Don’t raise unruly people in extreme cold weather

Chapter 451 Riot
Early in the morning, the window knocker knocked on the window of Robert's house on time, causing Robert to climb out of the not-so-warm bed.

The cold air made Robert shrink his neck. If possible, he wanted to crawl back into the bed. Even though it was not warm enough, at least he could feel a little bit of warmth.

But Robert did not do so. Instead, he put on his clothes shiveringly and washed himself with cold water.

In the past, Robert's wife would boil hot water before he got up, so that the family could have hot water for washing in the morning and drink steaming hot soup or porridge.

However, the Robert family can no longer afford to buy fuel, and even their breakfast is cold.

Of course, a big part of the reason for this is that now the Lauber family only has him and two children left.

His wife did not survive last winter, falling asleep one cold night and never waking up again.

Although Robert tried his best to take care of the two children, as a grown man, he had to go out to work during the day to earn as much money as possible to support his family. It was really difficult for him to have enough energy to do the things that were originally the responsibility of his wife.

He went to the kitchen, crushed the two compressed biscuits he had received yesterday in a bowl, then added water to make three bowls of porridge that was not at all delicious. Then Robert went to wake up his two children.

Although the family had lost their mother, Robert was relieved that the children were all very sensible.

The eldest of his two children, the nine-year-old son, is now learning how to take care of his five-year-old sister.

Although the nine-year-old child could not do many things well by himself, he still tried his best to help his sister put on her clothes after his father woke him up to prevent her from catching a cold, and then took his sister to wash.

By the time the two children sat down at the table, Robert had already finished his portion of porridge.

He deliberately used a large bowl and pretended that he had eaten a full bowl and was full.

In fact, the porridge, which is only enough for one adult, is divided into three portions. Children may be able to eat it and feel half full, but it is not enough for adults to fill their stomachs.

But this was all the food ration that Robert could earn every day, and he basically left it all for his two children.

As for himself, he could have a lunch on the construction site, which was barely enough to maintain his basic daily consumption.

Because of this, Robert was very grateful to Countess Brandlis who gave him the job.

Although Robert had heard that she had a bad reputation and that she liked to brutally suppress anyone who opposed her, what did this have to do with Robert, an ordinary worker?

For Robert, the Countess killing a few nobles had no effect on him. Instead, it would make him feel that it would be better if more of those inhuman nobles died.

Compared to those damn nobles, the Countess with a bad reputation gave him a job, allowing him to still have a job to make a living in this terrible environment and earn enough food to feed his children.

Although this ration is barely enough to feed the children, just think about the situation on the streets of Longton now to understand how rare it is to have a job that provides a stable ration.

It is for this reason that Robert is very grateful to the Countess.

At least he didn't have to queue up every day to eat relief food at the street corner like his neighbors, just to keep himself from starving to death.

Nowadays in Longton, it is difficult to find a job even in the downtown area.

Although there are many construction sites in the city and it seems that people are recruiting everywhere, in fact there are at least five people waiting in line for each job.

Even if the Countess had been kind-hearted and hired three people for one position, adopting a rotation system to carry out 24-hour construction, there would still be two people who could not find jobs and could only rely on relief food to barely keep themselves from starving to death.

Most of those who can find jobs have a special skill or at least ten years of work experience. For example, Robert used to be a foreman of a construction team and had been in the industry for almost ten years. Only then was he recruited so that he could have a job to make a living.

Although the work was tiring every day, at least he could get a ration and a meal was provided on the construction site. This allowed Robert to ensure that his children at home were well fed while not starving to death. This was enough for Robert to be grateful to the Countess.

As for the gossips about the Countess, saying that it was her incompetence that caused the people of Langton to have no food to eat? Robert could only say that these people were still not hungry enough.

In fact, although there were some gossips about the Countess among Robert's co-workers, everyone had a very good impression of her.

Whatever she did, at least she gave them work and food to eat.

Moreover, compared with Langton before the disaster, the working hours required by the Countess were already very lenient. She only allowed each worker to work ten hours a day, with a half-hour break in between.

You know, before the disaster, no job Robert could find in Longton required less than twelve hours of work.

Although according to the Countess, this working time is because she needs all workers to work at the most efficient level within the working hours, long working hours will only lead to reduced labor efficiency and mistakes. Since they are already working in three shifts 24 hours a day, there is no need to compete for those few hours of work.

Robert did not quite understand what the Countess said, but he knew at least one thing: the Countess asked him to work only ten hours a day.

So even though he was very worried about the two children at home, Robert still carefully told his son to take good care of his sister at home, not to open the door for anyone, and not to go out to play and then go to work.

Before the disaster, Lauber's son was already attending a public elementary school, but with the disaster, public schools were basically closed.

In addition, with the death of the woman in the family, Robert had no relatives or friends who could help take care of the children, so he could only let his nine-year-old son take care of his five-year-old daughter.

It took some time to get to the construction site. Robert had to sign in with the foreman before he could receive today's rations.

This was also one of the Countess's benevolent policies. She paid the workers one day's rations first, so that they could complete today's work with peace of mind without worrying about having no rations after finishing the work.

And from another perspective, if some workers did not have breakfast, this ration could at least fill their stomachs.

In fact, Robert knew that more than one worker would eat a quarter of the rations after receiving them in the morning. The reason why they did not eat all of them was that they wanted to save a portion for the evening, and most of them needed to take the rations home like Robert.

However, just as Robert put his rations in his pocket and prepared to go to work, the foreman stopped him.

"Robert, I remember you said that you used to be a foreman in a construction team, right?" The foreman looked at Robert and asked him.

Robert nodded. Although he didn't know what the foreman wanted to talk to him about, he still answered honestly: "Yes, when I was working in a construction company, I was the foreman of the construction team. I worked there for about four years."

The foreman nodded in satisfaction, and then asked him: "I remember you have two children? Is there enough food at home?"

"It's barely enough for the children. Even though I'm a little hungry, I can still have a meal at the construction site at noon. It's not a big problem." Robert answered honestly. He had some vague guesses, but still controlled his emotions well.

The foreman was more and more satisfied with Robert, so he explained to him: "The Countess has issued a new order, requiring each construction site to strengthen the control of workers, and to promote foremen from the workers to do the work appropriately, to ensure that each team has at least one team leader.

I was previously in charge of all the groups in your class. Now, according to the order of the Countess, I have to promote a team leader from each of your three groups.

Robert, you are the most diligent and honest in your group. In addition, you have work experience and are very respectful to the Countess, so you have a place among the three team leaders.

From now on, you can get an extra ration every day, and you can eat two meals at the construction site, which is considered an extra treatment for the team leader."

"Is this true? I was promoted?" Robert was overjoyed when he heard the news. Although he suddenly felt that his promotion was inevitably related to his respect for the Countess, his joy still prevented him from thinking about it too much.

Receiving an extra ration of food every day was a huge help to Robert, and their family's living conditions improved qualitatively.

Especially since Robert can eat two meals a day at the construction site in the future, this means that he can save his two rations for his children and only need to eat at the construction site.

After all, you don't have to be as frugal when eating on a construction site as you do at home. Although the portion for each person is fixed, one portion is enough to fill an adult.

The reason why Robert was able to hold on during this period was all thanks to this meal at the construction site.

Now that he can eat two meals a day, for Robert, he has gone from being half-hungry to at least half-full.

The foreman understood Robert's happiness very well. He nodded and said affirmatively: "Yes, you are promoted to the team leader of your group. You will be responsible for the people in your group from now on."

"Please rest assured! I will take good care of them and ensure that all work is completed on time every day!" Robert assured the foreman seriously. This was the only thing he could guarantee.

However, the foreman shook his head and said, "It is your responsibility to complete the work conscientiously. It is also something you must do. As a team leader, you are responsible for more than just this!"

Seeing that Robert really didn't understand, the foreman could only shake his head helplessly and explained: "The reason why Miss Countess wants to promote you team leaders is not to let you urge the workers to work hard, although there is indeed a requirement in this regard, but if that's all, the foremen are enough.

The purpose of the Countess setting up the team leader is to let you urge the workers not to participate in illegal gatherings that are not allowed by the empire during this period, not to listen to unfounded rumors, and not to believe in any heretical sects!
Robert, your job is to let these workers work peacefully every day, instead of participating in illegal gatherings and being instigated to join marches!"

Hearing what the foreman said, Robert suddenly remembered that before the construction of the site started, there were indeed some religious people active in the outer city and the lower city.

It was just that the beliefs they preached were contrary to those preached by the mainstream church in the empire. Robert did not pay attention to this, but just told the patrolman about it when he passed by the police booth.

After that, I rarely saw such a person.

Now that the foreman had reminded him, Robert finally understood what he should do.

Although Robert didn't care about politics at all, he still had a clear understanding of these things that were almost touching him.

Therefore, under the foreman's earnest expectation, Robert nodded seriously: "Don't worry, I will supervise every worker seriously! I will never let them go astray."

In this regard, the foreman showed more trust in Robert.

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At this time, on the route from Langton to the North, Perfect was returning to the North on his airship.

At this critical moment, Perfecto shouldn't have left Langton.

However, Perfect had to return to the North for some important matters, so after arranging various matters and temporarily handing the work to Princess Anne, Perfect boarded his airship and embarked on the journey back to the North.

For ordinary people in the empire, such things really do not pose any impact or burden to them.

Even though the entire empire is now in a situation of food shortage, ordinary people will not suffer from food shortage just because of Perfectot's trip.

After all, food itself will not pop out from between rocks, nor will it disappear for no reason.

For ordinary people, traveling in Perfect will indeed have an impact, but when this impact really falls on ordinary people, they can hardly feel anything due to various reasons.

This effect is, of course, the result of Perfecto's careful arrangements along the way.

Not only that, she also issued several new orders against the nobles of Langton, successfully making the nobles within the scope of the decree hate her, while the common people praised her kindness.

Of course, Perfect could turn around and exploit the common people to safeguard the interests of the aristocracy, but compared with damaging the interests of some aristocrats while benefiting the people, Perfect felt that it was better for everyone to cry than for one family to cry.

The interests of a noble may be damaged, but it can feed many ordinary people.

So cry for the nobles and let her bear the blame!
(End of this chapter)