The Little Demonic Cultivator in the Courtyard: Borrowing 100,000 Japanese Pirates to Heal

Xu Jiande looked at the somewhat shy Bai Ling and said, "If Wang Xiaoyong is arrested later and can't withstand the torture, he might surrender and implicate you. Then you'll be in great danger, and so will I."

"We will be safer only if no one but you knows my identity or my strength."

Bai Ling thought about it and realized it was true.

She did learn this principle during the training: single-line contact, separation and secrecy, and each comrade only knowing the minimum information necessary to complete the task.

She had already learned all of these principles, but seeing Wang Xiaoyong suddenly turn from a traitor into a comrade was too unexpected and exciting for her, and she momentarily forgot about them.

He immediately began to reflect on his actions.

Xu Jiande added, "And to be honest, I'm not really sure if Wang Xiaoyong is a true member of the Communist Party. The code matches, but that doesn't mean he can't betray us. We have to be extremely careful."

"In short, only you can know my identity; no one else can know it. It's a secret between us."

Bai Ling nodded.

Looking at Xu Jiande, a very complicated feeling welled up in my heart.

This person was much more cautious and meticulous than she had imagined.

He refused to join the Party, and people assumed he had other reasons.

After all, the "pot party" has been demonizing and promoting the major party for years.

Now she understood that his concerns were deeper and more far-reaching than she had imagined.

Then it was time for breakfast.

We ate steamed buns, which were heated up before we started eating.

After finishing his meal, Xu Jiande took out a 20-jin bag of coarse grains from the cellar, tied it with hemp rope, carried it on a shoulder pole, and headed out towards the rice shop.

The scenery on the road was completely different from yesterday.

There were sentries at every street corner, and machine gunners crouched behind sandbag bunkers, their guns pointed at the street.

There were more than twice as many Japanese soldiers on patrol as yesterday, and the clattering sound of their leather boots on the bluestone slabs never stopped from morning till night.

The air was filled with the smells of gunpowder and blood, as well as an indescribable burnt smell; it was unclear which house had been burned down.

The sound of crying occasionally drifted from the depths of the alley, intermittent, sometimes sharp and sometimes low, as if the whole city was weeping.

Occasionally, ordinary people would walk briskly along the wall, heads down and shoulders hunched, not daring to look to either side.

Xu Jiande recalled Wang Xiaoyong's words and thought they made some sense.

However, not only did the Japanese underestimate themselves, but Wang Xiaoyong did as well.

He decided to teach the Japanese devils a lesson and threaten them tonight.

Those who dared to attack unarmed civilians would specifically assassinate their officers and commanders.

It all comes down to who isn't afraid of death.

As he thought this, Xu Jiande was somewhat influenced by the demonic power.

In other words, some people are not afraid of the city's people dying, and they are playing a cowardly game.

It's about seeing who can't bear the loss and ultimately concedes defeat.

A dozen minutes later, Xu Jiande arrived at the entrance of the rice shop.

He put down the carrying pole, looked at the scene before him, and frowned.

The door of the rice shop was smashed.

Both doors were smashed to the ground, covered with footprints and dents.

The wooden plaque with the words "Xu's Rice Shop" hanging crookedly on the door frame, as if it might fall down at any moment.

The price tag was trampled to pieces, and the scene inside was even worse when you stepped across the threshold.

The counter was overturned, the drawers were pulled out and thrown on the ground, and the account books inside were scattered all over the floor.

The rice bin was overturned, and the remaining cornmeal at the bottom was scattered all over the ground, covered with footprints.

The large vats for pickling vegetables in the corner were all smashed, the shelves were overturned, and the clutter was piled up haphazardly, as if a wild boar had run over them.

Aji stood in the house, looking at the mess on the floor, completely bewildered.

Upon seeing Xu Jiande enter, he suddenly stood up, his expression a mixture of anger and bewilderment.

"Brother Xu, this... our shop has been robbed."

Xu Jiande was instantly enraged. "Damn it, who the hell did this?"

The man's voice trembled slightly, whether from anger or rage, it was hard to tell. I really didn't expect these villains to be so bold.

It can only be said that in the occupied areas, all the former order is rapidly collapsing.

As Xu Jiande cursed, he took the carrying pole off his shoulder, put the twenty pounds of coarse grain against the wall, squatted down to pick up the account book on the ground, and couldn't help but curse, "These damned bastards, damn it, they knew I was going to kill them."

Aji also appeared very angry.

At this moment, Xu Jiande said to Aji, "Fortunately, we were vigilant yesterday and didn't leave the rice in the store, otherwise the loss would have been even greater."

Aji then remembered this, paused for a moment, and then nodded repeatedly: "Yes, the master is really smart. If the master hadn't said he would transport the grain back yesterday, all this rice would probably be gone."

Xu Jiande sighed, squatted down to pick up the scattered account books, and couldn't help but curse.

"What's the use of being smart? The Japanese are here, and everything's in chaos. Yesterday they were smashing doors, who knows what they'll smash tomorrow. This shop probably won't be able to stay open for a while."

"Damn those Japanese devils!"

"..." Aji opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but didn't know how to respond.

He watched Xu Jiande squatting in the mess, picking things up, but his mind was on something else entirely.

Whether the rice shop can stay open or not is none of his business; he didn't come here as a shop assistant to earn that little bit of money.

But he couldn't show it on his face. He picked up the broken broom and started sweeping the broken pottery shards on the ground toward the corner of the wall.

Xu Jiande stacked the ledgers, dusted off his hands, found paper and pen in the shop, and rewrote the price tags.

Today's price of whole grains has increased by 50% compared to yesterday.

Since yesterday afternoon, the price of this batch of grain has more than doubled.

He placed the price tag he had written in a prominent position by the door, then turned to Aji and said, "You stay here and tidy up, I'll go find a carpenter to fix the door."

Xu Jiande walked to the next street and found a carpenter's shop.

There were piles of wood and semi-finished furniture in front of the shop, and an old carpenter in his fifties was squatting at the door, planing the wood.

Xu Jiande explained his purpose to him, and the old carpenter didn't say much. He picked up his toolbox and followed him back to the rice shop.

The two men picked up the fallen door panel. The old carpenter examined the damage and said the door panel was still usable, but the hinges were broken; they could be replaced with two new ones.

While we were busy, someone came to buy rice.

He was a middle-aged man wearing a gray cloth shirt, tall and thin, with high cheekbones and deep-set eyes, looking like he hadn't eaten a full meal in days.

He walked to the door, glanced at the price tag, and his expression immediately changed.

The expression wasn't just anger; it conveyed more of the despair of having salt rubbed into a wound.

"Why is this Mr. Xu so expensive?" His voice was a little hoarse, like sandpaper scraping against wood. "Yesterday it wasn't...it wasn't this price yesterday."

Xu Jiande didn't even look up, continuing to hold the door panel for the carpenter, and replied in a very sharp tone, "I can't buy rice either. Go check at the main store, they're out of rice."

Then he couldn't help but complain that his shop had been robbed last night, and if he hadn't transported the grain away in advance yesterday, he wouldn't even have any rice to sell now.

"Damn it, I've already lost so much money that I'm practically bankrupting my family. If I didn't have a good conscience, I would have stopped selling this rice a long time ago, or at least sold it for double the price."

The man opened his mouth as if to say something, but seeing the mess in the rice shop, he swallowed his words.

The shop looked like it had really been robbed; it didn't seem like they were faking it. I thought to myself, "Serves them right."

He stood at the door for a while, hesitating, before finally saying, "Okay, I'll buy two pounds."

Xu Jiande took the money and asked Aji to weigh the rice.

Aji scooped two pounds of cornmeal from the bag of coarse grains in the corner and packed it away.

The man took the noodles, looked at Xu Jiande, and his eyes were full of complex emotions—resentment, helplessness, and frustration.

As Xu Jiande walked out the door, he heard him muttering something under his breath, his voice very low, cursing the unscrupulous businessman.

As Aji watched the man walk away, he thought to himself that Xu Jiande was no ordinary person with a black heart.

However, keeping such unscrupulous merchants around would be of great use to the Imperial Army.

If there were more unscrupulous merchants like this in Beijing, driving up grain prices to the sky, the people would naturally complain bitterly.

When the time comes, the Imperial Army will arrest all these unscrupulous merchants, execute them in public, and then pin all the blame on them, saying that their greed caused the price of grain to skyrocket.

In this way, the people's anger would be directed at these rice bosses, and they would instead be grateful to the Imperial Army.