Chapter 504

In just ten short days, Long Gu had aged significantly. He had not been idle; over these ten days, he had tried numerous ways to handle the crisis. For instance, he forcibly requisitioned grain from commoners who still had stores, intending to distribute it uniformly. Yet this move only enraged the citizens who had spent their hard-earned money on grain—why should the provisions they bought with their own cash be shared equally with others? It was not just the buyers who were unhappy; even those who had bought nothing were dissatisfied. The uniformly distributed rations were so meager that boiling them into porridge felt like drinking water; in the end, a large family would receive a mere handful of grain, which was far from enough to eat. And that was for the fortunate ones; those who arrived late did not get a single handful of grain, let alone half a kernel.