Chapter 40

Captain Lin was right. Xiaxi Village was indeed a very small village, with only about ten households in the entire village.

But compared to the desolation Gu Ran had imagined, Xiaxi Village was not so dilapidated.

The houses of these households are not all concentrated together. They are all built next to farmland or next to streams that run through the village. Only houses of two or three households are built together.

These village houses are not thatched houses. There are brick and tile houses, mud-walled houses, stone houses, and at the very least, wooden houses.

From this perspective, it seems that the lives of the villagers in Xiaxi Village are not very difficult?

However, along the Xia Creek - the origin of the village's name, this is the active stream in summer, so it is called Xia Creek. Going further along the Xia Creek, about two or three miles away is a dense forest.

The mountains in the dense forest are continuous and deep, so deep that the sun cannot be seen. Few people approach it because it is rumored to be a miasma forest that can easily take a person's life, and no one dares to approach it casually.

This is why there are so few households in Xiaxi Village and few people get close to it.

The people of the Dasheng Dynasty were terrified by the miasma, but Gu Ran knew the principle of the miasma and was not afraid of it.

The dense forest ahead was obviously a primeval forest that was rarely visited by people and had rarely been developed or transformed. The so-called miasma produced in this forest actually refers to air containing harmful toxins.

The reason why these toxic air are produced is that in the hot, rainy and virgin forests of the south, the soil is moist, and the dead plants and dead animal carcasses in the forest rot inside, reacting with tiny organic matter to decompose into methane or hydrogen sulfide. Because the forests are lush, dark and closed, the air does not circulate, so clouds of fog are formed in the forest and cannot be eliminated, so it becomes miasma.

In such hot and humid forests, there is not only a lot of miasma, but also many mosquitoes and flies that breed in the rotten ground that cannot be evacuated. People who enter the forest or live on the edge of the forest, drink water contaminated by miasma in the forest, or are bitten by these mosquitoes and flies, are very likely to contract malaria, which in turn causes infectious diseases. This is another reason why people are afraid of miasma.

In modern society, as humans develop forests, cut down trees and reclaim wasteland, the environment in the forests has been greatly improved, and this kind of miasma containing toxic substances rarely exists.

But in many preserved tropical rainforests, these miasmas still exist to a greater or lesser extent.

Therefore, if you want to eliminate the miasma in the jungle, first, you need to find a way to drain the stagnant air that has accumulated in the forest for many years; second, you need to bury or dispose of the rotting corpses exposed on the ground and possible swamp areas; third, you need to eliminate the poisonous insects, mosquitoes and flies that breed due to humidity as much as possible; finally, you need to protect yourself as well.

So Gu Ran's first reaction when he saw the miasma forest was to go to Yongchang County the next day and buy some tents, mugwort, Chinese cabbage and other items to repel mosquitoes.

Xiaxi Village's headwoman, Wu, was a woman in her late 40s. Seeing Gu Ran coming to Xiaxi Village alone, she wasn't surprised. "We have houses in Xiaxi Village. I remember Uncle Wu's family has a vacant house, and so does the Chen family. It depends on which one you want to go to."

When resettling outsiders in a village, they usually rent a house from a villager first, and then move out after they build their own house.

Of course, according to the unwritten rules in the village, when a new household moves into the village, everyone will help build a house. As for whether it can be a brick house, a mud house or a wooden house, it depends on personal ability.

"Which one is more convenient?" Gu Ran asked.

"It's inconvenient for any household." Village chief Wu said bluntly without any ambiguity.

No rent is collected from new residents who settle in the village for the first three months, but the government will provide subsidies, such as supplies or small tax reductions. Generally speaking, people from poor families welcome new residents to move in and gain more benefits.

Unexpectedly, Village Chief Wu changed his usual behavior.

Later, Gu Ran learned that because Xiaxi Village was remote and adjacent to a deadly miasma forest, new residents who moved here would often try to move out of Xiaxi Village after a while.

That is why there have always been so few families in Xiaxi Village. Most of them are the families left behind by the imperial court when it migrated people to develop southern Xinjiang many years ago. The other few families settled here and had no way to find a way out elsewhere, so they had to stay.

At the beginning, Village Chief Wu was polite to the new villagers and tried his best to help them stay and settle down. But as more and more people left and the village became stagnant, he no longer had a good attitude towards these new households.

You're going to leave anyway, so why bother?

Gu Ran had guessed the reason for the village's decline when he first saw the miasma forest. Seeing that Village Chief Wu wasn't very friendly, he didn't take it seriously. "Then, do you have any vacant independent houses I can rent?"

"Do you want to live in a place of your own?" Village Chief Wu was stunned and looked at Gu Ran again.

Gu Ran nodded.

She was not a person who was particularly keen on interacting with others. If she was alone, she could calm down and not feel lonely or anything.

In my first life, when I was learning painting, I spent a lot of time alone. Later, when I started working, I stayed in the studio all day, silently finishing my drafts and going online. In my second life, as a talisman master, I did the same.

So, normal social interaction is acceptable, but if possible, she actually prefers to stay alone in the workshop.

Workroom, yes, the reason I converted the space into a workshop was so that I could have an environment where I could be alone without being disturbed.

If she stayed in Xiaxi Village, she would live alone in a household, which would naturally be the most convenient for her.

Village chief Wu thought for a while and took Gu Ran to a brick house in front that stood next to a few acres of fields.

"This empty house was built two years ago by a family who had just settled in Xiaxi Village, just like you. Look, is this house sturdy?"

Gu Ran nodded.

It is indeed. Although it is not large, it is very elegantly built.

The overall structure is black tiles and white walls. The outer wall is a saddle wall made of several sections of blue-black stones. There is also a small area paved with stones outside the door.

Such a nice house is actually vacant. It’s such a waste. Why doesn’t anyone move into Xiaxi Village?

After looking at the location of the house again, Gu Ran understood.

This house is the closest to the miasma forest in Xiaxi Village.

No wonder the villagers are afraid, and those who are sent here try their best to leave. If they don’t leave, they will have to face the miasma all the time, which is dangerous!

Judging from the skill with which this family built their house, from Yu Guran's point of view, it was the most beautiful one in the village. They must be well-off and could naturally have used their connections to move away.

"If you really want to stay in Xiaxi Village, this house..." Village Chief Wu looked at Gu Ran carefully, glanced at the simple bag she had, and estimated the value and disadvantages of the house. Finally, he said, "I'll sell this house to you for twenty taels. If you don't have that much money on hand, you can write an IOU and owe it to me first."

You can get such a nice house for 20 taels? And you don’t have to bother hiring someone to build it yourself!

Gu Ran simply couldn't believe it.

The prices in the Great Sheng Dynasty were similar to those in the mortal world where she was a cultivator. Twenty taels of silver could buy a thatched mud house. A house like the one in front of her, even in a small village, would cost at least eighty taels.

When did she get such a good thing by chance?

"The ten acres of land allocated to that person is near this house. However, the villagers saw that the land was just lying there, so they started cultivating it. After the summer harvest, the land will be transferred to your name. However, you must stay in Xiaxi Village for at least ten or eight years."

If Gu Erniang stayed in Xiaxi Village for ten or eight years, she would probably have married and had children, adding a lot of people to the village. Would she be able to leave? Village Chief Wu pondered silently.

"Stay, I'm stunned."

It can last not just eight or ten years, but a lifetime, Gu Ran thought to himself.

Village chief Wu is a straightforward man. After accepting Gu Ran as a new villager, he started to process the house deeds, land deeds and field deeds.

Gu Ran also wanted to make the final decision. If he missed the opportunity to buy this house, he might never get such a good opportunity again.

So he immediately took out two gold leaves from the remaining thirty-two taels of silver, all his fortune that he had kept for a long time, and handed them to Village Chief Wu.

Village Chief Wu took a look at Jin Ye Zi and his eyes widened immediately. He was stunned for a long time before he looked up at Gu Ran with a complicated expression.

Gu Ran knew that Village Chief Wu probably thought he had misjudged him and had offered him a lower price for selling his house. He felt unhappy and quickly explained, "This is the last bit of silver my... mother left for me for self-defense. It's just these twenty taels, and a little change."

Village chief Wu took the two gold leaves and said nothing.

The words were out, and the title deed had been written and stamped with the official seal of Xiaxi Village. Even though Village Chief Wu regretted suffering a great loss, as the village chief, he had to admit it.

For the first time, she felt that moving too fast was not a good thing.

"Also, Village Chief Wu, what about the ten acres of land?"

"Which ten acres?" Ten acres of land were allocated to the new villagers, but they had to reclaim the other ten acres themselves.

"It's the ten acres of land that the villagers are cultivating." Gu Ran explained.

She knew something about planting, but she was not good at it. What's more, she had ten acres of land, which she could not cultivate by herself.

When Gu Ran learned that he had to cultivate the ten acres of land allocated to him to pay taxes, he had already thought about it. He would first see the condition of the land. If possible, he would only keep two acres of land as a backup, or just plant some easy-to-grow vegetables. He planned to hire tenants to cultivate the remaining eight acres.

Instead of letting a layman like me ruin the fields, it is better to leave professional matters to professionals. Since everyone in the village has already started farming, it is better to hire them to continue working for me.

As for the remuneration, 10% of the harvest needs to be paid to the government, and 90% will be left, so Gu Ran plans to take 50% of it and give the remaining 40% to the villagers responsible for farming.

After hearing Gu Ran's proposal, Village Chief Wu began to look at the woman who had just become his villager with new respect.

"Okay, I'll tell the other farmers in the village about what you said. If anyone is interested, I'll be a witness and sign the contract for you."

Gu Ran thanked Village Chief Wu repeatedly. Village Chief Wu gave her a brief introduction to the situation in Xiaxi Village and reminded her in particular that when living in Xiaxi Village, she should pay special attention to preventing insects and mosquitoes, and not drink raw water. Drinking water must be boiled.

"People from other places think our Fujian region is a bad place, desolate and full of poisonous miasma, but that's not the case," Village Chief Wu said clearly. "Those outsiders were actually careless and didn't listen to our advice, so they took it lightly and fell ill and lost their lives."

It is said that preventing insects and mosquitoes is an official propaganda campaign sent by the government to every village, and drinking water must be boiled before drinking, which is also a rule of public welfare that has been continuously promoted by the government.

The tradition was passed down from generation to generation in the village, and it was found that following it greatly reduced the casualty rate among the local villagers, so they began to follow it imperceptibly.

Gu Ran immediately thought to himself, yes, in modern times, in order to prevent the epidemic, we also start by drinking boiled water and preventing insects and mosquitoes.

This means that among the former officials of the Dasheng Dynasty, there must have been a great man with foresight who got this thing done, and now it has yielded results. Otherwise, even the people in such a remote place as Xiaxi Village would not know these precautions.

"However, even though it's not as dangerous as others say, you should try not to go into Dayu Forest."

It turns out that the name of the miasma forest is Dayu Forest.

I wonder how Village Chief Wu and the locals understand the miasma in the island forest?

"Is it very dangerous?" Gu Ran asked knowingly.