Zhao Heng sat in the chair, legs crossed, looking smug: "What's wrong? It was her choice. Besides, I'm so fat, how am I supposed to get into the chicken coop? I've never done such smelly and dirty work before."
While Liang Shuyan was punishing Jin Dashan, she was surprised to find that Dashan's wife had been tricked by Zhao Heng into sweeping chicken coops again. She frowned slightly and said, "If this continues, Zhao Heng will not change at all. If the magistrate finds out, won't he be underestimating her? No, she has to personally supervise the work and watch Zhao Heng do it!"
"Damn it, who told you to do that?"
Zhang hurriedly crawled out of the chicken coop, her hair covered in chicken feathers and reeking of a strong stench. She stammered, "Mother, your daughter-in-law saw that Zhao Heng was too fat and couldn't do any work, so, so..."
"You really have inherited Jin Dashan's true teachings. Get out of here, wash up quickly, change into clean clothes, and go cook!"
Zhang was a gentle person, and when she saw her mother-in-law so angry, she was so frightened that she hurriedly ran away.
Liang Shuyan strode over to Zhao Heng and grabbed his ear, saying, "You really are a stubborn fool. You're not even afraid of Dahei anymore. Well, I'll make sure you get to work right now. I don't believe you can be any more unruly!"
Zhao Heng winced in pain: "You, you woman, how dare you lay a hand on the magistrate's son? Do you even respect the magistrate?"
"This is Old Jin's house in Daling Village, not the county government office!"
Having no other choice, Zhao Heng begged for mercy: "Let go, please let go! It's just cleaning the chicken coop, okay? I'll clean it!"
Zhao Heng crouched down and squeezed his way into the chicken coop, cleaning out the chicken feathers and droppings. He was panting heavily, and his face and mouth were covered in chicken feathers.
"Okay, okay, let Auntie take a look!"
Liang Shuyan glanced at it and noticed that the chicken droppings on the bamboo board hadn't been cleaned off yet. Pointing to the chicken droppings inside, she said, "No, look, all the chicken droppings on this bamboo board need to be cleaned off. It has to be spotless, not a single chicken dropping or feather can be seen!"
Zhao Heng felt completely drained. After panting heavily for a while, he fetched a basin of water, grabbed a broom, and scrubbed vigorously. This time, his entire face was splattered with chicken droppings. As he swept, he spat and coughed, his face turning red.
Following Liang Shuyan's instructions, Jin Erniu went to weed the wheat field. As soon as Liu entered the door, she carried a basket and said, "Mother, the wheat is growing well this year, but there are too many weeds. At this rate, when will we finish weeding the thirty acres of wheat?"
"If the wheat is growing well, we need to weed properly and not slack off. You've only been doing this for a few days, are you already complaining?"
Ruyan, wearing a patched dress, glanced at Liang Shuyan and said awkwardly, "Auntie, how about this, my mother, my sister, and I will all go weeding, since there's not much work to do at home anyway."
"How can you manage with a body like that?"
Ruyan raised her arm and demonstrated in front of everyone: "Look, Auntie, I'm strong. This is just taking a shovel to the field to weed, right? It's okay, I'll do it!"
Liang Shuyan nodded: "Okay, it's fine for you to go with your sister! But if you work for our family, your aunt will pay you five coins a day, how about that?"
Upon hearing this, Jin Sanwang happily ran over: "Mom, what's going on? How come Ruyan gets paid for her work? We do the same weeding, so why don't we get paid?"
"Jin Sanwang, first of all, you're surnamed Jin, you're a member of this family, eating and drinking at home, what more do you want in terms of money or inheritance? Second, you're a grown man, yet you always compare yourself to girls in everything you do, where's your face? Where's your face?"
Jin Sanwang was speechless after being lectured by Liang Shuyan. He took two steps back, covered his face, and said, "Mother, it's all Sanwang's fault. Sanwang knows he was wrong!"
"It's good that you know you're wrong. After you finish eating, you'll go up the mountain with your second brother, second sister-in-law, and Ruyan. You'll be responsible for bringing all the grass from the fields back and neatly placing it in the backyard to feed the donkey. If we have the chance, we'll catch a lamb for the family so we can have goat milk to drink!"
Ruyan felt ashamed to accept Liang Shuyan's treatment. She stepped forward and said politely, "Auntie, I can't accept the money. I brought my mother to your house and we've been eating and drinking here. It's only natural for me to do something for you. How can I accept your money?"
Grandma Liu breathed a sigh of relief: "That's right, in-law, you've really taken good care of my daughter and me. Now that there are weeds in the field, we should all lend a hand. How can we give Ruyan money? I'm not a useless old woman. I can still do something as simple as weeding. My wife does this kind of work at home too. It's alright."
Li Lanfang coughed softly: "What are you doing? You're so old, yet you're still coming out to work with us. If the villagers see this, who knows what they'll say about my daughter-in-law? Well then, I've just taken on some embroidery work. Why don't you sit down and keep me company, and help me with some embroidery?"
Li Lanfang had been doing these embroidery works whenever she had a spare moment, but the old lady was stubborn and didn't want to share them with the women in the village who knew how to embroider. Liang Shuyan saw her embroidering all day long and was worried that her health couldn't take it, so she brought up the matter of sharing the embroidery with the women in the village again. This time, the old lady did not refuse.
“That’s a good idea, but we need to check her embroidery skills first. If she’s good, we can let her do it. Once it’s finished, we’ll divide it up according to the pieces. How about this, after we finish eating, I’ll take Niu Niu to ask around.”
“Okay, Mom, this is a good idea. This way, as long as there are people in the village who know how to embroider, we can form an embroidery class, take orders, and then earn money together according to commission. This is a good idea!”
Liang Shuyan knew that the cold jelly business couldn't stop right now. She and her eldest daughter-in-law needed to find time to collect potato slices from various villages. Only by ensuring a sufficient supply of potato slices could they prevent the cold jelly from running out of stock!
Thinking of this, another idea popped into Liang Shuyan's mind: "That's right, potatoes aren't that difficult to grow. If we could take out the potato seeds from the system and plant them on a large scale, we could have as many potatoes as we wanted."
She hadn't been able to access the system for a long time. In order to obtain the system's superior varieties as soon as possible, Liang Shuyan decided to discuss the division of the wasteland with Li Zheng. Although the wasteland had been rented to her, some procedures in the village had not yet been completed. She didn't want to cause some people in the village to be jealous because of this.
"Mother, dinner's ready!" came the eldest daughter-in-law's voice from the courtyard.
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