Chapter 232: Sprouting Up
“Hey! Descendants of the great mountain, love the sun! The sun loves the people in the mountains!”
“The mountain roads here have eighteen bends, the water paths here have nine loops… the mountain roads here line up in a queue…”
Luo Zhi’er shuttled through the forest, and when passing the mountain stream path, she got excited and shouted a couple of lines.
This actually roused Li Sanmao and his son into high spirits. Luo Zhi’er gave him a cold look with her glazed beads, and Li Sanmao quickly said, “Wife, hehe, continue, continue!”
“What, not good to hear?”
“Good to hear! Especially good to hear!”
She knew it, with Luo Zhi’er’s physique, her pronunciation was rich and smooth, and her singing voice was exceptionally pleasant.
“Hey! The mountain roads here have eighteen bends…” Miaomiao covered her ears, looked up at her father’s eyes full of doting smile, and also put down her palm.
With Li Sanmao as the guide leading the way, they soon arrived near the mountainside behind Luojia Village. Luo Zhi’er frowned; crossing over wouldn’t still require passing through that leech forest, would it?
Li Sanmao knew she’d have this expression; he hooked the corner of his lips, carried Miaomiao on his back, “Miaomiao, hold tight to Daddy’s neck.”
“Wife, follow behind me!”
Then they climbed up the rock wall about five or six meters, pulled open the branches, and saw a slightly narrow cave that Luo Zhi’er could just pass through by tilting her body.
“Wife, be careful.”
The few of them passed through that long cave and arrived at the place she wanted to reach, without encountering a single leech.
A hint of crack appeared on Luo Zhi’er’s face. So easy? How had she not discovered it last time?
“Hehe, wife, I accidentally found this cave while hunting once. Actually, the cave entrance is blocked by these leaves, and being on the cliff face, no one has discovered it.”
Inside the cave, the dry soil has higher salt content, plus the vegetation she found inside isn’t what leeches like to eat, so it’s normal for there to be no leeches in this cave.
What surprised her was that after crossing over, the area below was exactly one corner of that wasteland; walking down the slope led to the place with the water source last time.
This was a pleasant surprise; this could serve as her secret passage in the future, and the salt she carried on her would be saved.
Li Sanmao saw her take out the salt bag from her bosom and nearly dropped his jaw. This wife had even prepared salt; it seemed she had planned to come here all along.
Seeing her scatter a few handfuls on the ground and around, then clear the path ahead, soon the few of them arrived at the place where she had buried the coffee seeds last time.
Light appeared in Luo Zhi’er’s eyes; she squatted down to look at those few green plants with big green leaves, raised her hand to count, a total of six plants.
The seeds she had casually tossed back then had not only taken root and sprouted, but currently looked thriving, nearly half a meter tall, with large patches of glossy green leaves. It had only been a little over a month; by normal standards, they shouldn’t grow this fast. Looking at the gurgling water flow below, Luo Zhi’er understood.
“Wife, what is this?”
Li Sanmao curiously looked at the few green plants growing on the ground; he had never seen them before.
Seeing Luo Zhi’er carefully examining the leaves of that plant again, he asked.
“A kind of plant.”
“Oh.”
Li Sanmao was a bit disappointed, but Luo Zhi’er added, “Husband, in a few days, let’s find people to reclaim this land and turn the soil!”
“What? Wife, this place is full of leeches; even if reclaimed, how could we plant crops?”
“Husband, what are leeches afraid of?”
“Afraid of what?… Afraid of salt… But how much salt would that take? Besides, if you scatter salt, the crops won’t grow either?”
“What else are they afraid of?”
“Afraid of fire?”
Luo Zhi’er narrowed her eyes,
“You’re right; I’m going to use fire to burn them.”
But before burning them, she still needed to scatter some lime in the field!
Having decided on the plan, tomorrow she would go to town to sell the dried tofu and then buy lime.
After confirming her coffee seedlings, Luo Zhi’er was in a great mood and didn’t linger much before heading back.
This matter soon caused a stir in the village!
“Heard about it? Someone at the leech ditch is hiring people to reclaim land! Two hundred wen a day!”
“What? Who would dare go? That place is full of leeches! Even for one tael of silver, I wouldn’t do it; it’d be suicide!” Aunt Huaihua shuddered; last time her leg was caught in the animal trap, and she hadn’t gone out for a stroll in a long time.
Under her man’s and son’s careful treatment, she could already hobble out to chat with people in the village!
She had just recovered and the fuss had mostly died down; folks didn’t know for sure if her leg was really caught at Luo Zhi’er’s house—they had only suspected it back then, Luo Zhi’er hadn’t named names, and she didn’t admit it.
Their family had a unified story, saying only that she fell into a ditch while carrying firewood down the mountain and was accidentally smashed by a rolling stone!
“Exactly!”
“Hey, what do you think they plan to plant?”
“That I don’t know!”
Li Shi, who was resting under the big grinding mill tree in the village, heard this news and furrowed her brows tightly. She looked at the silly Li Daniu—two hundred wen a day?
She craned her neck to talk to someone not far away, “Hehe, Aunt Huaihua, where did you hear this? When did that land get sold?”
Aunt Huaihua looked up and saw it was Li Shi; pinching her nose with a hint of contempt, she said,
“Of course I heard it while seeing a doctor in town. Don’t know which fool bought that land; they’re hiring at the marketplace to reclaim and plant crops. In my view, this person must be from outside and doesn’t know the terrible legend of that land!”
This was just Aunt Huaihua bothering to respond to her; birds of a feather flock together, people divide into groups—others ignored her.
This Li Shi was said to have maggots in her legs, no money to see a doctor in town, stinking with pus—terrifying just thinking about it!
Huaihua looked at her own leg; still, her man Zhao Er and son Zhao Zhao were reliable.
Others weren’t keen to talk to Li Shi either; that big grinding mill was where everyone husked corn kernels, but she lay on it all day sunning herself, fumigating her leg with mugwort, making it so no one dared to husk corn anymore—this old woman was too wicked.
Ma Shenzi: “Aunt Yinxing, say something!”
“Li Shi, how can you lie on the grinding mill? That’s where everyone husks grain!” Aunt Yinxing spoke up.
“Don’t I have no silver to treat my leg? Daniu found a folk remedy; these bugs need to be drawn out with those herbs and sunned, especially this big stone slab is an old village relic with spirituality—the bugs fear it!”
“Otherwise, you all chip in silver for me to get treated?”
This Li Shi was like a blind cat stumbling on a dead mouse; Li Daniu somehow got herbs that healed the wound on her leg quickly, and under the smoke of the herbs, maggots crawled out one after another.
Her heart panicked at the thought of the flesh in her leg being gnawed by bugs, but Li Shi calmly crushed a white bug with her finger, scaring Aunt Huaihua into a jolt.
Seeing Aunt Yinxing holding her rice bowl unable to eat and having left, she turned to leave, “This woman is too cruel.”
“Hey, Huaihua, wait; do you know where those people are hiring?”
“What? You going?”
“Hehe, what are you saying; I’m just casually asking around!” Li Shi said guiltily.
“Then I don’t know; go guard that wasteland and you’ll find out.”
Ma Shenzi followed up and lightly said to her, “What do you think Li Shi is asking about that for?”
“For what? Gone mad poor, of course; definitely sending her family’s Daniu to risk his life again!”
“Only Daniu is a fool, carrying her in and out and still gets scolded with eyes-not-eyes nose-not-nose, yet so filial to his mom!”
“Take it easy; she’s just got this one kid left to squeeze hard!”
