After eating and drinking her fill, Jiayin lay in her grandmother's arms for a nap. Listening to her two older brothers' stomachs rumbling, she felt reluctant to leave them.
So she whispered in her grandmother's ear and sweetly begged, "Grandma, let's stew goose for dinner!"
The old lady glanced at her two pitiful grandsons, guessed what her granddaughter was thinking, and felt even more like sighing.
How come there are so many naughty boys in the family? It would be so nice to have three or five sweet and lovely granddaughters like Fu Niu!
Fu Niu didn't actually want to eat stewed goose; she was just thinking about her two older brothers.
She kissed her granddaughter's soft little hair and replied, "Okay, go to sleep."
Jiayin yawned and snuggled into her grandmother's arms to sleep.
The branches that had been pressed down behind the shack were now letting in a draft because they had been lifted earlier.
Grandma Li was afraid the wind would blow on her granddaughter, so she quickly turned over to block it completely, and then couldn't help but glare at her grandson.
Jia'an and Jiaxi were all smiles, their earlier grievances completely gone, and they were already looking forward to the goose meat for dinner.
In the afternoon, in front of Jia An, Jia Xi, and a bunch of naughty boys, Old Lady Li slit the throat of the big white goose.
The naughty boy was frightened but also felt relieved, and he was drooling.
The village chief strolled over, picked up his pipe, and tapped each of them with it, cursing.
"All you do is cause trouble. You're no help at all, and I have to worry about protecting you. You all saw the goose is dead, right? It can't peck your butts anymore, so don't have nightmares tonight!"
The mischievous boys were all giggling non-stop.
Once the stewed goose was ready, each person received two pieces of goose meat. Their dreams were filled with the delicious aroma of goose meat; who remembered how terrifying it was to be chased and pecked on the rear by a goose...?
More than a thousand fruit trees were planted in just one day.
The men still need to plow the land and plant better seeds. It hasn't rained lately, so carrying water is also a big job.
The women hurried to the path leading from the valley entrance to the main road, where Yan Zheng and his men had already marked the spot.
In the future, all the courtyards of the entire village, including those of Young Master Ye and Madam Cui, totaling twenty-seven households, will be built here.
Each family's land, including the house and vegetable garden, is about two acres in size, making a total of fifty acres.
Logically, these fifty-odd acres should be deducted from the four hundred acres allocated by the imperial court, but this area is a riverbank, and no one would want it even if it were given away for free, let alone fight over it.
So everyone secretly gained a little advantage, using only the twenty acres allocated by the imperial court, and the rest were expanded outwards.
In this way, of the seventy mu of riverbank land, only about fifty mu remain.
The village chief and Uncle Zhao and a few others discussed planting peanuts and sweet potatoes, but while peanut seeds were easy to obtain, sweet potato seedlings that needed to be planted directly in the ground were hard to come by.
We'll have to find a solution in the nearby villages.
Just then, Li Lao Er came over and asked a few old men for advice.
“Uncle Village Chief, Uncle Zhao, there have been some people peeking around outside the valley lately. I think they're from nearby villages. We're going to be staying here permanently, so it's not good to keep this up. I was thinking, should we ask Young Master Yan if we can find some handymen from nearby villages? If we visit more often, we'll gradually get to know each other.”
The village chief nodded. “Even if you hadn’t come, I was planning to come find you anyway. Lend me your mule cart. I’m planning to take some grain to Big Banyan Tree and Little Wang Village. I’ll try to exchange it for some coarse grains, and of course, it would be even better if I could get some peanut seeds and sweet potato vines.”
After saying this, the group turned back. When they passed the intersection, they saw that the women were all sweating profusely from exhaustion.
They were busy weeding and collecting stones, and had already cleared out all the vegetable gardens.
The village chief called out, "Does everyone have enough rapeseed? Should we go to a nearby village to exchange some?"
The women laughed and replied loudly, "No need, uncle. We brought all the rapeseed from home with us when we left. We threw away everything on the way, but we didn't throw away the rapeseed."
"Alright, you're all good at managing a household. Get busy, we'll be able to eat new dishes in a few days."
The village chief waved his hand, quite satisfied.
To live a good life, a man, the money-making rake, naturally needs to be quick and nimble, but a woman, the money-holding box, is also indispensable.
Without a good woman who is thrifty and hardworking, no matter how much money you earn, you won't be able to save it all.
Soon, the village chief drove a mule cart, carrying half a sack of rice, and took Uncle Zhao with him as a companion, and they set off together.
Previously, when village women went to the big banyan tree to exchange goods, it was naturally the women who greeted them.
Even if the men were curious, they couldn't go forward, lest something bad happen.
But this time, two old men came, which was quite rare. The village head and the men, young and old, all abandoned their work in the fields and gathered at the village entrance to chat with them.
The village chief was eloquent and had his arm cut off by the barbarians. Standing next to Uncle Zhao, who was missing a leg, they looked quite strange, but no one would be wary of them.
So they were quickly surrounded and made to sit on a large rock at the entrance of the village.
Someone asked, "Uncle, I heard you're from the north? Were your hands and feet injured by barbarians?"
The village chief chuckled and replied, "That's true, and that's not true either. When we were young, we guarded the border. We killed many barbarians and were wounded before being discharged. But when we got old, the barbarians chased us south again. We suffered so much on the way. We were almost at the dock when the barbarians caught up with us. To protect the younger generation, we had no choice but to fight for our lives. Fortunately, we were rescued by Marquis Xinting and his troops!"
The people around the banyan tree were all tense, and couldn't help but feel anxious.
"Our place is still the best. Although we often suffer from floods and droughts, we don't have the pain of war. It's a blessed land."
"That's right," the village chief nodded repeatedly, offered to refill the tobacco pipes of the elderly people sitting next to him, and then smiled.
"The imperial court assigned us a gravel beach, and we were all in despair, thinking we couldn't grow any crops and would starve to death. But then we unearthed a hot spring, isn't this truly a blessed land?"
The people from the big banyan tree felt complicated upon hearing this, as it was precisely this matter that they had been envious of recently.
They've lived here for generations, how come they never noticed the hot spring on that hill? A bunch of outsiders just arrived and dug it up...
The village chief, seemingly oblivious to their displeasure, continued, "A few days ago, the son of some county magistrate was jealous and came to steal the hot spring. We got angry and went to the capital to file a complaint, directly to the Emperor. The Emperor is such a kind man; he not only dismissed that county magistrate but also rewarded us with a lot of rice."
As he spoke, he pointed to the grain sacks on the cart, "These are the best rice sent from the palace, the same kind that the emperor usually eats."
The people under the banyan tree were all taken aback, quickly making way and bowing before the grain sacks...
The village chief and Uncle Zhao exchanged a glance, their eyes filled with smug smiles, like two old foxes.
In the afternoon, as the sun began to set, the mule cart slowly made its way back to Suijintan.
Concerned, the villagers stepped forward to help the village chief and Uncle Zhao, and smelling the faint scent of alcohol on them, asked, "Uncle, have you been drinking outside?"
"Yes, Old Sun, the village head of the Big Banyan Tree Village, is so hospitable. He insisted on inviting us to stay for lunch."
Uncle Zhao couldn't help but complain, "Isn't it because you're too good at bluffing? You can't stop talking about the Emperor, so people don't dare to be disrespectful to you."
"Hahaha!" the village chief laughed triumphantly. "I wasn't lying. I really did see the Emperor, and I even spoke with him. That rice was a gift from the Emperor!"
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