Cultivation Simulator: Starting From The Empress' Palace

When Chen Mo was studying in the past,

his teacher once told them that ancient disaster relief methods were mostly as follows.

First is the direct distribution of silver coins for the disaster victims to buy grain themselves.

There is also an implicit form of relief by recruiting hungry people to construct hydraulic projects, called work relief, which both aids the disaster victims and alleviates the burden on the state.

Once the disaster situation stabilizes, the state would conditionally lend seeds, tools, and even fields to the victims to help them resume production and become self-sufficient, often exempting taxes for several years in the affected areas.

However, this is what the teacher said, but how it was implemented in practice was not taught to him.

Chen Mo also did not understand this.

Therefore, he thought of recruiting some people with government experience. Since they had been in officialdom, they knew a little and could help him manage.

Chen Mo only needed to be responsible for specific decision-making.

In the end, Chen Mo recruited six people.

Four of them were ordinary minor officials who had worked at the county government office catching people, knowing the laws of daily life.

Chen Mo assigned them to the east, west, south, and north of the city as heads of the stewards, to prevent riots among the refugees at the relief stations.

The other two, one named Shen Tong, had managed case files.

Another, the scholar Fu Bi, had written petitions.

Chen Mo assigned a few soldiers to the two of them to restore the county government office of Celestial River City to its former functions and deal with some crimes.

After the great chaos, there would definitely be people committing crimes, so Chen Mo planned to set up a temporary structure for the county government office of Celestial River and let them handle these matters.

After explaining all these matters,

the sky had already darkened.

Chen Mo planned to stay overnight at the Luo Mansion, letting his subordinates clean up a room for him.

At this moment, Luo Zhen found Chen Mo, saying she had a secret to tell him.

”Zhen’Er, what’s wrong?” Chen Mo held Luo Zhen in his arms, feeling a little ticklish in his heart, imagining various positions for experimentation later.

The young man’s blood was particularly vigorous, especially as Chen Mo practiced a cultivation technique that stimulated fire energy, having a great beauty beside him made him crave endless revelry if possible.

No wonder there is that poem.

”The spring night is short with the sun rising high, henceforth the king neglects the morning court.”

And Chen Mo happened to be such a... amorous person.

While holding her, he didn’t mind the dirt applied on Luo Zhen’s face, directly kissing her red lips, while his restless hands ventured into her linen clothes...

”Someone’s here.” Luo Zhen pushed Chen Mo forcefully, her face flushing red.

”It’s okay... Without my order, they won’t come over.”

Chen Mo watched the distant silhouettes, who were patrolling the Luo Mansion. Moreover, it was dark, and there were no lights around, so how could anyone see them?

Upon hearing this, Luo Zhen’s heart raced, feeling both a thrill of anticipation and an inexplicable nervousness and excitement, as they were outside. Simultaneously, there was a sense of secret joy.

At least her body could attract him.

Luo Zhen avoided Chen Mo’s kiss, then bashfully said, ”Master, at night... I’ll give you a good... okay? I have something to tell you now.”

Stopping his actions, Chen Mo pinched Luo Zhen’s cheek and released her: ”Go ahead.”

”Follow me.” Luo Zhen led the way in front.

Chen Mo was stunned for a moment, then followed behind.

The Luo Mansion was large, with a hint of Suzhou garden style. There were several courtyards, though they were all now ruined beyond recognition.

Luo Zhen took Chen Mo to the backyard of the Luo Mansion.

It was pitch dark here, with the trees around blocking out the moonlight.

Carefully, Luo Zhen moved forward.

Chen Mo took a step forward, grabbed her hand, then bent down to pick up a fallen lantern by the side, lighting the candle inside.

The dim yellow light shone out from the lantern, illuminating the place with some light.

”So dark. If you hurt yourself, I’d feel sorry.” Chen Mo held the lantern to provide light, then said, ”Tell me, what are you looking for? I’ll help you find it.”

Luo Zhen was startled, then her face showed a warm smile as she also held Chen Mo’s hand in return, softly saying:

”Having too much money will attract attention. So each time revenue comes in, I take some and change it into gold ingots, then melt them into gold bricks, burying them in a place only I know.

If we were to fall one day, these gold bricks could help us rise again.”

After speaking, taking advantage of the light, Luo Zhen found the room she once lived in and walked over.

Inside the room, almost everything movable had been taken away, and what couldn’t be moved had been smashed.

Luo Zhen walked to the doorway and let go of Chen Mo’s hand.

Then, with her back to the door,

she walked six steps forward and then thirteen steps to the left. Just as Chen Mo felt puzzled, Luo Zhen said, ”It should be here.”

Luo Zhen pointed to the ground under her feet.

”Hmm?” Chen Mo walked over.

Luo Zhen quickly explained: ”June 13th is my birthday. So the place where I buried the gold bricks is in my room, six steps forward and thirteen steps to the left.”

”Well done.” Chen Mo used True Qi to conjure a shovel, then asked Luo Zhen to step aside and said, ”How deep did you bury them?”

”Three feet,” Luo Zhen replied.

Then Chen Mo began to dig.

Soon, as he dug up a hard iron box, Chen Mo was delighted: ”Found it.”

”Seems it’s still here.” Luo Zhen also let out a sigh of relief.

Although only she knew the location, there were some people serving her at the time, and with many eyes, it was inevitable some might have seen it, potentially leaking the information.

Now it seemed Luo Zhen was overly worried.

Chen Mo lifted the iron box from the soil and had Luo Zhen hold the lantern while he opened the box.

Inside were a total of one hundred and thirty-seven gold bricks, and according to Luo Zhen, each weighed a jin.

In the Great Song Dynasty, a jin was sixteen liang.

One liang of gold equaled ten liang of patterned silver.

After conversion, it was roughly over twenty thousand liang.

For Chen Mo, who needed sixty-four thousand liang just to simulate a recharge once now, twenty thousand liang was merely a small sum.

Therefore, Chen Mo’s face did not show an expression of great joy.

”Master, are you not pleased?”

At the moment when the iron box was brought out, Luo Zhen was closely watching Chen Mo’s expression, hoping to see his excitement, as she sought to surprise him.

Over twenty thousand liang was a massive fortune for a civilian.

An ordinary person couldn’t earn that much in a lifetime.

”I’m happy, who said I’m not?”

”But I don’t see you excited at all.”

”It’s just small money, why should I be excited?”

”Over twenty thousand liang, small money?” Luo Zhen’s expression stiffened.

...

Though over twenty thousand liang was small money to Chen Mo, it could be used to accomplish many things.

Chen Mo called Gao Zheng and instructed him to buy several maids and a cook.

He allowed a higher price to be offered.

Though in these times, human lives were worth little.