Ren Xiaosu still had a lot of potatoes in his possession, but he did not let the refugees have them. It was not that he did not have any compassion but that he could only lead them to the Prosperous Northwest if they remained hungry.
When was a person most irrational? Was it when they were experiencing complete starvation? No.
Rather, it was when a person was completely starving and realized they were about to have something to eat.
Ren Xiaosu felt from the bottom of his heart that the Zhou Consortium did not care whether these people lived or died. The Wang Consortium also treated them as a weapon, and the Qing Consortium could not take them away either. Therefore, the only way for the refugees to survive was to head to the Prosperous Northwest.
He would not let these people starve to death. Once the steam locomotive arrived in the Northwest with them, Ren Xiaosu would immediately distribute potatoes for everyone to eat.
At that time, not only would he have saved their lives, but he would also earn a lot of gratitude tokens.
His gratitude tokens had already broken past the 8,000 mark, and he was only a step away from unlocking the third weapon. Ren Xiaosu felt that with his life-saving efforts this time, he could earn one gratitude token per refugee rescued at the minimum.
Meanwhile, there were several hundred thousand refugees in the vicinity of the Zhou Consortium, so he should at least be able to lead a 100,000 of them to the Prosperous Northwest, right?
With a 100,000 gratitude tokens, he might even be able to unlock the fourth weapon!
Thinking of this, Ren Xiaosu started looking at the refugees with a burning gaze.
However, when the refugees heard they needed to follow Ren Xiaosu, they started hesitating. After all, this chaotic world was fraught with danger. Any normal person would instinctively consider if there were a plot behind Ren Xiaosu giving them the potatoes and offering to bring them elsewhere.
“Where do you want to take us? Is it far?” a young man asked hesitantly.
Ren Xiaosu grinned. “It’s not far; it’s at most a day’s journey.”
Everyone figured that if they could get there within a day, it should at most be 70 to 80 kilometers away, right? After all, they could not walk fast in their current condition.
But what they did not know was that when Ren Xiaosu said they could get there within a day, he meant they would be traveling in the steam locomotive. The Zhou Consortium was more than 2,000 kilometers away from Stronghold 144 in a straight line, so even traveling by steam locomotive would take them 23 hours to get there.
To be honest, it would be unrealistic to expect they could return to the Central Plains by themselves after they were brought to the Northwest. It could even be said there was absolutely no turning back.
At this moment, Ren Xiaosu said, “There’s thousands of you here. Even if you want to leave midway, you can just return anytime. How can we stop everyone with just the two of us?”
Now he needed to coax these people onto the steam locomotive. When the steam locomotive started moving at a speed of 120 kilometers per hour, Ren Xiaosu did not believe anyone would have the courage to jump off the train.
If they really had the courage, they would not have stayed here and starved themselves to this state.
The refugees looked at one another. They were still very worried that Ren Xiaosu was a human trafficker who would kidnap them to sell to bandits.
Everyone was making wild guesses about his identity. In short, they felt that Ren Xiaosu and the Great Hoodwinker’s motives were not honest.
They were only refugees, not fools, so they wouldn’t really follow someone to another place just for a few potatoes. Who knew if any food would actually be at the place where Ren Xiaosu was going to take them?
A young woman holding a little girl’s hand said, “You chased away the bully for us just now. I believe you, so I’ll go with you!”
Ren Xiaosu smiled and nodded. Then he took out two more milk candies from his pocket and placed them into the little girl’s hands. He said to all the refugees around him, “Remember, although I’ll be taking y’all away from here this time, if there’s any others among you who’re up to no good, please let me know in advance so that I can get rid of them. Our utopia doesn’t welcome evil people, so let’s avoid any bad apples.”
Actually, this was a type of psychological hint. If Ren Xiaosu directly placed himself on the side opposing the villainous, most people would subconsciously think of him as good. They might even label him a “knight” or something like that.
Immediately, many people stepped forward. “We’ll go with you, but you have to keep your promise and give us food when we get there.”
Ren Xiaosu said with a smile, “Don’t worry, you’ll definitely get your fill when y’all get there. If I don’t keep my promise, all y’all can beat me up together.”
Before this, he discussed Zhou Yingxue’s potato cultivation and the market economy with Wang Yuexi. Everyone felt it was not suitable to push for Zhou Yingxue’s potato cultivation to be done on a large scale as it would affect the normal market mechanisms of the Northwest.
However, the potatoes could be used for emergencies. For example, in a situation like this, it was definitely the best option to feed this many people with potatoes so they would join the Prosperous Northwest.
As long as they could survive this year, the Northwest would only get more and more prosperous starting from the next.
In just half an hour, almost half the refugees decided to go with Ren Xiaosu. However, Ren Xiaosu still felt it was not enough. His goal was to take away 80% of the refugees.
But the commotion over here was so massive that even the Zhou Consortium’s garrison troops were alerted at this point.
The Great Hoodwinker had been watching the surroundings all this while. When the garrison troops at the city gate started moving towards them, he whispered to Ren Xiaosu, “The Zhou Consortium’s people are coming over. What should we do? Kill them?”
With their strength, it would not be a problem for them to deal with the 100-odd garrison troops.
Ren Xiaosu thought for a moment and said, “Diplomacy before violence, please.”
The Zhou Consortium’s garrison troops were already approaching them with loaded weapons. They looked at the crowd of refugees that had gathered and shouted, “Disperse! All of you, disperse! Don’t cause any trouble here!”
The refugees immediately dispersed and returned to their makeshift shacks. They wanted to see how Ren Xiaosu would handle the situation. If the two of them could not even deal with the Zhou Consortium’s people, talk of taking them away would just be pointless.
However, the refugees realized Ren Xiaosu and the Great Hoodwinker had remained seated at the campfire, motionless. It was as though they were not afraid of the soldiers at all.
When the 100-odd garrison troops realized Ren Xiaosu and the Great Hoodwinker were the instigators of this gathering, they immediately surrounded them. An officer stepped forward and said coldly, “Are you refugees or spies? What’s your purpose in gathering here?”
Ren Xiaosu thought for a moment and said, “I’m not a spy, nor am I a refugee. I’m just a normal person from the Northwest. As for why I’m here, I’m afraid that you aren’t qualified to talk to me at your level. Have Zhou Shiji or Zhou Shoushi come out here.”
The garrison officer was so angry he laughed. “Are you kidding?! Those two old bastards are dead!”
Ren Xiaosu remained silent for a moment before metallic armor suddenly covered his right arm. Then he asked, “Do you know how they died?”
