Chapter 63: The Winter of Jiwei (14)

  Li Chengzhong walked into the room and began speaking in Korean. Meanwhile, Wang Er, who was standing beside him, translated his words into Khitan language.

  "You know, I'm here in the midst of Bailu Mountain, and the supply road to Yuguuan has been blocked by you Khitans..."

  Jie Li had heard Li Chengzhong say similar things before, and seeing him bring up the topic again, he nodded in agreement. However, in his heart, he was secretly delighted: "It would be best if your supply lines were completely cut off!"

  He had just felt pleased in his heart for a short while, when he immediately knew that he was happy too early. He only heard Li Chengzhong continue to say: "... So there is not much food in the military camp, and there is no way to feed useless people. I think I've asked you all the things I wanted to know, and I really don't know what use you have."

  Xie's heart immediately rose to his throat, and he hastily said: "I am the most trusted horse of the tribal leader, I have said this before, you can use me as a ransom for cattle, sheep and war horses, it will definitely be worth a lot, believe me, the tribe is willing to pay a high price for my ransom."

  Li Chengzhong shook his head: "Not to mention whether your words are credible, even if the Tuli Department is willing to pay for your ransom, it's not very realistic at present. After all, I'm currently fighting against the Pin Department. Do you think they'll be happy to see so many cattle and war horses entering Bailu Mountain?"

  He silently understood that what Li Chengzhong said was indeed the truth. This piece of land was under the jurisdiction of Pin Department, and if Tu Hu's department wanted to redeem itself, it would have to negotiate with Pin Department. Under current circumstances, it was impossible for Pin Department to allow these supplies to fall into the hands of the White Wolf Mountain Garrison.

  Li Chengzhong stared at Jie Li for a while and said, "If you can't say what else you're useful for, I'll have to stop providing your food from tomorrow."

  His mind was a bit muddled, he tried hard to recall everything about the Khitan tribes, but unfortunately found that all he knew had already been told to the other party, and couldn't find any useful information to exchange for food. He felt very resentful in his heart, could it be because during today's snowball fight, he made the other party feel embarrassed, so they took revenge on him? Thinking of this, he was disheartened for a while.

  In the cave, there was a moment of silence. Suddenly, Li Chengzhong said: "Actually, you're also considered a man, I really can't bear to see you die like this. So, let's make an exception just this once. Starting from tomorrow, you'll have to do some work and use your own hands to earn food..."

  In the midst of panic, he grabbed this lifesaving straw, hastily nodded, and was in a daze, not hearing what the other side said afterwards, and was taken back by the guarding soldiers.

  Back in the cave, Rong Er sat blankly in front of the fireplace, suddenly slapping himself twice, his hands fiercely pulling at his hair. After a while, he curled up weakly on the haystack. He didn't understand what was wrong with him, as a brave warrior renowned throughout the tribe, how could he have fallen to such a state, and become afraid of death like a coward!

  The next morning, Wang Er took Jie Li out of the cave and handed him a broom made of branches. Thus, Jie Li got his first job in White Wolf Mountain, sweeping the snow on the school grounds. At this time, several villagers were already sweeping the grounds with their brooms, and Jie Li's task was to clear one section of it. Wang Er told Jie Li that after clearing this section, he could earn a work point.

  The "gongfen" system was proposed by Li Chengzhong to Feng Dao. Since the Bailu Mountain military camp implemented a material allocation system, it was necessary to make reasonable plans for allocating materials, both to prevent people from starving and to stimulate the enthusiasm of the people, so that those who worked more would get more, and those who worked less would get less. According to Li Chengzhong's words, this is called "distribution according to labor". Feng Dao listened and his eyes lit up, he thought that this "gongfen" system was equivalent to a currency in some sense, the people earned "gongfen" through labor and then used it to buy materials. The difference is that the "gongfen" system not only solved the current problem of no money in Bailu Mountain but also facilitated organization and allocation, and concentrated power to do big things.

  Under this system, regardless of whether they were adults or children, all able-bodied citizens had to participate in labor to earn work points, which could then be exchanged for goods stored in the White Wolf Mountain warehouse, including grain, clothing, salt, dried meat, and so on. To this end, Feng Dao assembled three elderly men, Zhang Laojiang and merchant Wang Er, and spent a full three days determining the point values for various tasks based on their intensity and duration, as well as their effectiveness, and set the point values for various goods based on the existing stockpiles at White Wolf Mountain.

  Jiali also heard about this work-point system, but didn't know how much food one work-point could exchange for. Pangzi then told Erwa that one work-point could be exchanged for a piece of flatbread or a bowl of porridge. So Jiali began to work hard for these work-points.

  Jier spent an hour clearing the assigned area, then piled up the snow he had swept into a wooden cart and pushed it to a mountain ditch in the back mountain to dump it. He ran back and forth several times before dumping all the snow, and Jier got a small bamboo slip, which represented that he got a work point.

  He exchanged a piece of bamboo for a pancake at the warehouse entrance and stuffed it into his stomach, but then he felt even hungrier. He went to find Fat Wang Er again to ask if there was anything else he could do, and Wang Er led him to the back mountain, pointing to the four small wooden houses: "Do you see those bathhouses? It's almost time for bathing, I've already helped you apply for the job of taking care of two of them. Every time someone goes in to bathe, you have to go to the nearby hot spring and fetch a bucket of hot water to send into the bathroom. For each group of soldiers who finish bathing, you can earn one work point."

  Make the soldiers take a bath at least every three days, it is a mandatory requirement issued by Li Chengzhong. These soldiers are extremely unsanitary, most people can't even wash their bodies once a month, which makes Li Chengzhong unacceptable. Especially since training, he has been surrounded by sweat and stench every day, it's really hard to bear. Since there are natural hot springs in White Wolf Mountain, why not make full use of the resources? Therefore, he doesn't care whether the soldiers are used to it or not, and makes bathing a military order, which is mandatory.

  "How long does it take for one bath?" asked Yelri.

  "Let's take a break for a moment." said Fat Wang Er.

  Let's calculate it, a team of 50 soldiers is divided into two wooden houses, so there are 25 people in each house. One person per minute, if everyone washes up, it will take more than three hours.

  "Can I take care of all four bathrooms?" asked Jier.

  In order not to pollute the hot spring, the bathroom was built far away from the hot spring in a mountain valley. The nearest hot spring is about three hundred steps away, that is to say, if four bathrooms are taken care of by one person, he needs to carry fifty buckets of water back and forth for three hundred steps within an hour and a half. This physical work is not easy, so Fat Wang Er asked: "Can you handle it?"

  Jie Li nodded, he needed to shorten the time to get work points as much as possible, even if it was a bit tiring, he really wanted to eat more.

  ……

  Wang Er brought Baozi to the workshop for three days, helping him get familiar with various tasks and meeting people in charge of different workshops. During these three days, Baozi worked extremely hard, exchanging all his work points for food which he stuffed into his belly. Although the three days were exhausting, he ate more than before, so Baozi thought it was not bad, and life seemed more fulfilling, unlike being cooped up in the cave all day feeling depressed and bored.

  In the following days, Jie Li began to work hard for his own food. He swept and cleaned the school grounds and warehouses, cut down trees in the mountains, took care of and fed the war horses, cleaned the toilets and bathrooms, fetched ice from the river and even followed Wang Da Lang to collect hay outside the mountain... Every day after working hard, Jie Li could fill his stomach to six or seven tenths full. During this time, Jie Li still did not find an opportunity to escape, as two soldiers were always following him.

  Wang Er couldn't always be the translator for Bao Zi, so he also taught Bao Zi some simple Chinese. Unexpectedly, Bao Zi had a natural talent for it and learned very quickly, able to hold simple conversations with people in less than a month. In order to reduce and avoid misunderstandings at work, and to maximize his benefits, Bao Zi decided to attend Feng Dao's class in the evenings to learn spoken Chinese and recognize simple Chinese characters.

  There were all sorts of people in the classroom, including ordinary Han civilians and Han soldiers, as well as some military officers. However, Li did not encounter any discrimination or exclusion in class, as everyone was focused on listening to the lecture and didn't pay attention to him. Although Li's Chinese proficiency was very poor and he often couldn't understand what was being said, Feng Dao seemed to have a few concessions for him, speaking slowly and clearly. Several times, Li plucked up the courage to ask questions, and Feng Dao did his best to answer in a way that was easy to understand. As a result, Li's Chinese proficiency improved dramatically over the course of a month.

  As his language barrier gradually disappeared, Yeli's life finally took a turn for the better. He began to engage in simple conversations with some "fellow workers" and successfully participated in several collective labor activities that required cooperation. He even made a few friends among the locals - well, strictly speaking, they were just acquaintances. The Han people seemed to always maintain a hint of vigilance towards him, but for Yeli, being able to exchange words was already enough to be considered friends.

  In addition, Jie also met a woman.

  The woman's life was bitter, having to feed two young children who were unable to work. At first, the woman had been hostile towards him, but he didn't understand why until one day when chatting with the villagers, he learned that she was a widow whose husband had been killed by the Khitan people, leaving her alone to flee to White Wolf Mountain with their two young children. After learning this, he suddenly felt a pang of guilt and began to consciously help the woman, such as choosing tasks that were similar to hers, actively helping her share the heavy physical labor, or secretly setting aside one or two flatbreads to give to the two young children to eat.

  As the days went by, the woman's hostility towards Yelü gradually dissipated, and they finally started talking. However, whenever they talked about the past, the woman would think of her deceased husband, making Yelü feel even more guilty. Past events could not be undone; although the woman's husband had died at the hands of Pianpian, it was not Yelü who had killed him personally, but Pianpian was also a member of the Khitan tribe, sharing the same ancestry and clan as Yelü. Therefore, Yelü decided to make amends for his tribesman's wrongdoing through his actions. He worked even harder to obtain more grain to help the woman raise her children.

  One day, Jie Li was carrying snow water from the back mountain to fill up the water bucket in the woman's cave, but saw that the younger child was wailing loudly. Jie Li had taken care of the two children for so many days and had developed feelings for them, so he quickly asked what was wrong. The woman said the child didn't understand things, so Jie Li asked the child why he didn't understand things? The woman said the child was throwing a tantrum because he wanted to eat meat, but no matter how she explained it to him, he wouldn't listen, and she had hit him. After hearing this, Jie Li fell silent for a very long time.

  Jiali hadn't tasted meat for a long time, and the prices of the dried meat in the warehouse were very high. A piece of dried meat that weighed less than one or two liang cost ten work points, and even fish was priced at five work points per piece. Jiali couldn't earn that many work points no matter how hard she worked for a day. When she returned to her own cave, she couldn't help but ask the soldier who was guarding her: "Who can afford to eat those dried meats that cost so many work points?"

  "That soldier said: 'Generally speaking, only we soldiers can get enough work points to exchange for meat.'"

  "Are you soldiers also going to earn work points?" Jie Li was very curious.

  The soldier smiled and said: "Those who perform well in training or have military achievements when going out on a mission can get bonus work points."

  "What counts as excellent performance in training?"

  The soldier said: "For example, the team that walks with the most spirit every day after training will select ten brothers to reward two work points each; for example, during combat training, a full-camp confrontation is held every five days, and the top ten in each camp are also rewarded with five work points each; or when competing in archery, those who hit the target with five out of ten arrows will also be rewarded with two work points."

  After listening, Ye Li returned to the cave and tossed about for a whole night.