Chapter 1911: Chapter 1744: Finding a Livelihood for the Criminal Syndicate (Part 2)

"However, it’s not that his abilities have reached their limit, but rather he doesn’t want to continue. It’s very difficult for Zichuan to do one thing for a long time; having him stay quietly in one place to do something is extremely challenging. The fact that he managed to talk all day today is quite rare." Guo Jia suddenly spoke up in response to the others’ glances.

Xun Yu, who had already predicted this, remained unfazed upon hearing it, while the others showed some signs of surprise. After all, if he’d reached his limit previously, it would have been terrifying enough, but if it was simply that he couldn’t sit still, then it was exceedingly frightening.

Just at that moment, Chen Xi suddenly ran back in from outside, and instantly a group of people stared at him with a strange expression.

"Zichuan, have you decided on something else to talk about?" Xun Yu cleared his throat twice, then looked towards Chen Xi and asked,

"I’d rather die than continue; I’m almost exhausted. Aren’t you all tired from sitting here all day?" Chen Xi asked, pursing his lips.

"Not tired." Xun Yu replied with an expression of dissatisfaction.

"I am tired." Chen Xi replied, grinning, indicating he definitely wasn’t willing to continue.

"If you’re tired and even ran off, why did you come back?" Zhou Yu asked curiously, "Shouldn’t you be out taking a stroll?"

"Oh, I forgot to mention something important earlier. You all had me going back and forth, and I completely forgot. I remembered when I saw someone digging outside." Chen Xi straightened his face, no longer joking around.

The civil officials, seeing Chen Xi’s serious expression, did not bring up previous matters.

"What’s the matter?" Xun Yu asked.

"It’s like this: I need you to apprehend all the Banshan Taoists and Mountain-moving Warriors within your jurisdictions and bring them over to me. I have a use for them." Chen Xi addressed the civil officials.

"Tomb robbers?" Xun Yu thought for a moment, nodding, "No problem. I’ll apprehend them all and send them over, although these people tend to hide quite well. I can’t guarantee I’ll catch them all."

"No problem on my end either; I’ll send them over soon." Zhou Yu replied calmly, understanding that the government would deal with such minor thieves, especially in this era of no human rights, apprehending them wouldn’t take much time.

"Oh, thank you very much. Wen He, please also apprehend the tomb robbers on our side; I have a use for them." Chen Xi said to Jia Xu.

"Tomb robbers?" Jia Xu pondered silently for a moment, then nodded.

In reality, Chen Xi had wanted to capture tomb robbers more than once or twice, but he never had the time. This time, he decided to put the matter on the agenda, intending to give these people a new background.

Compared to the skill of tomb-robbing, the underground earthwork is far simpler. After all, Chen Xi had wanted to build a sewer more than once or twice.

Most cities in this era lacked such infrastructure; of course, Chang’an had it, being the capital it paid attention to such details. But among all the cities in the Central Plains, only about ten had sewers, and two of those were newly built.

Without sewers, sanitation efforts were all in vain. The reason the emperor’s travels included laying yellow earth on paths and sprinkling clean water on streets came down to simply avoiding disgust.

Now that the cities are built, there are two choices for creating a sewer system: either dig directly in the city, creating pits and hollows that are then refilled.

This scale of work is nearly equivalent to tearing down an entire city once. Chen Xi found that doing so once was not as useful as what Fa Zheng did as Prime Minister of Qi State: raze the old city of Linzi and construct a whole new one beside it, achieving everything in one step, with not only a sewer but also an underground warehouse.

However, calculating the costs made Chen Xi promptly discard the idea. Just calculating the major cities within the Central Plains amounted to over two hundred. Razing and rebuilding them would certainly be satisfying, but constructing New Cities freely would cost over ten billion coins.

In short, with no funds, the plan was scrapped. Comprehensive restructuring would take five to six years and an additional four to five trillion coins, involving the labor of over a million people.

He decisively gave up; spending money like this wasn’t feasible. Apart from Jing-Xiang, Luoyang, and a few select cities worthy of such effort and costs, Chen Xi wouldn’t consider any others.

However, sanitation couldn’t be ignored. Continual sewage in cities was quite problematic, affecting aesthetics could be dismissed, but disease transmission was common, with treatment costs involved, and also hindered Chen Xi’s use of labor, reducing its lifespan.

Thus, sanitation was imperative, and construction of sewers, public baths, toilets, and the like was essential. However, without demolishing cities and reconstructing main roads, Chen Xi couldn’t think of many solutions.

Choosing the optimal method from available options was underground construction, a project with significant difficulty. After all, not every city is in the North, and unlike battlefields, ancient cities all had nearby water sources, risking collapses if dug improperly.

Therefore, Chen Xi needed specialists, and in this era, tomb robbers were considered specialists in this aspect.

During the attack on Yuzhou, a group of tomb robbers dug a temporary tunnel in a matter of days, even in such water-rich areas, so Chen Xi believed that with professional equipment and official funding, opening sewer systems for each city should be manageable for these experts.

It’s challenging, but it has to be done; if it goes wrong and leads to fatalities, they can only be considered unlucky. Anyway, in some respects, tomb robbers in this era were sure to be obliterated upon capture.

If excavating underground passages results in an accident and fatalities, Chen Xi would certainly have no sense of guilt; such deaths would be regarded as deserved. Survival would indicate heaven’s mercy, so they should diligently dig, and atone for their misdeeds; if not capital crimes, then get to work quickly.

Overall, Chen Xi required a large number of tomb robbers. Given the current situation in the Central Plains, he needed at least fifty thousand tomb robbers to barely complete the sewer systems in major cities within five years. Though it’s uncertain if there are still so many tomb robbers in the Central Plains. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

Letting ordinary people do this work would be difficult for Chen Xi; he hesitated due to compassion on one hand and incapability on the other.

In semi-arid areas north of Youzhou, underground tunnel excavation is feasible; in the Central Plains, a single wrong dig could lead to water infiltration, considering how many imperial mausoleum excavations suffered from such issues, one can understand the pitfalls.

Moreover, with cities above, water infiltration during excavation is detrimental, a collapse above risks total ruin. Such tasks need professional expertise, though Chen Xi estimated even skilled tomb robbers would face some degree of collapse among the over two hundred cities; one need not look further than the imperial mausoleums for examples of such professionals experiencing collapses.

"By the way, could you also help find some experts in underground earthwork?" Chen Xi continued to instruct, with the three nodding without much thought.

"Hmm, do any of you know of direct descendants from the geomancer, land appraisal, or Yin and Yang families?" Chen Xi asked.

"Regarding these three families, very few pure descendants exist now; it’s been many years since I’ve seen them." Chen Qun replied, "However, Lelang Commandery should have geomancer heirs, Nanyang’s Xuu Family likely has Yin and Yang successors, as for those inheriting the land appraisal branch of geomancers..."

Chen Qun stopped mid-sentence, appearing thoughtful, but Chen Xi heard Chen Qun’s voice transmission, "The land appraisal family was wiped out. They have records of China’s mountain, river, and mineral distributions; the Chen Family took advantage during the last upheaval to defeat them, and the scrolls are kept within the family."

"You should seek out Weishuo for such matters; he has friends all over the world." Jia Xu nodded towards Chen Xi and said.