The Three Kingdoms: The entire Cao Cao camp thought I was weak and frail.

With the full support of Xun Kun and Xun Yu, the Xun family's efficiency was astonishingly high.

In just half a month, a huge caravan consisting of three hundred strong guards and over a hundred carts was assembled outside Yingchuan City.

The caravan leader was Xun Fei, a distant relative of the Xun family. He had traveled extensively in his youth, possessing considerable business experience, and was known for his shrewdness and competence. After Xun Hao revealed his plan to him, Xun Fei was astonished and immediately pledged to complete the mission.

The caravan split into three groups.

Heading south to Jiangdong, their main task was to purchase grain.

Heading north to Youzhou, the main task is to purchase warhorses and ironware.

Another route was led by Xun Fei himself, heading to Sichuan to trade well salt and Sichuan brocade.

These three trade routes were carefully selected by Xun Hao based on his memories of later generations. In the early stages of the Yellow Turban Rebellion, these places were relatively stable and were the best trading partners.

Watching the massive caravan set off in a grand procession, Xun Hao felt far from relaxed.

This is only the first step in a long journey.

Money and supplies are easy to earn. But how to safely store them is the bigger challenge.

Yingchuan City is only so big, and the Xun family's residence is also limited.

If you pile all your food and supplies up at home, you'll be too conspicuous, practically having "Come and rob me!" written all over your head.

That day, Xun Hao took a map of Yingchuan City that he had drawn himself and found Xun Yu.

"Brother, look."

Xun Hao spread the map out on his desk. This map was much more detailed than the official maps. It not only marked the main streets and buildings, but also drew all the alleys, wells, and empty houses in the city.

Xun Yu could tell at a glance that this was the culmination of his younger brother's hard work over the past half month.

"This is……"

"This is the 'granary' I prepared for our family," Xun Hao said, pointing to the seven or eight places he had circled on the map with a vermilion pen.

These seven or eight places are scattered throughout the southeast, northwest and southwest of Yingchuan City. Some are abandoned courtyards, some are inconspicuous houses, and one is even a closed-down tavern.

"Ah Hao, what do you mean by this?" Xun Yu asked, puzzled.

"Brother, our food and supplies will be transported back soon. If we keep them all at home, they will be too conspicuous. My idea is to store these supplies in different locations."

Xun Hao picked up his pen and tapped on one of the circled houses.

"For example, this is a three-courtyard house in the south of the city. The owner moved away a few years ago and it has been empty ever since. We can buy it and then dig a deep enough cellar under the artificial hill in the backyard. The entrance to the cellar will be inside the artificial hill, so that there will be no trace of it from the outside."

He then pointed to another spot.

"And here, this is a large courtyard in the west of the city, housing more than a dozen families, all sorts of people, a real mixed bag. We can buy one of the inconspicuous rooms, and then under the bed, dig a tunnel leading to the abandoned well next door. We can hide the grain in the dried-up well, and seal it with stone slabs and mud, and no one will ever suspect it."

"And that tavern, we can dig its wine cellar twice as deep. The top layer can still be used to store some wine jars, and the bottom layer will be our real warehouse..."

Xun Hao explained his plan in detail.

With each proposal he put forward, Xun Yu's eyes lit up a little more.

By the end, Xun Yu was completely impressed by his younger brother's imaginative yet meticulously crafted idea.

He'd heard of the saying "a cunning rabbit has three burrows," but he'd never seen anyone take it so seriously, like Xun Hao.

Each hiding place was cleverly disguised, taking advantage of the surrounding environment. Even if the government sent people to search every inch of the place, let alone the Yellow Turban rebels, they might not find a single clue.

"Alright! We'll do it your way!" Xun Yu made a quick decision. "You'll arrange the house purchase and the cellar digging."

"Besides food, we also need to stockpile something else." Xun Hao's expression turned serious.

"What?"

"Books," Xun Hao said, emphasizing each word, "especially rare and valuable editions of classics, historical texts, agricultural and irrigation works, and medical and mathematical texts."

Xun Yu was taken aback, but then he understood.

In times of chaos, what is often destroyed first is not the city, but the civilization.

During the chaos at the end of the Qin Dynasty, a great fire broke out at the Epang Palace, burning countless pre-Qin classics.

The world is about to descend into chaos, and the devastation will likely far surpass that of the end of the Qin Dynasty. In the ensuing turmoil of war, these bamboo slips, which embody the wisdom of China over thousands of years, will probably be destroyed.

"I understand." Xun Yu nodded emphatically. "Leave this to me!"

Xun Hao, on the other hand, became the busiest "chief engineer".

He personally led trusted craftsmen to secretly carry out construction in the purchased houses.

He personally oversaw the design of every cellar and the arrangement of every mechanism.

To maintain secrecy, all the craftsmen involved in the construction were servants of the Xun family, whose loyalty was absolutely reliable. Moreover, each craftsman was only responsible for a small part of the project, and no one knew the full picture of the entire project.

That day, Xun Hao was in an abandoned house in the north of the city, directing craftsmen to install a flip-type cellar entrance.

Guo Jia, carrying a wine jug, appeared out of nowhere.

"Hey, our busy man, what are you doing?" Guo Jia asked lazily, leaning against the door frame.

Xun Hao was startled, but breathed a sigh of relief when he turned around and saw it was him.

"Brother Fengxiao, what brings you here?"

"If I hadn't come soon, would you have forgotten that I, your 'teacher,' even exist?" Guo Jia's tone carried a hint of sourness. "It's been almost ten days, and you haven't shown up at all. I thought you'd fallen into some pit."

Xun Hao smiled somewhat embarrassedly: "I've been busy with family matters lately, and I really haven't been able to get away."

Guo Jia walked into the courtyard and looked around curiously. There were piles of timber and stone in the courtyard, and several craftsmen were busy working with their tools.

"Are you... doing house repairs?"

"Yes, it's an old house passed down from my ancestors. It's been in disrepair for years, so I had someone renovate it." Xun Hao lied without batting an eye.

Guo Jia said "Oh," without delving into it further. He walked to Xun Hao's side and looked down at the blueprints on the ground.

The drawing shows a complex mechanical structure with levers, pulleys, and latches.

"What is this?" Guo Jia asked, intrigued.

"A...shelf for easy access to things," Xun Hao said vaguely.

Who is Guo Jia? He understood the principle of the device at a glance.

"That's not right." He pointed to the drawing with his finger. "This lever isn't designed to lift upwards, but to flip downwards. And look at the counterweight here; it's clearly meant to allow a heavy stone slab to be easily lifted. Ah Hao, this isn't some kind of storage shelf; you're... building the entrance to a secret room, aren't you?"