Sold immediately after wearing it? I took my family and fled the famine.

Shen Dehou sat on a bench, his face so worried that his brows were furrowed into a deep frown, and it seemed that a few more strands of white hair had appeared at his temples in the past few days.

He looked up, his gaze falling on Jiang Xing, and asked, "Girl, what do you say? What should we do about this?"

Jiang Xing hadn't said much, sitting quietly in the corner listening to everyone's discussion. Only when she heard Shen Dehou ask her a question did she raise her head and sigh.

"Everyone," Jiang Xing's voice wasn't loud, but his tone was steady, immediately silencing everyone around him, "we have to swallow this bitter pill."

Everyone was stunned by these words.

Jiang Xing looked at them and continued, "What did we flee all this way for? Wasn't it just for a stable place to settle down? Maocao Village is a large village with over a hundred households. We finally managed to change our household registration and have the right to stay. We can't just go head-to-head with the village right away. To put it bluntly, what good can a few of us do against a village with over a hundred households?"

She paused, her gaze sweeping over the crowd, her tone gradually becoming more forceful: "Furthermore, they said that as long as we pay the money or grain, the village will recognize us as people of Thatch Village. In other words, once we pay this sum, we will be proper villagers of Thatch Village, with the same status as everyone else in the village. If anyone bullies us like they did today, we can fight back or take it to the authorities without any hesitation."

The room fell silent as everyone pondered her words.

Jiang Xing softened his tone and finally said, "In the current situation, we need to make the villagers feel comfortable first, so they feel like they've gotten a good deal. Once we've established ourselves and are doing well, if they want to bully us again, they'll have to think twice. To put it bluntly, this sum of money is our toll for establishing ourselves in this village."

He spoke slowly and deliberately, yet he explained the principles clearly and thoroughly.

Upon hearing this, the families all fell silent. Everyone was preoccupied with calculating how much money they had left, and no one had time to speak.

Widow Sun sat in the corner, holding Niu Niu in her arms and leaning against Tie Dan. Listening to the crowd's discussion, her eyes reddened, and she couldn't help but cry softly.

During her escape, her husband died, and she lost contact with her family. She raised her two children alone, and her survival to this point was entirely due to the mutual support of several families. The quota for coming to Maocao Village was given to her by Jiang Xingyun, and the few taels of silver she had left were all spent when she changed her household registration. Now, she truly doesn't have a single copper coin left.

Five hundred catties of grain? Two taels of silver? To her, this was no different from taking the lives of her and her child.

Wang Laoshi's family was in no better shape. They had spent almost all their money on the road, and now they couldn't find more than a few copper coins in their pockets.

The same goes for Granny Chen's family; with so many mouths to feed, they couldn't save much money.

The only ones who were relatively well-off were Jiang Xing's family, Shen Dehou's family, and Doctor Gu.

For a moment, all that could be heard in the room was Widow Sun's low sobs and Aunt Wang's sighs.

Dr. Gu had been sitting quietly in the corner, but suddenly sighed, took his old medicine box off his back, placed it on his lap, and slowly began to speak.

"We definitely can't deliver the grain now; we can only convert it into silver." Doctor Gu's voice was old and calm, as if he had seen many vicissitudes of life. "I calculated it beforehand. According to current prices, five hundred catties of grain is roughly two taels of silver. That amount isn't small, but it's not excessive either."

He reached into his pocket, rummaged around for a while, and pulled out an old, faded purse, which he placed on the table.