Chapter 152: Chapter 121: Zero-Dollar Purchase of 60,000 Jin of Rice; Recruiting Refugees
’Four n at the front gate, four at the back. Another eight are split into two teams patrolling outside the walls. There are also two teams patrolling inside. That’s twenty-four n in total, led by six Ninth Grade Martial Artists. The security really is tight!’
In just a few minutes, Cheng Zongyang had already gotten a clear picture of the granary’s layout.
He seized an opening and easily scaled the wall to get inside.
In the dead of night, his black clothes provided excellent camouflage, allowing him to nearly lt into the darkness.
Only then did Cheng Zongyang notice that for a granary, this building’s defenses were exceptionally well-done.
All flammable materials had been completely cleared away. The doors and windows were covered with iron sheets, leaving not even a crack to start a fire through. There were even six or seven large water vats filled to the brim in the courtyard.
To have so much water available during a shortage spoke volus about the Wang Family’s resources and preparedness.
After carefully observing for a mont, Cheng Zongyang realized this wouldn’t be a problem for him.
He drew his Tang Blade and, in a corner, pressed its tip against the iron sheeting. With a slight push, the tal parted as easily as paper, creating a silent incision.
Now Cheng Zongyang had a plan.
As soon as the second patrol passed, Cheng Zongyang sprang into action. He quickly cut out a section of the iron sheet, took out his flint and steel, and without a second thought, set the window screen ablaze.
The next mont, he executed the Wind-Stepping Step and swiftly retreated.
Once outside the wall, he quickly changed his position, moving to a rooftop overlooking the rear courtyard.
A mont later, as shouts of "Fire!" erupted and the patrols rushed toward the commotion, Cheng Zongyang imdiately dropped to the ground. He used his Tang Blade to swiftly remove the window of an inner room, slipped inside, and then hung it back in place.
The entire process was seamless.
At that sa mont, the patrol captain realized soone had infiltrated and imdiately went to inspect the other rooms.
Just as Cheng Zongyang rehung the window to cover his tracks, the patrol arrived. Seeing the door and window intact, they breathed a sigh of relief and moved on elsewhere.
It was only because of the darkness that they couldn’t see the window clearly; otherwise, they surely would have noticed sothing was wrong.
But Cheng Zongyang paid no mind to the situation outside. He looked at the grain, which filled less than half the room, and shook his head slightly.
The amount was less than he expected. ’Shouldn’t it fill at least half the room, if not the whole thing? And this is all there is? It’s not even a third of the room.’
’The poor starve while the rich wallow in excess,’ he thought. In the faint glow of his flint and steel, he briefly examined the grains and sniffed them. It was Old Rice.
With that, he absorbed every last sack of rice into his Wilderness World.
Inside the marketplace cabin, watching the sacks of rice appear one after another as if falling from the heavens, Ma San gave a wry smile and imdiately started tossing them outside to keep them from piling up and filling the small space.
In less than ten minutes, Cheng Zongyang had finished collecting all the rice sacks in the room.
’This room only has two hundred sacks of rice. At one hundred pounds per sack, that’s a total of twenty thousand pounds,’ Cheng Zongyang calculated.
He then listened for any noise outside. Hearing none, he took the window down, returned it to its original position, and slipped away, sticking to the shadows along the corner of the wall.
Not one to let an opportunity pass, Cheng Zongyang crossed to the opposite building and repeated the process.
Fifteen minutes later, Cheng Zongyang erged, thoroughly satisfied.
’Too many people in the front courtyard, so I won’t go there. These two rooms held nearly six hundred sacks of rice, about sixty thousand pounds. Combined with the grain I already have stored, it’s more than enough to support a hundred people with two als a day for over a year.’
And so, content with his haul, he withdrew.
A man must know when he has enough!
But a minute after his departure, Wang Tianfeng, having received the news, rushed over.
Seeing that the fire had already been extinguished, Wang Tianfeng breathed a sigh of relief.
He then began to ask about the situation.
But when he heard that the flas were discovered without any prior commotion, he imdiately went to the window.
When he saw that a hole had been cut through the protective iron sheeting, his expression turned grave. He whipped his head around to face the patrol captain. "Are you certain you didn’t hear a thing?"
"Patriarch, we’re certain we heard nothing," the captain said firmly.
Wang Tianfeng pondered for a mont. The next second, as if recalling a past incident, his expression suddenly changed and he shouted,
"Check the integrity of all doors and windows imdiately! Then open the doors and check the grain in every building!"
At once, everyone scrambled into action.
A few monts later, Wang Tianfeng stared, his face ashen, at the two inner rooms. Nearly sixty thousand pounds of grain had vanished completely!
Behind him knelt the twenty-four patroln responsible for this building, including six Ninth Grade Martial Artists!
"Speak. What benefits did this new ’lord’ of yours offer you to all conspire together?" Wang Tianfeng’s voice was like ice, chilling to the bone.
"Patriarch, I swear on my head, that’s absolutely not what happened!" the patrol captain, kneeling on one knee, said with a grim expression. "If we were truly in collusion, why would we create such a commotion? And why would we leave the rest of the grain behind?"
"That’s just your way of throwing people off the scent!" Wang Tianfeng roared. "Mixing truth with lies is the best kind of deception! Give
an explanation, or don’t bla
for being rciless!"
At that, the six Ninth Grade Martial Artists were rendered speechless.
They had no explanation!
"Wang Tianfeng, if you want to kill us, just say so. Why bother with such an excuse?"
Just then, a young Martial Artist stood up, a sneer on his face. "Since we agreed to submit to you, we would never be the type to play both sides. But you would use such a low-down trick to fra us?
"The rice was stored in the granary in full view of everyone. But after it was stored and before the six of us took over the watch, there was a gap of seven hours. We never once saw if there was actually any rice inside after that point. The grain disappearing tonight... this was a trap you set up long ago, wasn’t it?"
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