She Also Wanted to See What a Western Regions Kingdom Looked Like in Ancient Times

The people of Kingdom of Khotan weren't fools. Seeing this group of easy prey, wouldn't they try to keep them all?

But the prefect pretended not to know, acting solely for his own benefit.

Furthermore, once they complete this transaction and learn the prefect's weaknesses, do you think the prefect will let them live?

Wang Quan knew perfectly well, and so did Zhou Wanwan: "What's there to be afraid of? If Kingdom of Khotan wants to rob us, we'll rob them in return."

Wang Quan sighed and said:

"Young master is far too naive. Do you even know who the other party in this transaction is?"

He was the second prince of the Kingdom of Kingdom of Khotan, and also its Kingdom of Khotan prince.

He has over 100,000 troops under his command; how could we possibly be a match for him?

Therefore, this trip to Kingdom of Khotan is extremely risky.

"The Second Prince? Tsk tsk tsk... I really need to go and see him." Zhou Wanwan had never traveled far from home before, and she was itching to go.

Staying in the mountain village every day is quite boring.

Taking this opportunity, she wanted to travel abroad and see what the ancient Western Regions were like.

Wang Quan said, "Then I'll go and make the arrangements right away."

Wang Quan felt rather conflicted; he hadn't expected the prefect to look after his entire family.

He led his men directly to the ironware, Manman six large carriages, all of which were covered with wooden crates.

Wang Quan's eyes reddened.

"If these ironwares are officially sold to Khotan, we will become traitors. I would never be a traitor."

The great general repeatedly warned us that it is better to die standing than to live on your knees.

I will not do such a thing as colluding with the enemy and betraying my country.

"We won't do it either, but what about our wives, children, and elderly parents?"

Wang Quan remained silent for a while before saying, "I trust our master; he will certainly take good care of them."

Some people expressed concern:

Even if our master is incredibly powerful, there's no way he could find our family.

"We have so many people, and we've been searching for days without finding it."

Wang Quan said in a deep voice, "Indeed, they have searched everywhere these past few days, but they haven't found any trace of their family members."

They'd even searched the prefect's estate. Zhou Wanwan looked at them and said, "We're about to leave. What? Worried about home?"

Wang Quan looked at Zhou Wanwan and said, "I'm really worried about them. I wonder how they're doing now."

Zhou Wanwan sighed and said, "Let's go! I'll show you around!"

Zhou Wanwan led them directly into the mountain village, where they saw a group of people coming out of a house; these were their family members.

Wang Quan looked utterly incredulous, and the others rubbed their eyes, exclaiming, "Oh my! They're all here!"

"Father, Mother..."

"Son, daughter, how are you?"

Wang Quan's wife shouted:

"These corrupt officials arrested us and threw us into the mine, forcing us to mine."

If I didn't agree, they would whip me; I almost died! Waaah...

Wang Quan looked at his wife's hand, trembling with anger. "Why did it have to come to this?"

Zhou Wanwan comforted her:

"Now everything's alright, isn't it? Everyone's quite happy living here, and they can look out for each other."

The government officials won't be able to find us here, so let's go to Khotan now and talk about it when we get back!

Of these 100-plus people, over 600 brought their families.

This puts an even greater burden on the mountain stronghold. Tie Niu sighed and said:

"Young master is recruiting people really fast. If this continues, our stronghold will be full very soon."

What will we do then?

Zhou Wanwan looked at him and said:

"Actually, there's no need to worry. Isn't there another mountain peak over there?"

They're connected, so we'll carve out the other side of the mountain too.

The land will grow larger and larger, and you can set up farms there to raise livestock, grow grains, and cultivate medicinal herbs, among other things.

Tie Niu's eyes lit up and he said:

"That's a good idea. We can build a bridge here to make it easier to cross."

However, building a bridge would be time-consuming and laborious!

Zhou Wanwan looked at the large trees and said, "It won't take too much effort. Someone will take care of building it, so you don't need to worry about it."

The mountains over there are clearly larger than this one. If they can take over that area, they can continue to develop.

But it's still quite far away; if we were to build a bridge, we'd need a lot of wood.

Zhou Wanwan looked at the Old Scholar Tree, Old Scholar Tree said, "I know a place with lots of wood."

Zhou Wanwan looked at him and asked, "Where are you?"

The Old Scholar Tree chuckled and said, "I'll take you there."

The Old Scholar Tree led them along the way, and soon they arrived at a forest where there was a workshop.

The Old Scholar Tree sighed and said:

"Many of my brothers were killed here before. The wood in this workshop was all destined for the capital."

I heard this place is going to be completely cleared out.

Sure enough, Zhou Wanwan saw many loggers, who were busy at work.

Zhou Wanwan saw that the open space over there was piled with wood.

Then they heard cries from the woods. "It hurts! Help! Someone, please help us!"

"I don't want to be chopped down, I don't want to die!"

"These beasts are cutting down trees day and night, we can't hold on much longer, sob sob sob..."

"I don't want to be in a palace; I want to stay in the woods. I still have many friends there."

Some trees are sentient; they know how to cry out in pain.

However, some trees are unaware of this; in fact, not every tree possesses sentience.

This also depends on the age of the tree. Generally, trees that are over a hundred years old will develop sentience.

Zhou Wanwan wandered around in the woods; most of the trees had been cut down.

Only some of the edges remained uncut.

The Old Scholar Tree looked at Zhou Wanwan and said, "Let's move all the wood here today!"

Zhou Wanwan nodded and said, "There must be tens of thousands of logs here! Cutting down so many logs just to build a palace?"

The Old Scholar Tree nodded and said:

"Not only here, but also in other places, a lot of the timber from these mountains has been transported to the capital."

Rather than transporting them to the capital, it would be better to bring them directly to the mountain stronghold.

That way, our mountain village can build a bridge too.

Zhou Wanwan nodded, and the trees began to carry the wood back, but a trace of sadness appeared on their faces.

The Old Scholar Tree said softly, "Some of these trees take hundreds of years to grow, and they've been turned into palaces like this. It's too cruel."

Zhou Wanwan nodded and said, "Let's plant more trees in the future. I've found that my current energy is very useful; it can make trees grow faster."

The Old Scholar Tree nodded and said:

"Indeed, there are too many places in life where we need wood. Trees under a hundred years old are fine; they don't have any spirituality."

"But some have been there for hundreds of years, even centuries, and they just cut them down like that? How can these people be so heartless?"

In just one night, they moved all the tens of thousands of trees here into the mountain village.

Zhou Wanwan then approached the villagers of Luban Village and asked them, "Do you have any ideas on how to build a wooden bridge across these two mountains?"