Chapter 145 Circular Economy, Integrated Development

Cheng Ziwei sat on the reclining chair of the drilling vehicle, feeling very confused.

The death scene of the woman whose head was shot through by Wen Rui kept replaying in her mind, so she didn't care why she had to take this strange underground vehicle to Jinling Sect.

This car is very large, half as long as a high-speed rail carriage, and the passenger compartment can seat 8 people. For the sake of comfort, there is a dining car and bar in the rear of the carriage. There is also a Jin Yaoer metal puppet in the carriage serving as a waiter.

The sound insulation measures are also perfect. The sound of the drill outside and the friction between the carriage and the rock can only be heard faintly and does not affect rest.

Wen Rui and He Lingyun were sitting in the front row, their heads close together, talking and laughing in low voices. They looked very intimate and harmonious, which made her feel a little sour in her heart.

However, Cheng Ziwei didn't feel jealous for the moment. She kept thinking about what Sect Master Wen said.

Open the pattern.

Death is not the end.

These two sentences may explain his reckless way of doing things.

Is it only by killing that miserable woman, ending her suffering in this life, and sending her soul into reincarnation that one can completely escape her miserable fate?
But she is not the only one suffering in the world. Does Sect Master Wen want to kill them all?
He treated cultivators with the same attitude, not taking their lives seriously at all. Cheng Ziwei was certain that Sect Master Wen had killed countless cultivators during the last exploration of the secret realm, but he had no psychological burden at all.

I guess this is the idea that sending someone to reincarnate is like granting them a favor.

The underground vehicle slowly raised its front end, and the tilt angle could be clearly felt inside the car. Cheng Ziwei guessed that after several days of traveling, it had finally arrived at the Jinling Sect, and the underground vehicle was about to break out of the ground.

Just as she had guessed, after some bumps, the car came to a steady stop, the side door opened, and the light from outside shone into the car.

Following Wen Rui out of the carriage, Cheng Ziwei saw a large piece of farmland that was being cultivated.

Unlike the terraced fields that Cheng Ziwei saw in Shushan, the fields here were obviously much larger.

This place is a plain, which is very different from the mountains and hills near Shu Mountain where Cheng Ziwei lives. She guessed that this is the "well-field" popular in the Central Plains. A "field" is a hundred steps long and wide, and one field is a hundred acres.

She saw farmers working in the fields and was surprised to find that the workers were a mixture of humans and demons. The strong bear, tiger and wild boar demons replaced the oxen to pull the plow and turn the soil. The humans and some smaller wolf, fox, deer and roe deer demons were holding hoes and shovels to level the ground and dig ridges and water channels. The smaller rabbit, mouse and toad demons were sowing seeds together with the human women.

This was the first time she had seen a scene of humans and demons living together, but considering her background as a religious person, Cheng Ziwei could only get used to it.

After all, in the Jiejiao back then, the human immortals and the demon immortals could get along harmoniously and were as close as a family.

However, after careful observation, she also found some inconsistencies. The human and demon races here did not seem to have a close relationship. Although they worked together, they were wary of each other and did not speak a word to each other. It seemed that they were forced to get together.

The metal puppets patrolling in the fields further confirmed this point. Some monsters were obviously forced, such as the bear monsters and tiger monsters. Occasionally, they would break free from the plow harness and want to go crazy, but the next moment a metal puppet would rush over and pin them to the ground and beat them up. After the beating, they would be quiet for a while.

There are also stubborn people among the human race who throw tantrums and refuse to do their jobs. The metal puppet will not tolerate them and will whip them.

"Master, what are these humans and demons doing?" Unable to suppress her curiosity, Cheng Ziwei asked.

"They are farming for me." Wen Rui replied, "This is public land. All the creatures in my territory are doing corvee labor for me, the lord."

Cheng Ziwei was confused for a moment and asked, "Master, aren't you a cultivator? Besides, you are a former minister of the Shang Dynasty. Can you also be a vassal of the Western Zhou Dynasty?"

"The Zhou royal family is declining day by day and has long been unable to control the eight hundred princes. Anyone with money and guns can be a king. Why can't I be a lord?"

Wen Rui smiled and said, "This place originally belonged to the Qin State. I bought the territory of the Lishan Mountains with a radius of 100 miles from Qin Bo in the name of the Chamber of Commerce. Now I am the lord of this land, and they are all my subjects."

"After the Conferred God War, Daozu Hongjun issued an order that cultivators of our generation cannot interfere in the internal affairs of the human dynasty or participate in the disputes among the princes..."

"I am just an ordinary mortal. I just live longer than ordinary mortals and am not bound by this rule." Wen Rui raised his eyebrows and said proudly, "Besides, I am from the royal family of the previous dynasty. My status is much higher than that of Qin Bo, a mere earl who was born as a horse slave in the Zhou Dynasty. I have the right to claim this place. What's wrong with a small restoration? It is reasonable, legal, and in line with the ancient times!"

"Besides, I didn't use extraordinary force to kill the king and seize the country. I just gave Qin Bo an offer that he couldn't refuse, using 100,000 dan of grain, 1,000 chariots, and 10,000 sets of weapons and armor in exchange for a small piece of territory. A weak country on the edge has become a powerful country with 1,000 chariots, and it only cost a few cities. He is so happy!"

"I have signed an alliance with the Duke of Qin. The Wen clan will join the Qin State and be granted fiefdoms. The new lands gained by the Qin State in attacking the Quanrong can be exchanged with me for supplies. In the future, my territory will become larger and larger."

Cheng Ziwei really couldn't find any excuse to refute, but she didn't understand how the head of a sect of immortal cultivation could become a lord. Was it to compensate for the decline of the Wen family when the Shang Dynasty was destroyed?
She couldn't help but secretly complain in her heart that Qin Bo was too bold. The capital Xianyang was not far from Lishan Mountain. He was greedy for temporary gains and invited a wolf into his doorstep, attracting such a black-hearted tyrant. He would deserve it if he was plotted to seize his country in the future.

"I don't believe that Uncle Qin is so stupid that he would make a deal with you even though he knew you had evil ambitions." After discovering that Sect Master Wen was not a strict boss, Cheng Ziwei became bold and complained directly.

"Haha, I just told the King of Qin that if he doesn't accept my good intentions, I will go to his evil neighbor, the Quanrong. The Quanrong king is worried about the lack of food, weapons, and arrows. If I supply them without limit, the Quanrong with a population of over one million will be able to raise an army of 300,000 cavalry archers. What will the Qin State use to resist them then?"

Cheng Ziwei was speechless for a moment, frowning and said: "I really don't understand what's the point of being a lord if you don't practice well, and what benefit will it bring to all living beings."

"The little girl's vision is really not good enough." Wen Rui shook his head and said, "Our sect mainly wants to establish a diversified Jiejiao country, to set an example for the small and small makeshift groups in the world who are always going backwards, so that they can know the advanced nature of Jiejiao's teachings. Jiejiao culture is the most suitable for educating sentient beings and guiding them from ignorance and barbarism to civilization and progress."

Cheng Ziwei didn't say anything, but just nodded. A metal puppet next to her was whipping a strong human man with a whip, making him roll on the ground and beg for mercy.

“So civilized!”

Wen Rui was also a little embarrassed, scratching his head and said: "Sometimes, it is necessary to use some tough measures and conduct physical education... The level of the human race today is too low, and most people can't read a single word. If they are not beaten, they can't remember anything. This is already the most gentle punishment among the means of controlling the people in the vassal states. Beating is also a form of education. Beating is love, scolding is love..."

Cheng Ziwei looked around and saw that the fields were connected together, and the irrigation facilities such as ditches, deep wells, and water wheels were also quite complete. It was roughly estimated that there were tens of thousands of acres of well-developed and fertile land. If properly tended, they would surely produce countless grains.

"You enslave all living beings to farm for you, is it to produce food to feed all living beings?" Cheng Ziwei asked curiously.

"This is public land. All the output belongs to me, the lord. The people have to grow their own food in their private fields."

Wen Rui replied: "The grass produced here is a high-yield forage grass called giant fungus grass, and then there are beans and sorghum. The grass is transported to the eastern grasslands to feed cattle and horses, beans are used to press oil, sorghum is used to make wine, and the lees and bean cakes are used to feed pigs."

"You are so cruel to exploit the people's power..."

"Tsk, you are an ignorant child who knows nothing about farming or politics."

Wen Rui curled his lips in disdain and said, "The human race can be exempted from 30% of the tax for the year by working together with the demon race on the public land, and the iron farm tools they use can be taken away after serving. These people came to serve voluntarily, crying and shouting. The conditions I offer are already countless times more generous than those offered by all the lords of the vassal states. Many wild people from the surrounding small countries have fled to my territory and begged to be my subjects."

Cheng Ziwei seemed to have noticed something and asked, "Most of the produce here is used to raise cattle, horses, pigs and sheep. Why do you raise so many livestock?"

"The demons prefer blood food. Blood food is as important to the demons as food is to humans. I will use these livestock to trade with the demons."

Wen Rui pointed at the farm tools used by the farmers and said, "These iron tools were exchanged for livestock with the demon kings who were engaged in industry in the northern mountainous areas. The surplus livestock can also be traded with wild demons in the Shiwan Mountains to exchange for scarce resources such as spider silk, scorpion venom, spirit stones, gems, and spirit gold."

"Don't underestimate this livestock trade. The demons have an adequate supply of blood and food, so they won't set their sights on humans. A cow can grow to over a thousand kilograms in a year and a half, and its meat output is several times more than that of ten adults who have grown to eighteen years old. How many lives can be saved invisibly, and how much killing karma can be saved for the demons? If this business continues to expand its production capacity, the merits it can provide me every year will be more than those of a miracle doctor who can bring people back to life and dispense medicine to save lives!"

Cheng Ziwei suddenly realized and was greatly enlightened. She realized that it was not only by slaying demons and eliminating monsters that one could do good deeds.

"What is the fundamental conflict between the demon race and the human race? The struggle for living space is nothing more than a fight for ecological niches. To put it bluntly, it is to destroy other people's jobs in order to earn a living for yourself."

Wen Rui patiently explained her doubts: "The human race has developed the wilderness, cut down trees to build houses, and destroyed forests to open up wasteland, which has greatly reduced the population of wild animals. The demons can't hunt for blood, so they set their sights on the humans who are easier to hunt and start eating humans. If you don't let humans open up the wasteland and plant crops, they will starve to death. If you don't let the demons eat blood, they will become weak and die. Does this situation have to be solved by destroying one side? How difficult is it to design an economic operation model so that both the human and demon races can eat from the same pot?"

Wen Rui sneered and said, "So, from now on, the so-called righteous cultivators should stop committing genocide against the demon race in the name of protecting the human race. With my plan, shouting such slogans is just an excuse for being instigated by certain beings to commit crimes. The way of heaven is clear, and retribution will come. I will see which cultivator in the world is not afraid of being entangled in evil karma and dares to kill the demon race wantonly!"

(End of this chapter)

previouscatalognext