Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Old Lady He's words kept Lu Yuan awake that night.

Her mind raced with thoughts of the wedding ceremony with the rooster and her future with Qi Cheng.

Restless and uncomfortable, she forced herself to stop dwelling on it, shifting her focus instead to the grand plan for her soy milk business.

The next morning, eager to get started on the soy milk, she rose early, selected the beans, then grabbed a bucket and a basket before heading out.

Old Lady He asked, "Where are you off to?"

Lu Yuan replied, "I'm going to the foot of the mountain to fetch some spring water to soak the beans."

Old Lady He looked puzzled. "There's water in the river. Why bother with mountain spring water?"

Lu Yuan explained, "Mountain spring water is clear and sweet. Using it will make the soy milk taste much better."

Old Lady He mused for a moment, then said, "You certainly go to a lot of trouble. Do other families use mountain spring water for their soy milk?"

Lu Yuan confidently stated, "Others might not, but I will. Mine will definitely taste better than theirs."

Old Lady He chuckled. "Alright then, I'll look forward to tasting this soy milk that's supposedly better than everyone else's."

Lu Yuan slung her basket over her back and left the yard, heading towards the mountain she had first entered.

She didn't dare venture deep into the mountain, only gathering some wild vegetables on the outskirts before fetching water.

The mountain spring was about two or three *li* (approximately one mile) from home. Carrying the water was tiring, so she planned to carry it back in her basket, using the opportunity to test if she could manage such a distance on market day.

As it turned out, after just two or three *li*, her shoulders were already aching.

This clearly wouldn't do. She couldn't risk her health just to make money.

Back home, Lu Yuan rested for a while before washing the beans and soaking them in the spring water.

In the warm seasons of summer and autumn, the beans only needed to soak for three or four *shichen* (6-8 hours), while in winter, it would take four or five *shichen*. The beans would be ready to grind by evening, and she could cook them the next morning before taking them to town.

The most challenging part now was the final step: how to transport them to town.

After soaking the beans, Lu Yuan asked, "Old Lady He, which family in our village has an ox cart?"

Without looking up, Old Lady He replied, "The village head's family."

"Will they drive the ox cart to town on market day? Do they take passengers?"

Old Lady He seemed to anticipate her thoughts and answered in one breath, "A round trip for one person costs just one *wen*. If you bring goods that take up space, it's an extra *wen*. They leave at *Chen* hour (7-9 AM) and return at noon (11 AM-1 PM)."

Lu Yuan calculated that it was a four-hour window, which seemed ample.

With a plan forming in her mind, Lu Yuan then asked another question.

"Old Lady He, where do people go to grind polished rice?"

Knowing Lu Yuan wanted to grind beans, and remembering that the polished rice also needed grinding, Old Lady He put down her work and said, "The village head's family has a grindstone. After lunch, I'll take you over to say hello, and we can grind the polished rice while we're there."

The village head's family was surprisingly well-off, seemingly having everything.

Old Lady He also soaked the polished rice in water, which would take about an hour.

While Lu Yuan was preparing the midday meal, Old Lady He brought an egg from the house and handed it to her.

Lu Yuan remembered Old Lady He's words from the day before. A small egg, yet it weighed heavily on her.

Old Lady He's actions felt like fattening up a chicken only to slaughter it for the table.

Lu Yuan felt like that chicken, awaiting its fate.

Despite the pressure, she knew she had to eat.

She made the single egg into a simple egg drop soup, ensuring everyone could have a little.

However, upon seeing the egg drop soup, Old Lady He grumbled unhappily, "One egg isn't even enough to fill a tooth gap, and you've diluted it into a whole pot of water. How is that supposed to nourish anyone?"

Lu Yuan glanced at the bowl, which was about seventy percent full, thinking it was far from a "pot."

"Whatever we eat will nourish us, naturally."

As she spoke, she ladled a spoonful into each of the children's bowls. When she tried to ladle some into Old Lady He's bowl, the old woman covered it, saying, "I can't drink it. I'm too angry to eat."

Alright then.

Lu Yuan gave a little more to the two children.

She mused that if she could sell soy milk tomorrow and earn some money, she would buy a few *liang* (ounces) of meat to satisfy their cravings. At least then the whole family wouldn't be so deprived that a single egg had to be rationed so tightly.

After the meal, she left the two children at home, closed the courtyard gate, and followed Old Lady He out.

They walked for about fifteen minutes through the village before arriving at a house with blue bricks and black tiles.

During the day, village gates were usually left open, so Old Lady He called out from the entrance. Only after hearing a response did she lead Lu Yuan into the courtyard.

A plump woman in her forties or fifties emerged from the house. Seeing Old Lady He and the woman behind her, she asked in surprise, "Old Lady He, what brings you here?"

Old Lady He explained, "I'm here to grind some polished rice, and I brought Su Shi along to visit. She wants to make soy milk to sell in town, so she'll also need to use the grindstone this afternoon."

The woman replied, "Feel free, it's out in the yard."

Old Lady He turned to Lu Yuan and said, "This is the village head's wife."

Lu Yuan greeted, "Village head's wife."

The village head's wife smiled and said, "No need for such formality. Just call me Auntie."

Lu Yuan didn't actually call her Auntie. She wasn't tactless—without any family relation, calling her Auntie might not be welcome.

Old Lady He carried the soaked polished rice to the grindstone.

The grindstone wasn't very large, about the size of a washbasin, and could be operated by one person.

Old Lady He rinsed the grindstone, then placed the soaked polished rice into the small hole at the top, looking at Lu Yuan: "Get to it."

Lu Yuan: ...

So she was brought here to work.

With a sense of novelty, she began pushing the millstone; though somewhat heavy, it wasn't overly strenuous.

A pound of polished rice, ground three or four times, though still a bit coarse, would soften and break down with prolonged cooking.

Lu Yuan had pretty much mastered the use of the grindstone.

After returning from the village head's house, Lu Yuan went to stretch and massage Qi Cheng's limbs.

While massaging, she chatted with him: "I'm planning to make soy milk to sell in town. Do you think this venture of mine can make money?"

After a moment, she continued, talking to herself, "It should make money. After all, the soy milk from that one shop in town isn't very good, yet lots of people still buy it. I don't believe mine will be worse than theirs."

"It's just that I didn't buy many soybeans this time, only two pounds. I calculated: one pound of soybeans can yield about twenty bowls of medium-thickness soy milk, so two pounds would make forty bowls. But there's bound to be some loss, so let's say thirty-five bowls."

"One bowl for one *wen*, that's thirty-five *wen*. But the soybeans cost money, setting up a stall costs two *wen*, and there's the ox-cart fee. Even after all that, I can still make about twenty *wen*."

"If I sell everything, I'll buy two more pounds of soybeans and take them to sell at the next market day."

Lu Yuan chattered on for quite a while, not noticing that Old Lady He had been watching her from the doorway for some time before leaving.

When Lu Yuan grew tired from massaging, she turned and left the room.

By mid-afternoon, around the *Shen* hour, she took the soybeans that had been soaking for four *shichen* (eight hours) and went to the village head's house.

Someone was always home at the village head's house, so there was no worry about finding no one there.

Seeing that Old Lady He hadn't come along this time, the village head's wife struck up a conversation with Su Shi.

The village head's wife asked, "Where are you from?"

Lu Yuan, having Su Shi's memories, answered calmly, "I'm from Juzhou. There was a three-year drought there, so I fled to Lingnan to escape the famine."

The village head's wife said, "I did hear that Juzhou had been in drought for several years, to the point where crops couldn't grow. If it doesn't rain soon, there'll likely be many refugees fleeing. Who knows how many will end up displaced or dead."

At the end of her words, the village head's wife sighed, then asked, "What happened to your previous husband?"

Since Lu Yuan was still using their grindstone, she had to respond: "Two villages were fighting over water sources. He was hit on the head with a club and didn't survive."

The village head's wife's eyes showed a touch of sympathy.

First, she lost her previous husband, and now she's saddled with another who is barely alive.

If luck was on her side, Qi Cheng might wake up, and the pillar of the household would return. If not, she'd be a widow again, and might even be seen as a jinx.

The village head's wife was soft-hearted. After turning it over in her mind, she couldn't help but say, "Though you're ordinary-looking, you could still remarry a reasonably good man. Why marry Qi Cheng?"

She also hoped Qi Cheng would wake up, but what if he didn't?

Lu Yuan sensed the village head's wife's kindness and shook her head: "The old lady promised she would treat my two daughters as though they were her grandnieces."

Old Lady He had made it clear that claiming to treat them as her own granddaughters would sound unconvincing to others—and to herself—so treating them as relatives was more believable.

"If I remarried someone else, I wouldn't know how my two daughters would be treated."

During the famine, Su Shi's skin had been darkened and roughened by the sun, and she was reduced to skin and bones from hunger. With her current appearance, she could only hope to marry an older widower or someone with a disability.

Su Shi was well aware that these weren't good options, which is why she agreed to Old Lady He's proposal.

At least she had a place to stay, without being abused or harshly treated.

The village head's wife sighed and said, "True. As a mother, you always think of your children first, then yourself."

With that, her impression of Su Shi improved a bit.

Someone who could prioritize her children to this extent probably wasn't a bad person.

When Lu Yuan was about to leave, the village head's wife brought over seven or eight taro roots, each about half the size of a fist, and placed them in her basket.

"Given the Qi family's situation, there's not much we can do to help. Take these taro roots home to eat."

Lu Yuan didn't refuse the village head's wife's kindness and said gratefully, "Thank you, village head's wife."

The village head's wife replied, "Head on back."

...

When Lu Yuan returned home, the old lady saw the taro roots in her basket and asked, "Did the village head's wife give these to you?"

Lu Yuan nodded, thought for a moment, and said, "After I cook the soy milk tomorrow morning, could you help me deliver some to the village head's house as a token of thanks?"

Old Lady He wasn't selfish and agreed, "Sure, we should return the favor."

After putting things away, Lu Yuan realized she didn't have enough spring water to cook the soy milk, so she went to fetch half a bucket of spring water.

She asked the old lady for a clean piece of hemp cloth to use for filtering the soybean residue the next day. She also took a dried gourd dipper hanging under the eaves, hollowed it out, cleaned it, and prepared to use it for ladling the soy milk.

As for bowls to hold the soy milk, Lu Yuan picked three bowls without cracks from home.

But she needed an extra wooden bucket to carry water for washing the bowls.

The family only had one water bucket, so she had to borrow another.

It seemed they were short on everything.

Lu Yuan sighed and went to borrow a bucket from Huang Lan.

When Huang Lan heard she was going to set up a stall at the market, she excitedly said, "Our family has some dried goods lately, which I can also sell at the market. Let's go together tomorrow."