Chapter 36: Take It All Away

County Lieutenant Zhou gathered his men.

He Da and the others were curious; before County Lieutenant Zhou had even walked over, they impatiently crowded around to look at the paper Wen Gu had given him.

There was no need for County Lieutenant Zhou to explain; even if one were illiterate, one could understand just by seeing the drawings on the paper.

"Is this a map of the area at the entrance to the Town?"

He Da stared at the paper.

He thought to himself: Is this the capability of a high-end scholar!

Where to enter the Town, which house to go to, what shops and residents were nearby, what items might be there, which places to focus on searching, where one could stay for the night, whether there were water wells, what the road conditions were like... it was all drawn on it.

With just a few simple strokes, it could convey all the information.

A follower beside him whispered to He Da: "He Daqiu, we don't need to think about anything else from now on; we should just eat, drink, and then listen to the Wen Scholar. Scholars are truly amazing!"

He Da nodded in agreement. Scholars were naturally amazing; otherwise, why would his family exhaust all their efforts to support his younger brother in his studies? That was something that could change one's fate!

Take the present moment, for example. If it were left to them, they would certainly have blundered in blindly, searching house by house; by the time the day passed and their strength was exhausted, they might not have found much by nightfall, and they would still have to make a hasty choice for a place to spend the night.

Yet the Wen Scholar was able to arrange everything properly while they were just chatting.

He Da, Yu Er, and the others looked on with admiration.

However, Zhou Shan's attention was not on this.

He gathered the members of the scouting squad and entered the Town once more.

This time they were not fumbling in the dark; following the map, their efficiency was extremely high.

There were not many evil entities in the Town; after slaying two, they arrived at the peddler's residence according to the map.

Seen from the outside, it was indeed ordinary; the pastry shop next door was much more conspicuous.

It was just that, looking at the pastry shop, one could tell at a glance that someone had already gone in to search it. But here at the peddler's, few people had paid any attention.

County Lieutenant Zhou took out a small bundle of fuel he had brought—firewood made from withered grass, twigs, and tree bark—and after lighting it to create thick smoke, he threw it into the house.

There was no movement of any evil entity being smoked out.

"Clear it out; we will stay here tonight."

"Shall we go in and search now? There's a wheelbarrow over there!" He Da said excitedly.

"A peddler's wheelbarrow can hold quite a lot of things!" someone echoed.

County Lieutenant Zhou merely glanced in that direction without looking for long, and said in a deep voice: "First, look for any hidden compartments, Cellars, and those concealed places where things might be hidden."

"What could a peddler possibly hide..."

"Salt!"

The few people who were about to walk toward the wheelbarrow made a sharp turn and rushed into the house.

Wen Gu, who was waiting outside the Town, did not wait for long.

Soon, a signal came from Matuan in the sky.

"Let's go, enter the Town!"

At the entrance to the small Town, Wu Shu and Xiao Liu were waiting there, both of them wearing expressions of clear excitement.

Seeing Wen Gu, Xiao Liu walked over quickly and said: "We found salt!"

When it came to searching for things, County Lieutenant Zhou still had professional experience.

The peddler's residence had been simply cleaned and tidied, and a fire had been lit; some interfering debris had been thrown into the fire to be burned, and the courtyard was filled with smoke.

The livestock shed was not large, but it would suffice for three head of livestock to squeeze in.

The person responsible for mixing the feed was absent-minded at this moment, his eyes constantly glancing toward the house.

Salt!

One would go hungry without grain, but one needed to eat salt to have strength!

Both salt and grain were important!

Under current conditions, there was no such thing as excessive intake; how many people couldn't afford to eat it?

Inside the house, County Lieutenant Zhou had already moved out two large bags of salt.

"There should have been four or five bags stored here before, but now only two remain. The peddler must have taken two or three bags when he left, but he was in a hurry to flee at the time and still had to pack grain and supplies, so he hid these two bags."

In areas at the border between city and countryside, smuggling was rampant.

The goods this peddler sold were not of many varieties, and he sold them at affordable prices; who could have imagined that he didn't rely on those small commodities to make money at all, and used them to cover up his real transactions!

The Town was too conspicuous, so the peddler's trading partners had always been in the nearby Villages, and there was no telling how many subordinates he had developed.

County Lieutenant Zhou pointed at the two bags of salt and said to Wen Gu:

"It's all coarse salt, with a distinct bitter taste."

He had experience with this.

"It doesn't look like salt produced by the large salt merchants by the sea. The technology of the large salt merchants there is more mature, and the private salt they produce is generally not transported to such small places."

"The private salt produced by small salt merchants is bitter and astringent. The technology is insufficient, and the salt produced is of inferior quality. However, for us right now, having coarse salt is already quite good."

County Lieutenant Zhou could not help but show a smile.

He Da and the others also nodded repeatedly.

At a time like this, why be picky? Even in the past, the salt they ate was about the same as this, and it was expensive; they usually ate it sparingly.

Wen Gu, however, frowned at this moment, his face serious:

"Coarse salt? The taste is distinctly bitter and astringent? That won't do! Eating inferior salt for a long time is bad for the body; we have to travel for a long time, and we can't have our bodies break down!"

As he spoke, he looked toward Qingyi Daozhang.

The vigilance in the Daoist Priest's heart was instantly maxed out: Why are you looking at me?!

Wen Gu walked over quickly: "My Study Tour..."

Qingyi Daozhang stiffened his face, his gaze sharp: "Say that again, damn you!"

Wen Gu: "Ahem, please trouble yourself, Daozhang, to refine this coarse salt."

They would stay in this Town for a day or two longer to scavenge for supplies, and during this time, Qingyi Daozhang could set up a furnace to refine salt; in any case, this dog of a Daoist had nothing else to do.

"I heard that a wealthy family here has a tripod, and there are iron pots in the Town as well. What other tools do you need, Daozhang? We will go find them."

Without waiting for Qingyi Daozhang to refuse, Wen Gu lowered his voice, putting on a mysterious "I understand everything" air:

"I on my Study Tour... heard that refining coarse salt might also yield mirabilite, Kulux, saltpeter, and so on."

Qingyi Daozhang fell silent.

Although he didn't know what this Gou Shusheng had "understood" during his Study Tour, looking at him like this, could there be uses he didn't know about?

The Daoist weighed the pros and cons in his heart with lightning speed.

Regardless, when he performed a Dharma Assembly for people, he did indeed need to use certain things. His current supply of materials was tight, and the few things obtained from refining coarse salt would indeed be useful to him.

Moreover, there were many people in the group now, so many miscellaneous tasks could be delegated to others, and it wouldn't take much effort.

After weighing it, Qingyi Daozhang assumed his high-expert demeanor and said aloud: "To seek benefit for the masses, how can one speak of toil?"

Wen Gu gave him plenty of face by bowing in front of everyone: "Daozhang is kind-hearted and possesses great virtue!"

Then he immediately had County Lieutenant Zhou set aside a portion of the coarse salt. There was no need to refine all of these two large bags; keeping some coarse salt on hand for external use was fine. Salt could also serve as a currency for trade, which was even more precious in these chaotic times.

No one was investigating whether it was private salt now, so there was no need to hide these coarse salts away.

After arranging where the salt would go and leaving the children and a few people to guard the courtyard, Wen Gu pointed to a few others, turned to Cheng Zhi, and said: "Let's go, let's head to the place you mentioned for sacrifices; there's a large tripod there, right?"

What Cheng Zhi spoke of was a wealthy household in the Town that had a small courtyard used for worshipping gods and performing sacrifices.

It was not far from the peddler's house, and the group soon found it.

Qingyi Daozhang followed along; he still wanted to find more items useful to himself.

In the small courtyard where that wealthy family worshipped the deity statue, a large tripod was placed.

Qingyi Daozhang felt a bit of envy, yet also some disdain.

He felt envy because a tripod of this caliber was a luxury for him at this moment, and he couldn't take it away either.

He felt disdain because he had seen better.

The Daoist's critical gaze stared at the tripod, while the others looked at the deity statue first.

The deity statue was nearly half a person tall and made of copper.

"So rich!"

"It looks so wealthy!"

He Da and Yu Er exclaimed, and were about to walk over to worship the deity.

County Lieutenant Zhou and Xiao Liu, however, were looking around first to see if there was any food left.

Worshipping the deity could be done later; the most important thing was, of course, finding food!

They had learned their lesson!

Cheng Zhi pointed to a spot: "The glutinous rice was found right there."

Wen Gu said: "This family could be considered wealthy in the Town; besides the five grains used for sacrifices, there should also be dried fruits, malt sugar..."

Before he could finish speaking, He Da and Yu Er, who were just about to worship the deity, immediately changed their target.

Food?

Malt sugar?

Hurry and let me see where there is more Sugar!!

As for worshipping the deity...

Oh, it's not that we don't respect the deity, we'll just worship later.

The immortals surely won't be angry with us over such a small matter.

County Lieutenant Zhou had his professional experience, and He Da and Yu Er had their social experience.

Soon, the overlooked food was unearthed one after another, and two jars of hard malt sugar were even found in the Cellar.

The opening of the jars was sealed with oil paper; County Lieutenant Zhou opened them to take a look and said joyfully: "It can be eaten!"

He Da and the others were breathing heavily.

The valuable items had already been taken away when the owners fled, but there were definitely things left behind, and they weren't necessarily all in the storeroom.

Subsequently, they found some malt syrup in another room, but unfortunately, it had already spoiled and could not be eaten.

The group let out a sigh of regret.

Cheng Zhi felt even more heartbroken. When he and his family came here before, they hadn't found it! Perhaps that malt syrup could still be eaten at that time!

Besides food, they also searched for incense and candles.

Cheng Zhi and his family had taken some of the incense for worshipping deities back with them, but they hadn't taken it all.

The incense and candles were not kept in just one place; searching a few more spots yielded quite a quantity.

This incense was not the medicinal incense refined by the Daoist and could not serve the purpose of Exorcism, but it could mask odors.

Useful!

Take it!

They even packed up the paper money intended for sacrifices.

They also found two small Incense Burners in other rooms of the residence.

There was also a lot of food that had severely spoiled, which made everyone feel terrible.

At the beginning of the chaotic times, not many people remained in the Town, and with no one to organize cooperation, the people who came here searched in a hurry and might not have understood the habits of these wealthy families in storing things, making it difficult to search thoroughly.

Now, after clearing the evil objects from the surroundings, the group searched carefully.

The master's room, the servants' rooms.

Salt, Sugar, dried fruits, medicinal herbs, cloth and ready-made clothing, weapons and tools...

The crowd became more excited the more they searched.

What god-worshipping?

Worshipping what god?

Put all of that aside for now!

Their minds were currently full of grain, salt, Sugar, and dried fruits...

A lot of the food here had already spoiled and rotted; if they didn't find it, the rest would all be ruined.

A waste!

It was too much of a waste!

They had to find all of it and take it away!

Although they were eager to rummage, time was limited.

Wen Gu looked at the sky and said to them, "We will stay here for one or two days; there is no rush for this one night. Let's go back and get some good rest first, and continue tomorrow morning."

He Da wanted to say that it was still bright out, and he could search for another hour.

But he heard Wen Gu say, "Everyone has been tired these past few days. Of the two jars of malt Sugar found, let's distribute one jar to everyone first; eat some sugar to build yourselves back up."

He Da immediately followed along.

Although those two jars of malt Sugar were found by County Lieutenant Zhou first, they had also put in effort during the process. Getting a smaller share was fine, as long as there was something.

How long had it been since he had eaten malt Sugar!

He Da thought to himself: My younger brother helped with the recording, so he should be able to get a few pieces, right?

The share our family gets must definitely be more than Yu Er's!

Must keep an eye on it!

While the others were excited, Cheng Zhi looked dazed.

Cheng Zhi and his family had all been to this residence before; his mother and sister-in-law had come many times, but at this moment, he had the illusion that "the residence everyone was searching was not the same one."

To think that so many things were hidden here!

Wen Gu seemed to see through his thoughts and said, "What one or two people can do is limited, but what five or ten people can achieve is several or even dozens of times the result."

Wen Gu's voice was neither high nor low, and everyone around him could hear it, except for Cheng Zhi.

"The ancients said, a single branch is easily broken, but a crowd is hard to destroy. Accumulated feathers can sink a boat, and many light things can break an axle. In common terms, there is strength in numbers."

Several people were lost in thought.

Wen Gu thought to himself: That is why this few people is still far from enough! I must increase it by five or ten times no matter what!

Three or four is not too few; many a little makes a mickle.

They did not return to the peddler's residence immediately.

Wen Gu said to Cheng Zhi, "We will drop you off on the way; it has been so long, your family must be very worried."

(End of chapter)