Chapter 382 - 279: Everyone Is a Talent

Chapter 382: Chapter 279: Everyone Is a Talent

The newly acquired Void Stone was completely empty. It was perfect for storing grain.

Tang Wen scanned its interior with his Spiritual Power. The space inside was comparable to a three-story building.

It seemed a little small for a granary.

But storing grain was all about volume.

The space of a three-story building, by a rough estimate, was about a thousand cubic meters.

The main grain in the Northwest Land was Maize. About one cubic meter could fill a large vat, holding up to 1,500 jin.

To truly fill the Void Stone would require over 1.5 million jin.

It couldn’t compare to the granaries from Tang Wen’s past life, which could easily hold millions of tons.

Still, it was enough to feed everyone in Flame Camp for more than a year.

In mid-flight, Hu Qi asked doubtfully, "You’re going to raid the Huang Family’s granary now.

When they match up the timing, the Huang Family will definitely think you did it.

And then they’ll realize you care a great deal about that small camp in the north.

Aren’t you afraid of the Huang Family discovering this?"

Tang Wen nodded. "Of course I am. That’s why I need to think of a clever plan."

"What kind of plan?"

"Haven’t thought of one yet."

Hu Qi: "..."

The Three-headed White Tiger galloped onward.

It headed southeast.

According to the map, a few of the Huang Family’s production camps were located there.

Before long, a series of black dots appeared on the distant horizon.

As they drew closer, each black dot resolved into a patch of farmland.

Lush green seedlings grew in the fields.

Amidst the farmlands of varying sizes was a lake spanning several li.

The lake water flowed into the surrounding fields through a crisscrossing network of canals.

Even though it was winter, the off-season for farming, people could still be seen everywhere in the fields, pulling weeds.

After turning invisible, Tang Wen drifted down with the White Tiger and observed the laboring peasants.

They were sallow and emaciated, yet their spirits seemed reasonably high. But when a gust of wind blew past, they shivered, their thin, tattered clothes offering no protection.

Hu Qi’s Spiritual Power scanned the area, guiding Tang Wen to the entrance of a cave.

In a sheltered spot before the cave entrance, a few Guards were drinking hot tea, shouting loudly as they shook dice.

Their leader was an Extraordinary.

Using an Extraordinary to guard a granary that was usually uneventful showed just how seriously they took it.

Following a mountain path, he arrived at the granary’s rear entrance, where several Guards were dozing off around a stove.

With his Stealth Technique active, Tang Wen slipped into the cave.

Whoa!

The moment he stepped inside, he was taken aback.

Towering stone walls formed massive cylinders.

Looking up, he saw they were at least five meters high.

Inside the cylinders, Maize was piled up like mountains, with peaks forming at the top.

’Has the entire mountain been hollowed out?’

Tang Wen strode deeper inside.

’One, two... I’ve counted all the way to seventy, and there are still more.’

He stopped and approached a small hut that suddenly appeared before the cave wall.

"How many taels of silver did you get this time?" a slick voice asked.

"How many times have I told you! Stop prying. Just take your share! If you don’t want to die, keep your mouth shut!" another man’s voice replied coldly.

Footsteps sounded, and a middle-aged man pushed the door open and walked out.

He was dressed in black, with a neat and tidy appearance.

’He looks like he should be the Grain Storekeeper.’

Intuition told Tang Wen that this was the man with the cold voice.

A little while later, the other man sauntered out.

Standing at the entrance and staring at the countless stores of grain, he muttered under his breath, "I do all this work, and they only give me three taels of silver! But they take several thousand jin of grain from the granary I’m in charge of."

What followed was a stream of curses.

Tang Wen followed him as he left and watched him gamble and carouse with women.

When he returned home late at night, his wife complained that he was bringing home less and less money. They hadn’t had any meat for days, and their son was still studying martial arts.

The man grew annoyed and gave his wife two hard slaps, silencing the room.

Next, the White Tiger followed a scent, leading Tang Wen to another, rather elegant, standalone courtyard.

This was the home of the cold-voiced Grain Storekeeper.

Sounds occasionally drifted from the courtyard, but looking up, the surrounding windows were all dark.

Before Tang Wen could get close, the dogs in the courtyard began to bark furiously.

’They sound like Low-level Exotic Beasts—Mountain Patrol Dogs.’

He proceeded with Invisibility and made his way to the third floor.

Inside, candles burned brightly, casting a brilliant glow.

Three men and three women sat at a crimson-purple round table, drinking and talking. The affected laughter of women could be heard from time to time.

Tang Wen listened for a while and understood the scheme they were running.

He figured out the identities of the three men. One was the granary’s storekeeper, responsible for inspections and inventory checks—the man with the cold voice.

The man in the middle was the Guard Commander for the granary’s rear entrance.

He was a Second-class Martial Artist.

The other man was a merchant who spoke of nothing but the price of rice, meat, and grain:

"The camp next door is pulling off an even bigger operation than we are! Their Guard Commander is nothing but a roadside thug compared to you two. But he took advantage of the surge in grain prices this year and has already taken five concubines! Five of them! One pair is even an aunt and her niece. They were so stunning, I almost couldn’t tear myself away."

Tang Wen’s interest was piqued by the neighboring camp. He memorized the men’s faces and led the White Tiger to the camp several hundred li away.

Here, too, were endless fields.

But there were no mountains. The granaries were brick and stone houses concentrated in a few sprawling courtyards, all surrounded by high walls.

On the granary doors, a seal of white paper with red characters read: "Granary Restricted Area. Opening without authorization means death."

The White Tigers yawned, bored.

Tang Wen didn’t have time to investigate them one by one either.

Looking down from the sky, he spotted the three largest courtyards in the camp and used Instant Teleportation to go there directly.

The one on the left had twenty to thirty rooms of various sizes, all dark.

Patrols occasionally passed by in the dead of night.

In the middle courtyard, lights flickered. An old master was enjoying himself, embracing his beautiful wife and concubines while watching singers and dancers, drinking and making merry.