Chapter 1455: Chapter 1372: Classic Cliche

In a tranquil and peaceful village, an old woman was tying up a special kind of dried grass leaves. In the Empire, these leaves are used to make straw shoes, which poor people wear for most of their lives.

The old woman’s eyesight seemed to be failing. She touched the leaves, feeling the dampness of the wild grass with her rough fingers. If they felt completely dry and tough, then these wild grasses would make good material for a pair of straw shoes.

Hunched over, the old woman’s face was marked with the hardships of life. They say the Empire values commerce and is wealthy, but ultimately, it has nothing to do with these countryside folks.

Perhaps those city gentlemen have money, and those noble families who trade goods might be rich, but the common people of the Empire still lead primitive, ancient lives.

They rise with the sun to work and rest as it sets, engaging in strenuous labor daily just to feed themselves and their families. If not for the changes brought by the Tang Empire, they might never have experienced any change in their lifetime.

However, with some commercial products from the Tang Empire entering the Empire, many things have changed there: like matches for making fire, candles for lighting, nails for construction…

Indeed, these light industrial products easily invade some backward areas, then receive names like “foreign fire,” “foreign wax,” “foreign nails,” and such.

Compared to the elusive cars and planes, candles that can illuminate the night and nails that can mend houses might truly be the things that impact the common people.

Of course, as time goes by, production techniques from the Tang Empire have indeed lowered some people’s living costs or turned some materials that were previously not available to the people into everyday consumables.

For example, cooking oil, salt and white sugar, some cheap fabrics. These have increased the population of the Empire, and finally, allowed the impoverished common people to wear clothes…

Indeed, wear clothes. For a long time in the past, the common folks of the Empire didn’t have clothes to wear. Clothing was a privilege of the noble, the big figures. Commoners generally went shirtless, only wrapping some things around their waists for modesty.

In those times, women of the Empire rarely went outdoors and if they had to, they only used their mother’s or sister’s clothes–one or two sets shared among them.

Anyway, the Shu Territory was hot, climate changes weren’t so noticeable, and each year passed like this. It wasn’t until cheap fabrics from the Tang Empire flooded the market, destroying the fragile textile industry of the Empire.

Just as the old woman was preparing to bundle up the dried grass leaves to take home, a child’s tender shout came from afar.

“Grandma! Grandma!” An urchin ran quickly from the village entrance, his clothes patched all over. The child fell as he ran, got up, and continued running towards his grandmother.

The old woman paused her work and looked at her grandson. She was very concerned about her grandson’s safety, but the recent situation had been uneasy, and the villagers had decided to let the children take turns keeping watch outside.

When the people of Qin Country invaded, they killed a few people and stationed an overseer in the village. This person reported the number of able-bodied men in the village a few months ago; later, the Qin Country people came and took away seven or eight men.

Nobody knows where these men went. Later, one escaped back saying the Qin Army made them dig trenches and then gave them guns to go and die.

After returning, this person killed the overseer working for the Qin Country, and took the remaining young men into the nearby mountains.

Surprisingly, the Qin Country men didn’t retaliate, not even questioning about the deserters from the village. The family of the slain didn’t dare to make a fuss; they buried the body quietly at night.

Recently, sounds like thunder can often be heard from the mountains on the other side, but no one knows the exact situation. All that’s known is, soldiers from Qin Country, who should have patrolled here this month, haven’t come to steal chickens and grain.

The child ran up to the old woman, yelling loudly, pointing towards the village entrance: “There’s a big cart! A car! A big iron cart.”

The old woman was shocked, quickly urging her grandson to return home. She walked to the doorway of a nearby household, knocking on the door: “Li Aunt, Li Aunt! Come out quickly! The Military has come.”

People have seen cars before; in earlier years, there were noble ones driving past here. So the villagers are familiar with the term ‘car.’ The old woman became alert when the child shouted ‘big iron cart.’

This was likely Qin Country’s weapons! The Qin Country men had come to retaliate! That was the old woman’s first reaction.

The door was opened, a woman from the Li Family poked her head out, asking fearfully: “What’s going on? What is it? Aunt Liu, what are you saying?”

“It’s possible the Qin Country men have returned! We can’t hide the incident in our village anymore.” Aunt Liu’s eyesight wasn’t great but she could still see things. As she spoke, she looked towards the village entrance.

As she spoke, a car had appeared at the village entrance, and some soldiers also began appearing one after another. People in the village who got the news watched these uninvited guests as a frightened atmosphere started to spread.

Next, the soldiers who reached the village began searching the entire village, checking the surroundings. Several armored cars with eight wheels parked at the village entrance–this must be what the child called the “big iron cart.”

Everyone was required to gather on the open ground at the village entrance, which was almost a routine. Aunt Liu soon saw her daughter-in-law and little grandson.

The village’s women and children were crying, the scene was chaotic. After confirming safety, an officer soon brought a few soldiers over to the frightened villagers and asked aloud: “Is this Chicken Caw Village?”

“…” Silence, sobbing, no one replied; they all wondered if these people before them would suddenly start shooting.

Seeing the villagers before him, the Tang Army commander was also speechless. He had chased the retreating soldiers of Qin Country all the way here, only wanting to confirm the safety of the surroundings and clarify his location.

He wasn’t here to scare a group of women and children and couldn’t, without discerning right from wrong, just whip out a gun. So he took out a loaf of bread wrapped in plastic from his pocket, shaking it: “Who can tell me what this village is? This food will be given to them.”

The soldiers standing beside looked at their company commander with some disdain: why does their company commander increasingly resemble those landlord gentry from movies who bully the people? He was truly afraid his company commander’s next line would be the classic: “Rewards for cooperation… Non-cooperation leads to beheading!”