Transmigrated as a Stepmother: Time to Bring the Family to Prosper!-Chapter 256 - 255: The Evil in Human Nature

It’s quite easy to leave, the government officers barely asked any questions before opening a gap for the carriage to pass through.

Those wanting to get in tried to squeeze through the gap, the officers drew their swords and shouted sternly to stop them. Once Qin Yao and the group passed through, the officers quickly closed the gate, stabilizing the situation.

There were sounds of confrontation coming from behind, curses, threats, a chaotic mess.

But that had nothing to do with Qin Yao and the others.

After passing the checkpoint, the scenery along the road markedly changed, only patches of green fields could be seen. Any wild vegetables or fruits by the roadside had only bare stalks left.

Every thirty or forty meters, a small group of people could be seen sitting or lying by the roadside. There were men and women, most were young adults with children, carrying baskets or large bundles on their backs. Their clothes were dirty and disheveled, their faces sallow, and their bodies very thin.

Their entire beings were covered in dust and dirt, but their eyes lit up when they saw people, with a faint glimpse of green light that was quite frightening.

Sanlang and Si Niang were still lying in the carriage, looking at the outside scenery through the opened rear door. They were startled by such a pair of eyes and gasped.

Da Lang noticed just in time and slammed the back door shut.

Second Lang climbed to the front door and quietly reported to Qin Yao, "Mother, those people’s eyes by the roadside look so scary. Sanlang and Si Niang were just startled, but big brother has already closed the back door."

"As long as it’s closed, don’t look around." Qin Yao instructed.

Second Lang nodded to show understanding. Their mother had already told them when they met the begging villagers in town before.

Kindness is allowed, but the premise is not to threaten one’s own safety.

Those people’s eyes by the roadside are so frightening, definitely can’t let them get close!

However, as soon as the mother and son’s conversation ended, the carriage in front suddenly stopped.

"What’s going on? Why aren’t we moving?" Liu Ji loudly questioned in dissatisfaction.

Da Zhuang leaned out from beside the shaft and pointed ahead, "There are people kneeling on the road, Young Master Ding’s carriage has stopped!"

So that’s why they couldn’t move forward.

It’s fine for two carriages to run parallel on the official road, but since everyone was in a convoy, it wasn’t good to overtake the Ding family.

"What’s the situation!" Qin Yao climbed to the top of the carriage to look, and it turned out that several people were kneeling in front of the Ding family carriage, constantly kowtowing and begging for food.

The coachman’s heart softened and he completely forgot Qin Yao’s earlier advice, stopping the carriage.

Qin Yao pursed her lips, speechless from dismay.

Liu Ji turned around and saw the people who had been lying by the roadside suddenly sit up, trying to surround them, and then without giving them time to react, one grimy hand stretched over, almost touching his chest.

"Kind sir, please be generous and give us something to eat. We’ve escaped the disaster all the way here, and our grains ran out long ago. The children are crying from hunger, please have mercy on us..."

"Even what you don’t want or leftovers will do, the child cannot go hungry anymore. If there’s nothing to eat, the child will die, please have mercy on us, kind sir!"

Liu Ji, startled, hastily pushed away the reaching hands, scolding, "Get lost! Get far away! I don’t even have enough to eat myself!"

"Mother!" Si Niang’s scream came from inside the carriage, "They’re stealing our book box!"

A sharp arrow swished down from the top of the carriage, piercing through a hand reaching for the carriage trunk.

A painful scream rang out, the men who were about to grab the trunk at the back of the carriage looked up in terror, meeting Qin Yao’s cold gaze, and hurriedly turned to flee.

The rest, seeing Qin Yao unexpectedly take out a sharp weapon, retreated several steps.

Qin Yao shouted angrily forward, "Ding Shi!"

The halted carriage finally started moving again, the guards went forward to drive away the people blocking the road. Then she jumped off the carriage, picked up the dropped trunk, and fastened it back to the rear of the carriage, slapping the door to urge Liu Ji to drive.

As the carriage moved, Qin Yao returned to sit on the shaft, holding her bow and arrow, warding off those trying to surround them.

Walking in the middle, Liu Li was also shocked, not expecting that just stopping for a moment would bring so many scattered refugees from the roadside together.

Meanwhile, at the front, Ding Shi was crouching by the carriage door, scolding the coachman harshly.

The coachman knew he was wrong and drove the carriage with his head down, steering it through the kneeling people.

These people, afraid for their lives, scrambled to dodge out of the way as the carriage rushed through.

With guards driving people away on both sides, the refugees on the roadside found them hard to provoke, hurling insults, as vile as they could be.

Curses about heartlessness and cruelty, accusing the wealthy of being no better than dogshit, bullying the common folk with extreme resentment.

Ding Shi broke into a cold sweat upon hearing it, the people who had just pitifully begged him a moment ago had suddenly shown such fearsome faces. As a young man, encountering this for the first time was truly shocking.

At this moment, he finally understood why Qin Yao had advised him as she did.

Because one can hardly imagine the evil in people’s hearts.

Seeing they had guards and the ruthless Qin Yao, those people did not dare to follow. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

Qin Yao’s group traveled over ten miles before slowing down.

However, the further they got from Prefecture, the more refugees appeared on the road.

Most of the time, they lingered near a village or town, begging the local villagers for food.

With the arrival of these refugees, the vegetables in the fields and fruits on the mountains were almost entirely stolen.

To protect their properties and food, each village organized numerous people to guard the necessary roads into their settlements, wary of these refugees.

During fierce times, both sides resorted to violence. These pitiful-looking refugees, when ferocious, were no less frightening than mountain bandits.

Especially those male adults acting alone, they were more reckless than those with children and the elderly. If encountering a refugee group composed entirely of men, one must be even more vigilant.

Traveling carriages were easy targets to be intercepted and extorted for money.

Since Zijing Mansion still had food for sale, money had become the primary target for these people.

The government didn’t have enough manpower to handle these refugees from other provinces invading the region and simply turned a blind eye, letting local authorities deal with the situation.

With such an attitude from the government, the common people’s hearts hardened further, so much so that disputes over food resources within the refugees often resulted in deaths.

Liu Ji, observing along the way, no longer dared to doubt the authenticity of the news Qin Yao had gathered, and instead began to worry about the situation in their village.

"Our village won’t be surrounded by refugees like this, right?" Liu Ji anxiously looked at Qin Yao.

There’s ten thousand catties of wheat in their granary, and with no one at home to guard it now, if the wheat he’d worked so hard to transport back was stolen, it would break his heart!

Qin Yao calmly replied, "Our village should be fine. Even if something happens, I believe the young adults in our village can handle it."

"Father and big brother are both at home, they will definitely help safeguard our grains."