Chapter 364

“Young Master, all the foreign-state farm laborers who signed contracts are heading toward Fengzhou Prefecture.”

At dawn, Ji You had just risen when Old Qiu arrived with news.

After reviewing Master Chen’s belongings, the matter of the Night Watchers remained shrouded in mist; he pondered all night, forming many hypotheses, but each hypothesis only spawned more questions.

Under these circumstances, he could only focus first on the present.

Ji You dressed himself, reached for the reply letter he had prepared for the moody ghost girl on the table.

This girl had specially sent him a letter to assure him of her safety, so last night before sleeping, he replied with a drawing of a chubby baby wearing tiger-head shoes.

The chubby baby was copied from a New Yuan-era New Year painting Old Qiu had bought, rendered vividly lifelike.

Stepping out the door, he handed the letter to Old Qiu, then added: “Go fetch Kuangcheng.”

“Yes.”

Old Qiu bowed and went to the western wing to summon the scholar Kuang.

The three arrived outside the fortress gate, passed through the long street of the prefectural city, and saw a vast, slow-moving tide of people approaching Fengzhou from afar—endless to the eye.

Seeing this, Ji You and Kuangcheng both furrowed their brows slightly.

For Fengzhou, cheap labor certainly aids regional development, but the problem is the sheer number of people.

If land leasing succeeds, these people will have no trouble being settled, but since the reform has not yet taken hold, this imbalance of labor becomes a headache—after all, each of them carries a crushing tax burden.

And Fengzhou truly cannot feed the entire world.

“First, notify all provincial governments to send personnel to register and categorize them by their familiar trades; also, classify those who have long worked in farming into groups: strong and young, weak, elderly, orphaned or disabled.”

Gazing at the masses pouring into Fengzhou’s borders, Ji You paused, then gave his orders.

Hearing this, Kuangcheng turned to look back: “Are we really going to clearly rank people into tiers?”

“Fengzhou can’t accommodate so many—we must send some back. This is the only option left; otherwise, even Fengzhou’s current stability will collapse.”

“That’s true…”

Kuangcheng muttered silently.

Immortals can exploit commoners so recklessly not only because of the Great Xia’s old tax promises, but most crucially because they’ve established a hierarchy separating immortals from mortals.

This is dangerously risky, because once the populace accepts this registration system, oppression from top to bottom will inevitably arise from within.

But now, they have no choice but to do it.

The scholar Kuang gazed into the distance, his eyes narrowing slightly.

At this distance, his mortal body couldn’t make out details, but from their slow, stumbling movements, he seemed to see the numbness and exhaustion on their faces.

Seeing such scenes too often truly unsettles the mind.

Old Qiu had already dispatched several young men around him to carry letters to Fengzhou Prefecture.

Upon receiving the order, the Prefect of Fengzhou immediately notified the subordinate district governors, and government offices across the region began sending large numbers of government office runners and militia toward the refugees flooding in from the six provinces.

Temporary checkpoints and registration stations were set up, systematically organizing the crowds by village, town, and county for registration.

After watching for a while, Ji You returned to Ji Fortress and laid out spirit stones across the courtyard.

His current physical combat strength remained at the Mid-Level of Wujiang, progressing slower than during his earlier external cultivation, but the spiritual energy required had risen another level.

Now, natural spiritual energy sites no longer held enough energy for a full body refinement—spirit stones had become essential.

Sixteen times…

Ji You couldn’t help silently muttering.

His attempt to break through the sixth gate had begun since his awakening at Tian Shu Academy—passing through the Spirit Fire thirteen times.

Based on this, the seventh passage will surely require more, and subsequent ones even more still; the refined spiritual energy needed will grow vastly greater, meaning he’ll need far more spirit stones.

Spirit stones are expensive, but he has no choice.

Ji You slipped into meditation and began absorbing spiritual energy.

As his qi orifices fully opened, the spirit stones surrounding him shattered one after another, countless refined spiritual energies merging with heavenly qi, surging wildly into his body.

As stars and moon turned, days passed swiftly.

The fifth surge of spirit fire blazed fiercely; hot flames began to seep out from within his body, the excruciating pain making his teeth grind audibly.

This was the second stage: as the spirit fire burned through his body, the heat would eventually pierce his skin, spreading across his entire frame with each repetition.

This process was like Qi Refining—burning the flesh into a single, unified whole.

Yet the pain caused by this method of breaking down before rebuilding was intense; yet with each step forward, Ji You always felt a liberating clarity of hearing and sight.

He had once heard that Dao cultivators sought ultimate freedom of the soul.

As his body refinement deepened, he hadn’t yet felt such soul freedom—but he had gained a profound sense of freedom over his own body.

Humans truly control less than three-tenths of their own bodies: skin, bones, organs, blood—all beyond conscious command.

In this regard, the demon race capable of transformation and the barbarian race capable of rage far surpassed humans.

And now, Ji You had surpassed even that initial state.

He clenched his fist slightly; a boiling tide of blood surged within him, roaring like a tiger’s bellow and a dragon’s cry, making his heartbeat thunder like a war drum.

This made him think of Cui Lang—how strong must the last Night Watcher have been?

During his body refinement, he received a reply from the moody ghost girl.

In the letter was a stick-figure with long hair slashing a stick in two, sending a chill down Ji You’s spine.

But the good news was, from the scale and size of the stick she drew, he felt she was quite satisfied—otherwise she wouldn’t have drawn it so exaggeratedly, even more terrifying than Yuan Caimei’s version.

As usual, Ji You replied to her, but this time he was more serious, describing his current life and future plans.

The moody ghost girl was lonely on the mountain—otherwise she wouldn’t keep sneaking to his residence whenever she had free time, giving him the chance to hear her call him “husband” like a future Empress wailing.

So this letter wasn’t really about conveying information—it was to ease her boredom.

In fact, Ji You had sent several letters to Danshan too, but since the mountain remained sealed, none had ever received a reply.

With a few swift strokes, he filled the page with flowing script.

After thinking a while, he added details about his search into Master Chen’s belongings, and appended the phrase: “Heaven is flawed; mortals are incomplete,” hoping she might uncover something.

Once the letter was sent, it was swiftly carried out of Fengzhou, escorted by galloping horses across a thousand li.

“...”

“Stand in line, don’t push! Register in order as instructed!”

“Fill out all information completely—no mistakes or omissions. This is for your own good.”

Outside Fengzhou Prefecture, under a drizzling rain, the people from the six provinces were undergoing mass registration.

Countless civilians, guided by officials from each district and county, gathered as previously arranged and were entered into the labor registry.

The registries were then taken to the rear rain shelter, where reviewing officers called names in sequence, asked follow-up questions, and marked each person with red ink: “Strong and Young,” “Weak,” “Elderly,” “Orphaned or Disabled.”

The people from the six provinces weren’t fools—they clearly understood why this was being done.

Even if Fengzhou were vast and rich, no matter how fast it reclaimed land, how much arable land could it possibly have?

But the commoners of the world were too many, all burdened with crushing taxes—Fengzhou alone couldn’t possibly keep them all.

To take them all in would mean Fengzhou alone must feed all of humanity—utterly impossible.

Beneath the rain shelter, some elderly farmers with white hair sighed softly, but said nothing.

In times of food shortage, surviving one winter was already the Immortal Lord’s grace—they still felt grateful.

“There are so many elderly, weak, sick, and disabled.”

Beneath the rain shelter, Wei Rui couldn’t help murmuring.

Kuangcheng nodded: “These times have worn people’s bodies to the bone.”

They both grew restless in Ji Fortress and didn’t need to cultivate like Ji You, so they came to help—now, gazing at those dark, silent faces, their hearts were deeply moved.

“Will these people be sent back?”

“Yes, but Fengzhou will send personnel to guide them, and over the years, Fengzhou’s Ministry of Agriculture has been cultivating superior seeds—high-yield varieties can be given to them as well.”

“If the land leasing had succeeded, wouldn’t there have been fewer heartbreaking choices?” Wei Rui’s eyelashes trembled slightly.

Kuangcheng looked toward Ji Fortress: “If land leasing succeeded, Ji Brother’s shoulders would bear an even heavier burden—even possibly death. Honestly, I’ve always had a selfish hope—that it never happened.”

“Cao Instructor and Lady Wen felt the same way.”

“Really?”

Wei Rui nodded: “I heard them say so when we drank tea together before the New Yuan era.”

The drizzle fell softly, the cold air biting.