164 – To be Rich, Mend the Road First

Yuanyuan and Manman were still young; if they were not careful, they might slip their tongue. Qin Mian and Lei Tie didn’t tell them that what they taught was the method of Cultivation of Trueness¹. They only said that it was a profound secret of martial arts. There was plenty of spiritual qi in the space, which was the best place to practice. Every time Qin Mian and Lei Tie brought Yuanyuan and Manman into the space to practice, they waited until the boys fell asleep. When Yuanyuan and Manman woke up and asked, they just said that it was a mysterious place in the mountains of Green Mountain Village. The reason they were so cautious was to protect their family. Yuanyuan and Manman didn’t doubt it. After the foundation was built, they entered the early stage of Enlightenment without a hitch.

White Spot and Golden Fur had changed a lot in the past year. Qin Mian didn’t know how Demon Cultivation was classified, but based on the condensation degree of White Spot’s vital spirit in its dantian, it could be judged that its cultivation today was equivalent to a human’s early stage of Fusion – it was not small progress. It seemed that Golden Fur and White Spot could communicate with each other. At present, Golden Fur was also on the road of cultivation; its cultivation was equivalent to a human’s mid-stage of Enlightenment.

White Spot and Golden Fur could live longer [because of cultivation] – it was good news Qin Mian’s whole family.

In the new year, Qin Mian’s development focus was not only on his own home but also on Green Mountain Village. Green Mountain Village had enchanting scenery. It would be a pity if it wasn’t developed well. However, after all, he was just a common man in Green Mountain Village. He still had to talk with Li Zheng about this.

As soon as Li Zheng saw Qin Mian, Lei Tie, Yuanyuan, and Manman coming to his home, he guessed that something good was coming. He welcomed them into his home happily and urged his wife to prepare snacks for Yuanyuan and Manman.

Li Zheng’s house had changed its appearance. The gate and wall of the courtyard were all new. He also imitated Qin Mian’s house by planting a fruit tree and a flowering tree in the courtyard. Since Qin Mian’s family had planted fruit trees and flowering trees in their yard, the villagers had followed suit. Almost every family planted flower trees and fruit trees in their yards. This seemed to have become a distinguishing feature of Green Mountain Village. Not to mention, planting flowers and fruit trees in the yard was more pleasing to the eye than when it was bare. It was also comfortable to live in the house, especially in spring when one could smell the fragrance of flowers.

Quite a few villagers saw that it took nearly an hour for Qin Mian’s family to leave after they entered Li Zheng’s house. Li Zheng’s expression was odd, looking both happy and worried, as he walked back and forth in the yard with his hands clasped behind his back.

The villagers wondered: What on earth has happened?

On the way back, Yuanyuan and Manman began to sing the children’s song that Qin Mian taught them, “I’m Not Fooled by Your Knocks”.

Manman sang, “I’m not fooled, not fooled, I’m not fooled by your knocks. I’m not fooled, not fooled, I’m not fooled by your knocks…”

Yuanyuan sang, “The morning of no school, I accompany Dad to buy vegetables. Dad says I’m really obedient, more and more well-behaved…”

Manman sang again, “Dad has to leave for something, tell me to wait in place…”

The two little boys cooperated very well. They took turns to sing a few sentences. When they sang “I”, “you”, “no” and other words, their little hands presentably made corresponding gestures, while their faces wore the expressions of joy or coldness. It was very fun.

Qin Mian didn’t teach them to do this, so he was very surprised. He wanted to laugh but was afraid of provoking the two little boys. He put his hands on Lei Tie’s shoulders and hid behind him to laugh in secret.

The warm breath spurted out while he laughed blew on Lei Tie’s nape, vaguely teasing. Lei Tie couldn’t bear it and pulled the person to his side. He whispered in his wife’s ear, “Wife, if Yuanyuan and Manman know you’re secretly laughing, maybe they will make you learn with them.”

Qin Mian immediately shut up and put on a serious face.

A ghost of a smile flashed in Lei Tie’s eyes. He patted his wife’s head gently.

After singing a song twice, the foursome entered the courtyard.

Yuanyuan looked up at Qin Mian, “Dad, we want to go to the amusement park.”

“Sure,” Qin Mian nodded, “but, you have to learn ten more words today.”

“Alright.”

The two little boys rushed forward hand in hand.

Qin Mian and Lei Tie followed, neither in a hurry nor slow.

The amusement park was actually the former grove. It was redesigned by Qin Mian and transformed by Lei Tie to become a small world of its own that was fully built of the wooden logs left by the cut trees. It was full of fun. There was not only a seesaw, swing, slide, swivel chair, single-log bridge, but also a climbing net. The climbing net was long and wide that could be changed in design. Qin Mian sometimes hung it up as a net wall, sometimes folded it into a three-storied tower, and sometimes made it into a small labyrinth…. Yuanyuan and Manman’s favorite was the climbing net. Every time, they played the climbing net until they were tired out.

“Old Dad, I want to play climbing net.” Manman broke no delay to speak.

Lei Tie tied safety ropes to the two boys.

The boys rushed to the climbing net immediately. In a short time, laughter came from the amusement park.

The servants brought fruit, tea, and snacks, while Qin Mian and Lei Tie sat by and watched over the two children…

Two days later in the morning, Li Zheng’s second son beat the gong and yelled to the whole village, “After breakfast, go to Li Zheng’s house for an official meeting, one representative from each household; after breakfast, go to Li Zheng’s house for an official meeting, one representative from each household…”

After breakfast, the villagers went to Li Zheng’s house in twos and threes. It was said that each household only needed to send one person, but the villagers were very concerned about the major events in the village. As long as they had nothing important on hand, they all went to Li Zheng’s house.

After breakfast, Qin Mian and Lei Tie told Yuanyuan and Manman to stay at home to review the previous day’s lessons before going to Li Zheng’s home together.

The villagers entered the gate and purposefully squatted in a place.

Elder Liu and Elder Wang were also invited – they sat on two armchairs under the eaves.

Qin Mian and Lei Tie were also assigned two chairs.

Li Zheng’s eldest son, Luo Youfu, called the names first. No matter who came to attend the meeting, he only called the head of the household, which if present, answered the roll call.

After the roll call, Li Zheng said, “It’s still the old rule. I’ll talk about things first. If you have any questions, ask you after I’ve finished.”

The villagers were used to Li Zheng’s way of doing things, so they had no objection.

After sitting down, Li Zheng said, “Today’s meeting is to discuss the road construction in Green Mountain Village. Why was Green Mountain Village so poor before? Why was there no school before? It’s all because Green Mountain Village is too remote and the road is too uneven. If the road can be mended, it will be much more convenient for us to sell the grain in the field or buy things from outside. If you don’t understand the reason, I’ll give you an analogy. Nowadays, if we want to sell a cart of grain, if it is 400 Jin, we need one person to drive the cart and six people to push the cart. It takes more than an hour from the village to the town, and we have to give salary to the six people who push the cart. If our road is easy to tread, maybe two people will be enough to push the cart. It only costs two wages and can save a lot of time. Everyone, think whether this is reasonable. Not only that, if the road is good, more girls are willing to marry into our village. Do you think a good girl is willing to marry to a village with a good road or a bad one? Therefore, road construction is not only beneficial to us but also to our future generations. While we can still work, we must do something good for future generations. Isn’t that right?”

His words were so simple that the villagers could understand them and nodded their heads one after another.

Li Zheng took a sip of tea and continued, “Before planting seedlings in the mid of the 5th month, everyone is basically idle. I thought, take this opportunity to mend the road out of the village. Every household must lend one strong manpower. But if there is really no strong manpower in the household, the young [married] woman, old woman, or half-adult son also must lend power to do easy works such as bring tea and water to the guys and so on. I will arrange this matter properly. In short, as a member of Green Mountain Village, every household has to contribute. Otherwise, you don’t walk on the road built by others.”

Someone opened his mouth to talk but Li Zheng waved his hand to stop him. “I haven’t finished yet. You must have guessed that Tie-zi and his wife proposed the road construction. Their household is the richest in Green Mountain Village, but they didn’t forget to take care of the villagers. They told me that they would teach everyone to bake bricks for free, and then our village would have a flat road paved with bricks. We have to thank Tie-zi and his wife for this. That’s what I want to say. Do you have any objection?”

Elder Liu nodded, “The road, really need to mend. It’s just that most of the men in our village work in the processing yard. If they go to mend roads, will the work on the other side of the processing yard be delayed?” He looked at Qin Mian and Lei Tie with concern.

Li Zheng said, “That’s why Tie-zi and his wife are virtuous and sincere. When we mend the roads, the men stop working.”

“Exactly.” Qin Mian looked around and said, “Road construction is a major event for the whole village. Naturally, our household will give full support to it.”

The villagers endlessly admired him and Lei Tie. Others even suggested that Qin Mian’s household did not have to lend manpower during the road construction.

The road construction was settled very smoothly.

Baking brick needed fuel, clay, water, and kiln. For fuel, the trees all over the mountain near Green Mountain Village could be made into fuel; for clay, there was a mountain depression in Green Mountain Village with deep ground level and good clay quality, which was very suitable for making bricks from clay; for water, there was no shortage of water if there was a river; for kiln, just built one now would do.

Qin Mian guided the villagers to build a brick kiln and make brick molds. There was a brick kiln in [previous world] Qin Mian’s grandfather’s village, which was abandoned after less than two years of operation because of conflicts between partners. Qin Mian and his playmates in the village often went to play in the brick kiln. He remembered the structure of the kiln very clearly.

After the road was mended, the brick kiln could still be used as a public property in the village. No matter who wanted to build a house in the village, they could bake bricks here without spending money to buy it. Therefore, the villagers were very dedicated. It took only a day to build the small brick kiln.

Qin Mian remembered that the size of a standard brick seemed to be 240mmX115mmX53mm, which seemed to be because this proportion could play out the optimum load-bearing capacity of the brick, so Qin Mian made the brick mold into the same size as he remembered.

Very soon, Li Zheng had made arrangements for the whole village. Now, there were 80 households in the village, each of which lent out one strong manpower, making the total of 80 manpower. Li Zheng arranged for 20 people to cut firewood, 30 people to dig clay, 10 people to pick pine resin, 10 people to bake bricks, and 10 people to transport.

It took nearly a month to produce enough bricks in a small kiln. During the baking of bricks, other villagers first used shovels, hoes, and other tools to smooth the road or paving or filling the pit with soil. Then, they compacted the road with a stone roller, laid the bricks neatly, and rolled the stone roller again to make the bricks embedded in the soil. Lastly, the gaps between the bricks were watered with melted pine resin to achieve the bonding effect. If the pine resin was not enough, tung oil, glutinous rice juice, and lime juice were mixed to be used for grouting.

With the help of the whole village, they had been busy for nearly two months. The road from Green Mountain Village to the outside of the mountain had become flat and beautiful.

After Li Zheng announced that the road could be used, the whole village, may it be adults or children, could not hold back from stepping and walking on the brick road. Everyone without exception, was happy and excited, glowing with vigor.

Teacher Chen of the imperial examination class witnessed the whole process of road construction in Green Mountain Village and wrote to his several friends about it.

When the villagers in the surrounding villages learned about it, they all came to watch the excitement and were envious. They realized very clearly that Green Mountain Village was getting better and better.

What people in Green Mountain Village didn’t expect was that a few days later, the incident even reached the ears of the County Magistrate of Zhaoyang County. The County Magistrate summoned Li Zheng of Green Mountain Village and rewarded him with 50 taels of silver.

Li Zheng was in a high mood. He didn’t take the 50 taels of silver for himself. He took out 20 taels and invited the whole village to have two meals. The remaining 30 taels would be kept for the village’s use in the future.

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