The sunlight filtered through the grass shed, reducing its scorching intensity.
The breeze blowing along the river made this place significantly cooler than elsewhere.
Under the grass shed, Heiwa, the first pottery maker of the Green Sparrow tribe, held a small jar in one hand and a brush made of animal fur, tree gum, and wood in the other. He gently brushed wood ash onto a small clay block about four centimeters long and two centimeters wide with more focus and care than he had shown when brushing other pottery pieces.
This rectangular clay block, less than a centimeter thick, wasn't perfectly smooth; its surface bore traces of carvings.
The piece Heiwa was working on had four characters engraved on its front face: the top two were "Green Sparrow," and the bottom two were "Heiwa."
There were many such small clay tablets, more than a hundred in total, matching the tribe's population of people aged three and above.
After brushing the front face of all the clay tablets, the ones at the front had already dried.
Heiwa came over with a thin bone shard and carefully flipped the clay tablet over.
The back of the tablet depicted a soaring Green Sparrow bird with outstretched wings.
Heiwa flipped through five clay tablets in succession, each with a soaring Green Sparrow bird engraved on its back.
As Heiwa's gaze swept over these Green Sparrow birds, his eyes revealed unmistakable affection and respect.
Not only were these Green Sparrow birds depicted vividly, but more importantly, each one was identical!
When the Divine Child made this request, even the best artisans in the tribe hesitated to agree. Drawing a Green Sparrow bird wasn't difficult, but making every single one identical was the challenge!
Handling one or two would have been manageable, but the Divine Child requested more than a hundred.
Anyone with a basic understanding of the matter knew how difficult this was. Some even believed it was impossible.
Not only did Heiwa believe this, but even the tribe's shaman and those most skilled with characters, like Shi Tou, also believed it was impossible.
However, this belief didn't last long. Three days after the Divine Child returned to the house with a piece of wood and sniffed, their inherent understanding was shattered.
They believed that the impossible task had been solved in a way that wasn't too difficult.
The solution was the small piece of wood held by the Divine Child.
With just a little force, pressing that piece of wood onto the newly shaped, not yet dry clay tablet immediately revealed a Green Sparrow bird.
Seeing the solution, Heiwa felt suddenly enlightened and began to slap his head continuously.
Why hadn't he thought of such a method?
When making pottery, he sometimes used fish bones or wooden sticks to press marks onto them, a method not much different from this.
How couldn't he have considered imprinting a Green Sparrow bird on them?
After staring at the unique Green Sparrow bird on the back of the clay tablet for a while, Heiwa still felt somewhat regretful and couldn't help but pat his head twice more before continuing to brush the wood ash water onto it.
He did this work meticulously because the Divine Child had previously emphasized that after these clay tablets were fired, they would become the tribe's...?
Scratching his head, Heiwa felt somewhat uncertain.
Hmm, it seems that's how it's called.
According to the Divine Child, this is called an identity card, and it corresponds to each of them, one per person, to prove they are members of the Green Sparrow tribe.
Facing the Divine Child's actions and explanations, Heiwa found it somewhat difficult to understand.
Aren't they, and everyone else in the tribe, already part of the tribe?
Why would they need such a pottery piece to prove it?
After brushing all the clay tablets again, Heiwa looked at them, pondering the Divine Child's intentions in doing these things, and felt puzzled again.
After a while, he could only attribute it to his lower level of understanding, unable to grasp the Divine Child’s superior thoughts.
Two days later, these meticulously fired "identity cards" were fresh out of the kiln.
Han Cheng picked up "one" identity card and carefully examined it for a while, nodding slightly in satisfaction.
Although these identity cards were somewhat crude, they had all the necessary elements to serve as the tribe's generational identity cards without any issues.
When time and technology allow, they can be updated and replaced.
Issuing identity cards to the people in the tribe seemed somewhat like a joke now.
After all, with the current population of the Green Sparrow tribe, everyone knew each other very well, living together, eating together, and working together in the same courtyard.
As the people of the tribe thought, confirming someone as a member of their tribe didn't require such a seemingly unnecessary thing as an identity card.
Han Cheng naturally understood this. However, an identity card wasn't just for proving identity. If other things were added to it, its significance would change.
In addition to this batch of meticulously crafted pottery identity cards, Han Cheng planned to produce another batch of small wooden plaques.
This second batch of identity cards wouldn't be for the Green Sparrow tribe members who already had pottery identity cards; they would be for newcomers joining the Green Sparrow tribe.
Those with pottery identity cards would be considered first-class citizens of the Green Sparrow tribe, while those with wooden identity cards would be second-class citizens.
First-class citizens could enjoy many privileges like the Green Sparrow tribe currently lived.
Second-class citizens would have some restrictions on their rights, such as their daily food intake and living quarters, which would differ from those of the elderly in the Green Sparrow tribe.
This differential treatment wasn't unfair.
Treating everyone equally would be the greatest injustice.
After all, how much effort had the elders of the Green Sparrow tribe put into achieving the current state of carefree living?
Regarding these newcomers, the Green Sparrow tribe wasn't numerous in the past and was still weak. Therefore, Han Cheng didn't adopt such measures towards the Pig and Bone tribes.
Now that the Green Sparrow tribe was no longer considered weak in this place, it was time to proceed with this matter.
Of course, those with second-class status didn't always remain second-class. After living in the Green Sparrow tribe for a certain period, their identity cards were replaced by wooden plaques rather than pottery.
If someone showed outstanding performance or contributed significantly to the tribe, this transition period could be considerably shortened.
Han Cheng hadn't set specific standards for this yet. When newcomers join the Green Sparrow tribe, they make decisions based on the situation.
Doing so would not only effectively capture the hearts of the tribe's elders, preventing them from feeling resentful due to perceived unfairness, but it would also provide a clear path for newcomers to progress quickly into the Green Sparrow tribe, encouraging them to contribute more to their tribe.
With these additional elements, what seemed to be a useless identity card now became of significant importance.