The Farm Girl's Charismatic Fortune-Chapter 48 - 46 Seeking Restitution from the Ruo Family
Chapter 48: Chapter 46: Seeking Restitution from the Ruo Family
Chapter 48 -46: Seeking Restitution from the Ruo Family
Jiang Qing stepped out, closing the door behind him. Turning back, his handsome face looked thoughtful.
“Isn’t Mother in a rush to find Master Xuan Ji to perform the rituals for Father?”
If it was about discussing the rituals, why couldn’t he listen?
But Jiang Qing was a filial son. The sudden death of the old General had deeply affected his mother, whose health was failing in numerous ways. She had even nearly choked to death on water, leaving Jiang Qing so busy he no longer had time to keep a vigil by his father’s coffin. Now that he had a moment to himself, he didn’t dwell on what his mother and the master were discussing and immediately returned to his father’s side to perform the vigil.
Inside the house,
Lady Zhou, with only one good eye, could hardly see clearly. She respectfully asked in a low voice, “Are you Master Xuan Ji?”
The figure didn’t quite resemble him. Master Xuan Ji didn’t seem this tall.
Xuan Ling: “I am the fifteenth disciple of my master, Xuan Ling. My master has some matters to attend to and couldn’t show his face, so he specially sent me to assist Madam Jiang.”
Lady Zhou became anxious: “If Master Xuan Ji doesn’t come, how can this be acceptable? The Ruo Family’s fortunes have changed, certainly at the direction of a greater power. Misfortunes have befallen us repeatedly!”
Xuan Ling’s lips curved slightly as he spoke indifferently, “Rest assured, there is no one in this world more formidable than my master, and among his many disciples, I am the one who has fully received his authentic teachings. Going forward, simply follow my instructions!”
The first fourteen fellow disciples either died failing to extend their life or in their failed ascension. Now he was the eldest and most advanced disciple of his master.
The master said next time it would be his turn to extend his life, teaching him the arts of life-extension and fortune-stealing.
Of course, extending life would require finding four children to continue it, preferably ones blessed with both fortune and longevity. Even if not, they must at least have both blessings.
His visit to Shaxi County was to search for such children with favorable destinies.
When Lady Zhou heard that he had received the true teachings of Master Xuan Ji, she felt somewhat reassured, “Master Xuan Ling, please give your commands. This old woman will surely follow them.”
“The fortunes of the General Residence have indeed shifted, which is a sign of backlash. If we are to change this, we need to find several children between the ages of three and ten…”
Lady Zhou immediately thought of the Ruo Family. If there was anything abundant in the Ruo Family, it was children!
~
On the fifth day, the skies were still cloudless at dawn with not a sign of impending rain, and even the sunlight was particularly radiant.
Early in the morning, the village head went around the entire village: “Today is the last day. Everyone, hurry up and bring your new grains to me for the public levy reduction. If you are any later, you won’t be able to get a ten-pound reduction. Everyone, hurry up and gather the grain from your fields. The day predicted by the State Preceptor is fast approaching!”
Seeing the sun in the sky, the villagers began to regret their actions. At the village head’s call, some couldn’t help but speak out: “Village head, do you think this weather looks like it’s going to rain? That so-called State Preceptor, talking nonsense, made me harvest the rice early, causing me to lose dozens of pounds of grain!”
“Exactly, seeing the sunny days day after day, I regret it so much! My rice was only half-ripe! Harvested now, I don’t even know if it will keep, and next year I won’t have seeds to plant!”
“That new County Magistrate must be corrupt, thinking of deceiving us out of our grain! I’m not going to pay!”
Granny Lei just happened to return from drying rice in the sun and couldn’t help but advise after hearing everyone’s comments: “The State Preceptor has made a prediction. How could it be false? Everyone should seize the time to collect as much grain as possible. When there’s none left to collect, there will be nowhere to cry!”
Baocai’s grandfather said, “Predictions from the State Preceptor are just that, predictions. Personally, I don’t believe it, not a single grain will I harvest! Floods in autumn? I’ve lived for so many years and have never seen one! The other day I noticed Lord County Magistrate seemed to agree with Xuanbao’s words before he announced the reduction of taxes. What State Preceptor? It’s all made up! Lei, could it be that you don’t have enough grain and want us all to have a poor yield so we starve like you? Is that why you’re deliberately fooling people?”
“No way, right? The County Magistrate wouldn’t be that foolish, and even Xuanbao believes it? Isn’t this going to kill people? I’ve harvested all of our grain! It’s dozens of pounds less than last year!”
“I’ve harvested half of mine, and I regret it to death! Could Xuanbao’s words be true?”
Granny Lei naturally didn’t want Xuanbao to be dragged into this: “Believe it or not! The notice posted by the Governor’s Office made it very clear. If you don’t believe the State Preceptor, whom will you trust? What does my family’s Xuanbao have to do with it? If Xuanbao says it’s going to rain, would you believe her? Would you go harvest your rice? Do you think the County Magistrate is a fool? This is utterly unreasonable!”
Having said that, she left in a hurry, unwilling to waste words with these people.
The village head couldn’t help but speak up after hearing their words: “What nonsense are you all talking about? Is the County Magistrate an idiot? If the State Preceptor hadn’t predicted the flood, would he spend a fortune buying Zizania, or spend big silver to hire people to reinforce the embankments? You all should be wise and quickly harvest your crops! Otherwise, if the flood really comes, you’ll be the ones regretting!”
Madam Liu, absolutely despising the Ruo Family, shamelessly said, “Right, everyone has harvested their grain, so what’s there to regret? If it doesn’t rain, we can just blame the Ruo Family, blame the village head, blame the Government for compensation of the grain! And if it does rain, then we’ll be in luck!”
Old man Zhen added, “Right, we should blame the Ruo Family, blame the village head! These past few days haven’t the Ruo Family been saying that they believe there’s an eighty to ninety percent chance of a flood, and that they’ve cleared out everything from their fields? If there’s no flood, we’ll demand compensation from the Ruo Family!”
“This year’s rice from the Ruo Family grew particularly well, and more than half of it is ripe. Of course, they’ve harvested everything clean!”
Madam Liu agreed, “Exactly, the Ruo Family is looking at a bumper harvest. Those sweet potatoes are fatter than my thigh. Granny Lei started spreading rumors, making many other families harvest their grain too. Everyone should demand compensation from them when the time comes!”
If they dare divorce her daughter, the Ruo Family won’t have an easy time!
Even if they can’t cause any real harm to the Ruo Family, it’s good to annoy them a bit!
…
The village chief scowled, “Utterly unreasonable!”
Without paying them any more attention, he continued to shout loudly as he walked toward the end of the village, “Those who have gathered the grain, hurry up and send your taxes here. The Governor’s Office people will be coming to collect them soon!”
The village chief was now both afraid that true rain would lead to flooding and afraid that it wouldn’t rain at all, feeling extremely conflicted!
Ruo Family
Ruo Shui climbed up the bamboo ladder, while Madam Liu handed him a round winnowing fan filled with sunflower seeds.
On the roof, several round winnowing fans of different sizes were already placed, each drying various beans like sesame, sunflower seeds, chili peppers, peanuts, red beans, mung beans, soybeans, and black beans.
Looking around, nearly every household in Xishui Village had round winnowing fans of various sizes on their roofs, drying peanuts, sesame, and various beans – a colorful array that stretched on and on.
The scene was a spectacular one, as if even the air was permeated with the joy of a bountiful harvest.
The Ruo Family only grew soybeans; the other beans were gifts from several friendly villagers in gratitude for the Ruo Family buying zizania at a high price.
Other villagers tried to undercut the Ruo Family’s business by selling zizania at a low price to the restaurants, but the shopkeeper just glanced at them and found that their zizania were of mixed quality, with old and young, big and small, and refused to buy them. No one at the market wanted them either, so they had to sell them to the Governor’s Office for a mere wen per jin.
Therefore, those few households were increasingly grateful to the Ruo Family, and when delivering zizania to the Ruo Family, they would also bring a pound or two of beans from their harvest.
In the corner of the yard, many dried vegetables were hung with ropes, all harvested from their fields, including bok choy and mustard greens. Under the eaves, strings of cured meats and sausages, and a few cured ducks and rabbits were hanging.
Ruo Xuan, standing on another ladder, leaned on the tile backs and looked at all the food in the courtyard, feeling especially content, “Mother, can we make some pastries to eat in advance?”
“What kind of pastries does Xuanbao want to eat?” Madam Liu asked as she picked up another winnowing fan from the ground and handed it to her husband.
“Red bean cakes, mung bean cakes, and fried rice cakes, shaped like rabbits and goats!”
Madam Liu laughed, not understanding why her daughter liked rabbits so much.
Because Ruo Xuan liked rabbits and goats, Ruo He, who could now see well, spent the past several nights making various rabbit-shaped molds for pastries and rice cakes in different poses.
“Okay, once your second aunt comes back, mother will ask her to make them for you.”
Madam Liu was good at cooking, but her pastries couldn’t compare to those of Madam Jiang.
Madam Jiang’s pastries had just the right consistency, sweet but not cloying.
Ruo Xuan was content. She looked up at the sun in the sky and sniffed. If she wasn’t mistaken, it would start raining by midnight!
“Father, after we gather the rice and beans tonight, let’s store them in the cave on the mountain. We can take them out to dry again later.”
“Alright, father will make sure to move all the grain and valuable items to the mountain before sunset tonight.”
The Ruo Family had found a cave in the mountain behind their house, which Old Master Ruo later expanded and reinforced, installing a door for the sole purpose of storing grain.
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In the past, the Ruo Family had large fields and a lot of grain, so the cave was filled to the brim every year. But these last few years, with less grain, they hadn’t even needed to use the mountain, and their grain bin had never been full!
Ruo Xuan glanced at the distant fields, a boundless sea of rolling yellow and green rice waves.
This expanse of rice paddies belonged to several villages, whose inhabitants did not believe there would be a flood and were unwilling to harvest early.
Only a few households, like theirs, had harvested all their crops from the fields.
Do their best, and leave the rest to fate. The villagers didn’t believe, and even though the Lord County Magistrate had sent people multiple times to urge everyone to harvest their rice, still, no one did.
She couldn’t do anything about it; everyone had their own destiny.
Having had her fill watching the harvest scenery, Ruo Xuan was about to climb down from the ladder when she saw the butler from the General Residence riding a horse, coming their way from afar.
