Thick smoke billowed out of the drafty kitchen, and Ye Lingyu finally breathed a sigh of relief.

She didn't want to be homeless and sleep in the wilderness this winter.

"What are you doing?"

"Cough cough cough, I was thinking of lighting the fire before you come back, so you can have one less thing to do when you get back."

"No need. Next time, let me handle this myself."

It seems we need to find a new place to hide the tinder and flint. Who knows what Cheng Qingyan will use them to light next?

Cheng Qingyan stood silently to the side, like a child who had done something wrong.

"Get some water and wash your face, it's all smudged."

Cheng Qingyan subconsciously rubbed his face with his sleeve, but unexpectedly, the more he rubbed, the darker it became. His entire face was now covered in ash and was pitch black.

"You should... stop wiping. Let me cook the porridge, then I'll take you to the river to wash."

“I can go by myself,” Cheng Qingyan said instinctively.

You can go by yourself, but whether you can come back from the river is another matter.

Seeing that Ye Lingyu did not answer him, Cheng Qingyan subconsciously shut his mouth.

The pile of firewood, which had been billowing smoke, soon caught fire with flickering flames. Cheng Qingyan felt like crawling into a hole. He had originally wanted to help Ye Lingyu relieve some of her stress, but now he had become the one causing trouble instead.

Once the fire had stabilized, Ye Lingyu added a few thicker wooden sticks to the fire and then got up to stand beside Cheng Qingyan.

The person in front of me could only be described as looking disheveled and embarrassed, even a little embarrassed to be looked at.

She's kind of cute.

"Let's go quickly."

Ye Lingyu kicked away the firewood that was close to the fire, so that even if they came back later and the firewood burned out, it wouldn't ignite the other firewood.

Cheng Qingyan followed behind Ye Lingyu, unaware of how dirty her face was, she secretly wiped it with her sleeve as she followed behind.

The ashes from the firewood on his sleeves smeared back onto his face.

As a result, when Ye Lingyu took Cheng Qingyan to the river to wash her face, she found that her face was even dirtier.

While squatting by the river to wash her face, Cheng Qingyan saw her reflection and realized how dirty her face was.

He immediately scooped up river water and splashed it on his face, rubbing it for a while until his skin was red. Turning back to Ye Lingyu, he asked, "How is it? Are you clean now?"

"There's still some on the left side of my forehead, and I haven't washed the right sideburns yet."

"Okay, I'll wash it again, it'll be done soon."

"No rush, just go slowly and don't fall in. I can't swim."

After wiping the water off her face, Cheng Qingyan said, "I will."

Ye Lingyu frowned slightly: "I'm not fully recovered yet, so I can't swim now."

Cheng Qingyan blushed and smiled, "Yes, I know. How is it? Are you clean now?"

Ye Lingyu looked closely, and finally raised her hand and touched the left side of her hairline: "There's still a little bit here."

Perhaps because her face had been warmed up by rubbing, Ye Lingyu's hands felt a little cool.

She was dressed too thinly, and they didn't have any clothes or anything like that.

Now she's starting to regret it; why did she throw away all those beginner gear items from her storage space?

What a waste of money! It's such a waste! Thinking about it now brings me a deep sense of heartache.

There's one more thing I need to buy.

The grass along the riverbank was still quite green, probably because it was too close to the water.

Their house was located at the very back of the village, with few other houses around it, and the river practically encircled the village.

Their house is located at a bend in the hillside, with rivers to the left rear and left front, but the water flow is low, making it inconvenient to bring water into their home.

If I have money in the future, I'll move the house a bit further back, behind the river, so it's closer to the foot of the mountain.

Ye Lingyu had no idea that Cheng Qingyan was already thinking about moving.

When I got home, the porridge was already boiling, and the fire was still burning.

After finishing their meal, Ye Lingyu said she wanted to go to the fields to check on the rice, as it was almost time to harvest.

Cheng Qingyan naturally wanted to go along and see where her family's two acres of land were.

This time, Ye Lingyu led her around the village. They walked for a while longer before reaching the fields.

The rice stalks, not too heavy, swayed happily in the wind.

Everyone knows that the heavier the ears of grain, the better the harvest.

She didn't know if the harvest from this field was good, but seeing how happy Ye Lingyu looked after inspecting the rice, she figured it must be good.

"Wife, do these two plots of land belong to our family?"

Following the direction Cheng Qingyan pointed, Ye Lingyu shook her head: "It used to be, but it's not anymore. You owed money to the villagers before, and they planted two acres of our land to pay off the debt. Until the debt is paid off, we can only plant this one plot of land."

Cheng Qingyan smiled awkwardly and then cursed the original owner of the body from head to toe!

The land they depend on for survival has been used to pay off debts; no wonder the family is so poor.

We still need to take the land back, otherwise how will she become rich? Will she rely on rice falling from the sky?

If you tell too many lies, you'll be struck by lightning.

"My lady, shall we take back all the fields that were mortgaged off starting tomorrow?"

Ye Lingyu did not answer, but stared at the distant rice paddies and sighed softly.

Cheng Qingyan followed her gaze and saw nothing but rice paddies; there was nothing special about them!

He couldn't help but ask curiously, "Wife, what are you looking at?"

Ye Lingyu withdrew her gaze, a smile playing on her lips: "I'm wondering how feasible your idea of ​​taking back all the fields is."

What does that mean?

Ye Lingyu shook her head: "It's nothing, just do it your way. After the autumn harvest, we'll take the land back."

Hopefully, the ginseng Cheng Qingyan dug up will be of good quality and fetch a good price. Let's repair the broken roof and walls and get through the winter peacefully.

The rice in Cheng Qingyan's space has not yet sprouted ears, and she doesn't know how much it will yield, nor does she know how much land her rice acreage covers.

We'll have to test whether the rice grown in the space can be planted in the fields outside, and what the yield would be; all of that will require experimentation.

So she needs land, part of which she wants to keep the existing crops on, and the other part she wants to use for experiments.

After all, there are so many crop seeds in the space. As long as there is a field, you can experiment with them as you like without worrying about wasting them.

After returning home from the fields, Ye Lingyu opened the rice jar and grabbed a handful of rice.

The rice felt so smooth and delicate; she wondered how it was threshed. She had never seen such smooth and high-quality rice before.

Each grain is crystal clear, unlike the rice harvested here, which is rough to the touch and some grains still have uncrushed husks on them.

In this era, there were no threshing or hulling machines; the most primitive method was to thresh the rice by pounding it. As for hulling the grains, it still required pounding.

They have tools made of stone and wood for pounding rice. Some families in the village have these tools, and people borrow them from each other.