Chapter 225: Chapter 150: Promotion to the Sixth Grade; Cultivation Technique Improvement

Cheng Zongyang called over Zhao the Seventh, who was supervising the work.

He was quite happy to see Cheng Zongyang return, and far more excited to see the medicinal material saplings and rice seedlings than the pile of dried fish.

During this time, he had also heard about some of Cheng Zongyang’s ideas from Li Lu, which naturally pleased him.

As long as the County Town could be stabilized, the likelihood of them continuing to be a regional power in the future was extremely high.

The planting of these rice seedlings was arranged in advance. After all, it was dry-field rice, not paddy rice, which was much simpler.

Until the results from the trials in the Wilderness World came in, they continued planting at a rate of 2,500 stalks per mu.

As for the dried fish, Zhao the Seventh had some men take it to the new Storehouse in West City for storage. This also made it convenient to fetch for making soup at the city gates.

When Li Lu got the news, he also rushed over from within the city.

Seeing the ten mu of rice seedlings the people had planted, he couldn’t help but ask, "Is this all that was sent?"

Cheng Zongyang nodded. "The request was too urgent, so this is just the first batch they managed to rush over. More will be sent in batches later. The quantity will be much larger. After all, transporting these seedlings isn’t easy."

"As for how much we’ll get later, that depends on their arrangements. But it won’t be less than three hundred mu’s worth."

"Three hundred mu?" Li Lu frowned. "Isn’t that a bit too little? Didn’t you say at least a thousand mu?"

Cheng Zongyang said, "Three hundred mu is just the guaranteed minimum. How much more we get depends on the situation. Besides, this rice comes from Luoyang; it’s not the kind we’re used to seeing. Even with only three hundred mu, the harvest won’t be less than three hundred thousand jin of grain!

Although the more rice, the better, we also have to see if they can supply our needs. After all, these are ready-made seedlings, not rice grains."

Hearing this harvest amount, Li Lu’s gaze trembled, and he revealed a look of disbelief.

"Three hundred thousand jin? Are you sure? Even though I’ve never farmed rice myself, I’ve heard a fair bit about it. A harvest of four hundred jin of grain per mu is already considered a bumper crop! Now you’re saying one mu can produce a thousand jin?!"

Cheng Zongyang smiled to himself. ’And that’s with normal farming. If I used the rotting-flesh soil, it would be a minimum of three thousand jin per mu.’

But that wasn’t necessary, and they wouldn’t believe him if he said it anyway. After all, even his own family wouldn’t have believed such a yield if they hadn’t seen the ear of rice with their own eyes.

More importantly, not only was it time-consuming, but he also didn’t have the right conditions for it at the moment.

"Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing. Just follow my arrangements." Cheng Zongyang didn’t explain any further. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Alright then."

Li Lu nodded and didn’t ask any more questions.

Out of his trust for Cheng Zongyang, he began to have some faith in the stated rice yield. Thus, a sense of anticipation grew in his heart.

If a single mu could really produce a thousand jin, that would be... it would be...

For a moment, he didn’t know how to describe this kind of rice!

After a moment, he pointed to the people working and said:

"These people work extremely fast. They prepared all this land in just two days. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen a scene of over ten thousand people working at once! But the food consumption is also terrifyingly fast. I’m afraid our food supplies won’t last much longer. Do you have any other solutions?"

Cheng Zongyang shook his head. "No. Zhao the Seventh just told me about your methods, and they have indeed saved a lot. But we can only endure for now. There are so many people in the city. Unless we get a massive shipment of grain, there’s no short-term solution.

We’re not the County Magistrate; we can’t request grain from the Commandery City. We’re responsible for our own profits and losses here. If people from the Government Office and the Thirteen Royal Families show up, not only could the produce from our fields be burned to the ground, but even the grain we’ve invested would be a complete loss."

Seeing this, Li Lu fell silent again. There really was no other way for now.

Just then, a thought suddenly struck him. He asked Cheng Zongyang, "What about going into the Inner Mountain? We can hunt for meat there, right? Even though the Inner Mountain is full of countless poisonous creatures and is incredibly dangerous, there’s still a chance, isn’t there?"

Cheng Zongyang shook his head.

"How much could we hunt? Without a thousand head of game, how could it be enough to feed the city’s population? If you go hunt a dozen or so, that’s only enough for the Gang members to have a small bite. In exchange, we’d risk a large number of our people dying in the Inner Mountain. These people are our workforce; we can’t afford to waste them."

At this, Li Lu said no more. He truly had no solution for the food problem. If he were told to eliminate a portion of the population to reduce food expenditure, that would be easy.

Cheng Zongyang didn’t say much either, looking toward the fields.

Because they had so many hands, the medicinal material saplings and rice seedlings had already been planted. What remained was the farmers directing some people to handle other tasks.

But time was tight, and he still needed more time to get the rest of his rice seedlings out.

This was even after he had simplified the process to just digging up the seedlings and ensuring they had some soil attached.

But this all took time. After all, the amount needed for a thousand mu was staggering.

He was even thinking of processing them at night—having Ma San and the others dig up the seedlings, not worrying about whether soil was attached, simply tying them into small bundles and putting them in bamboo baskets.

Likewise, the time ahead could not be wasted, and Cheng Zongyang was also pondering how to proceed.

However, because the situation was so uncertain, he had to avoid any "what ifs" that could cause all his hard work to be for naught.

Therefore, there were many superfluous tasks he couldn’t and didn’t want to do.

All he could do was gamble on planting the rice seedlings and medicinal material saplings.

As long as any newcomer’s strength didn’t exceed the Fifth Grade, anyone who wanted to touch his property would have to see if their neck was hard enough!

Although he was about to enter the Sixth Grade, with the Wilderness World and his weapon, fighting a Fifth Grade expert would be no problem!