Qi Family Village!!

Su Yao's ears perked up instantly, her eyes widening:

"Eh? Acting righteously? Killing who? No, no, no, how are we acting righteously!"

Wang Lang put down his teacup and said concisely, "To Qi Family Village. A village under Black Stone City's jurisdiction, about seventy or eighty li from here."

He paused, then added, "I heard there's a famine over there."

Su Yao reacted quickly, her fox tail swaying gently, "Are you going there to... distribute grain?"

Wang Lang didn't answer, only urged, "Hurry up and eat your roast chicken. Get ready to leave after you're done."

"I plan to go see what's going on."

After Wang Lang finished speaking, Su Yao felt the roast chicken in front of her lost its appeal.

It was half an hour later when the supplies they had brought into the manor were properly put away. The man and the fox then left Listening Waves Mountain Manor.

Wang Lang didn't possess any advanced movement techniques, but relying solely on his thousand-times-tempered physique to traverse the mountains and forests, his speed was still outrageously fast.

With every step he took, the ground beneath his feet slightly caved in, his figure like an arrow loosed from a bow.

Su Yao transformed into a white blur, nimbly following beside him, not a whit slower.

"Langzi, how are we going to do this? Just charge in? Take down all those greedy and unjust fellows..."

Su Yao said excitedly, her claws making a few gestures in the air, creating faint sounds of wind breaking.

Wang Lang interrupted, "Only take the grain, no killing, unless absolutely necessary."

"Ah? Why? Aren't they bad guys?" Su Yao asked, confused.

Wang Lang's voice was calm, "Kill one batch, and another will appear. If the village falls into chaos due to slaughter, it won't be good."

"So, just distribute the grain. I'll give them money myself."

The five hundred taels City Lord Zhou from Qinglin City had given him earlier had dwindled to about four hundred taels after some spending.

Of course, those four hundred taels were all kept in the form of banknotes.

After all, without a storage artifact, who would carry so much silver while traveling?

Su Yao seemed to understand but not fully, and didn't ask further.

She knew Wang Lang had his own reasons for doing things, and those reasons were often deeper than she could imagine.

Black Stone City was located northwest of Qinglin City, with Qi Family Village to its east.

Wang Lang didn't enter the city. He skirted the drab city walls, traveling through forests and fields, and waited peacefully for sunset before approaching the village.

As dusk settled, they arrived.

The scene before them was even more shocking than the old man at the tea stall had described.

The bark of the old elm trees at the village entrance had been stripped bare.

The fields were cracked like turtle shells, the seedlings withered and fallen, not a trace of green visible.

Several thatched huts had collapsed halfway, left unrepaired, their dark openings facing the sky.

The village was utterly silent. In the twilight, one could barely see any cooking smoke.

Only the occasional sound of crying and suppressed coughs could be heard from the dilapidated houses.

Wang Lang frowned.

Although Qinglin City wasn't prosperous, the common folk in the surrounding villages could still barely get by.

How could it be so desolate near Black Stone City, yet still within Yuan Province?

His gaze swept over the dirt road at the village entrance.

There were messy footprints and even cart tracks there, unlike the traces of ordinary villagers coming and going.

Looking closer, there were faint traces of simple shelters around the outskirts of the village. Although no one was visible, there were signs of fires having been lit.

"Soldiers were stationed here," Wang Lang said in a low voice.

Su Yao sniffed with her nose, "Mmm, the human scents are mixed, and there's blood... Quite a few people, but they seem to have withdrawn now?"

"Surrounded but not cut off," Wang Lang's voice turned cold. "They're trying to starve everyone to death here."

The few large, high-walled courtyards at the west end of the village were particularly striking in the twilight, with their blue bricks, grey tiles, and imposing gatehouses.

Faint dog barks, laughter, and even the sounds of stringed instruments could be heard from within the courtyards.

It was a stark contrast to the surrounding desolation and deathly silence.

Wang Lang motioned for Su Yao to be quiet, his body like smoke as he silently crept behind a half-collapsed thatched hut.

The faint cough of an old man could be heard from inside the hut.

He gently knocked on the dilapidated wooden door.

After a long while, the door creaked open a crack, revealing an old face like withered bark. His cloudy eyes warily sized up the person outside.

Seeing Wang Lang's burly figure, the old man visibly trembled and was about to close the door.

"Old man, don't be afraid," Wang Lang lowered his voice and took out half a piece of dry rations from his embrace to hand over.

"I was passing through and saw how miserable the village was. I wanted to ask what happened."

The old man stared at the dry rations, his Adam's apple bobbing, but he didn't dare to take them.

Wang Lang directly stuffed the rations into his hand. Only then did the old man tremble and open the door.

The room was dim. Besides a broken bed, it was bare. In a corner, on a pile of straw, lay a scrawny child.

"What a sin..." The old man took a bite of the dry rations and began to explain haltingly.

Qi Family Village had eighty-three households and was originally a self-sufficient village.

But after last year's autumn harvest, an order came from Black Stone City, saying that the City Lord needed to prepare for war and store grain, so taxes were increased by thirty percent.

That wasn't all. The richest man in the village, Master Qi, took it upon himself to collect the grain, saying he was helping the City Lord.

"That Qi the Skinner..." the old man gritted his teeth, "emptied the village warehouse and didn't leave a single grain!"

"This spring there was a drought, and all the crops were ruined. He went to the city to beg for relief, but when he returned, he said the City Lord had ordered that the village was under quarantine and no one was allowed in or out..."

Wang Lang asked, "The tracks at the village entrance..."

"Alas, those were left by the soldiers from Black Stone City. They surrounded us for two months."

The old man coughed and continued:

"They said they were afraid the epidemic would spread. But what epidemic? They all starved to death..."

"And all the young men from our village were conscripted to the city, ostensibly for construction labor. They went and never returned."

"All that's left are the old, the weak, women, and children. Just waiting to die."

"Does Master Qi's household have grain?"

"How could they not!" The old man's eyes turned red. "There's the smell of meat every day! Even his dogs eat better than we do!"

"A few days ago, Widow Li went to beg for food and was beaten out by the guards. The next day she..."

The old man couldn't go on, only wiping his tears.

Wang Lang quietly asked a few other households, and their stories were largely the same.

One household was left with only a half-grown child whose parents had starved to death. When the child spoke of Master Qi, his eyes held only numb hatred.

With each household Wang Lang visited, the chill in his heart grew.

He had originally planned to buy grain with money. Four hundred taels of silver notes should have been enough to buy some life-saving food.

But now, it seemed that Master Qi couldn't be dealt with just by money.

For a person like that, if you give him money, he'll just see you as a fat sheep and turn around to call the soldiers from Black Stone City to capture you as a bandit.

As for the City Lord of Black Stone City...

In the official system of the Limitless Dynasty, cities were established under provincial governments. City Lords were often fifth-rank or subordinate fifth-rank officials.

They weren't top court officials, but they were like local emperors.

Although City Lord Zhou of Qinglin City was also corrupt, he at least knew how to pace himself, and the people under his rule could still live.

But this Black Stone City Lord was clearly trying to kill his people.

"Killing officials is a grave crime, but if it's killing someone who deserves to die..."

Wang Lang felt the mask in his bosom. It was a broken Nuo Mask he had picked up casually on the road, only half of it remaining, as ferocious as a ghost.

This would be convenient for what he had to do next.