Endless Winter: My Camp Upgrades Infinitely

Chapter 1484 - 468: A Chance for Reversal and Brutal Oppression, Frost Ash Association Branch, The Dawn of Uprising_5

”So many people, why worry about not completing the quota?”

.........

Qingwu Village, with more than eighty thousand people in total, has about over four thousand at the Earth-digging Realm Limit. Naturally, during the day, these people are still in their dreams, unaware that Zhang Long and the eight deputy managers have quietly decided on their cruel fate for the next two months.

This is how the world works—a single document from the higher-ups can directly change the fate of thousands of households at the bottom. In the harsh and hierarchical Moao River region, this is even more severe.

On the night of August ninth, the village head of Qingwu Village and Subordinate Bureau Chief, Zhang Long, along with eight deputy managers, directly halted all gathering and hunting activities. They then summoned all the household heads of the village to announce the new grain harvest rules for the year.

The announcement of the new rules caused an uproar throughout the village.

Particularly those four thousand people at the Earth-digging Realm Limit, who were as if mourning the death of their parents, raising voices of questioning and resistance, with some even opposing outright.

Unfortunately, those questions and objections were all for naught, especially after Zhang Long ordered the County Guard Army to brutally kill five people, silencing all discordant voices immediately.

On August tenth, the annual grain harvest officially began.

In Qingwu Village thereafter, the sound of wailing echoed almost daily. Chen Cang and Cai Qiu, both still green, would hang green cloth strips at the door to show solemnity during major events. In less than two months, green cloth was hung at the entrance of over a thousand households in the village.

Under the same regulations of the Four Vassals of Moao River, only slaves could use cloth. This scene of green cloth at every household clearly signified that this year’s grain harvest was an extremely tragic man-made disaster for the million slaves across the sixteen Slave Villages in the Lu River Valley, including Qingwu Village.

During this period, the situation in other villages was unknown. Starting from the first day, almost every night in Qingwu Village, there were voices of resistance and opposition, but eventually, they were all suppressed by Zhang Long and his men. Some at the Earth-digging Realm Limit, unwilling to go and die in the rice fields, tried to escape with the help of their families, but none succeeded. Once caught, not only were they executed on the spot, but their families were also implicated and punished.

Following the principle of using waste and intimidation, Zhang Long devised a punishment method that required going to the west of the village to pick rice, with the rule that once five stalks were picked, the punishment would be considered over.

The problem was that all those at the Cold Resistance Level and Earth-digging Realm Limit were there, and those remaining were mostly ordinary Earth-diggers or even those at the Logging Realm. For them, going to the rice fields was no different from courting death.

Under Zhang Long’s extremely brutal suppression, the voices of resistance in the village grew increasingly fierce at the start, but by the end of October, they suddenly and uncharacteristically disappeared.

By early October, there were no more cries or objections every night before setting out. Everyone seemed to have accepted their fate and followed Zhang Long and others to the rice fields obediently.

Yet in their eyes, there was clearly something more—something indescribable and indistinct.

Zhang Long, the eight deputy managers, the Subordinate Bureau members, and the one hundred County Guard soldiers didn’t notice; they thought their bloody suppression had finally worked, making everyone completely submit.

Seeing the rice piles in the village’s main hall warehouse growing taller and approaching this year’s quota amount, their smiles naturally grew broader, and their hearts filled with joy.

October 15th, 299th year of the Caiqiu Calendar, late night

In a basement of a civilian’s house north of Qingwu Village.

The dim firelight reflected thirty-seven weary faces, of which only six were elderly, with the rest mostly middle-aged.