Chapter Sixty-Three: Extraordinary Means

Military drills were not a matter of neglecting oversight; after Wu Lao Liu led the hunting team out, Zhao Hengyi and his guards quietly followed behind. Every move made by the hunting team was closely monitored by the guards, with dedicated evaluators rating their performance—these scores would become one of the standards for assessing whether members of the hunting team could join the guard squad.

With relentless, rigorous training, even the hunting team members now far surpassed the soldiers of the Xuan Camp in individual strength. Among the border armies, these young men would be counted as elite forces. Yet their daily work was limited to escorting goods; as for actual hunting, whether by the hunting or guard teams, it was simply handled whenever they went into the mountains for exercises.

No longer did the people of Elm Bay hunt merely to exchange meat for grain or silver; all game caught was sent to the communal kitchen to improve everyone’s meals. Whether in the kiln, the textile workshop, or the poultry farm, anyone employed by Zhao Hengyi was guaranteed meals, a rule now firmly established.

The mere existence of a communal kitchen was extraordinarily attractive to people from nearby villages. When Elm Bay undertook large-scale construction, men from surrounding villages scrambled for jobs—working here meant not only a full belly, but daily wages in copper coins, an opportunity unmatched anywhere else.

In the Great Yan Empire, the tradition of male dominance was deeply entrenched. With an extremely skewed gender ratio, the authorities even imposed a marriage tax that worsened women’s status. As men from neighboring villages found work in Elm Bay and returned home with newfound arrogance, Zhao Hengyi had the old village chief set rules: anyone who beat his wife would be dismissed. Yet this had little effect.

Within his own village, the chief could keep watch, but in others, even if a woman was beaten, she would not come to Elm Bay to complain. It was not that all women were submissive, but their husbands’ jobs had genuinely improved their families' lives. Even if suffering, wives could not bear to let their husbands lose their work at Elm Bay.

To address this, Zhao Hengyi accelerated the expansion of the textile workshop. Female workers there, as long as they worked diligently, not only ate well but earned wages equal to the men. Once personal income rose, household status and gender differences would, with time, be erased at their root.

People’s ingrained ideas could not be changed overnight, but Zhao Hengyi could use his own methods to influence everyone’s thinking. Before, daughters were seen as burdens; now, with the textile workshop, girls not only no longer needed support from their families, but also brought home wages—who would dare call them burdens now?

All these experiences led Zhao Hengyi to realize that the people of the Great Yan Empire were not stubborn or resistant to change. As long as the benefits were clear and tangible, ordinary folk could be subtly guided. Compared to government edicts, Zhao Hengyi found that providing jobs was a far more effective and acceptable way to steer public opinion.

Those most deeply affected by Zhao Hengyi’s ideas were the hunting and guard teams, even more so than Miao Xiaoyu, who spent every day with him—after all, Zhao Hengyi was not mad enough to lecture his wife daily with plans and slogans.

Still, as the most admired and envied young men of Elm Bay and the surrounding villages, the guard and hunting team members influenced everyone by their words and actions, creating change in subtle ways.

Secretly observing how Wu Lao Liu and the hunting team dealt with the Mountain Dragon bandits, Zhao Hengyi found it quite entertaining. The guards deliberately flaunted their skills, keeping a close watch on the hunting team to provide Zhao Hengyi with firsthand reports.

Even ordinary people are said to have a sixth sense, let alone the highly trained hunting team. The guards’ scrutiny made the hunting team uneasy and suspicious, though they couldn’t identify the source of their anxiety. They attributed it to lack of experience, becoming tense even when dealing with a ragtag group of bandits—an unintentional increase in the difficulty of their assessment.

“Master, that youngster Wu Lao Liu sent out is clever and resourceful—a real talent!” whispered an old guard, sidling up to Zhao Hengyi. “He infiltrated the Mountain Dragon’s camp alone, even dared to search their leader’s quarters, and found the hidden silver in the cellar. Remarkable!”

“No matter how skilled, he’s still a child—can’t compare to you all. A promising seedling should be well taught; he’ll be of great use in the future,” Zhao Hengyi replied.

The old guard beamed with pride at the praise and left in high spirits. Zhao Hengyi knew the guards felt competitive but did not call them out—it was human nature. In praising the hunting team’s youngsters, he was also praising himself: after all, the hunting team had scouted the Mountain Dragon’s camp thoroughly without ever noticing the watchful eyes behind them.

A little competitive spirit, so long as it remained within bounds, was good—exactly what Zhao Hengyi intended to foster.

“Master, Wu Lao Liu’s team seems set on raiding the camp tonight. With their skill, the Mountain Dragon gang won’t stand a chance,” reported Wang Dahu, the more cautious guard, hurrying over. “But our southern lookout spotted another group—more than a hundred men, all looking tough. They seem to be heading to join the Mountain Dragon.”

Zhao Hengyi became instantly alert; the guards truly outclassed the hunting team, especially in the range their scouts could monitor—a capability those young men, unused to frontier warfare, could not match.

“Tell me more,” Zhao Hengyi said.

“The men to the south are all hardy and well-armed with official military gear. Two of their leaders wear leather armor, and more than a dozen carry longbows. They don’t look like ordinary soldiers, but like veterans from the border armies!”

The situation was growing more interesting: a group, apparently ex-border soldiers, fully armed and with archers, heading to join a motley collection of bandits. Clearly, the big figure supporting the Mountain Dragon had extraordinary means.