In Jiaozhou, the sky was cold and the ground was frozen. Snowflakes drifted down like cotton, covering the ground with a thick layer of ice. Children played joyfully on the frozen grounds, while Xie Jue and Fengyu worried over how to solve the food shortage. Their reserve of grain would only last until mid-February, and the military provisions for the Ningzhou Iron Cavalry were untouchable. Xie Xun led a group into the mountains, gathering a large batch of wild vegetables, and brought them back to the State Mansion to have the elderly farmers test which ones were edible and which ones were not.