Chapter 32. Taiqing shone on Cang Li's body...
Taiqing changed his robes to match Cangli's clothes, tied his long hair with a jade crown, and carried the very conspicuous wood ash placed beside Cangli's legs down to the field. He walked to the place where Cangli had not yet scattered the wood ash and scattered it into the ground.
Cang Li had been watching out of the corner of her eye, and seeing that Tai Qing had changed her attire in the blink of an eye, she immediately pretended to walk over:
"Oh dear, how could I possibly ask the Taoist priest to do the work?"
Taiqing: ...
Taiqing said gently, "It's alright, I'm just standing there anyway."
Cang Li turned her face away guiltily, thinking that Tai Qing had heard what she was saying in her heart.
In just a few days, Taiqing had adapted to the work. After telling the children the koans each day, he would ask Cangli with great interest what else needed to be done. He was indeed a good worker.
Cang Li thought she would see obvious emotions on Tai Qing's face, but who knew that this person had the same expression no matter what she did, and would even look at her with a faint smile and ask questions. Cang Li felt that Tai Qing was seducing her.
Yu shakily dug a hole nearby, then hugged Cang Li tightly, drooling as she called out, "Sister~"
Cang Li pulled Yu away: "Go away, you're filthy. I'll have someone wash your hands."
I slowly went to find someone.
Taiqing slowly wiped the dirt off his hands, walked to Cangli's side and said, "It might get colder in the next few days. They've only just entered the Dao and can't withstand it. We need to make plans early."
Cang Li snapped out of her daze and, upon hearing about the need to lower the temperature, immediately nodded: "Okay, thanks for the reminder."
Taiqing added, "You may call me if needed."
Cang Li didn't stand on ceremony with Tai Qing, and simply nodded in agreement. A wall of firewood had already been neatly stacked in the cave, and the cave door had been closed. As for the cotton, Cang Li didn't know how to fluff it, but he roughly knew that the cotton needed to be pressed into a whole. He didn't know how cold it would be in winter, so Cang Li planned to make more preparations.
“Hey, come with me up the mountain and pick up all those chestnuts.”
The chestnut grove is ripe, and you can pick up quite a few chestnuts every day. After picking them up and drying them for a few days, you can stomp them open with your feet and pick out the chestnuts from the burrs.
There were also oranges. That orange tree was laden with oranges. Cang Li tasted them, and they were quite delicious.
Just as Taiqing was about to follow Cangli, Cangli turned around and said:
"Master, I'll take them both. You stay home and watch over the house, and also keep an eye on Yu and Zhong, make sure they don't fight."
Taiqing paused for a moment, then stopped and said, "Okay."
After Cang Li left, Tai Qing lowered his head, feeling inexplicably that the word "guardian" didn't seem to suit him, but Tai Qing didn't dislike the word.
I walked over to the group who were squatting to the side playing with the grass. After a while, the group burst into tears and punched me with their fists.
Er, who was left behind, immediately dragged Yu away and looked at Taiqing for help.
Taiqing glanced at the three of them with indifferent eyes, then leisurely flew to a boulder extending from above the cave. From this vantage point, one could see all the land in front of the cave. Taiqing's actions clearly indicated that he did not intend to interfere in the conflict between Yu and the others.
Er looked at the crowd crying loudly, then at Yu, who was crying after being beaten and still trying to bite someone. Er said: Sister, please come back quickly!
Cang Li was picking chestnuts in the woods with Ji Hejie. To avoid getting pricked, she made three long tongs out of bent bamboo strips, which made picking chestnuts particularly easy.
The three of them moved quickly, and since the chestnut grove wasn't very big, they soon finished picking up all the fallen chestnuts. After picking up the ones on the ground, Cang Li used a bamboo pole to knock the chestnuts off the trees. They needed to collect all the chestnuts in the next few days and peel them while the sun was still out. The shells could be dried and used as firewood.
When the basket was full, Cang Li threw it into his backpack and took out an empty one to pick more. After picking up almost all the fruit, Cang Li took the two children to pick oranges. There weren't many fruits to eat in winter, only oranges. Cang Li also planned to save some oranges to mature, take out the seeds, and plant a few trees at the entrance of the cave.
After picking the grains, Cang Li saw that it was getting late, so she took the children down the mountain. When they got back, they still had to pound rice. The new rice had been drying for a few days and was ready to be pounded. Cang Li was drooling with desire for rice.
Before Cang Li even reached the entrance after descending the mountain, he heard Yu's cries, mixed with the wailing and shouts of the crowd:
"Sister! Where are you? Come quick! Yu bit me again! Waaaaaah..."
Cang Li: ...
So, what about the Taoist priest? Is this how he takes care of children?
As Cang Li reached her doorstep, Yu and the others rushed forward, eager to be the first to complain. Cang Li, exasperated, grabbed the two children, one in each arm, and asked Er, who was nearly crying while trying to soothe them:
"Where is the Taoist priest?"
Er looked up and Cang Li followed Er's gaze. He saw Taiqing, who looked like an immortal, sitting in meditation. Taiqing seemed to sense Cang Li's gaze, opened his eyes and looked over. Then he got up and was in front of Cang Li in the blink of an eye.
Cang Li hesitated for a moment, then finally couldn't help but ask, "They were crying so loudly, how could you still meditate?" Cang Li was very impressed by this composure; in modern times, he would definitely be a promising student.
Taiqing was puzzled: "Isn't their crying and fussing a characteristic of the human race? From my observation, it's in the nature of human infants to cry and fuss. What does that have to do with my meditation?"
Cang Li: "...I mean, don't you find it annoying?" It's really strange that someone would find a crying child annoying.
Taiqing explained, "This is their nature. I don't find it bothersome when I'm in meditation, so I don't care about it."
Cang Li: Okay, this is a true master.
For some reason, Taiqing instinctively added, "I just feel that we shouldn't interfere too much with them, not that we're completely ignoring them. They'll be fine once they've cried enough."
Cang Li: "Hmm... what you said makes sense." When she got annoyed, she would run away and come back when the cubs stopped crying. No one could stand the cubs crying incessantly and not being able to soothe them.
After a brief exchange, Ji Hejie had already skillfully appeased Yu Hezhong and even laid the chestnuts out to dry in the open space.
Cang Li took out the fan cart and placed it in the harvested field. Before pounding the rice, he had to remove the dry leaves, dust, and small mud particles that couldn't be swept out of the rice. The fan cart was used for this purpose. He poured the rice into the bin at the top of the cart and then turned the handle with the axle next to it. The wind generated by the wooden blade fan inside the cart would blow away the debris from the rice that fell from the bin and out from the rear of the cart. The rice, due to its own weight, would fall into the prepared basket from the outlet next to the handle.
This task wasn't difficult. Cang Li asked someone to come over and crank the handle. She moved a stool to stand on and put all the rice from her backpack into the container. The roller coaster was nearly two meters high. Cang Li wasn't short, but she was only 165 cm tall. Without standing on her feet, it wouldn't be easy to put it in.
Taiqing, watching from behind, hesitated to speak. This could be easily accomplished with magic that controls objects. Taiqing wanted Cangli to listen to the Daoist teachings together in the morning, but quickly realized that she shouldn't force Cangli. Cangli must have his reasons for doing so.
Cang Li busied himself unloading the rice, moving the clean rice grains to different baskets. After working for half a day, he finally finished processing the nearly 800 jin of rice. He kept about 200 jin as seeds, and the rest could be pounded and eaten.
Pounding rice is a skill; if it's too heavy, it will crush the rice; if it's too light, the husk won't come off.
Cang Li planned to make a little bit to eat first, and then slowly pound the rest. After Cang Li had pounded for a while, Tai Qing walked over leisurely and said:
"I'll do it."
Cang Li looked at Tai Qing with some doubt, after all, pounding rice was not easy, and she didn't really want to eat broken rice.
Taiqing had already taken the tool from Cangli's hand and, imitating Cangli's manner, smashed it down with just the right amount of force.
Cang Li was relieved after watching for a while; Tai Qing was indeed very capable.
After pounding a basket of rice, Cang Li quietly replaced it with fresh rice and put it in for Tai Qing to pound rice. He thought that since Tai Qing was doing such a good job, he should do more.
Cang Li didn't know what Tai Qing was thinking, but she kept pouring the rice into the container, and Tai Qing didn't stop her. She even stayed up all night to finish pounding all the rice for her. There were about 600 catties of paddy rice, and in the end, she got 430 or 440 catties of rice. Mixed with potatoes, sweet potatoes and chestnuts, it would be enough to eat for a while.
Moreover, the rice from Taiqing Chun was very intact. Cang Li cooked a large pot of rice, which was very fragrant. Paired with braised pork, pickled fish, and a dish of mushrooms and cabbage, Cang Li ate three large bowls of rice, satisfying his stomach, which hadn't eaten rice for a while.
After Taiqing finished eating the rice, he raised an eyebrow. No wonder Cangli took it so seriously.
Before it got cold, Cang Li harvested and husked all the ripe wheat in one go. But to grind the wheat into flour, a stone mill was needed. Cang Li glanced at Tai Qing and felt that she couldn't exploit people like that. That's why she made people stay up all night pounding rice. She wasn't Huang Shiren.
After temporarily abandoning the idea of grinding flour, Cang Li planned to catch more fish while the weather was still nice, and also tell her mother that she wouldn't cross the river when it got cold.
Cang Li was preparing for winter, busily stockpiling food and supplies. He even took some time to test the shuttle, figuring out how to put cotton on it. This shuttle, which was worth its increased price, was very useful. After the cotton was put on, it automatically wove a piece of white cotton cloth. Cang Li's confidence increased greatly. He kept twenty catties of cotton for the quilt filling and wove the remaining ten catties into cloth.
These cloths will be used to make two quilts, one larger and one smaller. Any extras will be used as sheets to cover the haystacks. The five children will sleep together, and she will have her own quilt.
Cang Li let Ji Hejie, who had nothing to do for the time being, grind the bone needles, while she took the Hongmeng Holy Sword and cut fabric.
The woven cloth was cut into two bed sheets and two duvet covers. The duvet covers need to be sewn, so these can be put aside for now. Cang Li still needs to process the cotton, which requires fluffing it.
Cang Li sighed. Fluffing cotton was too difficult. She didn't know how, so she could only tear the cotton apart by hand, fluff it up, and put it together. Then she used a bamboo mat to flatten it. Cang Li didn't plan to do it very well. She would just put on a quilt cover and sew it in place with a bone needle.
These past two days, Cang Li has been busy making quilts. She hasn't gone out much except for meals. Tai Qing looked at Cang Li, who was sewing the quilt by hand, with a puzzled expression. Of course, out of respect for principles, Tai Qing didn't say anything. She just silently helped Cang Li bring in the chestnuts that were drying at the door and went to the river to fetch a lot of water to store.
By the time Cang Li finished making the cotton quilts, the temperature outside had plummeted overnight, and when he woke up in the morning, he found the ground covered with a layer of white frost.
A note from the author:
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