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“Didn’t grow well? What about the ones you used to plant?” Lin Lu managed to ask despite his mounting frustration.

Jiang Dala replied, “The ones before? They’ve long since been sold.”

“Sold already? Do you know the rules? You casually sold off something that the Wen Family ordered.” Lin Lu could not help reprimanding.

Jiang Lao stared at him, thinking there was no need to be polite to him anymore. “Sir, firstly, we didn’t take any advance from the Wen Family, and secondly, we are not tenants of the Wen’s. We can decide who to sell our stuff to, it’s none of your business!”

Hearing this, he called his eldest son and went home without paying further attention to the group.

Aqiu and another attendant exchanged looks of bewilderment.

Lin Lu was infuriated, but he had no way to deal with these stubborn villagers.

“Let’s go! Back to town!” Angrily, he climbed into the carriage and yelled at the coachman to leave.

Aqiu had no choice but to follow on his own horse.

Returning the same route down the South Slope, they passed by the old residence of the Clan Leader and happened to run into his second daughter-in-law, Han Miaoniang.

Han Miaoniang recognized Aqiu, giving him a slight nod, and mistook the person in the carriage for Lady Wen, “Oh, Lady Wen is back again?”

Aqiu greeted her with a salute, “Madam Han, our lady isn’t here. The person in the carriage is her brother, our family’s eldest son.”

Since Lady Wen had stayed in the Clan Leader’s house for quite some time and had good relations with his daughters-in-law, Aqiu naturally treated them very politely.

Han looked at the carriage and asked with a smile, “I saw you heading to the South Slope earlier, why did you rush away so soon?”

Aqiu turned his head and looked at the carriage. He could see his master was deep in thought.

However, he was making no move to hurry and didn’t ask him to send Han Miaoniang away, apparently he was distracted by his unsuccessful endeavor.

Aqiu turned back to Han and said, “Well, I might as well tell you, our young master came to the Jiang’s to gather mushrooms, but unexpectedly, the Jiang family sold the mushrooms to someone else, causing us to make a fruitless trip for thousands of miles.”

Upon hearing that they came for mushroom collection, Han Miaoniang’s eyes sparkled, and she hurriedly said, “Little brother Aqiu, actually, our house still has quite a few golden ears. Would you like to have a look?”

“Really?” Aqiu was delighted when he heard this, “does your family truly have golden ears?”

Having stayed in Dongchen Village for more than half a year, he naturally knew that everyone in the village was growing mushrooms. However, he didn’t understand why the Wen’s asked them to collect mushrooms specifically from the Jiang family.

Han Miaoniang replied, “Of course it’s true. Would you like to wait here while I go home and bring some for you to see?”

Before Aqiu responded, Lin Lu lifted the carriage curtain, peeked out, and said: “Go fetch them.”

“Right away!” Han Miaoniang happily ran back home and brought back the golden ears that hadn’t been sold before.

These moldy golden ears had been re-cleaned and dried by her, and all mold spots had been removed, which was undetectable to anyone not familiar with the product.

Originally, she intended to take them to the county, but it didn’t work out.

Soon, Han Miaoniang came back with a large basket full of golden ears, and her sister-in-law Chen Dashao was also following behind.

“Little brother Aqiu, you see, our golden ears are always the brightest. If it weren’t for the fact that we are holding them for domestic use, they would have been sold long ago.”

As Han Miaoniang was explaining, she was also assessing Aqiu and the person in the carriage.

Lin Lu leaned out, picked up a mushroom and looked at it, then sniffed it and asked, “How much are you selling these for?”

To be honest, Lin Lu had only seen golden ears once at his sister’s house, hence he had a general idea of what golden ears looked like, but knew nothing about their quality.

However, as long as he could take the goods back, it would mean his mission was complete.

Han could tell immediately that this person didn’t know the products well, so she grinned happily and said, “Last time, Lady Wen purchased them for ten taels of silver per catty.”

Lin Lu didn’t haggle over the price. He nodded to Aqiu, “Go and weigh them.”

Before leaving, Lady Wen had handed him a balance. She asked him to weigh the mushrooms to avoid being deceived by the villagers.

Aqiu agreed and took out the balance from a box on the carriage to weigh the golden ears.

Chen Dashao, watching, couldn’t hide her eagerness, “Sir, we also have a few catties of golden ears at our house as well. Would you like to buy them?”

Lin Lu glanced at the gold earrings that were being weighed, saw that there weren’t many, and nodded, “Bring them over for me to see.”

Chen Dasao was overjoyed and rushed home to bring her gold earrings.

Lin Lu took a quick look and then let Aqiu weigh them.

The two sets of gold earrings totaled fifteen and a half jin, which at ten taels per jin, was one hundred and fifty-five taels.

Lin Lu took out the ready cash from the carriage box, handed it to them, ordered the attendants to load the gold earrings onto the carriage, and then drove away.

Han Miaoniang was so happy that she was going mad. She watched as the carriage disappeared into the distance, held the silver, and rushed home.

“Hahaha, I’ve hit the jackpot.”

Han Miaoniang was beside herself with joy and said to Chen Dasao: “It’s just as the old saying goes – every cloud has a silver lining. Steward Zhou wouldn’t buy our gold earrings for three taels per jin, but just after the New Year, our gold earrings sold for ten taels per jin.”

Humph! I really want to throw a silver ingot at the face of that unscrupulous Steward Zhou. So he can see the value of the gold earrings that he refused to buy. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have made so much money.

“Isn’t it just?” Chen Dasao said, holding several dozen taels of silver and gratefully saying to Han Miaoniang: “Thanks for reminding me this time. I’ll go to town later to buy some meat and we can make dumplings.”

Han Miaoniang laughed in triumph: “Who are we kidding? We’re family.”

The Han family didn’t know that their gold earrings almost led to the extermination of the Chen family.

After March, it quickly came to the end of April.

These past few days, the weather has been unusually oppressive.

The two thousand gold and mushroom ear seedlings that Yingbao had planted had matured, and she and her mom were busy harvesting them in the bamboo shed.

Jiang Sanlang was drying the harvested mushrooms in the drying oven.

The family had worked for several days until all the mushrooms had finally been properly harvested. They harvested a total of twenty-eight jin of gold earrings and an equal number of mushroom ears.

If all of these were sold, it would be another significant income.

Taking advantage of the current absence of rain, Jiang Sanlang decided to transport this batch of mushrooms to the county town and let his eldest nephew, Jiang Cheng, sell them.

“No need to hurry.”

Yingbao looked out at the sky and said to her father: “The weather has been bad recently. I think there’s going to be a heavy rainstorm. You shouldn’t be traveling far.”

She had been feeling uneasy lately, as if something bad was about to happen.

Jiang Sanlang always listened to his darling daughter, “Okay, then, I’ll go and notify the villagers to be careful.”

He especially needed to remind Clan Leader Chen. His two sons were still living in the old house at the foot of the hill.

Crrrack!

A loud clap of thunder, accompanied by a bright flash of lightning, was really shocking.

Yingbao jumped off the kang bed, startled, and peered out of the window.

It was clearly afternoon, but outside it was as dark as if night had fallen.

She jumped down from the bed, put on her shoes, and ran outside.

“Yingbao! Where are you going?” Chunniang chased after her, shouting: “Your brother is still at home.”

As Yingbao ran, she looked back at Chunniang and said: “I’m going to find father.”

“Your father went to the Clan Leader’s house! Come back! I’ll go and find him!” Chunniang grabbed an oiled-paper umbrella and ran out after her.

Yingbao ran quickly and soon arrived at the place where the Clan Leader lived.

She ran into Chen Zhu’s courtyard and saw Tang Aipo leading her grandson, standing under the eaves and looking over.

“Yingbao? Why are you running around when it’s about to rain?” Tang Shi scolded: “What if you get caught in the rain? You’d better go home!”