Chief was more likely to produce children who were equally powerful.

For the Tribal Chief, power remained in the hands of their own people. For the tribesmen, a transfer of power without variables had less impact on the tribe and would not cause them harm; naturally, it was a win-win situation.

The night-watch Soldiers, excited as they were, quickly split off a few people to notify all the high-level officials and tribesmen, as this was, after all, a matter very much worth celebrating.

Xiong was awakened from his sleep by urgent knocking on the door. Just as his temper was rising, he was informed by a Soldier that the Tribal Chief's child had been born. Xiong was startled at first, then laughed heartily with joy; the feeling was the same as when his son Shaoyin had come into the world.

Shaoyin was now able to run and jump skillfully, and his speech was very fluent; he was completely a prototype of the strongest future Soldier. He thought that in another two years, he would let the Tribal Chief teach the child; he must be able to read and understand those strange but very useful pieces of knowledge.

The Shaman, Chi, and the others were in the same state, all having been awakened from their sleep. When their children came into the world, Baifeng would always bring gifts to visit them. Of course, this "child" only referred to the children born to their Primary Wife. They had too many wives and gave birth to many children; if he were to visit and congratulate them for every single one, Baifeng would not be able to bear it.

Of course, there was a reason for Baifeng doing this. The Baifeng Tribe would only grow larger in the future, and the power of these high-level officials would also grow greater. For the sake of their interests, this power would certainly have to be inherited from generation to generation; this was almost an inevitability of the era.

The tribe did not have enough productivity to allow everyone's children to be free from labor to study. Only the children of high-level officials had this opportunity. Naturally, these children were the best among their peers and could be used as the ruling class.

It was not that Baifeng was unaware of the drawbacks of this model. Even with his historical cheat, he had no way to change it; this was the inevitability of an era with low productivity. What he could do was to let all children receive basic education from the very beginning, then weed out the dull ones to enter production, and keep the intelligent ones to continue studying and enter the high-level ranks.

Baifeng did not completely cut off the path for class mobility; he was even expanding this path under the limitations of the era. In the future, he would also teach his own children these things, letting them pass them down from generation to generation.

His theory was not absolutely correct, but it was fully capable of transcending the era by thousands of years. When the social productivity changed at that time, he would let them reform it themselves. What's more, it was hard to say whether their tribe could even exist for that long. The tribe would eventually disappear into history, and it would be Baifeng's generation that ended it with their own hands, to be replaced by a state.

As for why it was the first child of the first wife, it was because they had no concept of love at all and would not truly love any one woman. Therefore, Baifeng calculated it by whoever was married first being the superior one; the one married first was the Primary Wife, and the child born to the Primary Wife was the eldest son or daughter, who had the right of inheritance. This was also to prevent their children from fighting for power.

Currently, they fought for power by relying on force. This was because their generation had not yet developed wisdom. By the time the next generation of children had wisdom, the destructive power when fighting for power would be stronger than relying purely on force. Therefore, Baifeng was laying the groundwork for what would happen in the future from the very beginning.

Everyone was very happy. The high-level officials, carrying gifts, had already headed toward the delivery room, just waiting for Baifeng to come out so they could offer their blessings.

Only one person was unhappy, and that was Chinv. At first, she had thought that Sui was like her—a woman from some large tribe who had fallen on hard times. She might not have been a Tribal Chief's daughter like her, but her status was at least relatively high; otherwise, Baifeng would not have married her.

Unexpectedly, after spending a long time together, she learned that Sui was actually a woman who had been abandoned in an unknown tribe and traded as a commodity. If the Tribal Chief hadn't saved her, she would have long since become a pile of ash somewhere.

Therefore, she was very dissatisfied with Baifeng favoring Sui and attaching importance to their child. She believed that only she was worthy of such a high status and that only her child could inherit the tribe; Sui was not worthy.

When she first learned of Sui's identity, Chinv immediately began to change her mindset, catering to Baifeng with the highest enthusiasm, hoping to make Baifeng notice her and raise her status above Sui's. However, she later learned that Baifeng didn't care about a woman's background at all and only looked at which woman the man married first. Chinv's heart felt as if it had turned cold. Now that Sui's child was born, her heart was even colder.

She did not have the guts, nor could she harm Sui's child, for if she did, she would not have a good end either, because Baifeng's methods were truly too formidable; there was nothing that could be hidden from him. Now, she only hoped that she could give birth to a stronger son who would eventually surpass Sui's child; in that case, Baifeng would certainly consider it carefully.

Unfortunately, her belly remained flat.

Now, no matter how unhappy she was in her heart, the Soldier had already notified her outside the door, and she had to go and visit. This was something she had to do; if she didn't go, she was afraid she wouldn't have a good outcome in the future.

Baifeng did not know what the situation was outside; he only knew that he had a son, and he was chubby and plump, looking very healthy at first glance. He had not expected that Sui would be able to give birth to the child so easily.

He cut and stitched the child's umbilical cord, then wiped him clean and carried him to Sui, letting her see her own child.

Sui's spirits were still very good, and she was not exhausted. She was also very happy looking at her child, and under Baifeng's guidance, she let the child drink the colostrum.

Now Baifeng was considering what name to give his child. Before the birth, he had already thought of many—authoritative ones, elegant ones, or ones that sounded sturdy and easy to raise—but after the child was truly born, he didn't know how to choose again.