Chapter 96

Chapter 96

That night, the whole family stayed alert, not daring to sleep soundly.

Late at night, a strong wind began to howl, making everyone’s heart pound. Little Blackie kept howling in the living room, a habit picked up from somewhere, sounding like a wolf’s cry. It jolted Old Zhao awake twice, and he grabbed a straw shoe to bang on the door.

Each time he banged, it quieted for a while, but then the howling started again.

Sleep was impossible, and the wind grew fiercer, with the sound of logs rolling in the yard. Firewood under the eaves had likely been knocked over too. Gathering firewood wasn’t easy, and the more he thought about it, the less he could sleep. He finally got up, grabbed a jacket from the bedside, slipped on his straw shoes, lit a kerosene lamp, and opened the door.

Stepping into the living room, he heard noises outside. As he slid the door bolt, he called out, “First son?”

“Dad, it’s me,” Zhao Dashan’s voice came from outside.

Old Zhao pushed open the living room door, and a gust of wind hit him, almost knocking him over. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted two figures in straw rain capes tidying up firewood. From their builds, it was the eldest and second son. The wind and rain were so loud he hadn’t heard them inside: “What are you doing up?”

“The wind’s too strong, and stuff’s been clattering outside, keeping us awake,” Zhao Dashan and Zhao Ertian, each pulling one end of a rope to tie up the dry firewood under the eaves, said. What they couldn’t tie up, they carried to the kitchen, leaving the wet wood that had blown into the yard.

In the wind and rain, Old Zhao stood under the eaves, drenched with raindrops, and his oil lamp blew out.

He reached out to help, but Dashan pushed him inside: “You’ll get soaked and have to change—it’s a pain. Me and the eldest have it covered outside. Go back to bed; don’t worry about this. I’ve checked the rooms; the roofs are fine, no leaks.”

With his son handling things, Old Zhao didn’t push to help. Can’t sleep, so he pulled up a stool and sat by the living room door to watch them work.

The wind howled, knocking over stools in the living room, and he stepped on one to keep it from tipping.

“Dad, I’m going to check the fields,” Dashan said after tying up the firewood. “The rain’s too heavy; water from the hill behind is flowing into our yard. I’m worried the drainage can’t handle it and the ridges might give way.”

He’d given up on the rice seedlings by now—with the rain unrelenting since evening, he knew it was a lost cause. Now he just hoped the ridges wouldn’t collapse; that would be a bigger problem.

“Brother, I’ll go with you,” Zhao Ertian added, worried about his own fields.

Without waiting for Old Zhao to speak, the brothers grabbed hoes from the storage shed. When they came out, they found their father in a straw rain cape and hat, rolling up his pants under the eaves. The three of them set off into the storm.

Outside was pitch black, but having grown up in the village, they knew the paths by heart. Passing through the village, they met other villagers, equally worried, heading out with hoes. They exchanged brief greetings and hurried to their own fields.

As expected, water from the hill behind flowed into Li Dahe’s field, flooding its ridges. The drainage ditch couldn’t handle it, and water cascaded from his field to the ones below, one after another, devastating the entire area.

The drainage ditch was like a small waterfall, roaring loud enough to make your ears ache.

The river below surged violently, its water level rising.

That old Li Dahe sure is carefree, sleeping through this! Old Zhao grabbed the hoe from his eldest son and widened Li Dahe’s ditch. Seeing it still couldn’t drain, he dug another ditch on the other side. Only for family would he do this—for others, even if the ridges collapsed, he wouldn’t dare dig. Farming families rarely tampered with others’ fields, no matter the reason, as it easily caused conflicts.

Their own fields were also flooded, especially the rice seedling beds. The drainage channels dug on both sides had completely disappeared, with water spilling over. Since it was their own land, Old Zhao quickly dug two ditches to drain the water from both ends.

As they worked, a shout came from below, followed by a loud crash—a field ridge had collapsed, water gushing loudly.

“A ridge collapsed?” Old Zhao turned instinctively.

“It collapsed,” came a tearful reply from below. He couldn’t see the person, but the voice was familiar—it was Zhou Erduo. His father and Chunya’s grandfather were brothers, their fields adjacent, one above the other. “My third uncle dug two ditches.”

Old Zhao handed the hoe to his eldest son and went down to check.

Sure enough, Chunya’s field had two ditches, one on each side, dug at some unknown time, draining water from both ends. Zhou Erduo’s field had only one ditch, so it couldn’t drain fast enough. The field was severely flooded, and the collapse was inevitable.

“In the evening, there was only one ditch; now there are two, and they didn’t even tell us,” Zhou Erduo said, his hands trembling with anger as he gripped his hoe. “All their water drains into my field. If they’d said they were digging, I’d have dug too. Now my ridge has collapsed.”

He was about to step into the field when Old Zhao stopped him: “It’s pitch black and pouring rain—too dangerous. Fix it tomorrow. Since it’s already collapsed, it won’t matter for a while. First, check your other fields and dig ditches where needed. Don’t delay.”

Zhou Erduo paused, neither stepping into the field nor checking the others. He told Old Zhao to go back to work and not worry about him.

Once he left, Zhou Erduo used his hoe to fill in Chunya’s newly dug ditches.

Old Zhao vaguely saw his actions, hesitated, but ultimately said nothing.

With close relatives, it was one thing—they’d share good food and help first in times of need. But with strained relationships, even brothers could be scheming. Knowing the heavy rain meant everyone was guarding their fields, Chunya’s grandfather must have understood the consequences of digging those ditches. Old Zhao didn’t believe otherwise; they were all old farmers, and no one could be fooled.

Now, Zhou Erduo had filled in Chunya’s ditches, and since his own field had two, it was only a matter of time before Chunya’s ridges collapsed.

Sure enough, early the next morning, Old Lady Zhou went to Zhou Erduo’s house, hands on her hips, cursing loudly enough to drown out the storm: “You rotten-hearted, filthy thing! Your ridge gets washed out by the rain, and you block my ditch! We share the same ancestral grave as brothers, and you’re nothing! If our parents saw this from the grave, they’d flip their coffins and come back to life!”

“Hiding in the house? You dare to do it but not face it?!”

Zhou Erduo’s mother pushed open the kitchen door and stood under the eaves, pointing and yelling back: “You thief crying ‘thief’! You’ve been scheming since you were young, and now you’re worse! Who’s the rotten-hearted one? You know damn well! Knowing the fields can’t hold water in this weather, you secretly dug two ditches, draining water into ours! In the evening, there was one; by night, two! Dare you say you didn’t dig them secretly?!”

“I dig my own field ridges with my own hoe—do I need to notify the whole village?” Old Lady Zhou shouted back. “You’re too carefree to care about your seedlings—that’s your problem! I care about my crops! After dinner, I check; before bed, I check again. My seedlings were about to flood, so I dug a ditch—what’s wrong with that? We split the family decades ago, and you still haven’t stopped playing the elder sister-in-law! Do I have to report everything to you?!”

Zhou Erduo’s mother was about to charge out and fight her, but her daughter-in-law pulled her back: “Mom, it’s raining outside! Don’t stoop to her level! She played dirty, and we paid her back—there’s nothing wrong with that!”

“Well said, Wu! You’ve let it slip! I knew you blocked my ditch on purpose! Just wait—this isn’t over!”

With nothing to do at home and the village in an uproar, Zhu Shi and her two sisters-in-law returned from watching the commotion, reporting that the two families had fought, rolling in the mud in the yard. Decades ago, they’d eaten at the same table, but now the brothers, old as they were, acted like enemies, scheming against each other’s crops.

“Chunya’s grandfather threw out his back, and that ended it,” Zhu Shi said, shaking her head as the family sat in the living room, eating fruit and chatting while watching the rain outside.

Wang Shi bounced her daughter in her arms: “If they still have energy to quarrel and fight, they’re not really worried yet.”

She glanced at her three daughters-in-law and said, “This is what happens when sisters-in-law don’t get along when they’re young—they hold grudges. Old Lady Zhou dug in secret, Zhou Erduo blocked in the open. They each vented their anger, but neither gained anything. The ridges can be rebuilt, but a broken brotherly bond isn’t easily mended.”

“How much real enmity is there between them? None. Your dad says their family split fairly back then, and Chunya’s grandfather and Erduo’s father usually had no major conflicts. The problem lies with the two women.” She took a pear slice her daughter fed her, chewing the juicy flesh. “Instead of helping in hard times, they scheme against each other, and they didn’t even gain anything. Wasn’t that a foolish move?”

Zhu Shi was sharp; she didn’t care about the move’s wisdom—the issue wasn’t there. She joked, “I’d never do that. To live well, brothers must stick together, so outsiders don’t dare bully you. Whether split or not, we all share one ancestor. Scheming against family instead of outsiders—I look down on that, and I won’t be that kind of person.”

Luo Shi caught on, glancing cautiously at her mother-in-law, and nodded: “I wouldn’t either. When it’s time to find wives for Gu Zi and A Deng, I’ll be careful not to pick troublemakers who break up brotherly bonds. I raised two sons, worked hard all my life, and want to enjoy my old age, not mediate their disputes every day.”

“Exactly,” Sun Shi, also clever, quickly added, “Sisters-in-law, if I do anything wrong, please tell me directly. We’re family—speak up, don’t hold grudges. We can’t end up like Old Lady Zhou and her sister-in-law!”

Zhao Xiaobao sat on her mother’s lap, watching her three sisters-in-law chatter, her head spinning. Weren’t they talking about Chunya’s grandfather fighting? How did it turn to their own family?

She looked up at her mother, who was smiling warmly, and couldn’t help but grin: “Mom, why are you secretly laughing?”

Wang Shi glared playfully at her daughters-in-law, then smiled, tapping her daughter’s nose. Instead of explaining, she asked, “You and your nieces were whispering all morning—what were you talking about?”

“Xiao Wu said the river’s risen, so we can’t set traps today—it’s dangerous,” Zhao Xiaobao said, biting into a pear and stuffing a piece into her mother’s mouth. She continued chewing, mumbling, “He said the seedlings in the divine land aren’t ready yet, and while Dad and brothers are busy, he wants me to let him and Gu Zi in to dig a fish pond.”

The rice seeds had been sown at the same time. Outside, the seedling fields were flooded, but the divine land’s were fine. In about ten days, when the seedlings were ready, transplanting would begin. With the heavy rain outside, Old Zhao couldn’t tend to the divine land, so it was the kids’ chance to work.

In the divine land, the weather was calm and sunny. Blackie lay by the fish pond, his long limbs stretched out, yawning widely.

The fish pond was tiny, dug in a hurry by the brothers during breaks from clearing land. It was a rough job—just a hole filled with water and some fish thrown in. Expanding it now was troublesome: one stood in the water digging, while the other shoveled dirt on the bank.

After a day’s work, sure enough, two fish floated belly-up the next day, dead. Fish were delicate; even with good care, they could die. He’d been messing around in the water all day yesterday and had worried, and sure enough, some had died.

Not knowing how long they’d been dead, there was no smell, but they were dead fish. Zhao Xiaowu didn’t plan to eat them, but throwing them away seemed wasteful, so he picked them up and tossed them to Blackie: “Blackie, here, eat the fish!”

“Woof!” Blackie barked angrily, craning his neck at him, then turned and headed to the small orchard.

“Bro, you’re not getting any fruit now,” Zhao Gu laughed. “Blackie’s smarter than Little Blackie and picky. Toss him dead fish, and he’ll hold a grudge.” The small orchard was now guarded by Blackie. Though they could enter the divine land, they never dared pick fruit from the orchard—Blackie would chase them. He wouldn’t bite, but he’d tear their clothes. Last time, Xier climbed a tree to pick pears, and Blackie ripped his pants, leaving him bare-bottomed until his auntie let him out.

In the orchard, no one dared to pick the fruit except Little Auntie. Not Grandpa, not Grandma, not even Mom or Dad. Blackie was more possessive and protective than a deity, with only Little Auntie in that dog's eyes.

"Hmph, how could I not get to eat? Little Auntie will give me some." Zhao Xiaowu picked up the dead fish Blackie had turned his nose up at, deciding to take it out to Xiao Heizi. This fish came from a pond fed by a stream, so even a dead one tasted better than live fish outside. He was sure Xiao Heizi wouldn't say no.

Besides, Xiao Heizi didn't know it was a dead fish.

The brothers dug the fish pond for three days and didn't come out until the fourth, because the rain had stopped.

After four straight days of heavy rain—the first two with strong winds, the last two with even heavier downpours but no wind—the mountains looked like they might flash flood. Every family's fields were underwater, countless ridges collapsed, and the fields closest to the river were submerged by rising waters.

The water level surged, flooding the area where they had set fish traps. Old Man Zhao initially worried about landslides, then about flash floods, so worried he got blisters on his lips, and he couldn't sleep or eat well. If not for Xiaobao's reassurance, who insisted it was just heavy rain and no landslides in the mountains, he would have moved the family elsewhere. The rain was truly terrifying.

The last time it rained this hard was over ten years ago, when the back mountain gave way.

On the fifth day, the sun came out—a blazing sun that felt weirdly warm for the season. But no one in the village cared about the heat; they all wished the sun would shine even brighter, hoping to dry out the flooded fields so they could reseed and grow new rice seedlings.

Spring planting couldn't be delayed. After the rain stopped, every household in the village pitched in, even the kids were sent to the fields to watch the drainage. Except for the fields completely submerged near the river, which had to wait for the water to recede, everyone else was busy repairing ridges, draining water, and some even set bamboo baskets under the irrigation channels to catch fish. Streams in the mountain carried fish downhill, and as the water flowed into the fields, some people actually caught some.

Since the river was dangerous, Zhao Xiaowu and the others headed for the mountains, especially near ditches. They set bamboo baskets downstream and, in half a day, could catch half a bucketful of fish, big and small.

It wasn't until two weeks later that the river's water level dropped. By then, new rice seeds had been sown in freshly prepared seedling beds.

While waiting for the seedlings to grow, the seedlings in the Immortal Land finally grew nice and slow—each with four leaves, a lush green sea.

Old Man Zhao and his three sons took turns planting the seedlings. Now, two people could go in at a time, making the work much faster. In under three days, they finished the four acres.

"Seven acres in total..." Old Man Zhao walked along the ridges, laughing and sighing by turns. He was happy, but he was also worried. Planting was doable, even for one person, but the fall harvest would be tough. It wasn't that one person couldn't do it, but it was exhausting, with many detailed tasks. Even with an extra hand now, it would still be a pain and hard to manage.

"Dad, now our family has thirteen and a half acres!" Zhao Dashan rubbed his hands together all excited. Six and a half acres outside, seven in the Immortal Land—the future was unimaginable; he'd wake up grinning from his dreams!

"What do you mean, 'our family's thirteen and a half acres'? We only have six and a half!" Old Man Zhao frowned at this, turning to glare at his eldest son. "These seven acres belong to your little sister. You brothers are just borrowing her land to grow crops, like tenant farmers under a landlord, except she doesn't charge rent. You've already gotten a great deal, so don't say things like that."

He knew his eldest didn't mean any harm and wasn't speaking carelessly; it was just that he hadn't been mindful of Xiaobao. Still, while it's not good to be too precise between siblings, it's also not good to be too vague. This needed to be made clear to avoid future squabbles and hard feelings.

Family property was family property; Xiaobao's was Xiaobao's. They had to be counted separately.

Xiaobao was a good girl, naturally she wouldn't let her brothers and nephews go hungry, but her brothers also needed to understand what could be shared and what couldn't. They had to have a clear head about it.

"Dad, I know." Zhao Dashan scratched his head and chuckled. "I wouldn't dare covet anything from the Immortal Land, and I never have."

Then he shook his head. "Well, not entirely true."

Just as Old Man Zhao was about to glare at him, he added, "I'm after the chance to farm Xiaobao's land for a lifetime. Dad, I've thought it over. The matter of Xiaobao's Immortal Land should be kept secret among us and the Xiao Wu generation."

Old Man Zhao was taken aback. "What do you mean?"

"When Xiao Wu grows up and marries, his children won't be told. We'll bury this secret for generations." Zhao Dashan had thought it through carefully. Though he hated to admit it, branches splitting from the tree was an age-old truth. He couldn't guarantee that grandchildren and great-grandchildren would all be honest and kind. No matter how good the family's roots, a bad seed would eventually appear in a few generations—every family had one. By then, they siblings might be long gone, but who knew?

It would be a shame if, after all their caution in their youth, they suffered because of the grandchildren's generation.

There was no choice now. Xiao Wu and the others already knew about the Immortal Land. If he had understood the gravity of the situation back then and had the foresight, he would have kept it from Xiao Wu's generation too.

But it wasn't too late. The boys had good characters and were protective of their little aunt. As long as they chose their wives wisely, no major problems would arise.

But the next generation had to be completely kept in the dark.

Old Man Zhao had never considered this. Hearing his eldest son's words, he thought it over and found some truth in them. The fewer people who knew, the better. They say wealth doesn't last three generations. Since Xiaobao was born, the family's fortunes had improved day by day—enriching parents, siblings, and nephews. That was three generations, and that was enough.

As for her own children and grandchildren, whether Xiaobao wanted to tell them was up to her.

...The Immortal Land probably couldn't be passed down, could it? Old Man Zhao couldn't help but wonder. Maybe he should cultivate fewer acres, so that after a hundred years, when Xiaobao passed on, even if she opened hundreds of acres, it would all be for nothing!

He patted his eldest son on the shoulder, his face full of pride. "Eldest, when did you get so smart?"

"...Dad, since Third is the second smartest in the family, as the eldest brother, I can't fall too far behind." That day in the mountains, hiding from the conscription, he had heard everything Dad and Old Man Sun said.

"Hey, you rascal." Old Man Zhao slapped him on the back, then gazed at the seven acres of land brimming with spring vitality. The gloom from the heavy rain that had oppressed him for days vanished, and he laughed heartily. "From today on, you're the fourth smartest in the family!"

"Ah, poor Second with that brain of his. He never missed a peach or a bowl of rice, so why isn't he sharper?"

"He's the dumbest in the whole family!"

With that, he threw his head back and laughed loudly.