Homo Sapiens

Dongba.

Thanks to the Homo Sapiens Company’s full-scale entry and investment in the region, the local food crisis had begun to ease.

In Dongba’s Capital City Daka, large numbers of the poor were being absorbed into construction companies as the Homo Sapiens Company launched a massive infrastructure plan.

This massive infrastructure push was always the first project the Homo Sapiens Company arranged upon entering a new region, with the goal of providing work as a form of relief.

The wages offered by the construction companies were very low—only 50 Jin yuan a month—but they included food and lodging.

Fengrao House’s local supermarkets quickly began selling synthetic food to temporary employees at extremely low prices, subsidized through their internal employee cards.

Having just received 50 Jin yuan from her husband, Duomin hurried to a Fengrao House supermarket.

Dongba had implemented zero tariffs on Homo Sapiens Company products. Furthermore, Dongba’s proximity to Hongsawaddy made it easy for Fengrao House to transfer goods from its Hongsawaddy Branch.

As a result, the prices of products on the shelves were extremely low.

Duomin pushed a shopping cart, first buying a large bag of synthetic rice—a 50-kilogram bag cost only 5 yuan. Then, she bought a 10-liter bottle of synthetic liquid egg for 2 yuan, a 5-kilogram bag of dehydrated vegetables for 1.5 yuan, and finally, a chilled white-feathered chicken for 2.3 yuan.

Finally, she grabbed salt, curry powder, synthetic cooking oil, onions, carrots, and potatoes.

She had bought a huge pile of groceries, yet it only cost 14.4 yuan.

Duomin clutched the employee card in her hand. ’This Homo Sapiens Company card is more important than gold,’ she thought.

The relatives of other Homo Sapiens Company temporary employees were also shopping frantically. Many worried that prices would rise or that the supply of goods would run out.

After all, Dongba’s material supply had been getting worse year after year.

This was mainly because Dongba’s population had grown too much naturally, while its land was extremely limited. At the same time, Dongba’s farmland was frequently affected by natural disasters such as typhoons, tidal waves, and floods.

Furthermore, due to high-intensity cultivation in recent years, coupled with a severe lack of organic and chemical fertilizers, the organic matter content in Dongba’s soil was rapidly declining, leading to serious soil degradation.

Clearly, Dongba’s own food production could no longer sustain the needs of its 160 million people.

Dao Yulan, who had been transferred from Hongsawaddy to oversee the Dongba Branch’s economic strategy, knew she absolutely could not support small-scale farmers and farm owners. Instead, she had to do the exact opposite.

She would mobilize the Homo Sapiens Company’s vast stockpile of synthetic food to crush Dongba’s small-scale agricultural economy in one fell swoop.

Dao Yulan had run this same operation in Hongsawaddy and Siam. She knew perfectly well that propping up Dongba’s small-scale agricultural system would prevent the modernization of farming and allow conservative forces in the countryside to continue their tyranny.

’You can’t build something new without tearing down the old.’ Only by completely destroying Dongba’s small-scale economy and concentrating the entire population in cities could they increase agricultural productivity and, at the same time, suppress the local natural population growth rate.

Right now, Dao Yulan was ordering Fengrao House to dump grain and food products at low prices precisely to suppress local agricultural production, driving farmers and farm owners into bankruptcy or a state of unprofitability.

The areas surrounding Dhaka City were the first to be affected.

In less than a week, the Homo Sapiens Company’s food dumping had rendered local farming unprofitable.

In the supermarkets, the prices of agricultural products and food were very low, but the prices of industrial goods were much higher.

This price disparity would create a ”scissors gap,” a situation where farmers could sell hundreds of kilograms of rice and still not be able to afford a single piece of clothing or a pair of rubber shoes.

Meanwhile, the temporary employees working for the Homo Sapiens Company could easily buy cheap daily necessities thanks to their employee subsidies.

Of course, this created opportunities for exploitation.

For instance, temporary employees could buy discounted goods and then resell them to non-employees.

Dao Yulan was prepared for this. She ruthlessly suppressed the procurement prices of grain and agricultural products, making them completely unprofitable.

As long as agricultural products were unprofitable, temporary employees couldn’t cash in by reselling their discounted goods.

The logic was very simple.

Farmers and farm owners didn’t have Jin yuan; they only had land, agricultural products, and small amounts of precious metals.

Temporary employees, on the other hand, had small amounts of Jin yuan and access to cheap, discounted goods.

Therefore, if temporary employees sold their discounted goods to farmers and farm owners, they could only receive agricultural products, land, or small amounts of precious metals in return.

Since agricultural products were worthless at this point, and the employees couldn’t possibly eat that much food themselves, they would naturally lose interest in what the farmers had to offer.

Besides, this kind of behavior was tantamount to snatching the company’s prey, and the consequences were severe.

In a mild case, you’d lose your job. In a severe one, you’d lose your life.

As for selling grain to Tianzhu or to major grain traders like the ”ABCD” companies, that option was also shut down by the Homo Sapiens Company.

Dao Yulan had already used her connection with Yang Mengjiao to get restrictions placed on the external sale of local grain, imposing a 5,000% punitive tax on any exports.

Now, the farmers and farm owners of Dongba had only one path left: smuggling.

At that very moment, Yang Mengjiao was at the border between Dongba and Tianzhu.

She was there specifically to ”go fishing.”

With swarms of reconnaissance insects blanketing the area and a dense network of magnetic field radars, Yang Mengjiao came down hard on anyone capable of smuggling grain into Tianzhu.

Trying to smuggle right under the Homo Sapiens Company’s nose was basically like lighting a lamp in a toilet—courting death.

Coincidentally, Yang Mengjiao was also eager to eliminate these rebellious types, so she was lying in wait for them.

Meanwhile, Dao Yulan continued to regulate Dongba’s economy.

In truth, Tianzhu’s reaction to the Homo Sapiens Company’s full-scale investment in Dongba was extremely strong.

But they lacked the power. Dharma didn’t dare to challenge the Homo Sapiens Company head-on. Besides, Tianzhu could barely fend for itself at the moment, so all it could do was watch helplessly as the Homo Sapiens Company forced its investment on Dongba, seething with impotent rage.

「Meanwhile.」

America was busy harvesting its allies and paid no attention to the Homo Sapiens Company’s investment and poverty alleviation efforts in Dongba.

Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say America was willing but lacked the strength.

The other world powers were similarly preoccupied with their own problems.

With no one to stop them, the Homo Sapiens Company naturally grew even more audacious.

They not only forced Dongba to open its gates to trade and engage in comprehensive commerce with the Homo Sapiens Company... but they also exploited the food crisis to demand that Nepal accept the Homo Sapiens Company’s ”investment” and open its markets as well.

Food may seem unremarkable in normal times.

But the moment it becomes scarce in a place that cannot produce enough to be self-sufficient, food becomes a weapon.

In this world, there are people who would not bow for a meager salary, but the vast majority of ordinary people are destined to do just that.

And those regions with large populations and insufficient agricultural resources must also bow for their daily bread.

If you don’t open your markets to the Homo Sapiens Company, you can forget about getting enough food.

Tianzhu, for instance, was currently trying to tough out its food and economic crises. It could only grit its teeth and use a portion of its Gold reserves to import grain from Lucia and America in an attempt to stabilize its domestic food supply.

But international grain prices had been climbing steadily of late.

Whether Tianzhu would be able to procure 20 million tons of grain from the international market this time remained an open question.

However, Dao Yulan and Yang Mengjiao were closely monitoring Tianzhu, especially its internal grain prices and total food inventory.

Then, on October 12th, another piece of breaking news sent the entire international grain market into violent turmoil.