To prevent any slacking off, Fang Zichen assigned ten soldiers to supervise.
These ten soldiers had gone with Fang Zichen on the campaign to wipe out the bandits, so they knew very well that this bunch were vicious, heartless criminals who had done every evil under the sun. They were merciless. Like reincarnations of the stingiest landlords, they gave the convicts nothing but wild-greens steamed buns each day, and even their trips to the latrine were strictly timed. If anyone took longer than the allotted time, they were forced to hold it in—and if they couldn't, they got a beating.
But they were still short-handed. Every workshop in the factory needed people, and the limestone had to be quarried and hauled back to the factory. There wasn't a single ox in the village, so it all had to be carried by manpower.
So the soldiers went down to the villages again.
"Do you want work? Do you want to earn money?"
Of course they did.
"Then come work at our cement factory! Nine copper coins a day."
Everyone knew the factory was built by the government. But government officials were all bad. No way—they weren't going.
The men were about to shake their heads when someone rushed over.
"Officer, I'll go! I'll go!"
"Tieniu, are you crazy? You've got nothing better to do than work for free?"
"You're the crazy one. That cement factory was built by the prefect. He's a good official. I'm happy to work for him."
"Oh, Tieniu, since when did you learn to tell jokes?"
"You! All you do is hang around Widow Hua's place every single day. You don't know a thing about what's really going on."
That man fell silent and watched coldly as Tieniu led a group to sign up.
He's so desperate for money he'd work for those animal officials. Pah! No backbone.
Tieniu watched him head off toward Widow Hua's house again and paid him no mind.
A factory only had so many spots—first come, first served. That man would regret it.
Thirteen men from the village signed up, all of them close to Tieniu. Tieniu had connections in town and got news fast. He said the new prefect was a good man, and that this work was worth doing. Everyone was still half-doubting, but since Tieniu had asked them personally, they felt they owed him that much respect—so they went along.
If the officials didn't pay them in the end, well—it was just one day of free labor. No big loss.
A few others saw Tieniu sign up and wanted to join too, but their families held them back.
---
The next evening, the whole village gathered at the entrance of the village, waiting.
From a distance, they spotted Tieniu and his group walking back, covered in gray dust, but every single one of them was beaming.
There was no need to ask anymore.
The officials must have paid them—otherwise Tieniu wouldn't be grinning like such a fool.
But some still refused to believe it—until everyone pulled out their wages.
Nine copper coins. A palm full of copper coins.
Oh, my goodness!
Nine copper coins a day—that was excellent pay. Such wages were hard to find anywhere else.
And it was close to the village too. No need to travel far away.
One man's eyes went wide. "No—no way. These coins must be fake!" He couldn't bring himself to believe it. He popped a coin into his mouth and bit down. "Pwah!" he declared with conviction: "These are fake."
Tieniu was furious. "What do you mean they're fake?"
"This coin stinks! It doesn't have that nice copper smell!"
Before Tieniu could say anything, the others burst out laughing.
"Is it kind of like foot odor?"
"Yeah! I couldn't quite place it, but now that you mention it, it does smell a bit like sweaty feet. You've been scammed—these coins must be made out of some nasty stuff."
"Don't talk nonsense. This coin just fell into my shoe earlier."
"..."
---
The next morning, Li Yisheng had just arrived at the factory gate when he saw a huge crowd of people waiting outside.
Nobody knew exactly who Li Yisheng was, but he was running this big factory, and even the soldiers took orders from him—so he must have been someone important.
No one dared swarm him all at once.
"Officer."
"Yes? What is it?"
"Nothing, nothing... we just wanted to ask—are you still hiring?"
"No, we're full."
Everyone was deeply disappointed. Some women's eyes turned red on the spot, and they started complaining.
"That day I told you to go sign up, but you refused. You said it was a scam, called me an ignorant woman who believed anything. And now look—the jobs are gone."
Tieniu had said this wasn't short-term work!
And it made sense—if they were only going to work for a few months, they wouldn't have gone to all that trouble to build a whole factory.
A factory with brick walls and tiled roofs—the villagers looked at it with envy.
Everyone started bickering and blaming each other.
Then the men from the neighboring village showed up to start their shift, and the onlookers watched with burning envy.
Wait—
Something wasn't right.
Several women and fulangs walked toward the factory.
"You hire women too?"
The way they asked sounded wrong. Li Yisheng's eyes turned cold. "Yes, we do."
The people from this village never went anywhere, so they had no idea. They just assumed the new prefect was another bad one. On hiring day, hardly anyone had signed up. It was only the villagers from Xiaya Village—so poor that they couldn't resist the lure of nine copper coins a day—who had shown up.
The women and fulangs who were now stepping forward had lost their husbands and sons when their families couldn't pay taxes, and the men were taken away and never returned. They resented the officials too, of course. But when they were poor, when there was nothing to eat at home, they had to lower their heads.
"Officer." They were so frightened they didn't dare look up, speaking in barely audible voices: "C-can we sign up too? We can do any kind of work."
The women and fulangs in the village worked hard every single day. They had plenty of strength—no less than the men. And the cement factory wasn't all heavy labor. Besides, Fang Zichen had given clear instructions earlier: Hire anyone who's able-bodied, hardworking, and willing—regardless of gender.
"Yes, you can. What are your names?" The women trembled, their breathing quick and shallow—the soldiers were afraid they might pass out on the spot. So they softened their tone: "But let me make this clear first—our cement factory is in Daping Village, which is quite a distance from your village."
"That's fine, that's fine—we don't mind the distance."
They were only afraid of having no work.
After signing up, the women and fulangs went home overjoyed. When their in-laws heard the news, they weren't worried that the officials might be up to something dirty or trying to abduct their daughters-in-law.
There was no reason for that. If they wanted to kidnap people, they'd just come straight to the door—that's exactly how the previous officials had taken away their sons. And frankly, to be blunt, their daughters-in-law weren't particularly good-looking anyway. Years of hard labor had left them thin and dark-skinned. If they had been laid in a pile of charcoal and no one opened their eyes, they wouldn't even have been found—they were perfectly safe.
Still, there were warnings to give.
"Stick with the other villagers. Don't wander off with strangers, understand? And if the work is too much, just come home. Your life matters more than anything."
The daughter-in-law nodded. "Mother-in-law, I understand."
The women and fulangs had never gone out to work before. Well before dawn, more than a dozen of them set off together, walking toward Daping Village.
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