Chapter 218: Buying Another Mountain
"Okay." Wen Yan still put business first. There was nothing interesting about digging a well.
The two walked towards the village, one in front and the other behind.
Wen Yan asked him about the charcoal burning incidentally: "This is beneficial to the people, you won't disagree!"
The young leader Yuan had a painful expression on his face: "How can I not agree to do good things for the people in the disaster area?"
Wen Yan praised him: "You are indeed a smart man who cares about the people. You will definitely be a good official who cares about the people in the future."
Chief Yuan made a face and muttered to himself, "Could it be that Ying Zhilin was fooled by her sweet words?"
Soon, they entered the village.
The houses and people in the village came into view.
Wen Yan discovered that this village was extremely poor.
Not only were all the villagers dressed in rags and looked pale and thin, but even the village chief lived in a thatched hut.
"Please come in and have a seat, both of you." It was said that these people were nobles who had come from the capital, and the village chief greeted them warmly, "Old woman, please bring the tea."
Although the village chief's house is a thatched hut, it is very clean.
The village chief had pale hair and was extremely thin, looking malnourished.
After a while, the village chief's old wife brought up two bowls of foamy tea.
The young leader Yuan took a sip of tea and did not mention the matter of buying the mountain. Instead, he told him about the well digging.
"If this well doesn't produce water, your village may have to move elsewhere."
"Do we have to move away?" The village chief frowned, looking as if he found it difficult to accept.
No one wants to leave their hometown if they can stay.
People who leave their hometown are cheaper than grass.
Chief Yuan said, "At least we can survive.
You can come back when the disaster is over.
Of course, if you can get some water, you don't have to leave."
The young leader Yuan broke it open and crushed it and told him.
The village chief was not an unreasonable person and gradually accepted it.
Then they talked about their ultimate goal for today: "Our other goal today is to buy the mountain next to the well from you."
"What!" The village chief was immediately excited. "You want to buy the mountain?"
The mountain is not very big, but most of the black pines on it are more than forty or fifty years old.
It is the perfect material for making high-quality ink.
As long as the trees are cut down and planted properly, ink smoke can be produced continuously.
Seeing Yan nod, the village chief rubbed his hands, looking embarrassed: "Excuse me, what are you going to do with the mountain?"
Wen Yan smiled and replied, "It has its uses."
The village chief didn't mind.
This is how other people make money, so it's understandable that they don't want to say more.
Everyone in their village has the same surname and they have one ancestor. They have branched out and now have nearly a thousand people.
All their fields and the surrounding mountains were also left to their descendants by that ancestor.
Now that the mountain has been sold, every household will be able to get a considerable sum of money.
This amount of money is enough to marry two wives under normal circumstances.
Now we can stockpile a lot of food to help the villagers overcome the current crisis.
Therefore, the village chief was absolutely willing to let Wen Yan buy the mountain.
The price was agreed upon immediately and the contract was signed.
Buying the mountain went very smoothly, but the next day when I went to the county town to get the transfer deed, I encountered difficulties.
They asked a lot of questions at first, and then when they heard that Yan was from another place, the government office wanted to take advantage of him.
In the end, it was the disaster relief official who came with them who took out a badge and intimidated the other party.
The man turned pale with fear and completed the procedures for them very quickly.
After Wen Yan returned, he told Meng Xiyan about the situation in the county government office.
Meng Xiyan was a man of action. He immediately sent Yuan Xiao, the young leader, to the county town to conduct an investigation, and many people were exposed.
Of course, this is all in the past.
After signing the contract and paying the deposit to reassure the village chief, Wen Yan and the others prepared to leave.
But the village chief insisted on keeping them for lunch.
The village made such a huge amount of money, and the whole village has hope.
The village chief's family wanted to treat them well.
He immediately asked his wife to catch the old hen at home and stew it.
The village chief has several children, and despite such a difficult situation, he still raises hens. It must be to provide nourishment for the children.
How could Wen Yan have the nerve to eat, so she grabbed the little leader Yuan and ran away.
As a result, at lunch time, the village chief came to the door with a jar of chicken soup.
The chicken is already stewed, so there’s no point in being pretentious.
Wen Yan calmly accepted the clay pot of chicken soup.
The village chief smiled and said, "Take your time to eat. I will talk to the villagers about whether they need silver or buy food."
Wen Yan watched his frail figure walk out and couldn't help but call out to him, "If you've decided to buy grain, wait a little longer. Maybe new grain merchants will come to Jinyang Prefecture."
Wen Yan said it with certainty.
The village chief took the words to heart.
Wen Yan went back to prepare dinner.
When you open the lid of the earthenware jar, the rich aroma of chicken soup wafts from far away.
There were two whole chicken legs in the earthenware jar, obviously for Wen Yan and Little Leader Yuan.
There are also a lot of shiitake mushrooms and a few white and plump adenophoras.
Wen Yan didn't know whether to laugh or cry: "The village chief must have stewed all the good things in his home into this pot of soup."
Pei'er was so greedy that she kept swallowing her saliva: "I haven't had chicken soup since I entered Jinyang Prefecture."
Even if we kill a pheasant, there won't be enough water to make a stew.
Each person got half a bowl of chicken soup and a few pieces of chicken, and everyone ate happily.
Especially the pair of sisters that Wen Yan had just adopted, Wen Yan gave them new names, the elder sister was called Xin'er and the younger sister was called Sheng'er.
It means they start a new life.
It was the first time in their lives that they drank chicken soup, and they started crying while holding the bowl.
Xin'er burst into tears: "Last year, when my mother gave birth to my younger brother, my grandmother sent a chicken to nourish her body, but the old woman stewed it for her grandson to eat. Woo woo..."
Pei'er patted her head: "Don't cry, as long as you are loyal to the young lady, you will have plenty of food in the future."
After dinner, Wen Yan asked the young leader Yuan to go with him to find the village chief and tell him about collecting charcoal.
The village chief was confused, but he immediately realized that this was a way to make money.
But no one in their village knows how to make charcoal!
The village chief was so anxious that he scratched his head, as if the whole village was about to miss the opportunity to get rich quickly.
"Don't worry, village chief. I came here today just to tell you that you can pick out a few people and I will teach them how to make charcoal."
"You're going to teach us how to make charcoal?" This is a secret technique. "Tuition?"
Wen Yan said, "I used that can of chicken soup to pay for my tuition."
The village chief's eyes instantly turned red.
He grabbed the hand of the young leader Yuan and kept praising Wen Yan for his kindness.
Little Leader Yuan: "..."
**
Two days later, water finally came out of the well.
The water output is not large and is completely insufficient to meet the villagers' daily water needs.
But since we can dig a well with water, we can also dig a second and a third!
Seeing that they had circled the new wellhead, Wen Yan and his group packed their luggage and prepared to set off back to Jinyang City.
Before setting off, Wen Yan found Meng Xiyan and suggested, "I remember that the nearby river flows through Jinyang Prefecture. Can we return to the city along the river?"
"That would be a long detour. What other ideas have you come up with?"
"I'm not sure right now, I can only try and see."
In his previous life, after being convicted, Lan Hongneng rose through the ranks through river management and became a high-ranking member of the cabinet.
In this life, why can't this credit fall on them?
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