In the following period, almost every mountain, except those with large families or villages strong enough to protect themselves, beca targets of robbery.
It no longer mattered if it was day or night; conflicts over food were constant, and many lost their lives because of it.
The Five Bucktooth Brothers were among the more ruthless ones, robbing a lot in a short ti. To enhance their intimidation, they even recruited so lone n, yet that didn’t prevent them from being targets of robbery too.
Who could bla them for causing such envy with their aggressive looting?
Fierce clashes occurred frequently in the fight to keep their food, and losing lives was not uncommon.
In less than half a month, with a shortage of dicine, food, and warm clothing, all moral boundaries collapsed and ceased to exist. The only thought in everyone’s mind was to survive, to survive by any ans necessary.
Amidst the heavy rain, tension was everywhere. To survive, everyone had to think of every possible way, including the wealthy families who huddled together tightly.
Never underestimate what starving, desperate people are capable of doing.
Initially, the county magistrate who hid atop the mountain would send governnt officials down to exert so deterrence. But as ti went by, more and more people were driven by hunger; if not for the many n and sharp weapons under his command, even the magistrate nearly couldn’t escape being robbed.
This incident frightened the magistrate deeply. Facing madness that feared neither pain nor death, his n were helpless; after all, you might be able to cut down one person with a knife, but not several people rushing at you at once.
All the ideals about officials being the people’s protector and safeguarding the populace were matters of the peaceful age. In the midst of this disaster, when the whole world was a scorched earth, he was rely a small county magistrate with a large family to protect, including those who depended on him. He had no way to manage so many lives and didn’t have the capacity to do so. Even with guilt in his heart, he could only pretend not to see.
The madness of the starving people also stressed the magistrate, and he decided to migrate further into the deep mountains despite the pouring rain.
These crazed, starving people who could attack once could attack countless tis, so the day after the conflict, the magistrate residing on the mountaintop took his family, governnt officials, and dependent wealthy rchants straight into the deep mountains without daring to stay, believing that even facing the fearso beasts there was safer than dealing with the crazed people.
By the ti others on the mountain noticed, they had already been in the deep mountains for several days and found a place to stay.
They also discovered many traces of people scattered in the deep mountains, similar to them who sensed danger and gambled everything to escape into the mountains, hiding far from crowds like a startled bird.
Even though there were dangers in the deep mountains, food could be preserved, and perhaps survival was possible. Staying on the old mountain where there were more people provided stronger deterrence to beasts, but not being able to protect food still ant death.
Moreover, with more people than food, and wild vegetables growing scarcer, wild animals and clean wild fruits were picked bare on the mountain; it was better to take a gamble in the deep mountain.
It turned out to be a wise choice. Upon reaching the deep mountains, they found it wasn’t as dangerous as imagined. Perhaps frightened by the heavy rain and floods, nearly all large wild animals had fled to even deeper mountains, leaving behind only so small animals.
Most surprisingly, no one had set foot in the mountains, and everywhere was filled with wild vegetables and fruits. As long as they worked hard, they could avoid going hungry, which ant they could save their existing food and accumulate so more. Wild vegetables could be blanched and dried by the fire for long-term storage, and if lucky enough to hunt, making jerky provided more reserves.
Amid such a catastrophe, everyone’s heart was filled with anxiety, not knowing how long the disaster would last, instinctively wanting to hoard more food, even if it was just dried wild vegetables.
Those who did not dare to gamble faced either having their food completely snatched away or losing their lives.
Even if they eventually realized and fled to the mountains, without anything, it was extrely difficult to survive.
After a month of continuous rain, the land was rife with fire, murder, and looting. These shaful scenes were not just limited to Shanggu Town; the entire continent was engulfed in madness. Only those with power and enough n could live in relative ease, while most struggled in oppression and turmoil, fighting to survive.
The only safe haven in Shanggu Town might be on the mountain where Hua Village was located.
Hua Village was in a remote area with no nearby villages for miles. Naturally, no village could shelter on Qinggu Mountain, so there was no outside conflict. At this mont, apart from being helpless about the continuous heavy rain, life for Hua Village’s inhabitants was not much different from before.
At dawn, they rose; at dusk, they lay down. They did not idly squander away their resources. Instead, they engaged in farming, and the idle labor force occasionally organized groups to head out to pick wild vegetables and chop firewood, preparing for the future, especially for cooking and heating-related firewood.
With a month of constant rain, the temperature continuously dropped, and now it was already very cold. A thin layer of ice had ford over the jars kept at the cave entrances.
The n going out had already changed into thick, warm clothes. Each ti they went out, they wrapped themselves in oilcloth and wore rain capes to prevent themselves from freezing and being unable to move.
At this ti, it was already late October, officially entering winter, yet the rain showed no sign of stopping.
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Bazi Village, where Hua’s second aunt lived, hid a few miles away from their village on a mountain. Simultaneously, adjacent villages, including Hua’s eldest aunt’s Shuixia Village, also took refuge on this mountain.
Fortunately, the villages were not too far apart and were relatively familiar with each other. Almost every family had married-in brides or daughters married off, and thanks to bringing enough supplies when they first fled to the mountain, apart from the cold, life wasn’t overly difficult.
However, the arrival of survivors shattered this peace. Even when several villages huddled together, they faced constant harassnt and the risk of being robbed or hard at any misstep.
Most of these people were swept in by the flood or reached the mountain just before it was subrged. Their commonality was having very little food with them.
Initially, they could still rely on wild vegetables and fruits to stave off hunger, but as the temperature dropped and the weather grew colder, the wild fruits disappeared. Although wild vegetables didn’t completely vanish, they grew smaller and smaller, insufficient to fill even a third of the stomach, making it colder and tougher to endure.
So people considered forcefully taking resources, but they had little beyond their clothes, so there was nothing to grab even if they wanted to.
With no other option to survive, they had to move from mountain to mountain. Finding no food on one, they moved to the next, eventually reaching the mountain where these villages resided, disrupting the peace those villages had enjoyed.
Initially, they only played the victim card, begging in hopes of soone’s soft heart giving them food or warm clothing.
To be honest, everyone has a sense of pity.
Seeing them so pitifully starved, many villagers could hardly help but feel compassion. Despite the elders in the village repeatedly ordering people not to give anything away, so villagers still couldn’t resist fulfilling their sense of self-righteousness by secretly providing clothes and even food.
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