“How can this be?” Chen suddenly burst into tears. “We two will never have the chance to leave Dingshui Village again in this lifetime, but Ah Zheng back then… In short, I don’t want him to leave like this without knowing why.”

Upon hearing this, Old Man Lu sighed, patted her hand, and said nothing more.

...

After arriving home, Jiang Qinyu tidied up the house, making sure everything was organized.

After separating from the Lu family, they didn't actually get much; the rooms all looked empty.

Jiang Qinyu planned to give the room next to the master bedroom to her two children. She had already asked the eldest son of Village Chief Li to make a partition. As long as the thin wooden door in the middle was locked, it would be two private spaces.

However, before they could move in, she still needed to furnish the room with some things, such as beds, tables, chairs, wardrobes, and so on.

Because there are two children, everything has to be doubled. Jiang Qinyu has enough money on hand now, but when she thinks about the expenses of raising two children, she can't help but sigh.

If she wants to live a peaceful life, she still has a long way to go!

Next to the children's room was a specially built storage room, constructed entirely of stones. It was drafty, fine in the summer, but unsuitable for living in the winter.

Opposite the few rooms was a fence that was two people high, and on the other side of the fence was the home of Old Man Lu and Mrs. Chen.

Near the gate of the courtyard, a woodshed was built, with a newly dug dry toilet and a specially built shower room on either side of the woodshed.

On the other side of the gate is the kitchen, and next to the kitchen is Jiang Qinyu's master bedroom. In the middle of the courtyard, there is a thatched shed with a stone table and benches underneath for entertaining guests.

The courtyard wasn't large, even a bit cramped, but it had everything Jiang Qinyu needed, and she was quite satisfied.

"Auntie, I've finished sweeping!" Pan'er stood in the middle of the yard with a broom and called out to Jiang Qinyu.

Shufan poked his head out of the house, "I wiped everything in the house too. Auntie, look, the water is clean."

Jiang Qinyu waved to the two of them, "You two are great, you're already little adults. Now that you've finished your work, let's get ready to go out!"

The three of them picked up baskets from the corner of the courtyard wall and went out together.

When she came out, Jiang Qinyu saw that Old Man Lu had also come out of the yard with a hoe.

"Dad, are you going to the fields?" Jiang Qinyu called out.

Although Chen's suggestion that she remarry was strange, it didn't affect their normal relationship.

Old Lu nodded and said, "I noticed the soil in the field wasn't as dry a couple of days ago. I have some time now, so I'll go take a look."

“I saw it yesterday too. If the soil is a little wetter in the deeper areas, we can start turning the soil to prepare for autumn planting,” Jiang Qinyu nodded in agreement.

The two talked as they walked, with Shufan and Pan'er obediently following behind. The group soon arrived at the field.

Jiang Qinyu's plot of land was next to Old Man Lu's. She also took a small hoe and the two of them dug around in the field for a while.

"Yu'er, what's the situation on your end?" Old Man Lu called out.

Jiang Qinyu turned the hoe over; the soil underneath was already thoroughly moistened. She turned to her and replied, "It looks alright here, Dad. How about yours?"

"I'm almost done here too. I'll go back and check with Old Chen later. Maybe we can start tilling the land sooner!" Old Lu said excitedly.

The Old Chen he mentioned was Chen Shao's father, two years younger than Old Man Lu, but one of the most skilled farmers in the village.

Jiang Qinyu smiled and used her mind to turn on the taps in the aquatic product area so that other people's land could be tilled as soon as possible.

It seems she'll have to retrieve the plastic hoses from other people's fields tonight. To prevent the land from drying out again, she'll need to find a place to bury the hoses.

...

That evening, Village Chief Li convened another village meeting under the big locust tree at the village entrance. The main topic of the meeting was whether to allow Wang Pozi and her family to join them.

The villagers had grievances against those families. After all, they had gone to Qinggang Mountain together to seize grain and hunt together, sharing joys and sorrows. But those families insisted on fleeing the famine, as if they couldn't survive if they stayed with them.

"They left of their own volition in the first place, but now they want to come back and be with us. What's going on?"

"That's right, and those families are notorious for being cunning and dishonest. Let them join, lest they drag us down."

"Last time we were hunting in the mountains, Wang the Cripple even tried to sneak away..."

The crowd chimed in with their own opinions, without explicitly saying that Wang Pozi's family was not allowed to join, but many people were still unhappy and their words revealed a sense of exclusion.

Seeing this, Village Chief Li quickly told everyone to be quiet. "Everyone, let me say a few words. Their ancestors have lived in our village for generations, and there are ancestral tablets in the ancestral hall. Even if we don't care about them, let's at least consider the reputation of their ancestors."

"As for their past cheating and shirking, we now use a work point system. If they don't work hard, their base work points will keep decreasing. Whether they can get enough work points to support their families depends on their own abilities."

"Besides, with them joining us, we'll have more manpower for everything, right? Everyone can also supervise their work, and we can solve any problems that arise."

His words eased the crowd's discontent slightly, but no one still volunteered to agree.

At this moment, Grandpa Jiang suddenly stood up and said, "Everyone, listen to me for a moment." He looked at Wang Pozi's family and then at everyone else. "Not everyone in those families is bad. For example, the eldest son of the Wang family, the youngest son of the Ma family, and the daughters-in-law of the Deng family are all good at working."

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