Poverty Alleviation in Qin: A Sky-High Review of "I Am the Female Prime Minister of All Time&qu

The prefecture seat chosen by Li You was located in the Bushan area of ​​Houguilin Prefecture, at the confluence of the Li River and the Yu River, a vital waterway controlling all directions.

The Li River flows northward, connecting with the Xiang River via the Ling Canal, and reaches the Yangtze River system. This is the only channel for goods from the Central Plains to travel south.

The Yu River flows eastward and joins the Xi River, reaching directly to the Nanhai Commandery.

Going westward to the Zuojiang and Yongjiang rivers, one reaches the heartland of the Luoyue tribes.

The First Emperor appointed Li You as the prefect to oversee this area. From then on, the Xiou people had to pass through here to trade, the Luoyue people had to pass through here to move eastward, and the Nanyue people had to go around here to move northward.

The area around Bushan is an alluvial plain formed by the Lishui and Yushui rivers. The terrain is relatively flat and open, with a dense network of waterways, but it is not particularly dangerous or difficult to traverse.

The local Xiou people have long practiced rice farming on a considerable scale, using ponds to store water and irrigate fields. Villages are distributed along the river, with fixed settlements and farming cycles.

Since the Yue people had settled down and started farming, the Qin people were able to measure the fields, register households, collect taxes per acre, and establish pavilions and villages, gradually embedding the prefecture-county system into the land.

Heading north from Bushan, one can reach Lingqu Canal in a few days along the Li River.

The Lingqu Canal was the lifeline for the Qin army's southern expeditions against the Baiyue tribes. After Shi Lu completed its construction, all the grain, weapons, and documents from the Central Plains relied on this waterway to travel south. Furthermore, the Xiou, Luoyue, and Nanyue tribes did not speak each other's languages. Each of the three languages—Xiou, Luoyue, and Nanyue—had its own system, and communication between them required translators.

Because of different customs and totems among the various tribes, the chieftains even killed each other.

In the end, none of the tribes trusted anyone else, and they could only deal with the Qin people individually.

In short, this place wasn't chosen randomly.

Backed by water and mountains, with convenient waterways.

It was both a trade hub and a springboard for implementing the prefecture-county system.

Meanwhile, other groups such as Luoyue (further southwest, from southwestern Guangxi to northern Vietnam), Nanyue (the area around Panyu (Guangzhou) in present-day Guangdong), Minyue (present-day Fujian), Dongou, and Shanyue were overseen by other officials dispatched by the First Emperor.

After figuring this out, Song Ye and the others finished their meal and immediately left Tucheng, heading towards a nearby Xiou tribe.

Li You originally wanted them to stay another half an hour, but Song also said, "Since we're here, let's first observe the local customs so we can better address the problem."

So he took two interpreters and led Song Ye, the prince and princess, and walked downstream along a tributary of the Li River for about half an hour.

At the bend in the river, a cluster of stilted bamboo houses are scattered on the hillside.

Wooden pillars support the floor three feet off the ground, with pigs and chickens kept underneath. On the floor, one can see Yue people walking barefoot, and rice and dried fish spread out on bamboo mats.

A few wisps of smoke rose from the bamboo pipes on the roof, carrying the smell of water vapor and wood ash.

Several young Yue men stood on the outskirts of the tribe, short knives at their waists. They looked wary when they saw the Qin group approaching.

Li You stepped forward and spoke a few words in Xiou language, with the interpreter following beside him.

The other person sized them up for a while, then turned around and called out in the direction of the bamboo house.

A short while later, an old man came out of the largest bamboo house.

The old man was about fifty years old, with dark skin and a face full of wrinkles. He was only wearing a piece of coarse linen, and large patches of dark blue tattoos were visible on his shoulders and chest—a coiled snake that stretched from his collarbone down to his ribs.

What's most striking is his mouth: his two upper front teeth are missing, but the gaps have healed, and he speaks with a lisp, as if he was born that way.

The old man walked up to Song Ye and the others, stopped three steps away, and nodded slightly.

The interpreter translated, "The chieftain said, 'The Qin people are honored guests who have come from afar. Welcome! But please do not enter the inner room; there are rules in the tribe.'"

The tone was polite, but very distant.

Song returned the greeting with a bow, and the interpreter translated it.

The gist is that I am just passing by and visiting, and I will not go inside but will just look around from the outside without disturbing anyone.

The old man nodded, stepped aside, and gestured that they could walk around and observe from the outskirts of the tribe.

Ying Yinman stood behind Song Ye, her eyes already too many to take it all in.

She first saw several Xiou women squatting by the stream, scraping fish scales with stone knives.

The fish was still alive, its tail slapping the water. The woman, without changing her expression, took a bamboo skewer and poked it through the gills, and blood flowed down the stream.

Then she saw a naked child chasing a lizard under the bamboo house. He caught up with it, grabbed its tail, and the lizard twisted its body and bit his finger. The child yelled and shook his hand, and the lizard flew away. He pounced on it again, picked it up, and stuffed it into the bamboo basket at his waist with a grin.

Ying Yinman: "..."

Before she could even process what she was seeing, she noticed several earthenware pots set up in the open space in the center of the village, with several Yue people sitting around them eating.

Upon closer inspection, Ying Yinman's pupils dilated instantly.

"!!!"

"?!?!"

A snake?! Aaaaaaah!

Moreover, several of them were skinned, cut into sections, and thrown into the soup along with the bones. A layer of dark green leaves floated on the surface of the soup, and I don't know what kind of herb it was.

Immediately afterwards, a Yue man scooped up a bowl with a wooden spoon and slurped it down, soup and meat in one gulp, smacking his lips as he finished.

The other pot contained unidentified insects and raw fish.

Ying Yinman couldn't recognize what kind of insect it was. It was dark brown, as thick as a finger, and swarming in the pot. Yue Ren picked it up with bamboo chopsticks, snapped it in half with a snap, and juices splattered everywhere. People next to him were still adding new ones to the pot.

"..."

Also, there was a palm-sized fish in the pot, gutted and sliced ​​thinly, laid out on banana leaves, and drizzled with a dark red sauce, like some kind of sour fruit juice.

Then he saw a young man pick up a piece with his hand, put it in his mouth and chew it, with blood on the corner of his mouth.

"..."

Ying Yinman almost vomited on the spot after taking the last bite of the pot.

Ant eggs?!

A whole bowl of white ant eggs, about the size of a thumbnail, mixed with honey or some kind of sweet syrup.

One of the women was using two bamboo skewers to pick up a piece and put it in her mouth, chewing it with a crunching sound.

Gongzi Gao stood to the side, his face turning from dark red to deathly pale. His Adam's apple bobbed twice as he forced back the sour water that rose to his throat.

Jiang Lu was more resilient than them, but his brows were furrowed and his lips were pursed until they turned white.

He asked the interpreter next to him, "Do they...eat this every day?"

The interpreter nodded: "There are few prey in the mountains, but plenty of fish in the rivers, and insects are available all year round. Ant eggs are the best thing in spring."

"??????"

What does it mean that ant eggs are the best thing in spring?

After a long pause, Gongzi Gao finally managed to stammer out, "...Even the poorest people in Guanzhong wouldn't resort to eating insects."

The interpreter glanced at him and said in a flat tone, "The Guanzhong Plain is a fertile land for thousands of miles, where millet and wheat are grown. Here, there are many mountains and little arable land, so rice only ripens once a year, and if there is a flood, the entire harvest is lost."

"If you don't catch insects and eat snakes, people will starve to death in winter."

Upon hearing this, Ying Yinman and the other princes and princesses fell silent.

What kind of lives do these people lead?