Chapter 31 Wang Tianfeng

Far East, Magic City.

The Magic City in the 1930s was the most prosperous city in China. The name of this city was derived from the "Ten Miles of Foreign Concessions" and "Oriental Magic City". At that time, the Magic City could be said to be the most international city in Southeast Asia. Hollywood blockbusters released in the United States could be released simultaneously in Shanghai.

After a long ocean voyage, Lei Wanting finally led his fleet to this international metropolis. Because there were white Americans on board, they settled in the concession smoothly. Then they began to sell the goods as planned. The medical conditions in this era were very poor and medicines were in short supply, so the products of Shennong Pharmaceutical Company were in great demand. Then, through the introduction of the American consul, most of the arms brought from America were sold, and some were left in Antalaha, Madagascar as a backup.

After receiving the money, Lei Wanting first rented an office in Shanghai. His work in the Far East mainly involved three things: first, contacting major medicinal material merchants to order a batch of raw materials needed by Shennong Pharmaceutical Company;
The second is to arrange for people to go to the inland provinces with money and food to recruit refugees;
The third is Zhang Feng’s request before he left, which was to collect more Chinese books and cultural relics.

The first and third are very simple, as long as you have money you can do it. The second is a bit difficult. The difficulty is not in recruiting refugees. During the Republic of China period, there were refugees everywhere in China. The difficulty is how to migrate them in large numbers from inland areas to coastal areas and onto ships.

There were years of war during the Republic of China period. In addition, the bald comprador Zheng Fu did not care about the people at all and only wanted to make money for himself. Severe famine broke out in the Central Plains many times.

The Great Famine of 1920-1921: more than 1000 million people starved to death and 3000 million people were affected.

In 1925, a great famine occurred, and the death toll was unknown.

1928年至 1930年发生大饥荒：超过 1300万人被饿死。造成无数百姓逃荒，超过600万人流离失所。难民人数估计约为5000万。

In 1934, a severe drought hit the country, leading to famine, and more than 600 million people starved to death.

More than 1936 million people were affected by the Great Famine of 1937-3700.

The Great Famine in Guangdong Province in 1941 and the Great Famine in Central China in 1942: Due to the failure of the government to provide disaster relief, 300 million people starved to death in Central China alone. A movie 1942 was later made about this period.
In 1943, during the Great Famine in Guangdong Province, 300 million people froze to death or starved to death.

During the Great Famine in the South in 1946 and 1947, 1750 million people starved to death in just two years.

During the Republic of China period, the average life expectancy of Chinese people was only 35 years.

It is shocking to see these numbers, but they are just numbers. Maybe people today don’t feel anything when they see them in history books, but if you live in this era, you will understand the cruelty involved.

Well, so bullying one's own people is a tradition. No matter what era it is, there are always people who don't treat their own people as human beings.

Zhang Feng thought that even if it was not for his own career, he should do something. Working like a slave was better than starving to death. His plan saved so many people. Saving a life was better than building a seven-story pagoda. So how many pagodas could he build?

He felt that no matter how great the favor was that he was allowed to travel through time, he had completely repaid it this time and would never owe anyone anything again. Any reward he received was well-deserved.

Besides, as for the recovery of refugee immigrants, fortunately they are a foreign company, and it is from the United States. Because from the Northern Expedition to unify China in 1927 to becoming one of the five permanent leaders of the United Nations in 1945, the bald man's rise has always been inseparable from an important role supporting him behind the scenes - the United States.

So when Lei Wanting paid the American Consul to negotiate, all these problems were solved. The clerk signed contracts with the refugees in exchange for food, and they became workers of the Meihua Company and went overseas to work and pay back the money. In order to survive, they had no choice but to agree. In this way, with the green light all the way, hundreds of thousands of refugees were recruited in less than three months. For this reason, Lei Wanting had to store most of the purchased medicinal materials in the warehouse and wait to ship them back next time.

The five merchant ships obviously did not have enough capacity, so he had to rent some more ships and then transport the people in batches. In order to keep it secret, Lei Wanting could only spend money to build a temporary camp in the Dutch colony of Borneo for secondary training, and let the rented ships transport people to Borneo to speed up the pace of immigration. However, this would cost money like water, and Lei Wanting could only slow down the pace of immigration afterwards.

Wang Tianfeng is from Zibo, Qilu Province. He is fifteen years old this year. Due to years of war and frequent natural disasters, his hometown has not had any harvest for several years. Except for the elderly who are waiting to die at home, everyone in the village has fled the famine. Originally, he was a member of a family of five, but on the way, his younger brother died of illness. His parents gave the little food they had left to the children, and later starved to death. In the end, only he and an eight-year-old sister were left.

As time went by, people fleeing famine could be seen everywhere on the road. Instead of finding food, the crowds grew larger and larger, like a swarm of locusts. Anything edible was looted, and even the bark of trees within a radius of dozens of miles was eaten up.

He could only follow the main group with his sister, going with the flow. Now, their clothes were already torn and tattered, and as they walked, they could no longer keep up with the group and slowly fell behind.

That day, Wang Tianfeng and his sister found a dilapidated straw hut. Before it got dark, they lay on the ground, ready to fight hunger with sleep, but they couldn't fall asleep, and his sister kept shouting that she was hungry. After finally getting through until midnight, they suddenly smelled the smell of barbecue. He wondered where the meat came from at this time. As he smelled it, he couldn't help but feel the call of his stomach, so he had to pull his sister to ask for some, even if it was just one bite, it would be enough to satisfy his hunger.

The two men walked outside and saw several men not far away making a fire and roasting some meat, which looked like pork legs. When they got closer, they saw that they were not pork legs at all, but human legs, and children's at that.

Without saying anything, Wang Tianfeng pulled his sister and ran away, not daring to stop for a moment. He was extremely frightened at this time, worried that he and his sister would be eaten by someone. He didn't care if anyone was chasing them or not, he just kept walking and running. He was obviously very weak, and he didn't know where he got the strength from, but he kept walking until dawn.

Just when the two were tired and hungry and about to faint from exhaustion, they suddenly heard someone say that there was a kind-hearted person giving out porridge not far ahead. Wang Tianfeng could only force himself to cheer up and half-pulled and half-hugged his sister as they continued walking forward.

Soon, they saw a long line of refugees. There were also a few people whose clothes were obviously different from those of the refugees and were particularly conspicuous. They had guns in their hands and were shouting at them to line up. There was a big pot at the front and a few people who were dressed similarly to the refugees were serving porridge to the people in line.

The people holding guns were all employees recruited by the Meihua Company in Shanghai. The staff serving porridge were temporarily selected from the refugees who were relatively honest and cooperative. There were such refugee recruitment points in several coastal cities. At the beginning, the Meihua Company would send some employees to the inland to promote the cause, but later found that it was not necessary because there were refugees everywhere and they simply could not accept them all.

Wang Tianfeng and his sister were standing at the back of the line. Just as they finished lining up and breathed a sigh of relief, he and his sister could no longer hold on and fell to the ground.

When he woke up, he found himself lying in a clean wooden house. A middle-aged man came over with a bowl of porridge and said to him, "Boy, you are awake now. You must be very hungry. Just drink this bowl of porridge."

Wang Tianfeng was not polite either. He didn't even have the strength to speak, so he started to wolf down the food. Even though it was still a little hot, he didn't care. After a few seconds, he even licked the bottom of the bowl clean.

"Haha, slow down, there's more." When the man saw Wang Tianfeng like this, he just smiled and reminded him. He had seen this kind of scene many times in the past few days and was no longer surprised.

"Uncle, where is this place? Where is the little girl who was with me before? How is my sister?" Wang Tianfeng drank a bowl of porridge and asked slowly.

"Don't worry, your sister is fine. She is in a house not far from here. There are women there and someone is taking care of her. This is the territory of the Meihua Company. Their boss is also a Chinese. He is preparing to recruit immigrants from the mainland to farm overseas. When he heard that his compatriots were affected by the disaster, he spent a lot of money to provide porridge in various provinces to help the victims. But we can't keep people like this forever. More and more people are receiving news every day. Even if we have mountains of gold and silver, we can't afford to support them. So each person can only stay here for three days. After the three of them have recovered, they can either leave on their own and continue to flee the famine, or become employees of the Meihua Company and follow them to farm overseas. As for me, I have now joined the Meihua Company. Boy, what are your plans?"

The middle-aged man is named Li Dabiao, he is 25 years old. The people from Meihua Company recruited him into the company because he was strong and was responsible for the management of refugees. Now he also thinks that Wang Tianfeng is a good person, who can survive with a half-grown child and his sister, so he wants to bring him into the company as well.

"Uncle, I also want to be an employee of this company. Can you help me?" Wang Tianfeng saw that although Li Dabiao looked big and strong, he was quite kind. It seemed that he wanted him to speak for him and join this company.

He felt that he and his sister were too young to have much strength to work, and he was worried that people would not accept them. As for continuing to flee from famine, he no longer held out hope. After fleeing for so long, they were the only two children left in the family. If they continued to flee from famine, they would probably be the only ones left with the entire family.

At that time, there were many people who had the same idea as him, so the Meihua Company could easily recruit a large number of refugees. Of course, there were also a small number of people who either were reluctant to leave their hometowns or were worried about being sold as pigs like before, and chose to continue fleeing. There were even a few people who wanted to make trouble, and eventually fell under the gun of the Meihua Company.

"It's the Meihua Company. You must remember it in the future. Of course, I am in charge of recruiting people. My last name is Li Dabiao. You will just follow me in the future." Zhang Dabiao reminded again, in case he went out without knowing the name of the company and upset the people from the head office.

"I remember, uncle. Can I take my sister with me? If not, I will..." Wang Tianfeng was very happy to hear that Li Dabiao agreed. He wanted his sister to go with him as well. His eyes turned red as he spoke. If not, he could only take his sister with him and continue to flee the famine.

"No problem, Uncle Li is here, so what do you have to worry about?" Li Dabiao patted his chest and assured.

In fact, the company's rule for recruiting refugees is to try to recruit people between the ages of 5 and 35, regardless of gender, so that children are easier to train and more loyal in the future. If they are too young, they are difficult to take care of and are likely to die on the ship. If they are too old, they are basically worthless unless they have a special skill.

"Hurry, line up, grab your belongings, and get ready to board the ship!" The employees of Meihua Company were organizing the newly recruited employees to prepare for departure at the dock. Wang Tianfeng was holding his sister's hand at this time, looking at the big iron ship of Hope parked on the sea ahead. This was the biggest ship he had ever seen since he grew up.

Just like that, half a month after joining the Meihua Company, Wang Tianfeng boarded an immigration ship to Borneo in Weihai. Standing on the deck, feeling the warm sea breeze, he was excited.

(End of this chapter)