Chapter 53

Chapter 53

Nowadays, the villagers are all actively stockpiling grain. It's not just Chang Pozi's family who is short on money. There will definitely be others who have the same idea as her—borrowing money from the Jiang family.

So, after Jiang He returned with the pigs, Jiang Chun sent him off to borrow money from clan head Jiang Zhaonian and Village Head Zou with great fanfare.

Of course, Jiang Zhaonian was just a smokescreen. Jiang Zhaonian was Jiang He's close elder uncle and had always doted on his nephew. There was no need for Jiang He to hide anything from him; he could just speak the truth.

As for Village Head Zou's family, it would be best if he refused to lend money with some excuse. But if he was willing to lend it, Jiang He would accept it.

In any case, borrowing money in the village didn't involve interest. Once the famine passed, Jiang He could return the money and give a small token of thanks.

The important thing wasn't whether they could borrow the money or not, but the act of Jiang He trying to borrow money everywhere, showing that his family was truly destitute and couldn't even afford to buy grain.

This would put an end to the villagers' thoughts of borrowing money from the Jiang family.

Moreover, Jiang He felt no guilt when lying. After all, the 500 taels of silver and 50 taels of gold were considered unexpected wealth and shouldn't be touched easily. Currently, they only had about four taels of silver left at home. Wasn't that being truly destitute?

Jiang Chun was busy pounding rice and dealing with visitors at home, only getting a break in the late afternoon.

She walked into the west room and saw Song Shian sitting upright in front of the kang table, painting with a brush.

The colored parts of the painting were almost complete, with only a small section in the upper right corner still blank.

She didn't disturb him, but sat on the edge of the kang and quietly watched him work.

Song Shian had long eyebrows reaching his temples and below them, a pair of fiercely aggressive phoenix eyes. When he had no expression on his face, he appeared cold and detached, even a little ruthless.

Jiang Chun felt that she had probably hallucinated last night. The person who shed large tears from the corners of their eyes wasn't him!

How could such a person cry because of a quarrel with her?

But in fact, he had done just that.

What did that mean?

It meant that he truly loved her deeply.

Jiang Chun covered her face, feeling it heat up. What virtue did she possess to make Song Shian, this beautiful yet tragic male supporting character, feel this way for her?

Song Shian was so engrossed in painting that he didn't notice Jiang Chun's entrance. After the final brushstroke, he placed the brush in the inkstone and looked up.

Just in time to see Jiang Chun covering her flushed face with both hands, shaking her head like a rattle.

He said lightly, "What are you shaking your head randomly for? Doesn't your head feel dizzy?"

Jiang Chun stopped shaking her head and then reached her hand to her forehead, feigning weakness, and coquettishly said, "Oh, my head feels so dizzy, please help me up."

Song Shian: "..."

Though he knew she was deliberately putting on a show, his bones couldn't help but feel a bit weak.

He struggled to reach out and support her shoulders.

Jiang Chun leaned into him.

The next moment, they both fell backward.

Fortunately, there was a pile of quilts and mattresses behind them, and Song Shian's back rested on them.

Jiang Chun twitched at the corner of her mouth.

She had only leaned on him gently and hadn't used any force, how did she manage to push him over?

She strongly suspected he was faking it, but she had no evidence.

But since he had already fallen, why be polite? She decisively wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest.

She exclaimed, "Oh, my head hurts even more from this fall, husband."

Song Shian's face turned slightly red.

He had been focused on painting for over an hour, perhaps his legs had gone numb from sitting. He intended to help her up but ended up falling backward with her...

He closed his eyes and said, "Let go first, I'll help you up, or I can't get up."

Jiang Chun hugged him tighter and whined, "Why should we get up? Isn't it nice to just lie here?"

Song Shian looked down at her and patiently coaxed, "It's broad daylight, don't be too clingy, careful that father will come back and see."

Jiang Chun caught the loophole in his words and asked with a smile, "According to my husband, it's okay to be clingy at night?"

Song Shian humphed, "If I say no, will you stop being clingy?"

Jiang Chun decisively said, "That's impossible."

"Let go," Song Shian urged again.

Jiang Chun then explained, "Don't worry unnecessarily. I sent father to borrow money from Sixth Grandfather's house and Village Head Zou's. He won't be back for a while."

Upon hearing this, Song Shian fell silent.

He didn't ask why she sent Jiang He to borrow money from others. Jiang Chun had been pounding rice by the stove in the main room, so Song Shian had overheard Chang Pozi's words completely.

She did this, mostly to feign poverty by borrowing money, to put an end to the villagers' thoughts of borrowing from the Jiang family.

They lay there hugging each other.

Neither mentioned the incident of his tears last night, as if it had never happened.

But both understood his feelings for her.

So, although they appeared the same as usual, something was different.

There was a mutual understanding.

At that moment, without any kisses or sweet words, just lying there quietly with their eyes closed, they felt an inner peace, as if their souls had found their home.

And then they both fell asleep.

When Jiang He returned from Village Head Zou's house with the ten taels of silver borrowed from him, he called out for his daughter in the yard but received no response. After calling several times, he pushed open the door to the west room and was so shocked that he immediately backed out.

His face flushed red, he cursed inwardly. This young couple was sleeping together during the day. If it had been an outsider who returned instead of him...

Although villagers didn't knock when entering the main gate, they would usually shout out once they were in the yard, and wouldn't directly enter someone else's room.

But not everyone was so polite; some would barge right into a house.

So, when Jiang Chun woke up in the evening, Jiang He found a pretext to call her aside and hesitated before reminding her, "In the future, if you and your husband take afternoon naps during the day, remember to bolt the door to the main room."

Jiang Chun's face turned red as she agreed, "I understand, father."

Jiang He didn't say it directly, but he must have pushed open the door to the west room and seen her and Song Shian sleeping together, otherwise, he wouldn't have said such things out of the blue.

Although they were both fully clothed and there was nothing major about being seen by Jiang He, it was still a bit embarrassing.

She ran back to the west room and blamed Song Shian, "Why didn't you insist on letting me go earlier? Now my father saw us sleeping together, how embarrassing."

Song Shian: "..."

It was a bit embarrassing for his father-in-law to see them sleeping together, but how could this be blamed on him?

Hadn't he advised her? It was only because she said Jiang He wouldn't be back for a while that he hadn't insisted further.

But he didn't argue.

After all, there was no winning an argument with someone who was always right. Even if he could argue logically, it would be useless. She could still be unreasonable.

Choosing to argue with someone who could never lose meant losing before the argument even began.

He had experienced it firsthand last night and didn't want to go through it again.

Seeing that Song Shian had no response, Jiang Chun let the matter drop.

She even consoled him instead, "Forget it, forget it. If father saw, then he saw. It's not a big deal. Don't think he's scolding me seriously. In his heart, he's probably very happy and thinks there's hope for a grandchild."

Song Shian: "..."

The consolation made it worse.

The medicinal soup he needed to take for his health had to be consumed for a whole year. It was only the second month, and there were still ten months to go before they could be intimate.

Jiang He would have to wait quite a while for that grandchild.

But time, while it could seem slow, could also pass quickly. In the blink of an eye, it was the twelfth lunar month.

Magistrate Lu Zhengheng wasn't like other prefects and magistrates who held their positions without doing much. He stepped forward to raise a large amount of grain from the wealthy families in the county to provide porridge for the refugees.

Over the past two months, refugees had been coming to Hongye County from Yanzhou Prefecture, hoping for a way to survive. Outside the county town, there were makeshift shelters set up by the refugees.

Last month, Jiang Chun had ventured to the county town to get medicine for Song Shian. The city gate was so blocked that there was no place to set foot. She had to turn back several miles and leave her mule cart at the home of a village head before walking to the county town.

Because she had the household registration document from Qi Prefecture, which stated "Jiang Chun from Daliushu Village, Hongye Town," the soldiers at the gate looked at each other and, deciding they couldn't afford to offend her, let her pass.

She observed the situation in the city. Since the refugees couldn't enter, the city was relatively orderly.

So, she took the opportunity to pawn the pair of jade bracelets she had obtained from the jewelry store in a previous visit. She received twenty-eight taels of silver for them.

Normally, they would have fetched double the price, or at least thirty to forty taels, but times were hard, and the old shopkeeper had a take-it-or-leave-it attitude. She had no choice but to accept the offer.

Of course, after leaving the pawnshop, she didn't forget to check in.

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Pawnshop" successful, obtained 1 ruby-set gold ring, 1 Ru kiln enamel cup, 2 pairs of silver chopsticks.]

Jiang Chun's mouth almost split from smiling. Leveling up to 3 was so great; she could get three rewards at once! Although it was probabilistic, depending on luck.

But she and Hongye County were very compatible. When checking in at the county's shops, she didn't always get full rewards, but most of the time, she did.

It was much better than in Hongye Town.

She hoped she would be just as compatible with the Imperial City. After all, she would likely spend the rest of her life there in the future.

Happily, she checked in at all the other shops.

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Bookstore" successful, obtained 5 blocks of pine soot ink, 3 jars of pigments, 8 bamboo brushes.]

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Iron Shop" successful, obtained 1 iron shovel, 1 iron kettle, 1 iron pot.]

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Jewelry Store" successful, obtained 1 gold hairpin, 1 pair of silver clove earrings, 1 pair of pearl flowers.]

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Cloth Store" successful, obtained 6 bolts of fine cotton fabric, 8 pounds of cotton, 3 bolts of silk.]

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Money Shop" successful, obtained 820 copper coins.]

[Ding! Check-in at "Hongye County Pharmacy" successful, obtained 5 pounds of fragrant leaves, 6 pounds of star anise, 8 ounces of bird's nest.]

[Ding! Successfully checked in at the "Hongye County Medical Clinic" and received 4 pounds of cinnamon and 5 ounces of indigowoad root.]

After checking in and signing the log at the clinic, she lifted her foot and walked inside.

This time she could still enter Hongye County city, but who knows what the situation will be next time.

So she found Doctor Cao and directly asked him to prepare six months' worth of medication.

After all, Prefecture Qi is located in the Lu province, where the winter and spring climates are dry, so there's no worry of the medicine getting damp or moldy. It's fine to stock up on more at home.

Since the ginseng slices obtained from the check-in were already used up, the cost of the medicine returned to three taels per month, making the total cost for six months eighteen taels.

The twenty-eight taels of silver obtained from pawning the jade bracelet quickly dwindled to just ten taels.

Thirty doses of medicine per month, meaning one hundred and eighty doses for six months, her bag couldn't hold them all. It was only when Doctor Cao instructed his staff to give her a coarse hemp cloth used for drying medicinal herbs that they were properly packed.

Thanks to the loosely woven hemp cloth given by Doctor Cao, which was too gap-filled to hold grain, she slung the package over her shoulder. When she squeezed out of the city gate, the refugees only glanced at her before ignoring her.

Of course, the hemp cloth package was one thing; her attire that day also played a significant role.

She wore a rough, dirty cloth garment usually donned only when slaughtering pigs, stained with both dried blood and dirt, so dirty that the original color of the fabric was barely visible.

Her face, neck, and hands were smeared with ash, and she had deliberately not washed her hair for a week, tousling it to resemble a bird's nest.

She looked more like a refugee than the refugees themselves, who would pinch their noses and make way for her.

This arduous trip to the county, besides getting medicine for Song Shian, also yielded a good haul of spices from the clinic and pharmacy.

Li's words weren't wrong; currently, grain prices were soaring. The price of wheat had tripled, rising from six hundred wen per stone to one tael and eight hundred wen per stone.

Who could afford to feed pigs with grain anymore? Farmers were selling their pigs, even the unfinished ones.

Entering the twelfth lunar month, Jiang He found it increasingly difficult to buy pigs. Often, he would spend an entire day out without securing even one pig, causing their meat shop to switch from daily stall operations to setting up only once every three days.

This pig-slaughtering and meat-selling business was becoming harder to sustain. Jiang He felt this couldn't continue; they needed to find another way to earn money instead of sitting on their savings.

With the spices in Jiang Chun's hands now, and with the year-end approaching, why not braise some meat for sale?

Jiang Chun, being decisive, acted immediately. The next day, when slaughtering the pig, she directly set aside the pig's head and the offal. After returning from selling meat in the town, she began preparations.

Removing the hair from the pig's head was quite troublesome; it needed to be scalded first, then scraped laboriously. This didn't faze Jiang Chun, as she was strong.

However, cleaning the pig's intestines almost made her gag. She rubbed them with bran, soaked them in saltwater, and finally blanched them with baijiu. It took her most of the day, and it was already dark by the time she finished.

She was nearly exhausted to the point of collapse, her back almost unable to straighten.

The house was also filled with a strange smell. When Song Shian came out to use the outhouse, he pinched his nose.

Passing by her, he couldn't resist a sarcastic comment: "Even if we're poor, you don't have to cook... well, you know."

This infuriated Jiang Chun.

She shouted, "Who's cooking that? I'm blanching pig intestines! If you don't understand, don't talk nonsense, you vegetarian wannabe monk!"

If it weren't for his frail health, she would've slapped him, and he'd be begging on his knees not to die. She really wanted to teach him a lesson.

She decided that these pig intestines would be braised for her and Jiang He to eat, not to be wasted on others.

Unless she craved braised pig intestines, she would never clean them again.

It was too much effort for something that didn't fetch a good price. Why bother?

She wanted to start another business to earn money, not create more trouble for herself.

Wouldn't it be easier to just braise the pig's head and the offal like heart, liver, and lungs?