240 The law is unenforceable when everyone is a criminal (1/2)

Ren Xiaosu had thought there wouldn't be too many soldiers in the private troops, but he was wrong. After assembling, the soldiers even outnumbered a combat brigade of the organization. Li Qingzheng asked around and discovered that all of these private troops were actually gathered from the various Li Consortium strongholds.

The private troops of the various strongholds were currently under the command of an officer named Li Anjun. He was a family member of the Li Consortium and was also concurrently serving as the overseer of Stronghold 107. And the officer in charge of Stronghold 108's private troops was called Liu Taiyu.

By this moment, the private troops of the other strongholds had fully assembled. Liu Taiyu was looking disconsolately at the sole platoon in front of him that was made up of Ren Xiaosu's group. The rest of his soldiers were nowhere to be seen.

Liu Taiyu looked at Li Qingzheng. ”Did anything happen on your way here?”

Li Qingzheng stood to attention and answered, ”Sir, there were no incidents along the way. Our Eighth Platoon of the Iron Second Battalion has assembled on time. Awaiting your instructions, sir! I—”

”Alright, that's enough.” Liu Taiyu waved his hand in frustration and dismissed him. ”Do you think it's not chaotic enough? Just stand right here and be quiet!”

With that, Liu Taiyu left. No one knew where he went.

Someone in the platoon whispered, ”Did everyone else that was behind us get into a spat?”

”Seems so. They're probably stealing from each other's platoons,” Li Qingzheng said in embarrassment.

Ren Xiaosu was amused. ”That could turn out to be a good thing. As y'all should know, they can't enforce the law on us if everyone is a criminal. If a fight breaks out between all of the outposts, there won't be a need for any punishment.”

Actually, the soldiers from other outposts only dared to do so because they also understood this fact. Since the Li Consortium needed people to fight the war now, surely they wouldn't waste their efforts to hold them all accountable, right?

At this moment, someone looked at Ren Xiaosu and said, ”Platoon Commander, could you have expected this too? So you only wanted to create chaos that would lead to a situation where the law would not apply to all those in the wrong?”

Ren Xiaosu cleared his throat. ”Not bad, right? Everything is well within my control.”

But at this moment, Chen Wudi said, ”My master is not that smart.”

Ren Xiaosu looked at Chen Wudi speechlessly.

Actually, the management of the private troops had always been a mess. It became even more chaotic now that the private troops had recently expanded.

Ren Xiaosu and his group had never been to other outposts before. If they had, they would know that many of the outposts did not have the required full strength. The platoon commanders of the platoons would even deliberately lie about the number of soldiers under them as they wanted to freeload off of the consortium's supplies. But in the end, they were all caught off guard when they were suddenly requested to assemble for war.

If the higher-ups knew they were freeloading off them, they wouldn't be let off with just a simple punishment. Perhaps some people would even get executed as a warning to the others. So some people deliberately continued stirring up the pot even further amid the chaos.

While Liu Taiyu personally went to bring the rest of the private troops back, the other strongholds' private troops set out. Only Stronghold 108's platoons remained behind.

They were supposed to assemble and report at 7 AM, but it was almost evening now.

During this period, no one bothered with Ren Xiaosu and his group. Their entire platoon was allowed to roam freely like grazing sheep. Ren Xiaosu even had time to take everyone to town where he bought an egg-stuffed flatbread for each of them. This was a treat from Li Qingzheng.

In the evening, Liu Taiyu returned with a large number of troops. These private soldiers all had bruised and swollen faces. But the most shocking thing was that several of the established platoons had completely disappeared.

Many of them had their clothes torn, and some even lost their shoes. Only Ren Xiaosu's platoon was still looking somewhat dignified.