Jiang Wang wasn’t clear about other places, but at least within the Jiacheng city area, the news of Shopkeeper Qian’s escape was only spreading in a small circle. The Four Seas Merchant Alliance’s “work” here was still continuing.

It mainly relied on the warehouses established in various places when they first arrived.

Outside of Qingyang Town, the so-called “work” was simply the local warehouse managers trying to sell these materials at high prices without starving too many people. Even if the Yang country was weakening, the official government had a bottom line: they couldn’t let the citizens starve to death.

The money that could be taken was taken away by Shopkeeper Qian, leaving behind a large amount of supplies stockpiled in warehouses across the land.

Ironically, the new City Lord of Jiacheng was still hesitating about how to respond and didn’t take over the supplies forcefully at the first moment. After all, the other party was the Four Seas Merchant Alliance from Qi. Like many officials in Yang, he still harbored illusions about Qi.

After being a dog for so many years, he had, in many ways, begun to see himself as the master.

The new City Lord of Jiacheng was named Shi Jing. He was over fifty years old and had wasted many years. The reason he was able to pick up the position of City Lord of Jiacheng was purely due to another connection.

He was actually the adopted son of the fourth concubine of the Rizhao Prefect!

No one knew how he managed to latch on.

In any case, he became the adopted son of the Rizhao Prefect. With this “relative” relationship, he was able to take office smoothly.

In the current chaotic Yang government, no one would care about such things anymore.

At least in Jiacheng, there was no shortage of supplies. At the beginning of the disaster relief efforts, the Four Seas Merchant Alliance had mobilized a large amount of materials and stockpiled them in various places, thanks to their strong organizational ability.

As you could see in Qingyang Town, the bald-headed guard Chen Yong and the others had left, but the remaining warehouse was still supporting the needs of tens of thousands of townspeople.

On July 27th, under the operation of Shopkeeper Qian, resources were continuously being transferred to Qingyang Town.

On July 28th, the new City Lord of Jiacheng seemed to have woken up from a dream and banned the circulation of materials throughout the city area. In the name of the City Lord’s Mansion, he took over all the materials for dispatch.

As for the people of the Four Seas Merchant Alliance, except for those who ran away, the rest were arrested by him, severely tortured, and interrogated for the whereabouts of the money.

However, it was no longer important to Jiang Wang. The material warehouse in Qingyang Town was already full. It was enough to supply the people of Qingyang Town for at least three months.

No matter what the Qi army commander was thinking, the war couldn’t possibly drag on until November.

By July 29th, the news of the Qi army blockading the border had spread completely.

In the official letter, the Qi side expressed that it was still to help Yang block the mutated rat plague and maintain the safety of the Eastern Region.

Apart from not allowing people to enter or leave, they seemed to have no plans to fight at all. Of course, they also gave Yang enough time to organize their army—the confidence they showed was especially despairing.

The people of Yang knew very well that they no longer had a truly combat-capable strong army. Not to mention the last strong army that the previous ruler had buried.

Even just in recent years, following the Qi army on expeditions, the repeated losses in various wars did not bring back soldiers honed by experience, but only a large amount of financial rewards from Qi.

Yang seemed to be getting richer and richer, and the treasury was becoming more and more abundant, but the military strength was declining again and again.

This was a weakening like boiling a frog in warm water. Unfortunately, it was not until the army blockaded the country that many people realized this.

Yang Jiande was very clear about it, but precisely because he saw through it, he couldn’t refuse. The only result of refusal was to accelerate the process of national destruction.

So later, he gradually handed over power and focused on cultivation. On the one hand, he had no hope for national affairs and pinned his hopes on individual transcendent strength. On the other hand, it was also a kind of escape.

It was also because Yang was so weak that Yang Jiande didn’t immediately gather troops to fight to the death with the Qi army after killing the crown prince, but instead begged for surrender in humble words, even at the expense of the ruler’s face, to try to lure Chongxuan Chuliang to Zhaohneg City and surround him and kill him.

If he could make the Fierce Butcher fall, it would undoubtedly greatly boost the morale of the entire Yang country. Yang Jiande himself could also buy some time to maneuver and transfer. He could seek support, win over allies, or create contradictions within the Qi people… In short, it was the only solution he could think of in the current situation.

But Chongxuan Chuliang simply ignored him, sitting firmly in the commander’s tent, unmoved. Although he didn’t seem as brave as he used to be, it made people feel even more desperate.

Let’s not talk about the big picture. Just look at Rizhao Prefecture.

While the people of Yang were panicking everywhere, Song Guang, the Rizhao Prefect who was on the verge of death, came up with another “brilliant move.”

He actually forcibly requisitioned materials from various cities under his rule, requiring each place to keep no more than seven days’ worth of food and hand them over to the prefectural government for unified allocation, in order to stabilize the people in the prefecture by strictly controlling food.

He also set a quota to collect a huge amount of money, saying that it was to raise troops to protect the land. However, since it had not been approved by the Yang court and there was no official name, it was only privately called the “National Salvation Tax.”

This series of actions was not only dazzling, but simply blinding and deafening.

Just in terms of unified allocation of food, the difficulty of allocating materials from each city in the name of the City Lord’s Mansion and allocating materials from the entire prefecture in the name of the Prefectural Mansion was not at the same level at all. It was completely abandoning the easy for the difficult, wasting manpower.

Song Guang was not stupid.

How could Song Guang, who was able to become a local prefect, be a fool with only strength?

Although many of his decisions seemed stupid at this point in time when the Yang country was swaying.

But this kind of “stupidity” was relative to Yang. For himself, it was an extremely wise decision.

If Yang could rise again, he would also have stabilized the situation.

If Yang had no tomorrow, he would have grasped the resources. To put it bluntly, he could sell them for a good price.

However, in Jiang Wang’s position, the feeling was not so comfortable.

Because the requisition document from the Jiacheng City Lord’s Mansion had been issued to Qingyang Town.

Jiang Wang of course ignored it and tore it to pieces on the spot.

He himself was not wealthy and could not fill the old thief Rizhao Prefect’s insatiable desire. As for the materials stockpiled in Qingyang Town, they were the lives of more than 30,000 people in the town, so he could not let go of them.

But what he didn’t expect was…

Just one day later, Shi Jing, the new City Lord of Jiacheng, actually mobilized the city guards and sent troops to Qingyang Town!!

Outside Qingyang Town, the army was in formation.

Before the generals drew their swords, the killing intent had already disturbed the clouds.

The Jiacheng city guards were fully manned with ten thousand people. The Xi family had completely withdrawn from Yang, and some middle and high-level generals had left, but the army could not be taken away. Although some talents were lost, the overall structure was still there.

No matter how much Shi Jing relied on his connections to get his position, he also knew the importance of military power. Therefore, the first thing he did after taking office was to control the army, and he had indeed achieved results.

When his adoptive father Song Guang gave an order, he was the most active among the city lords.

However, the entire Jiacheng city area was a severely affected area of the rat plague and had also experienced the withdrawal of the Xi family and the harvesting of the Four Seas Merchant Alliance, so it was really not wealthy. He had scraped the ground clean.

He led the army to Qingyang Town, firstly to kill the monkey to warn the chickens and establish the authority of the new City Lord. Secondly, he had received reliable information that Shopkeeper Qian of the Four Seas Merchant Alliance had fled with a large amount of money and was hiding in Qingyang Town.

Of course, he wouldn’t not know about Jiang Wang’s forceful killing of Xi Munan.

To be on the safe side, he had brought a full five thousand city guards this time. All of them were elites.

Except for the necessary garrison troops to maintain order in various parts of the city area, he had almost dispatched all of them. Not to mention, he had also used personal connections to invite two peak Tenglong Realm experts from the prefectural government to join the army.

With all the preparations, he only sought to win the battle in one fell swoop and be foolproof!