AWB Chapter 377 This is not enough
Chapter 377 This is not enough
Lu Yangyang angrily crushed the cup in her hand.
The room was quiet, and for a moment, none of the three spoke.
The three women came from very different backgrounds, but even Lu Yangyang, who grew up wildly in the wilderness, was fortunate. She was lucky to meet Uncle Zhou, the hunter who saved her life; the village chief and villagers who took her in and gave her food from time to time; her aunt, who, although a bit crazy, taught her how to make a living; Lu Wei, who taught her to read; and later, after she went to the capital, she met several close friends, received her elder brother's favor, met His Highness who opened up a wider world for her, and many other people who helped her.
It helped her go from being clueless to gradually being able to survive in this world on her own.
So she is lucky.
But there are many others who share a similar fate with her, yet suffer misfortune. Like these sick girls, most of them were abandoned and sold by their parents or relatives, or were trafficked, or were forced into prostitution due to desperation. Surviving was already difficult enough, but after a few years, they contracted venereal diseases, were abandoned again, and were used as tools to be exploited until all their value was squeezed out before being burned to ashes.
"Why is this happening?" Lu Yangyang murmured to herself.
Jiang Zhiyi walked to her side and gently placed her hand on her shoulder, offering silent comfort.
Lu Yangyang frowned, looking ahead thoughtfully as she spoke to Jiang Zhiyi: "I can cure their illnesses, but where will they go after they're cured? I can provide some money to settle them, but most of them are physically weak and unable to cultivate the land. Even if they do hard labor, they might not be able to find suitable work. I can provide for them for a while now, even for a few years, but what about after that?"
"If I encounter more people like this in the future, and I save them, will I be saving them or harming them?"
When she thought of the girls' fates, which were like duckweed, she couldn't help but feel confused and sad. She always felt that this was wrong. If she had only cured their illnesses and given them a chance to live, she could indeed be considered to have helped them.
But just like when she saw Boss Luo, he wholeheartedly believed that by saving those who were persecuted, and by trying his best to shoulder the responsibility, he had saved them. But in reality, he was simply unable to support so many people's lives. Those people still struggled to live under his care, and some were even forced to go astray, their futures uncertain and unspeakable.
After she saves those girls, can she support their lives?
That shouldn't be the case; it's not enough.
"Are you worried that even if you save their lives, you won't be able to secure their future?" Jiang Zhiyi asked.
Lu Yangyang hummed in agreement.
Jiang Zhiyi thought for a moment and said, "If you trust me, then entrust them to me. I think Qingqing's beauty cream has great potential. I want to cooperate with Qingqing to open a workshop. If it's inconvenient for Qingqing, I also have shops and estates under my name, which can also accommodate some people."
This is a solution.
Lu Yangyang still felt something was missing. Jiang Zhiyi could accommodate a hundred or so people, but what about more? How many brothels were there in every prefecture and state? How many girls were left destitute and helpless after falling ill, left to fend for themselves? Although she couldn't reveal herself now, she could use Wen Qingqing's identity as the Little Fairy Doctor to gradually spread her methods for treating venereal diseases and cure more people. But curing them wasn't about pushing them into a deeper abyss, nor was it about forcing them to return to their old ways. So how could she truly enable these originally destitute women to establish themselves in this world?
Jiang Zhiyi looked at Lu Yangyang's increasingly furrowed brows and realized that what Lu Yangyang wanted was probably not the resettlement of those hundred or so people, but even more people.
In that case, she probably wouldn't be able to do anything.
Just as the two were puzzled and frowning, Wen Qingqing suddenly spoke up.
"I have a solution!"
"Wouldn't it be better to just send them all out to work?"
Both of them turned to look at her.
Wen Qingqing spread her hands: "Don't look at me like that. I know it sounds a bit empty, but it really is. You know my mother is a businesswoman, right? She said that if all women in the world could go out to work freely, it would change the whole era, and the problems you're worried about would naturally be solved. No matter how many people there are, they can be settled because they can make a living on their own."
"But the fundamental problem is that even if you teach them skills, it's difficult to get them all to work under the current circumstances. So it becomes just empty talk!"
At this point, Wen Qingqing scratched her head: "Oh dear, I don't really understand these things, so I don't know how to explain it to you. Basically, if each woman stayed home weaving, she could probably weave one bolt of cloth in about ten days. If she also did housework, she'd be lucky to weave one bolt a month. But if you gathered many of these women together and improved the loom, how much cloth could they weave in a day? It's like the beauty cream workshop Yiyi mentioned earlier. If only one workshop could accommodate dozens of people, what about hundreds or thousands? Most men couldn't do that, right?"
Wen Qingqing was still struggling with how to explain things to Lu Yangyang and Jiang Zhiyi, but after a moment of silence, Lu Yangyang and Jiang Zhiyi looked at each other in tacit understanding and instantly understood each other's intentions.
"I know what to do!" they both said almost simultaneously, then burst out laughing at the same time.
Wen Qingqing blinked: "You understand now? When my mother told me this, I didn't understand what she meant for a long time. She just told me to focus on studying medicine and said that I didn't have the talent to do business."
“You don’t need to have it; your talent for medicine is the best.” Lu Yangyang patted her shoulder with a cheerful expression. “But you’ve woken me up from my dream; now our great cause has a future!”
Wen Qingqing: "What grand undertaking?"
Lu Yangyang raised the corners of her lips, her smile bright: "Of course, it's the great cause of enabling all women in this world to go out and work."
“My mother said this is very difficult.” Wen Qingqing said with a bitter face, “It’s very, very, very difficult. I rarely see her troubled by anything, but this is the only thing she says is too difficult and she is so unwilling to accept it.”
“It is indeed difficult. One person can’t do it alone, but we have three people now, and there will be more in the future! We will be able to do it one day!” Lu Yangyang said.
Tears welled up in Jiang Zhiyi's eyes. She had encountered unimaginable cruelty in her life, but it seemed that she had found a career she could dedicate her life to.
Lu Yangyang reached out her hand, and Jiang Zhiyi handed it to her and took it. Wen Qingqing looked at them, then reached out her own hand and took it tightly!