Urged on by Xu Errui, Qiaoyun looked up and exclaimed, "Ah! It's a silver lilac!"

Her eyes widened in shock, not with delight: "Errui, where did you get that earring? Does Mother know?"

Xu Errui was still laughing: "Someone gave it to you, hurry up and try it on!"

Qiaoyun looked as if she had seen something terrifying and quickly stood up: "Give it to Mother, I don't want it!"

Xu Errui put away the silver earring: "If you don't want it, then I'll give it to Mother!"

Qiaoyun sat down again, holding the child: "Tell me first, where did the silver earrings come from?"

Xu Errui slurped his noodles: "I used herbs to cure someone's stomachache. It was a gift from someone, not something I stole. Look how scared you are!"

Knowing it was a gift, Qiaoyun felt relieved: "Then tell me, whose stomach aches did you save?"

"I don't know them either. Anyway, they gave it to me as a thank you. Actually, hehe, it's really that simple!" Xu Errui explained the whole story while eating his noodles.

It turned out that on his first day helping to build the kang (a heated brick bed) at the medical shed, he needed to find yellow mud and stones, as well as cut some reeds to weave curtain rods, so he took a few laborers to dig outside the village.

Xu Errui grew up in the village and knew best where to find good yellow mud, so this journey was quite far.

Before the earth and stones had been found, a carriage with guards was seen parked on the official road, as if something had happened.

Xu Errui and the handyman didn't come closer. They only saw a middle-aged man get out of the car, squat by the roadside, and vomit while a woman brought him water.

Seeing that someone was sick, the handyman loudly announced that there was a medical tent in the village and that they could go to see Doctor Xu for treatment.

But the people in the carriage said they were in a hurry and it was inconvenient to go into the village, so they wanted to drive away and asked how far it was from Pingchuan County.

Xujia Village is dozens of miles from the county seat, and the nearest town is Lihua Town, which is only a dozen miles away. Although it has been a place of bandits, there are still shops there.

Seeing the carriage rushing off, Xu Errui couldn't help but say, "You can gather herbs to relieve the urgency. Loach skewers can cure stomach aches and vomiting without the need for decoction. You can eat them while you travel, so it won't delay your business."

He didn't speak loudly, but the people in the car still heard him.

The man leaned forward, looking somewhat weak, and asked, "Young man, do you know what kind of herb that is?"

He drank cold tea on the way, and then experienced waves of severe abdominal pain, feeling nauseous but unable to vomit.

If there were enough time, we could rest and prepare medicine at the medical stalls along the way, but now we urgently need to return to the city, so we have to bear the pain and keep going.

Xu Errui then realized that the man, who looked like a middle-aged man at first glance, was actually about sixty years old. He had just mistaken him for someone else because of his burly build.

"We know, we eat it ourselves!" Xu Errui said honestly, casually picking a blade of grass from the roadside.

The old man frowned slightly: "This is Malan! Not the loach skewers you mentioned!"

Xu Errui quickly peeled off the mud from the roots and scraped off the black outer skin before taking a bite: "This is the Malan you mentioned, and it's also the loach skewer. Old man, aren't you a local?"

"Old man?"

The old man smiled, not answering whether he was a local or not, but simply having his guard pluck a few mudskippers: "Mustard root is a good dish, I never knew the root could be used as medicine, young man, I've learned something! Lanzhi, give him a tip!"

"Mother, Qiaoyun, this silver earring was given to us by that maid!"

Xu Errui had already explained the matter to Qiaoyun, but Qiaoyun didn't believe him. She thought he was related to that "Lanzhi" because he only said a few words.

Now that his mother has come home, Xu Errui tells the story again.

Jiang Zhi naturally believed this. The silver earring was very small and nothing to a wealthy person who could afford to bring guards and ride in a carriage. It was just a habit for them to give tips.

She said, "You said that old man didn't speak like we live here, and he was dressed very well?"

Xu Errui nodded vigorously: "Yes, he speaks differently from us, and we can only barely understand him. Mother, you once said that loach skewers are also called Malan, how does he know that?"

Jiang Zhi said, "This old man is not from around here; they are probably from Malan."

Since it was a tip from someone else, Jiang Zhi told Qiaoyun to accept the earrings.

With her mother-in-law's permission, Qiaoyun happily took the cloth bag into the room and found a place to put it away.

Xu Errui then took out another piece of paper from his person, which was covered with writing.

“Mother, these are the names of the medicines written by Physician Xu. I also brought back those small cloth bags, which contain samples of the medicines.”

Physician Xu said, "We need everything; many people are catching colds now, and we're using a lot of medicine."

Jiang Zhi took the paper, which was covered with medicinal herbs for relieving exterior syndromes, such as perilla, mint, and kudzu root.

But she had to pretend she couldn't read: "Oh dear, how do I recognize these characters?"

Xu Errui found the folded medicine bags, arranged them on the ground according to the names of the medicines, and then took out the medicine samples to compare: "Mother, Physician Xu said that if you arrange them like this, you can recognize the names of the medicines!"

Jiang Zhi almost burst out laughing. This was basically the medicine cabinet's label, one medicine per bag per label.

Xu Dong was just being lazy and didn't separate the names on the paper and stick them on.

She was lazy and directly called Qiaoyun over: "Qiaoyun, you and Errui come and identify what the characters and medicines are."

This was forcing the two to learn to read and to recognize medicinal herbs. It's never a bad thing for young people to learn more; they can make a living by farming and collecting herbs in the future.

Even in drought, skilled craftsmen will not starve; learning a skill at any time will ensure a livelihood.

They packed the medicinal herbs overnight, and the next day, just as dawn was breaking, Xu Errui carried a basket of herbs and went down the mountain with Xiaoman to work.

Jiang Zhi stood on the high slope and watched them go for a while, until the two disappeared into the thick fog before returning home.

She was thinking about what Xu Errui had brought back.

Migrants from all over the country are being repatriated, and those who remain in the county and prefectural cities are being forcibly expelled, and are required to return to their place of household registration to register and resume farming.

If the fields are still empty by the time of spring planting, they will be forcibly taken back by the government.

This is just the government's idea.

The roads are still not safe, and the refugees who have found a place to stay certainly do not want to take risks again. They will try to settle down locally to delay returning home, and no amount of pressure from the government will work.

Jiang Zhi lives on the mountain, so there's nothing to worry about.

My home is nearby, and I can go back to the village to farm anytime.

She was thinking that people were being driven out of the city.

Those villagers who fled into Yuzhou Prefecture with the village chief will probably be returning.

How many of them will come back from this trip, and how will I treat them?

It's been a long time since I've dreamed of listening to audiobooks. As someone caught in the middle of it all, without the God's-eye view, Jiang Zhi doesn't know how Nie Fantian and the others are doing now.

Whether or not they are striving according to the goals set in the original book, even though his aunt is not dead, he is just a minor character and shouldn't be able to cause any trouble or change anything.

So much time has passed, and while doing heavy farm work, she has become more and more immersed in the role through the few words spoken by Xiaoman's grandmother and Chunfeng, and has also gained a better understanding of the hardships the original owner endured.

The original owner of this body was once a shy and beautiful girl, just like Qiaoyun, who dreamed of getting married, having children, and being a good wife and mother.

But her good days didn't last long. A husband who was hurt and tried to smooth things over, in-laws who favored their grandson, and a sister-in-law who abandoned her child ruined her life.

The arduous farm work gradually wore away her youth, and the death of her eldest son extinguished her last bit of compassion.

In reality, this quagmire-like family and the surrounding moral blackmail had already killed her, leaving behind only a shell that survived through violence.