Chapter 136 Shen Lie
When she returned to the cave, Sang Luo pinched her stiff face a few times before stepping in.
I never want to do such stupid things again.
Come to think of it, given the current conditions, the only space a family of four can move around in is this small cave. Why think so much?
Take hanging clothes for example. Before, when she hung clothes out to dry, because she made close-fitting underwear and didn’t want Chen Lie to see it, she could hang them directly in the backyard and lock the door. Chen Lie would naturally hang his washed clothes outside the yard. Is it possible now?
Of course not. There is no backyard or front yard. There are only two pieces of land.
So, be more open-minded when you should.
…
On the nineteenth night of her escape, Sang Luo finally slept on her long-missed bed, and finally she no longer had to worry about a snake jumping out of the bushes next to her when she went to the toilet.
Sang Luo finally felt a little settled. She was tired after a whole day and soon fell into a deep sleep with her eyes closed. When she woke up the next day, she had completely forgotten the little embarrassment of the previous night. Well, she didn't have time to think about it because she was busy!
The food had not yet been transported away, and Chen Lie and his group of young and strong men only stayed in the valley for a total of five days. One day had been spent on felling trees, cleaning up the caves and making furniture. The rest of the time they would carry some soil from outside into the valley, turn the land into fields, turn the mountain walls into three-dimensional vegetable plots, and move some suitable trees into the paddy fields.
Sang Luo seized the opportunity and followed Chen Lie and his group out of the valley. Of course, she was not the only one who followed. Brave people like Qin Fangniang, Shi Erlang's wife, Feng Liuniang, and Zhou's eldest daughter-in-law also followed. It was not for any other reason. The vegetables would not grow well so quickly after being planted. There were not many wild vegetables in the valley because of the land reclamation. The only things they could eat on a daily basis were some dried vegetables and wild vegetables that they had brought with them, as well as beans and sprouts.
There are abundant resources in the mountains. While Chen Lie and other young and strong people are here and their safety is guaranteed, we can go into the mountains to look for some things, either to harvest or to transplant.
Even an old woman like Mrs. Chen asked to go out with them. She didn't go there to look for wild vegetables, but mainly to look for some medicinal herbs to repel snakes and insects. Snakes and insects would appear in February and March, and there would be more of them in summer. In this deep mountain and dense forest, we had to be on guard.
She couldn't ask others to do this job for her, because others wouldn't recognize it and she couldn't describe it well, so Mrs. Chen had to go out and look for it herself. Once she found the pattern, she asked Chen Lie and the other people who often traveled outside to recognize it. Later, whenever they saw it, they would dig some up and plant it.
The soil was carried back to the entrance of the valley in loads and carried back in dustpans. In addition to the thickening of the soil in the fields, Sang Luo and her friends had been out for several days in a row and had also reaped a lot of rewards. They got a lot of seasonal wild vegetables, and also found some mint, basil, etc. They dug up a lot of them, transplanted some of them between the filled soil walls, and distributed the rest to Old Lady Xu, who dared not go out.
Old Mrs. Xu returned the favor by giving Sang Luo some pieces of ginger, which was one of the seeds that Manager Xu sent along with the grain.
Sang Luo's eyes lit up when she saw ginger. This was something she had been dreaming of for a long time, but there was very little of it sold outside, and most of the time she could only buy dried ginger at the pharmacy.
She asked Chen Lie to find some sandy soil for her and planted it as if it were her treasure.
As for the snake-repellent plants that Mrs. Chen wanted to find, she found five or six species. There weren't many, so she distributed them to each family and planted one or two near the entrance of the cave.
Sang Luo couldn't recognize those grasses or shrubs, but thinking about the snake repellent powder that Mrs. Chen had, and her family had been hunters for generations, she knew it must be good, so she planted one on each side of the cave.
Later, Chen Lie and his companions brought back a lot of them. Sang Luo planted all the places on the surface of the cave that were close to the mountain and could be filled with soil, to ensure that snakes that passed by any path that might lead them into her cave would quickly retreat. The clean room and the short section of road from the cave to the clean room were also planted in the same way.
The situation of other families is similar. Everything else is good living in this valley. The only thing that is difficult to protect against is snakes. With these snake-repellent plants as barriers, we can finally feel a little more at ease.
For four days in a row, they were busy carrying soil from outside to level the ground during the day, and in the evening and at night, they repaired the inner wall of the cave, focusing on the rugged and protruding ones. Not only did they repair their own walls, but the Xu family also helped. However, Wei Qinghe himself gradually learned some skills, and although he was slow at chiseling stones, he did a good job.
When it was time to go to pick up grain again, Sang Luo didn't know what was going on in other families, but in her family, the chicken and duck coop that Sang Luo was worried about had been moved here. The chicken and duck coop had been carefully renovated, and even the food trough and water sink had been made in detail. He also made shelves to organize the jars that were previously scattered all over the floor, and made a wooden table next to the stove, so Sang Luo no longer had to squat on the floor to cut vegetables and prepare food. There were also shelves under the wooden table, which could hold various pottery pots and pans, and temporarily put bowls and chopsticks, and the cutting board for cutting vegetables was also made.
Chen Lie smoothed out the protruding and easily bumped areas in the cave, and even after asking Sang Luo for her opinion, he carved out a lampstand in the middle of the cave.
A small space was hollowed out in the stone wall, where an oil lamp could be placed to provide lighting for the cave, and a fire starter was placed next to it.
The same thing happened in the purification room. In addition to leveling the stone walls, a place was also chiseled out to place the oil lamp.
"It's okay to leave the door open when cooking in the future, but you should close the door when you sleep at night. Don't leave any fire on the stove. It's not safe to have a fire in a completely enclosed space. When I come back next time, I'll find some clay on the way and bring some back to properly build the stove. After building a flue to get it out, everything will be fine."
When Sang Luo heard about repairing the chimney, her first reaction was that snakes could crawl in along the chimney. Later, she thought of the many snake-repellent plants planted around the cave, which made her feel a little more at ease. However, she still asked, "Can we make one that can be blocked when not in use?"
Shen Lie was stunned for a moment, then he reacted and suddenly laughed: "Okay."
After talking about family affairs, they talked about farm work, which was particularly tiring and heavy. During this period, the young and strong people like Chen Lie had finished all the work while they were at home. The next step was to dig canals and release water. There was little land in the valley, so the four people who stayed behind, Chen Laohan, Lu Laohan, Zhou Cunzheng and Chen Youtian, could do this work. Sang Luo and the others could only help out when they had time.
The hardest part is farming.
"For the millet to be planted this year, Grandma Chen will help us with the soaking of seeds. They picked the best seeds last year, and now there is not so much land to plant, so they simply brought them out for us and the Xu family. We just need to return the corresponding grain when the time comes. There is only one thing, I am afraid I will not be able to return in time for the spring plowing. That work is really dirty and tiring, but because each family has very little land, it is not difficult. I found Uncle Youtian and asked him to help make a wooden plow. I will take Xiao An to the fields and teach him farming."
I'm ten years old now, and it's time for me to learn these things in the countryside.
Chen Lie really couldn't imagine what the scene would be like when Sang Luo took off her shoes and socks, rolled up her trouser legs, and stepped into the paddy field with both legs together.
Before she came to their house, except for the time when she was fleeing, she had probably never suffered so much.
Chen Lie actually heard from Chen An about why she almost starved to death in the beginning. It was because of her upbringing since she was a child that even though she could have found a way to catch some fish in the stream, she was bound by etiquette and refused to take off her shoes and socks to go into the water.
For a young lady like this, if she were to live in a poor family like theirs, it would be worse than living in a grass nest. She would be bothered to take off her shoes and socks and go into the water in the wild when no one is around, so how could she be willing to take off her shoes and socks and walk bare-legged in the fields in front of others, with her legs covered in mud?
Therefore, Chen Lie had never even thought about letting Sang Luo plow the fields, and he arranged it a few days in advance.
Sang Luo didn't expect that Shen Lie would know what she said to dispel Shen An's doubts and would always remember it, but she was really not good at farming.
When she lived in the mountains before, she only grew vegetables and raised chickens. She had never planted a field because she was actually quite afraid of leeches. She had lived in an orphanage since she was a child and didn't understand anything about them. But in the first year she lived in the mountains, she saw someone coming out of the field with several leeches biting his legs.
After that incident, I no longer thought about farming.
She could just grow some vegetables and raise some chickens. Her health was not good to begin with, and she could not endure such hardship. Therefore, during those years, she bought rice from her fellow villagers in the mountains. It was not expensive and she did not spend much in a year. It was the same pure natural green food.
Sang Luo was relieved to hear Chen Lie say that she didn't need to go to plow the fields and Chen An could do it. Thinking about the size of the field belonging to their family, which was indeed not big, she turned to look at Chen An.
Seeing his sister-in-law looking over, Chen An nodded hurriedly, "Yes, sister-in-law, you don't have to go to the fields, I'll go plow the fields. It's such a small piece of land, I can do it with Uncle Tian's guidance. My brother told me about it two days ago, and Hu Zi and the others also started to learn to farm this year."
Sang Luo laughed: "Okay, I'm just afraid of going to the fields."
The three siblings all laughed at once. Sang Luo was very capable, but that capability was more reflected in her knowledge, intelligence and cooking. In fact, when she really went to the fields, she was afraid of the smell of manure, and she was also particularly afraid of insects and snakes. Several people in the family knew it.
Chen Lie also smiled, but it was a pity. He looked at the morning light outside and said, "I should go now. I'll go back and forth and see if Manager Xu has left a letter. I'm afraid it will take ten days for me to come back."
As he spoke, he was already reluctant to leave.
Sang Luo was fine. If she had known that he was leaving early this morning, she would have prepared dry food and water. After he packed up, her instructions were similar to before, mostly about paying attention to safety.
Chen Lie felt a little disappointed when he didn't see the corresponding reluctance in Sang Luo's eyes, but he quickly covered it up with a smile.
Sang Luo didn't notice his slight change in mood, and together with Shen An and Shen Ning, she sent Chen Lie out.
At this time, each family also sent people out, all the way to the entrance of the canyon, and they had to remind them earnestly to be careful on the way, but they did not dare to delay too much. They watched Chen Lie remove the stones blocking both ends of the passage, and the group walked out. Both ends of the passage were once again sealed by Chen Lie.
With so many people gone, the valley became much quieter. Of course, they were not idle either, digging canals to store water, transplanting rice seedlings and growing vegetables, and even the water sources had to be carefully zoned.
The small waterfall receives fresh water flowing down from the mountain for drinking water. In addition to being released into the paddy fields, the water in the pond is also stored for backup. Clothes are also washed by the pond, but if it is sewage, that has to be disposed of elsewhere.
Old man Chen and his companions walked around the valley for a few times. There were quite a few small springs there, so they chose a spot close to the composting pond and prepared to dig a small pond to store water. They could wash the dirty things there in the future.
The valley is not big, and if you want a good living environment, it all depends on everyone's care, so there are a lot of small tasks to do.
Chen Youtian had to make wooden plows for each family, so the work fell on Old Man Chen, Old Man Lu and Zhou Cunzheng. Zhou Cunzheng called all the teenage boys from each family to help.
Little girls like Chen Ning, Chen Xiaoya, Shi Qiaoer and Xu Wenyin were left to play by themselves.
Several little girls went together to the Xu family's cave, and Sang Luo returned to her own cave.
The mat where Chen Lie slept was still spread out on the ground, and the quilt was neatly folded. Sang Luo looked at the mattress and pillow that were laid out neatly and smoothed without any wrinkles, and only then did she realize that she was reluctant to leave Shen Lie.
Or maybe it's not just reluctance, but a very complicated feeling.
During the five days, he was so busy that he hardly stopped. He did a lot of things, even planning and arranging everything about her for the next ten days. The only thing he didn't have time to make was the bed he would sleep in.
Sang Luo looked at the floor for a while, then suddenly smiled, her brows softened with this smile.
Deep and fierce.
After going over the name in her mind, Sang Luo smiled, turned around and went out to pick a place to set up a drying rack, then moved Chen Lie's quilt and pillow to her bed, and hung the mattress and a few wolf skins out to dry.
Wait for him to come back and make the bed, then take apart the mattress and quilt and wash them.
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