Chapter 61

Baifeng got up with dark circles under his eyes; he had barely slept all night, while Sui slept soundly beside him, completely oblivious to Baifeng's worries.

Unable to come up with a plan himself, Baifeng tried to look for inspiration in history; he didn't understand the livelihood policies of the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, so he started from the Qin dynasty and went all the way to modern times, putting himself in the shoes of an Emperor to try and find the most suitable development method for his tribe.

As a result, tracing through history, Baifeng's worries only grew; he truly couldn't imagine the pressure the enlightened Emperors of those great empires must have endured, as he was losing sleep over the survival of a tribe of less than a thousand people, while those Emperors were concerned with the survival of tens of millions or hundreds of millions, and while dissolute Emperors could enjoy themselves without a care, one had to have immense stress resistance to want to be a wise monarch.

Unfortunately, dissolute dynasties did not last long, and his small tribe was even more likely to collapse completely within a few months due to a single mistake of his.

Baifeng felt truly stifled, so he quietly opened the wooden window to look at the night scenery; the moon was larger and rounder than what he had seen in later generations, and his eyes, without nearsightedness or astigmatism, could even see the craters on the moon, where a vague figure seemed to be waving their arms and chopping something.

A cool breeze blew by, clearing Baifeng's head a little; he turned his head to look, and Sui was still sleeping sweetly, so Baifeng closed the window and returned to his spot, not lying down, but sitting quietly in a cross-legged position.

Recalling the era he was most familiar with, where great people led the country from chaos to prosperity and strength, they also had to constantly reform and experiment along the way to find a path suitable for their own development.

Perhaps, was communalization suitable for his current state?

Baifeng thought carefully about the feasibility; of course, the conditions were similar but not identical, so it could be used, but not entirely.

Collective living in a large tribe, working together and distributing uniformly, with poverty and low output, and no class conflict having emerged yet—it seemed very feasible? Baifeng changed to a comfortable position to lie down and continued to refine his ideas.

Amidst Xiong's whistling, everyone got up one after another; the tribespeople washed their faces and rinsed their mouths, while Baifeng used a willow branch chewed into fibers as a toothbrush, dipping it in refined fine salt to brush his teeth, and Sui had also gotten used to brushing her teeth at Baifeng's request, which was fortunate as she naturally had white teeth, otherwise, if Sui opened her mouth to reveal big yellow teeth, Baifeng wouldn't know how to go on living.

The newly incorporated tribespeople had regained some strength after resting, and although they were still trembling, they didn't understand what the whistle meant, but seeing everyone else getting up to wash, they had no choice but to get up and crowd together, only because they didn't know how to fetch water and didn't have the habit of washing their faces, they were all timid and didn't know what to do, appearing very restrained.

The old tribespeople wouldn't care about these newly arrived savages; perhaps in a moment the Tribal Chief would announce how these Slaves were to be distributed, and teach them how to fetch water and wash their faces? That would be beneath them!

Xiong was the one who understood the situation, taking Yishang to see how to fetch water, having him use the pottery basin he was assigned to fetch water and wash his hands and face clean, and telling him that this was the rule of the Baifeng tribe, that one must keep oneself clean; yesterday they didn't require it because they were too tired, but today they must wash their whole body clean, the kind where you couldn't find a single louse.

Although Yishang didn't understand why there were such strange rules—he could have understood even if it were worshipping the Sun in the morning—he didn't dare to have any objections and obediently washed his hands and face clean; the water had already turned murky, and seeing that the water was only pale yellow after the other tribespeople finished washing, he felt a bit embarrassed himself.

After teaching Yishang, it was then Yishang's turn to teach the people he brought; looking at the chaotic, disorderly, and jostling group of skeletons, Xiong had no desire to keep watching, whereas looking at his own old tribespeople, they were neat and orderly, how natural, how elegant.

While the new tribespeople were still chaotically washing their faces, the old tribespeople had already assembled, collected their identity tags, and confirmed that everyone was present, just waiting for Baifeng to issue tasks and start the day's work.

Although Baifeng's face was haggard, because he had found a solution to his worries, his spirits were quite good; the tribespeople were waiting, and Baifeng was waiting too.

When the new tribespeople finished washing, their hands and arms were clearly a different color from their faces and torsos; they stood in a mess, also restrainedly waiting for Baifeng to arrange their fate.

Baifeng cleared his throat: "Everyone, our tribe has some good news, which I believe you have all seen: it is the two hundred or so people standing over there; our tribe has expanded once again!"

Xiong took the lead in clapping, and the tribespeople also clapped sparsely; the new tribespeople nearby didn't understand, so some also clapped, while others wanted to clap but were embarrassed, and by the time they wanted to, the applause from the old tribespeople had already stopped.

Clapping was one of Baifeng's bad habits; he always felt uncomfortable if there was no reaction when he spoke, so he required the tribespeople to clap to show agreement when he reached the exciting parts of his speech; they didn't know what counted as exciting, so it was usually led by smart people like Xiong or the Shaman.

When the last bit of applause stopped, Baifeng continued: "Perhaps most of you think they are Slaves of our tribe, although that was what Xiong suggested to me at the time." There was a slightly uneasy stir among the new tribespeople.

"But I didn't think so; I intend to let them join the Baifeng tribe and let them become our tribespeople too."

This time, there was an uneasy stir among the old tribespeople.

Baifeng pressed his hands down to let everyone be quiet: "I know you don't understand, and you don't want the food you worked hard to find to be eaten by unrelated people, but once they become our tribespeople, wouldn't it be normal for them to eat our food?"

The old tribespeople felt this was wrong, but couldn't find where it was wrong; Xiong and the Shaman twitched their noses without a word.

"Of course, they won't eat for free; consider it as you lending it to them; only when the work they do can cover the food they eat will they be able to possess their own real food just like you; otherwise, they can only eat the least and worst food while doing the same work.

Furthermore, for the sake of everyone and the future development of our tribe, our tribe cannot always be a small tribe of a few hundred people; we are going to become a great tribe of tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands!"

The tribespeople were moved by Baifeng's not-so-clever grand promise and also roared excitedly a few times.

"For the sake of long-term development in the future, I have decided to implement a Work Point System in our tribe; that is to say, everyone works together and eats together, but the work everyone does every day will be calculated as a certain amount of work points; the more you work, the more you earn; when our tribe has a surplus in Winter, you can use your work points to exchange for the food and items you want; what you exchange for will be your own, and you won't have to share it with the tribespeople again."

As soon as these words were spoken, both new and old tribespeople were confused; the one with the biggest reaction was the Shaman: Tribal Chief, are you thinking I have too much free time?