Volume 8, Chapter 61: Contend For The World
Time could dilute anything and cause many things to precipitate.
When the Nine Death Silkworm truly awoke and he found Zhangsun Qianxue in Changling, Ding Ning thought that he was lucky. In this world, only he had the chance to see his past life and correct his mistakes.
For many years in Changling, he had understood love and hate. He could not be in a rush. His feelings settled, from anxiousness and urgency to calm, like he had become a different person. So he rarely would show anger.
The light yellow jelly was food. Food was crucial to armies and cultivators who wanted to conquer the world. Most cultivators could not rid themselves of the need for food. The primal energies of the universe they absorbed into their bodies could not completely replace the substances provided by food, especially when the organs were regulated since birth, just like how the movements of the stars could not be rashly thrown into chaos. If the organs were out of balance, the energies inside a cultivator’s body would have major problems.
From a certain point of view, the stronger the energies in the organs, the greater the need for food. Cultivators could not eat more many days, but in a meal, they could eat the amount of several, even a dozen people. Ordinary soldiers, and some cultivators of low power were the normal army. Their food was the base. If they missed a meal, their power would be greatly reduced. Especially in many battles when the sufficient food would affect morale and spirits.
This was the reason that before troops moved, the food and gra.s.s would move first. An army had a stunning appet.i.te for grain and gra.s.s. Take for example the Qin war against the Chu. Even before winter, they had started to transport supplies to the border, they had prepared half a year ahead of time. But now, the Qin troops in the Chu borders still did not have enough food.
The food, which was small in volume but could provide enough energy and feeling of fullness for a long time, was the best of military rations. Back when the You Dynasty conquered the world, they had their black bee pills. It was a kind of pill made with special black king bee honey and many kinds of herbs. Each pill could last for two days.
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There were records that the barley powder of the Jin Dynasty was the same. The powder was made from a kind of barley that was then ground into powder. It was very convenient to carry in bags. Also, just a little water was needed to create a large bowl that easily filled the belly. The Jin Dynasty cavalry always appeared to be unburdened, moving like the wind, but were able to fight in the wilderness for months without losing their combat power because they had such good rations.
Ding Ning had never seen the black bee pill of the You Dynasty, but he had seen the barley powder of the Jin Dynasty, because while not a lot of the rations had been produced after the Jin were destroyed, there were some left. So he was certain that the military rations of the Jin Dynasty were far from the jelly in front of him. This light yellow jelly was the legendary “mermaid jelly.”
Many books in the cultivation world said that there were “mer” in the oceans, half human, half fish. After a long time of absorbing the essence of the moon and sun, they would transform into humans.
But in reality “mermaid jelly” had nothing to do with these “mer”. The raw material was a kind of large muscle from deep into the ocean. Such mussels were called “honey mussels.” They were many meters wide. When their flesh was processed simply, and some salt was added, they would naturally form jelly.
The jelly contained stunning beneficial substances, and just a few bites were enough to fulfill a normal person’s food needs for several days. The fragrance was also refreshing to a person’s mind, and during winter, they had the effect of fending off the cold through a slight heating effect. These were naturally the best military rations.
In the past when the Qin Dynasty fought the Han, Zhao and Wei, the Qin Dynasty had not been as rich as now. In many battles, they had only lasted through the power and the spirit of the cultivators and the soldiers.
In many battles against the Zhao and Wei, there had been times when armies of a hundred thousand or more died in battle because of a lack of food. In some long battles, there were many tragedies of cutting each other’s flesh to eat.
The Ba Mountain Sword Field had been commanders of those battles back then. Ding Ning naturally knew how hard those battles had been back then. The mer jelly had once appeared from some workshops of the common people, very few in quant.i.ty. Jiaodong Commandery had never provided for the Qin military.
The reason being honey mussels were rare, and hard to catch from the deep ocean. The information given to everyone was that such things could not appear in large quant.i.ties. But how much was stored in this warehouse?
At this time, they were piled up in mountains on the shelves. The quant.i.ty was likely enough to support hundreds of thousands of troops to fight for a long time. Jiaodong Commandery had prepared military rations in order to contend for the world. Even if all of their lands encountered a natural disaster for a time and there was no harvest at all, such supplies were enough for them to win a long and protracted battle. They could even create some disasters so that the enemy would lose their supplies, and they could win based on the things in the warehouse!
If the mer jelly, able to be stored for long periods of time, could be provided to the Qin militaries, then back when fighting the three dynasties, regardless of which side they were on, how many less Qin people would have died?
Ding Ning had experienced many battles himself, and seen many people fall down and die in battle. This was the source of his anger.
“We are the ones to charge and die, they keep the good things for themselves, and in the end, they get the fruits.” Lin Zhujiu laughed. He had also experienced those things, so while he did not show much anger, his laugh was exceptionally cold. “But will there always be such good things in the world?”
“They will have to pay what they owe in the end.” Zhang Shiwu took a deep breath. He suddenly wanted to drink alcohol and then run wildly because he thought of a friend from many years ago who liked to drink. And that friend had fought to the death along with the entire army at a pa.s.s because they lacked rations.
“What else is there?” Ding Ning said and walked to the remaining warehouse.
Tools, medicine, beasts, wealth, and even military rations had been prepared, that did not need special troops and horses to transport. Then to Jiaodong Commandery, what else did they lack to contend for the world?
The last two warehouses were close together. Ding Ning waved his wand and then an invisible force formed in front of him, pushing open the doors.
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