Picking Up a General to Plow the Fields

Land reclamation also comes with a cost
Translated by Maggie Edited by Simple

“Haha, you, this girl getting better and better at speaking! No need to thank me, look at you, thanking people again!” Aunt Zhang chuckled, and said, “don’t exhaust yourself too much in the future. If there is heavy work, just say it to us and let your Uncle Li and Brother San Ge go do it! You’re a girl, how much strength could you have? Ah Ze is still small, his body and bones are still tender, better not break it! That is a matter for a lifetime, na!”

“En, Aunt rest assured, I will take good care of Ah Ze and the others!” Lian Fang Zhou’s heart warmed up and nodded as she smiled.

Aunt Zhang saw that she purposely ignored the first half of the sentence, and couldn’t help sigh; at the moment it wasn’t good to say anything more, so she simply said a few words, then went back.

“Let’s go! We’ll also go in and rest! Tomorrow we need to wake up early.” Lian Fang Zhou smiled, holding Lian Fang Qing’s hand in one hand and Lian Che in the other.

“Sister, Sister, we won, right? Mrs Liu that bad guy, that rotten egg lost!” Lian Fang Qing’s round eyes were wide open and asked as she looked up.

“… …” Lian Fang Zhou was a little dumbfounded, this little girl, look at that little face filled with excitement, how could she know this matter was very perilous. If she made one bad move, then she would have suffered thousands of accusing fingers, and the one everyone would have cast aside is her!

“Good little girl, go back and obediently sleep! This matter, you’re not allowed to talk about it anymore. In the future, if you see the Hua Family’s people, take a detour, understand?” Lian Fang Zhou sternly smiled as she said to her.

Lian Fang Qing blinked her eyes, obediently said “en,” and whispered, “I do not want to give way to her…… They are all bad people……”

The next day, after breakfast, Lian Fang Zhou and Lian Ze took the little twins to the garden. She and Lian Ze stuck the long tree strips into the ground and were tied to the pile and woven tightly three times. Lian Fang Qing and Lian Ze then got some twigs and sticks, tightly stuck them into the interwoven strips, and the vegetable garden was thoroughly surrounded.

Aunt Zhang and Mrs Zhao had originally come to help, but Lian Fang Zhou insisted that it was easy work and definitely didn’t need help. So Aunt Zhang could only give up.

Originally full of reluctance, Mrs Zhao saw the situation and her heart felt more comfortable; she frankly shot a smile at Lian Fang Zhou.

After spending a whole morning fencing the garden, at noon they took a break for more than an hour. In the afternoon Lian Fang Zhou and Lian Ze tidied up the garden again and made the soil even. They transported some ash from the stove and chicken manure from the chicken coop, mixed evenly into the soil, doused it with water and made it ready for tomorrow to plant the seedlings. This place will be used as a nursery.

In the evening, Lian Fang Zhou picked up packs of herbs, wrapped it in a yellow paper that this body’s mother used last year.

At home, naturally, no one can read. So these yellow papers were marked with black charcoal marks, it must have been used to distinguish between the variety of seeds by this body’s mother.

Lian Fang Zhou held these yellow paper bags in her hand and thought of people that have already passed away; she could not help but be secretly sad for a moment.

Although she doesn’t recognize the marks on the yellow paper bag, but she was a professional agricultural researcher; so towards a variety of agricultural seeds, she is no stranger. Just taking a look at what’s in her hand will make it crystal clear.

Among these seeds, there were several kinds, like daikon, celery, napa, cabbage, bok choy, Chinese cabbage, and cauliflower.

She opened one pack after the other. She used a stick around the size of a coin and gently rolled back and forth, the outer skin of the seeds got thinner or even slightly cracked.

Then she found three shallow dishes and placed the seeds on them. Damion and celery seeds were put into separate dishes; the remaining seeds were mixed and placed into one dish. Water was then added to each dish until it covered the surface of the seed.

It should soak for one night, and the next morning the seed bud will sprout out. This way of planting it, it will not only sprout out faster, but germination rate is higher as well.

While Lian Fang Zhou was doing these things, Lian Fang Qing sat nearby with her hands on her cheeks with her beautiful eyes wide open looking at her curiously.

Lian Fang Zhou smiled at her and just let her be.

She put the three dishes on the table. The next morning, once she woke up, and sure enough the seeds cracked out a gap; popping out a little bit of a white bud.

After breakfast, she went to the vegetable garden with Lian Fang Qing and sprinkled the seeds and watered them.

They will only need a few days before they can have fresh vegetable seedlings to eat.

She needs to wait until the vegetable seedlings grow until they were two fingers long, then they can pick up those that are healthy and robust to transplant.

Lian Fang Zhou also looked at the pepper plant that was slightly trimmed and fertilized a few days ago and found that it had turned green and bloomed out a lot of small white flowers. Little fruits can be seen, her heart burst with joy.

Lian Fang Qing is also giggling happily. “My Sister is really great! This pepper is growing again!”

Lian Fang Zhou laughed, “wait until the pepper grows up, then Sister will make fried eggs, OK?”

“En! Tender pepper is not one bit spicy, I like to eat them the most!” Lian Fang Qing smiled as she nodded, she also said, “Sister and second brother should also eat them!”

Now Lian Fang Zhou can really cook one or two eggs every day for her and Lian Che, but Lian Fang Zhou and Lian Ze themselves don’t eat them, so that was why Lian Fang Qing said this.

Unexpectedly, Lian Fang Zhou’s heart felt warm, smiling as she casually said, “OK!”

These little guys, they always make her feel moved.

The sisters shut the door to the vegetable garden and returned home. Lian Ze and Lian Che went to dig sweet potatoes; they were afraid that they’ll only return at noon.

After a break, Lian Fang Zhou did not feel relieved and was worried. She then called out to Lian Fang Qing to lead the way and the both of the went.

That piece of land where the sweet potatoes are at are in the northwest of the village. It is six miles on the horsehead slope, at the bottom of the slope was a road winding along the mountain, the land was on that hillside.

The field was about a mu (1 mu= 0.0667 hectares) or so, 3 or 4 parts were planted with sweet potatoes; also, 2 parts had a variety of taro. It was just a month until harvesting time.

The rest of the plants were cowpea, soybeans, chili peppers and the like. Since at this time of the year, it has already passed the right time to plant; so the ground is full of messy yellow vine foliage.

Near the edge of the slope, two slanting large bowls were growing on the thick pear tree. Lian Fang Zhou went over to take a look and then said, “this pear tree is not fruitful, next year we need to cut it.”

“When it blooms it’s really nice to see, sister can we please keep it!” Lian Fang Qing in a spoiled manner immediately opposed.

Lian Che scratched his head and said, “every year Mother planted pumpkin, winter melon and musk melons at the bottom of the tree; then let them climb up for fruition, why do we need cut it, sister?”

It was then that Lian Fang Zhou noticed on the top of the tree there was also hanging a lot of semi- dry, semi yellow vines. She suddenly realized something, she smiled and said, “so it’s like that ah, then keep it, let’s not cut it!”

She could also see that on the vines there was a lot of melon stems, presumably because there was no food so the melon has long been since picked away.

Lian Fang Zhou secretly shook her head. This bodies respected one, (the bodies former owner), can be really muddled head while living her life. She was a fourteen to fifteen-year-old girl, let’s not talk about others, but she couldn’t even grow some food to eat, and just counted on the Yang Family’s marriage! She does not know why that Yang Huai Shan was so set on loving her…

Lian Ze had already dug a lot of sweet potatoes, with the exact same method of planting the vegetable garden. It’s not like the modern method of stem or root cutting, but from a seed to a sweet potato. This is such a waste, ah!

Lian Fang Zhou went up and took the hoe from Lian Ze and smiled, “Ah Ze, take a break and I’ll do it! We’ll dig this all up today. In the evening I’ll go find Hunter Sun to see when he’s going to Mount Xian Teng!”