No one felt relieved even after the people left. Tian pulled Zhou and pointed at the twenty or so people over there.
Zhou moved a little and looked at Chunxiao.
The mountains and the rivers looked at each other, not knowing what to say.
Chunxiao had to take charge of this matter. She pulled a stool and sat in the middle. The other family members stood behind her. "Is there anyone in charge here?"
Everyone looked at each other, and finally pushed one person out.
The man knelt down hurriedly and said, "Master, we used to work for the manager Zheng in the manor, and he arranged all the work for us."
Chunxiao looked at the man who had replied. He was about 30 or 40 years old, and looked honest, but a little thin. Not only him, but everyone in this group was thin. "What's your name?"
"I am Ah Wu."
Ah Wu? There was no one named Ah Wu in his indenture. Chun Xiao frowned, "You guys won't be ranked until twenty-seven, will you?"
Dahe at the back couldn't help but laugh.
"The boss is right. We are from Ada to twenty-seven."
Chun Xiao was speechless. As expected, for the sake of convenience, the name was simple and crude. "So what was your original name?"
"My name is Wang Shiwen."
The name Wang Shiwen does exist. They are all outsiders and Chunxiao doesn't know where those places are. Since they have signed a death contract, unless the master's family is kind-hearted, the master's family will decide on their marriages and children.
"Well, Wang Shiwen, you remember this, and you should remember this too." She looked at everyone, "I am the new owner of this farm. These people behind me are all my family. From now on, just do your best to follow my instructions. I will never treat you harshly. If there are any traitors, don't blame me for being merciless."
As soon as these words were spoken, everyone knelt down and said they didn't dare.
Tian felt that Chunxiao was very imposing.
"Wang Shiwen, since there is no one in charge among you, and you were elected by everyone, then from today on, you are the manager of these 27 people. Do you understand? Everyone, stand up." He was really not used to others kneeling down to him.
The people below stood up one after another and stood aside politely without talking to each other.
"All of you please come forward and raise your heads and tell me your names so I can have an idea."
Of the 27 people, only six were women; the rest were all able-bodied men. They came forward one by one to give their names. Chunxiao took the indentures and examined them one by one, checking their ages and places of origin. The youngest was 32, the oldest was 48, and Wang Shiwen, the man from earlier, was 35. Most of them were in their prime, evidently having been carefully selected by the previous owner of the manor. Among them were four couples and two widows.
After checking in with everyone one by one, Chun Xiao asked the others to go down and rest, leaving only Wang Shiwen behind. "Follow me first. I'll ask you if there's anything I don't understand."
"Just ask me, I'll be waiting for you."
"Dad, Mom, let's go room by room. Let's first check the rooms where people live. Let's clear out anything that's broken or unwanted."
The group walked around to the back of the main courtyard. The rooms there were all constructed of wood and brick. There were sixteen living rooms, furnished with beds, cabinets, tables, chairs, and benches. They looked well-maintained and relatively clean, especially the four rooms on the east side, which were particularly well-furnished. The beds looked more refined than those in the other rooms, and the rooms even had screens. The rooms weren't much to tidy up, so they went to look at the utility rooms in the back. This village was truly well-built, with courtyards nestled within each other, each clearly distinct.
When they lit the fire just now, they saw that the woodshed they had been to before was full of wood. "With these materials, we can continue to make charcoal."
"Let's keep it. We can use this wood to make things. It would be a shame to burn it. If it burns, the farm will need something again and we'll have to buy new ones. That's not worth it."
"Chunxiao is thinking that our family still has a lot of things to make. If we had known that we had the materials here, we wouldn't have used Yan Laowu's and could have saved a lot of money."
"Dad, you've already said Uncle Wu's price is fair, what else is there to say?"
"Next door is a large warehouse. I saw it before. There were several bags of cotton seeds, some other seeds, and a bag of grain. They must have been left for the servants. The former manager of the manor was considered a kind and righteous person."
"Mom, let's go and take a look. I haven't seen it yet." Chunxiao followed Zhou and the others to the utility room.
The utility room was large, but now it was empty. Chunxiao indeed saw a lot of cotton seeds and miscellaneous vegetable seeds.
"Wang Shiwen, you know how much cotton Zhuangzi planted before."
"I went back to my employer's house and planted 90 mu of cotton, 110 mu of rice, and 58 mu of wheat. Rice requires irrigation, so the rice fields are all outside. After the August harvest, soybeans were planted, and the wheat fields were also planted with soybeans. The cotton harvest was late, so the fields are now empty."
“How are the harvests of these crops?”
"I don't know the total harvest. When we were harvesting cotton, the former manager calculated the yield per mu and said that one mu of land could produce 110 catties of cotton, and the land tax on cotton was 20 catties. One mu of rice could produce about 250 catties, and one mu of wheat could produce about 220 catties. The land tax on both of these was 40 catties. One mu of soybean land could produce about 240 catties, and the land tax was 50 catties."
Chun Xiao saw him talking nonchalantly and suddenly smiled, "It seems that I chose the right person as the manager. He is very concerned about grain production."
Wang Shiwen was a little frightened by what he said. "I, I just paid more attention to it. I didn't deliberately ask about the master's financial affairs."
"Don't be afraid, I'm not being sarcastic. I need this data right now. You're right." She suddenly remembered something. When she was planting wheat, she got so excited that she threshed all the wheat and didn't save any seeds. Wheat seeds and rice seeds are both food, so naturally, no one would leave them for her. It seemed that she had to find a way.
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