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Jiang Liu knew her son and daughter-in-law hadn’t seen each other for a long time and there must be private matters to discuss. Therefore, she led Yingbao out, shooting her husband a glance before she left.

Old man Jiang understood and made his way back inside.

Earlier this morning, their eldest son had driven the clan leader and his wife to the county town, and so he wasn’t home.

The eldest daughter-in-law, Mrs. Zhou, and their eldest granddaughter were in the fields too, leaving only him and his wife at home.

When Yingbao entered her uncle’s courtyard, she saw hedgehogs piled up everywhere, and in the corner of the yard, there was a large pile of chestnut shells.

“Grandpa, have all the chestnuts been gathered?” she asked.

Old man Jiang kicked away the chestnut shell under his feet to keep his granddaughter from stepping on the hedgehogs. “Not all of them. Your second brother said we should gather them bit by bit. If we harvest them all at once, they’ll get moldy.”

Yingbao looked around and noticed several large bamboo trays filled with purple skinned chestnuts in the yard.

Jiang Liu said, “Once we’ve peeled the chestnuts, your aunt will make chestnut cakes. When your second brother comes back in a few days, he’ll take them to the store for sale.”

Yingbao nodded, picked up a purple-skinned chestnut, bit open the shell, and ate it crunchily after peeling off its hairy skin.

The chestnuts were sweet and large, far bigger than the roasted chestnuts sold by the street vendors in Wa City.

Seeing her granddaughter eating raw chestnuts, Jiang Liu peeled two and handed them to her, cautioning, “Don’t eat too many raw ones, they’ll upset your stomach.”

“Okay.” Yingbao obediently nodded.

“Yingbao, tell Grandpa about Beijing.”

Old man Jiang, sitting on a bench made from an old tree root, asked as he peeled hedgehogs, “What does the Emperor’s palace look like?”

“Beijing has a lot of people, and a lot of carts, and even more people doing business,” Yingbao replied.

Unable to describe the hustle and bustle of Beijing, Yingbao said, “The Emperor’s residence looks like a fairy palace. Its roof tiles are golden. When the sun shines on them, they dazzle people’s eyes. Oh, and I brought some lychee back from Beijing.”

Yingbao rummaged through her bag, pulled out a bunch of purple-skinned lychees, and handed them to her grandparents.

By this time of year, lychee should have been off the market already, but those she had kept in her vault remained fresh and unspoiled.

“Oh my!” Jiang Liu exclaimed in surprise taking the lychee from her granddaughter. “So this is a lychee! It’s my first time seeing one.”

Old man Jiang had seen them before, but like his wife, he had never tasted one before.

The old couple each peeled a lychee and popped it in their mouths, exclaiming, “It’s so sweet!”

Jiang Liu quickly peeled another one for her granddaughter and watched with delight as she gobbled it up.

After chatting with her grandparents for a while, Yingbao said her goodbyes and headed home.

Her father, Jiang Sanlang, and his wife were in the living room. Seeing their daughter return, they eagerly waved her over. “Baobao, come here.”

Yingbao approached them, and upon closer inspection, saw that her father’s beard was rugged, and his face pale and gaunt, having aged considerably in the last two months.

Jiang Sanlang invited his daughter to sit on the chair next to him. “The mushrooms you grew have been harvested and dried. There are twenty-eight pounds of golden mushrooms and twenty-seven pounds of snow fungus. I have kept an account of it all and had Erquan deliver them to the county store,” he reported.

He handed a ledger to his daughter, “Keep this safe. Even between brothers, we keep clean accounts. Your cousin has a copy as well. Oh, by the way, the specialty shop is doing quite well. Erni has been called to help.”

Yingbao leafed through the ledger. It not only recorded the quantities of golden mushrooms and snow fungus, but also the weight of fruit preserves, grapes, apples, and pears.

Even the number of gourds sent to the market was recorded.

The ledger also listed the purchase prices, signed off by her second cousin, as a record of the wholesale prices they had paid.

It seemed that the shop, under the management of her eldest and second eldest cousin, had finally got on track.

Jiang Sanlang continued, “Your second cousin has also brought some of our family’s woven cotton to the shop, and it’s selling very well. From now on, we can sell our family’s cotton in the shop.”

Of course, the family’s own textile workshop also had to be taken into account because cloth brings in more revenue than simply selling cotton.

Yingbao closed the ledger. “Our cotton should be ready to harvest, right?”

Jiang Sanlang nodded, “We will harvest it in a day or two. I have already hired the workers who will come then.

Oh, right, I have had people clean up the backyard of your business premises and have hired over thirty bricklayers to build some houses. They should be finished by the end of the year.”

Jiang Sanlang unfolded a blueprint. “I have asked them to construct five main rooms, a kitchen, and a stable. Once the houses there are built, we can clean up this wasteland.”

In the first half of the year, Jiang Sanlang had bought a large plot of wasteland on the east side of South Slope, which he hadn’t had time to clean up yet.

Once the autumn rush was over, he wanted to hire some workers to reclaim the unused land so that by the time spring came around, the entire wasteland would be planted with peppers and various fruit tree seedlings. He also planned to dig a couple of ponds.

As the population of South Slope increased, the issue of water became a problem.

They had not noticed this issue when they lived next to the Chuanhe River as they would simply wash their clothes and dishes in the river. However, now that they lived on the South Slope, not only was drinking water scarce but also washing became inconvenient. Not to mention, each household had to carry water daily for their crops and gardens.

So, it was necessary to get a workforce together to dig some more ponds.

Yingbao looked over the blueprint and was very satisfied. She suddenly remembered the fruit tree seedlings in her cave. “Dad, when spring comes next year, I want to plant lychee, tangerine, and longan trees on the mountain.”

Jiang Sanlang laughed, “Great, then the people in our village will also have lychee and tangerines to eat.”

But what was this longan thing his daughter was talking about?

Well, whatever it was, it was bound to be something good.

The villagers were now keeping a close eye on the Jiang family, ready to follow their lead and plant whatever the they were planting.

Just take their grapes, for instance— everyone in the village had now taken cuttings to plant in there own yards, with some even growing apple seedlings from apple cores.

And, surprisingly, the grape cuttings were all surviving. It remained to be seen whether apple trees could actually grow from those apple cores.

Next, Yingbao brought up the matter of Li Xu and his mother.

“He owes me money for medical treatment, so he’s come here to teach as repayment.”

Yingbao proudly declared, “Li Xu has agreed to teach here for three years. After three years, he’ll return to take the imperial examination, and at that time, I’ll give him the money for the round trip.”

To help Li Xu and his mother recover quickly, she had given them several bottles of medicinal concoctions. Now, Li Xu’s health had greatly improved, and Lady An’s eyesight had recovered somewhat, but her vision was still slightly blurry at night.

“Is he really a scholar?” asked Jiang Sanlang.

Yingbao confirmed, “Yes, he passed the examination for scholar at seventeen. His future is very promising.”

Jiang Sanlang chuckled, “That’s excellent! We must treat him and his mother well, and hopefully, they’ll decide to stay here for good.”

Having a scholar teach at the village school was a matter of great pride. He estimated that in no time, their village would become even more famous.

Although the school in the town was run by an old scholar, the man was too old to have many students, and he was considerably prideful and dismissive of others’ perspectives, producing few successful students.

Li Xu, on the other hand, was only twenty and was at the prime of his life with innovative learning methods and examination tips.

Even if he taught for only three years, it would be a tremendous help to the village children.