Chapter 7: Universally Praised |
Arriving in front of Chu Xun, the green snake and the white snake coiled their bodies and raised their heads.
Chu Xun smiled and reached out his hand, and the small snake on his neck immediately slithered down obediently.
He took the opportunity to pat the heads of the green and white snakes, smiling as he said, "You two are growing awfully fast. In a few more years, I'm afraid you'll become pythons."
About a meter long is a snake; about a zhang long is a python.
The green and white snakes obediently let him pet them. Then they raised their heads, flicked their tongues at his palm, and left with the small snake.
Two weasels popped out from the ground. The slightly smaller female beast bit the little one's neck and dragged it down.
Then it raised its two front paws towards Chu Xun and bowed, before diving into the field and disappearing.
Only after these poultry and livestock left did the crows on the tree fly down.
In the fields and at the edges, they picked up the small trinkets brought by the poultry and livestock.
These were all gifts brought by the poultry and livestock. Chu Xun brought a bamboo basket and put them in one by one.
Every year, these things alone could be exchanged for no less than ten taels of silver.
If he occasionally encountered rare mountain delicacies, they would sell for even more.
With the increase in the number of poultry and livestock, by the time the dog days of summer arrived this year, Chu Xun had already sold eight taels and eight mace.
Carrying the half-full bamboo basket, he waved his hand at the crows and walked towards the village.
The crows tilted their heads behind him, watching him enter the village before taking flight.
They lingered around those graves in the fields, cawing for a while.
Three years ago, to fight for water, Pinecone Village lost ten men.
Yellow paper fluttered in the sky. Now that the three years of mourning had passed, the weather was favorable, and they had finally stepped out of the haze.
At the door of a farmhouse at the edge of the village, a woman was looking down, weaving straw sandals.
A four-year-old boy, holding a thin branch and scratching back and forth on the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.
Seeing Chu Xun, he immediately ran over bare-bottomed, hopping and skipping, "Uncle Xun!"
Chu Xun smiled and took a wild fruit from the bamboo basket. The boy happily clutched it in his hand and reached out to pull him over, "Uncle Xun, look at the one, two, three I wrote!"
Chu Xun looked down and saw a few horizontal lines drawn crookedly on the ground.
According to the laws of the Kingdom of Jing, those who do not enter private schools or public schools are not allowed to learn to read and write.
The euphemistic name for this was to protect the literary atmosphere from being corrupted.
In reality, the aristocratic families and powerful clans did not want the common people to become enlightened. Even the Emperor of Jing, who had great ambitions, never raised any objections to this rule.
The more ignorant the common people were, the easier they were to govern.
As long as they didn't starve to death, they would only blame heaven and earth, and blame themselves for being incompetent.
Although Chu Xun had the ability, he couldn't act freely because of this law.
He could only teach them the basic one, two, three, four during his leisure time when telling stories to the children.
For these necessities of people's livelihood, the government turned a blind eye and wouldn't restrict them too much.
"Where's the four?" Chu Xun asked.
The boy embarrassedly scratched his dirty buttocks, "I forgot how to write it."
Chu Xun couldn't help but laugh. The woman nearby had already stood up and took the initiative to greet him, "Brother Xun'er."
Unlike the "Brother Xun" that Zhang Anxiu called out, the woman's greeting carried an 'er' sound at the end.
According to the village's customs, such an address was more intimate and had nothing to do with age.
"Stone, go scoop some water for your Uncle Xun. Brother Xun'er, will you eat at our house at noon? I'll go cook!" The woman greeted him eagerly.
The man of her house was exactly one of those who died in the water dispute.
During the severe droughts of the previous two years, a woman with a newborn baby couldn't fetch much water.
Not to mention having no harvest, she couldn't even afford to pay the grain tax.
The tax collector who came down from the county office, with a pointed mouth and monkey-like cheeks, clamored to collect the Wasteland Tax from her family.
It was Li Shoutian who privately slipped him two or three taels of silver to gloss over the matter.
The Wasteland Tax wouldn't be collected from you, but the grain couldn't be short by a single catty.
At that time, not many in the village had surplus grain. Li Shoutian ran to find Chu Xun again, and together they took out some surplus grain to help these struggling households pay it.
They also left some extra so that the orphans and widows wouldn't starve to death.
It was said that they would return it when there was a harvest in the fields in the future, but Chu Xun never thought about these things.
It was just a few hundred catties of grain; he didn't lack it now, nor did he care.
When winter came, he would even send extra firewood to those families to help them keep warm.
In Chu Xun's words, he grew up eating the collective meals of a hundred families when he was young, so doing these things now was only natural.
But the villagers were honest; they didn't think about what was natural or not, they only knew that Chu Xun was a good person.
Although the Village Chief was Li Shoutian, Chu Xun had done so many good deeds over the years that his prestige was almost the same, only lacking in age and seniority.
Most of those who had received his kindness were full of gratitude towards Chu Xun.
Of course, there were also a few who were jealous that Chu Xun could save so much silver. To his face or behind his back, they would always half-jokingly say that Chu Xun had eaten the meals of a hundred families.
The silver he saved should belong to the village.
A few women went up and scratched that person's face until it bloomed. They had watched Chu Xun grow up and had received his kindness; they couldn't stand seeing someone say such shameless things.
"I won't eat, Anxiu should have already cooked," Chu Xun said.
The woman asked curiously, "You're not really going to marry that little girl Anxiu, are you?"
Over the past few years, Zhang Anxiu and Zhang Sanchun frequently came to the fields to help with sowing and weeding.
When it was time to eat, she would run over to help cook.
Although they weren't a family, they were better than a family.
Among the families in the village with daughters, who didn't hope for Chu Xun to be their son-in-law or brother-in-law?
Watching Zhang Anxiu constantly slipping into Chu Xun's house every day, they were extremely jealous and gossiped with rumors and slander.
Zhang Anxiu didn't care about these things at all. You can say whatever you want, she was going to go anyway.
Even if Chu Xun didn't marry her, she was willing to be a maidservant. She was happy to do it, so what!
The woman glanced at her son who ran to scoop water, covered her mouth and chuckled softly, puffed up her high chest, and sent amorous glances, "What does that little girl know? Do you want Sister-in-law to teach you a few things?"
What could she teach?
Nothing more than those matters.
These words were half true and half false. Although it was very sad when her man died, three years had passed, and any sad matters should have faded.
Replacing it was the loneliness of guarding an empty room alone.
Those dark-skinned farmers in the village, with mouthfuls of yellow teeth, were either old or foolish; she didn't fancy them.
Chu Xun, this nineteen-year-old strong and vigorous young man, although he hadn't attended a private school, was educated and reasonable.
He knew how to earn silver, and even more so how to save silver.
His reputation in the village was top-notch.
If they could really get tangled up in the same bed, she would be taking a huge advantage.
Stared at by her seemingly dripping eyes, Chu Xun felt his scalp tingle. He didn't even dare to drink the water and quickly made an excuse to go home for dinner and ran away.
The woman giggled, and a moment later, a look of slight loneliness appeared on her face.
She touched her own face and muttered in a low voice, "I'm not considered too old, am I? It's not like I'm going to eat you, what are you running for."
Having "escaped" from the farmhouse, the villagers he met on the way home would all take the initiative to greet him.
Chu Xun responded one by one. When he encountered bold women who flirted with him, he would hurriedly lower his head and run away.
This drew bursts of laughter from the women. So young and with such thin skin, he truly became more likable the more they looked at him.
When he returned home, Zhang Anxiu ran out from the courtyard.
"Brother Xun! The Village Chief is looking for you, he's been waiting for a long time."
Chu Xun looked up and only then saw Li Shoutian standing at the door of the house.
Li Shoutian didn't come this time for silver or grain, but to bring a piece of news that was neither good nor bad.
In order to expand farmland and strengthen national power, the imperial court had promulgated a new law.
The Wasteland Reclamation Decree!
(End of Chapter)
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