Shen Yunyun could guess that the young emperor's studies must be extremely heavy, covering a wide range of subjects, but she hadn't expected him to start dealing with state affairs at just eleven years old.
After returning, she went to Tang Family Village the next day.
When she arrived, a flour mill was delivering supplies to the village.
Shen Yunyun only then learned that someone had set up a flour-grinding facility here.
It couldn't really be called a factory—at most, it was a workshop.
The village chief enthusiastically updated Shen Yunyun on the latest happenings in the village.
He said that Seventh Uncle's youngest son had come back to raise sheep, now tending over two hundred of them, running all over the mountains every day to find them.
He mentioned that Wang Auntie's son, Xiaochuan, had also returned, now buying up grain everywhere, making seven or eight hundred yuan a day on good days.
He added that Yingzi had her family grow vegetables to sell to Tang Family Village.
He also said that Liu Second Aunt's family had started raising pigs, planning to open their own slaughterhouse and sell the meat to them.
There were also chicken and duck farmers.
Shen Yunyun listened to the village chief's updates with a happy heart.
She hadn't expected that her simple attempt to provide livelihoods for the villagers would spark related industries to spring up.
Standing at the village entrance, Shen Yunyun watched the flour mill delivery men skillfully unload flour from a farm tricycle onto a handcart to haul into the village. Just as she was about to enter, a few small cars drove past the entrance.
Seeing the cars, Shen Yunyun asked curiously, "There are a lot more vehicles on the road."
"Indeed, the peaches on the slope had a bumper harvest, and these fruit merchants are here to place orders."
"Isn't that a good thing?"
"Not really. Every fruit merchant complains business is tough, driving down prices hard—offering five cents per catty and making the farmers pick the fruit themselves. Isn't that degrading?"
"What kind of peaches are five cents a catty?"
"White peaches, blood peaches, yellow peaches, nectarines, yellow flat peaches, flat peaches..."
Shen Yunyun was shocked. In the city, yellow peaches could sell for six yuan a catty, but at the source, they're five cents?
How could they be so ruthless?
"Can you handle it? If you can, help buy some up, and I'll try to contact outside fruit dealers."
The peaches could also be taken to the apocalypse or even to the interstellar realm—they wouldn't be hard to sell.
The village chief hurriedly tried to kneel and kowtow to Shen Yunyun, but she stopped him, telling him to act within his means and not push himself.
This time, she brought a large amount of food to find Zhang Yifan again.
Zhang Yifan sensed Shen Yunyun's return visit inquiry and immediately left his companions to go out.
"Yifan, where are you going?" Liu Feng quickly asked.
"To pick someone up," Zhang Yifan said, activating his ability and dashing out.
The rest exchanged puzzled glances.
Their group had split into two factions due to differing views, but everyone knew they couldn't separate over disagreements now.
Once separated, the danger would multiply.
Having finally achieved this brief peace, they didn't want to go back to that state of constant mental tension and the ever-present threat of death.
But they were in the middle of a meeting discussion, and Zhang Yifan just left like that—picking someone up? Who?
Zhang Yifan went to a spot where Liu Feng and the others couldn't see him before accepting Shen Yunyun's return visit.
When Shen Yunyun appeared, only Zhang Yifan was in front of her.
"Shen Yunyun." Zhang Yifan's face lit up.
Shen Yunyun immediately handed him a fresh peach.
Zhang Yifan's eyes brightened, and he took it, biting into it.
In the apocalypse, even getting a meal was hard, let alone fruit.
"How have you been lately?"
Zhang Yifan was too busy eating the peach to answer her right away.
Only after finishing the peach did he reply, "Better than before. We've gathered a lot of supplies in this city, but disagreements have arisen among us."