After what seemed like an eternity, Bai Zemin finally regained control over himself.
Slowly, he put his hands on the small shoulders of the woman who clung to him tenderly and gently pushed her back.
Wu Yijun was shocked and for an instant felt like crying as she felt that her confession had just been rejected even though she had not said a single word; which was not necessary, as it was difficult to be more direct than she was being.
Fortunately or not, just as Wu Yijun felt as if everything was crumbling before her and within herself, Bai Zemin's words pacified her.
"We should go inside. We have a lot of work to delegate. We'll have time for warm moments, it's just that this isn't a good time."
His voice was calm and his eyes were as relaxed as a lake that had been silent for countless years as he looked at everyone. Even the way he looked at Wu Yijun was not awkward at all despite what had just happened.
"Y-Yes." Wu Yijun hurriedly nodded as she looked into his eyes with a slight blush on her baby face. "With so many survivors joining the base, the change in the overall structure will be huge. Besides, a lot of things also happened during this time that needs urgent checking."
Seeing the woman in front of him leave it at that, Bai Zemin was secretly relieved. He would already find time in the near future to settle this matter, it was just that currently, it was not the right time.
Shangguan Bing Xue also nodded and before Chen He could say what he had in mind she entered the vehicle from which she had exited a moment ago. Then, from the outside, her image could be seen beyond the front glass of the vehicle as she gave orders to the several leaders waiting in the caravan.
Chen He secretly smiled bitterly and forced a smile as he watched this. In the end, he also shook his head and walked towards the military jeep after greeting Bai Zemin and the rest.
…
The union of approximately five thousand survivors was not a simple task for the Beginning Village. Things could be much simpler if these five thousand joined gradually and slowly, but when they all joined at the same time everything became a little too complicated.
The new survivors needed houses according to their different statuses within the faction, the spaces where relief food was distributed on a daily basis needed to expand, those who had power and prestige in the North Camp needed to adapt to the change as they slowly began to get to know the upper echelons of the Beginning Village, etc.
There were too many things that required time and it was not something that could be taken care of in just one or two days.
Fortunately, Bai Zemin had the help of people like Cai Jingyi, who not only led a powerful army of soul evolvers but also possessed great authority when it came to politics.
With Cai Jingyi, Lu XIaoyao, Wu Yijun, and several other people working as a team, everything slowly began to take shape. The only thing Bai Zemin had to do was to delegate orders from behind the scenes and make slight changes to some things that had been dealt with in a manner not too appealing to him.
* * *
Another four days passed in an instant and the Beginning Village was extremely noisy.
Bai Zemin walked through the streets of his establishment and as he observed the situation around him, a feeling of pride was naturally born in his heart.
During his absence, the other leaders were not slacking off as although the process of conquests had slowed down, the number of lands controlled and surviving under his faction had been steadily increasing.
At this point, Bai Zemin's faction had over 8000 survivors, which meant that in the span of his absence Beginning Village had received the arrival of approximately 2000 more survivors.
However, the person who had worked the hardest while he conquered the North Camp was undoubtedly Wu Yijun. Thanks to her, many things had changed for the better.
"Big brother, I want to eat that!"
A cute and sweet voice reached Bai Zemin's ears, pulling him out of his inner thoughts for an instant.
Bai Zemin's body was dragged away and when he looked beside him he saw the pretty Luo Ning pulling his hand in the direction of a stand where a woman was selling some candied fruits.
Thanks to Wu Yijun, who invested not only a lot of time but also part of her own resources obtained to boost trade, the various survivors began to cheer up and try to start a new life in this new world.
Mankind needed to start adapting and moving forward. They could not stay stagnant forever.
While it was temporarily impossible to implement a new currency, a simpler method of payment had been created where there were different colored tickets that represented a certain amount of food of different types. With this type of method, employees in different types of jobs began to receive tickets in the form of payment that they could use to buy whatever they wanted instead of receiving a fixed rate of food.
In addition, these colored tickets had been created using a special paper that only grew from a mutant plant that Wu Yijun was sure no normal person could have since she could only cultivate it thanks to her own skill as well as a huge amount of luck.
There were even some soul evolvers who started hunting wild beasts and then selling the meat or setting up their own businesses. After all, while every soul evolver was in some way or another tied to the army, in their free time they were free to hunt and do whatever they wanted with their spoils of war.
Bai Zemin looked at the woman on the other side of the candied fruit stand and then asked, "Little Ning, choose whatever you want."
"Mhm!" Luo Ning nodded with a big smile and then began to look at the products with sparkling eyes.
The current Luo Ning had already reached level 24 and was a powerful warrior despite her young age. Even if she was young and small, the pay she received was very high to the point where she could be considered a rich young miss within the Bai Zemin faction, making her the major supporter of her home and surpassing her elder brother Luo Cheng with ease.
However, Luo Ning still loved to make others buy sweets to her as during these four days she took advantage of any instance when Bai Zemin was free to drag him around with her to the different stands, using her "charm" to force him to buy delicious delicacies to her.
While waiting for Luo Ning to make her decision, Bai Zemin felt a gentle tug on his left sleeve and looking beside him saw another little loli looking at him with spoiled kitten eyes.
"Xiang Feng, is there anything you like? Big brother will buy it for you." He said with a small smile.
Xiang Feng's eyes sparkled at these words and then she did not hesitate as she pointed to a caramel apple.
Although she was a year older than Luo Ning, Xiang Feng was just an ordinary girl who would shortly start her schooling again. Still, Bai Zemin did not push her away just because of this and when the girl wanted to and he had time, he would also take her out for a walk.
Soon, Luo Ning had also made her decision. She had chosen a banana with chocolate.
"Aunt, how much for these two?"
"I see you have two cute little sisters here." The woman at the stand smiled gently as she took what Bai Zemin asked for.
The thought of him being a pervert never crossed the woman's mind as everyone in the establishment was fully aware that the high command punished such behavior with death regardless of who the offender was.
Bai Zemin did not know whether to laugh or cry upon hearing this. If not for the fact that he was waiting for some people to arrive, where could he be here wasting his time?
"Two chocolate bananas and two caramel apples. A red ticket will do it." The woman finally handed the candy to the girls with a smile, not worried that they wouldn't pay her at all since not far away there were several officers patrolling the area.
This was another proof that security was considerably good in Beginning Village; another reason why the eyes of the survivors no longer looked hollow and lifeless.
A red ticket was equivalent to 200 grams in food and was the ticket whose value was the smallest of the seven food tickets introduced. While this was not a good measure, at least it was better than nothing until a new currency was intruded, a currency that the survivors would not be afraid to use for fear that the faction would fall; but that would take more time, power, and gaining everyone's trust.
Bai Zemin took out a bundle of papers of various colors and the woman's expression changed noticeably when she noticed several violet tickets.
The violet colored ticket was the most precious and a single one was equivalent to 100,000 kilograms worth of food! The person in front of her had several of them!
Who is this person? The woman almost died of shock and could barely calm down a bit when she finally realized that fortunately she did not disrespect the young man in front of her in any way or she could get into big troubles.
Someone with such wealth definitely could not be someone common! When this thought popped into the woman's mind, she didn't dare to act as casual as before and immediately said in a trembling voice, "This…. You don't need to pay…"
Although this was her livelihood, she knew that she could not offend people with great power or even if the rules were strict for everyone some people might find ways to make her life miserable.
Bai Zemin was confused at first, but soon realized his mistake and could not help but smile bitterly.
These tickets were handed to him by Wu Yijun a couple of days ago while he, she, and some other people were having dinner together. As Bai Zemin was the highest leader of the establishment, naturally he could basically do as he pleased so these tickets were just useless paper in his eyes. However, in other people's eyes, these tickets were symbolic of status and power, something he had unconsciously overlooked.
"Aunt, that's not how it works." Bai Zemin shook his head and placed a red ticket on the counter. "You work and therefore you will receive your payment accordingly. Those are the rules and everyone must follow them."
"This…" The woman looked at the red ticket and hesitated.
However, before she could say anything else the young man in front of her had already turned and carried the two little girls away, disappearing into the crowd in an instant.
…
Bai Zemin spent approximately two hours together with Luo Ning and Xiang Feng before the relaxation hour was over. Xiang Feng was handed over to her mother by Bai Zemin while Luo Ning clung to him as they were heading to the same place.
While holding the girl's hand, Ba Zemin made his way to the building where the important meetings were being held, moving further and further away from the masses. By the time he reached the area near the building, except for a few armed troops no survivors could be seen roaming around, after all, this was a private area and only a few were allowed access.
Inside the building, in the meeting room, approximately one hundred people were gathered in small teams, muttering quietly to each other.
If it were in the past, it would be impossible for so many people to fit into just one room. However, a few days earlier, several walls of the building had been knocked down and the hall had been enlarged, so now even if the number of people doubled compared to today, there would still be enough space to accommodate them all.
Shangguan Bing Xue, Chen He, Wu Yijun, Cai Jingyi, Fu Xuefeng, Zhong De, Xiao Ming, Yan Tu, Lu Xiaoyao, Lu Yan, Luo Cheng, Gu Tao, Old Zhi, and many more. Each and every one of them was either powerful soul evolvers, leaders of a team of at least 50 armed men, or were in high positions among the pyramid of power.
"It looks like the King will make some changes." Xiao Ming spoke quietly to Luo Cheng.
Luo Cheng nodded and muttered, "From what I understand, he finally thought of a power scale to differentiate us all. I heard Miss Wu Yijun say that the structure of the army will change now that our troop's number is close to 2000."
* * * * * * *
Thank you very much to everyone who voted for Blood Warlock with Golden Tickets! <3
