One week later, the workers from the village who worked in the town factories returned on leave and announced big news.
Their wages had increased, and by a full eight yuan.
In an era when one cent could buy a steamed bun, that was truly a considerable amount.
After Lin Guanghui and Jiang Tao returned, they gathered the leaders of several factories and explained the little girl’s wishes.
Without exception, everyone was shocked.
That was ginseng worth tens of thousands of yuan, not just a few yuan or a few dozen yuan.
Yet she wanted nothing and asked for it all to be distributed to the workers?
Heavens.
What kind of family could raise such a generous child?
Since that little girl was thinking so much about the workers, the factories couldn’t simply do nothing either.
So, using this as a reason, they decided to improve the wage benefits.
They couldn’t disappoint the little girl’s goodwill.
After discussion, since they were going to raise wages, they might as well raise them properly.
Ten yuan seemed a little too much.
Five yuan seemed a little too little.
Then eight yuan.
That was decided.
The little girl, who had hidden her contributions and fame, was still busy working on her own back garden.
With the little girl’s speed and technique, she had long finished turning the soil.
Now she was preparing to raise seedlings.
In her previous life, the little girl had lived in the countryside, so these tasks were truly not difficult for her.
She went up the mountain to find bamboo, made several bamboo frames, then found a piece of plastic sheet and built an arched little greenhouse.
Plastic absorbed heat, so the temperature inside the shed was higher, making it perfect for raising seedlings.
At night, she covered the greenhouse with straw mats to keep it warm and protect it from the cold.
She understood the whole process perfectly on her own.
She mixed mud and made seedling blocks.
Afraid she hadn’t done them well, she even added plenty of water from her space.
She didn’t ask others for seeds either.
She simply searched through her space and scattered some of every vegetable seed she had.
She treated it as practice.
A few days later, when the village began transplanting rice seedlings, the seedlings she had raised had already grown to about two inches tall.
She really wasn’t afraid of farming.
Transplanting rice required bending over, which was hard on the waist.
One hand carried the prepared rice seedlings, while the other took a seedling and tossed it into the water.
This also required skill.
Only when the rows were straight and neat could one be called impressive.
When they first began turning the soil, the village chief had already arranged for people to cultivate rice seedlings in the seedling field.
Now the seedlings had grown to about half a chi high, and the paddies had been soaked thoroughly.
It was the perfect time to transplant.
Wearing waterproof boots, every step lifted a clump of mud, making movement very difficult.
Seeing that most villagers entered the water barefoot, the little girl instantly felt she had become even more delicate.
She was failing at adapting to local customs.
After a busy week of transplanting rice, they spent several more days planting corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, wheat, sorghum, and soybeans.
Once spring planting ended, the villagers had visibly lost weight again.
After that, the work in the fields mainly involved daily tasks like watching the water, weeding, and catching insects.
Going to work every day was no longer so busy.
The days were also getting longer.
The little girl used her time after work to transplant the seedlings she had raised into her back garden.
It was at this time that Lin Guanghui came.
Seeing her working, he didn’t stand idle.
He rolled up his sleeves and came to help, passing seedlings to the little girl.
“Why are your seedlings so big?”
“Ah? Are they big? Aren’t seedlings supposed to be this size after being raised?”
The little girl was puzzled.
Wasn’t this how seedlings were raised?
Lin Guanghui was an authentic rural man and had always paid attention to crop growth.
“How did you raise these seedlings?”
“There.”
The little girl lifted her chin.
Lin Guanghui followed her gaze and saw the seedling greenhouse with half the seedlings still inside, along with the plastic sheet that had been pulled over it.
“You used plastic sheet to make a seedling greenhouse?”
His voice sounded strangely odd.
“Yes. If not this, then what?”
Lin Guanghui smiled bitterly and sat down on the ground.
Plastic sheets weren’t cheap.
Their price was almost comparable to a piece of cloth.
No one had ever thought of using plastic sheets for this purpose.
They didn’t dare think of it.
It was too expensive.
In the past few years, people had barely been able to eat.
How could they dare imagine such things?
The little girl was confused.
“What’s wrong? Is there something wrong with using plastic sheet?”
Lin Guanghui shook his head.
“No. It’s too good. It’s just that most people can’t afford to use it.”
The little girl blinked.
“Oh, no wonder. Yesterday, I saw Auntie Li’s tomato seedlings were so small. Then why not raise seedlings indoors? If the room is heated warmer, that should work too.”
Lin Guanghui’s voice became even lower.
“There isn’t enough sunlight indoors.”
Oh.
That was true.
The windows now only had a small piece of glass, so very little sunlight could enter.
It was all because of poverty.
The little girl had no solution for that either.
“If people are willing to use plastic sheet, they can build a bigger shed. In winter, they could heat it properly and grow vegetables inside. Some vegetables can be harvested several times in one winter. As long as buyers can be found, winter vegetables should be very popular, right?”
Not just popular!
Lin Guanghui stared fixedly at the little girl.
She would never know how much shock her casual words brought to others.
“If anyone in the village wants to try it, I can help find plastic sheets. Treat it as borrowed. There’s no need to pay first.”
“Alright.”
She had already considered the villagers to this extent.
Besides agreeing, he didn’t know what else to say.
“Why doesn’t anyone in the village raise chickens or pigs?”
This question was purely out of curiosity.
“Before I left, a few families in the village seemed to have raised some. Later, I heard there was nothing to feed them, and they starved to death. Everyone felt distressed and feared they couldn’t feed them properly. Besides, these past few years, people couldn’t even feed themselves, so no one was willing to spend money buying piglets.”
“Doesn’t the village have a fish pond?”
“There used to be one. Later, during the drought, the water in the pond dried up, and the fish pond disappeared.”
Was she getting a bit depressed?
“Then why not use it again? It’s just empty anyway. Can’t they just put in some fish fry?”
His father had also been thinking about this issue recently.
The little girl thought again.
“Are fish fry very expensive?”
Lin Guanghui’s expression went blank.
Was the issue whether they were expensive?
No.
“Isn’t that little river over there flowing water? If they put a net downstream, wouldn’t that work? A ready-made fish pond.”
She muttered the last sentence quietly, but Lin Guanghui heard it clearly.
“What did you say?”
“Ah?”
“What did you just say?”
The little girl was stunned by the question and thought for a moment.
“That little river… put a net across it…”
Yes.
That was exactly it.
Had the problem just been solved like this?
Lin Guanghui turned and ran outside.
“I’ll come back later to help you work.”
As if I care about you helping me!
He rushed straight to the production team courtyard to find his father.
Coincidentally, his father and several village committee members were all there.
When they heard the idea, the men looked at each other.
Hey.
This idea was good.
A ready-made fish pond.
Why did they insist on digging one themselves?
The old men immediately went to inspect the site.
After being used and then abandoned, Lin Guanghui obediently returned to help the little girl with her work.
It had to be said that two people working together were fast.
By that afternoon, the back garden was fully planted.
As for the front garden—more accurately, the courtyard—the little girl didn’t plan to fill it completely.
How much could she eat alone?
The back garden was already so big.
At the moment, the courtyard only had the grape vines she had brought down from the mountain.
They had survived winter and were already sprouting.
The little girl planned to make a trellis for them when she had time.
Grapes could grow above, and people could sit underneath.
Perfect!
Lin Guanghui found it strange.
Wasn’t a vegetable garden just a few kinds of vegetables?
How did she come up with so many varieties?
Seeing there were still many seedlings left on one side, the little girl…
Had miscalculated.
She had made too many.
“Is there anyone who didn’t manage to raise seedlings in time? If they don’t mind, they can take these. Throwing them away would be a waste.”
Lin Guanghui: I knew it. No wonder your greenhouse was so big.
“I’ll bring a few of each kind to Taozi. The rest can be given to others.”
Jiang Tao had a small garden at home.
His wife kept it very tidy and planted vegetables every year. During summer, it could save them quite a bit on vegetable expenses.
The little girl didn’t want to look at the pile anymore.
“Hurry and move them away. Hurry, hurry.”
Lin Guanghui smiled, went out to find a pushcart, and pushed away the full cart of seedlings.
The little girl finally let out a breath of relief.
He kept a few of each kind to bring away, then sent the rest directly to the production team courtyard.
He also let them see what seedlings raised in a greenhouse looked like.
Didn’t the older sisters-in-law’s eyes turn green when they saw them?
How could these seedlings be so good?
They were fresh and tender.
Once planted, they would definitely survive, much better than the ones at home.
Every family’s garden was already more or less planted, and those who lacked seedlings had already exchanged with one another.
Now they were simply envious because these seedlings looked so good.
The village chief didn’t stop them.
“Each family can take a few. Take them all back and plant them properly. When they grow up, let’s compare and see what’s different about seedlings grown like this.”
The village chief made a rare joke.
The village had already begun preparing fine nets to block the river.
Once they bought fish fry tomorrow or the day after, they could release them inside.
Flowing water was still better.
The fish would be fresh, and the survival rate would be high.
Why hadn’t they thought of this in previous years?
Lin Guanghui brought the vegetable seedlings to Jiang Tao’s house.
The old lady kept muttering:
“Good seedlings. Truly good seedlings.”
After asking Lin Guanghui, the little girl confirmed that raising pigs and chickens wasn’t forbidden—it was just that villagers were reluctant to do it.
That reassured her.
The next day, she bought three piglets and ten chicks, taking very careful care of them.
Now she had another task:
Cutting grass and digging wild vegetables for the pigs.
Digging wild vegetables and catching insects for the chickens.
The little girl became joyfully busy.
As for hygiene, she wasn’t afraid.
She had spiritual energy.
The little girl had only recently discovered that spiritual energy could be used like a cleaning spell.
It was especially useful.
The waste could be directly cleaned into the compost pit behind the house.
Recently, nothing major happened.
The little girl happily lived a life of working at sunrise and resting at sunset, while practicing her spiritual energy along the way.
During summer, something happened.
This year’s educated youth assignment began again.
There were still three people: one man and two women, likely from the same place.
The educated youth station was already full.
After Tang Tang moved out last year, the village chief had led people to tear down the neighboring building and rebuild it as a thatched house.
It was a little larger than before and newer than the old educated youth station.
The village chief’s meaning was that now there were five female educated youths total, just enough to live next door together.
The original educated youth station could then be given to the male educated youths.
This arrangement was actually just right.
However, the newly arrived female educated youth, Jiang Ruxue, had heard from somewhere that there was another educated youth who lived alone in a house at the foot of the mountain.
Thoughts immediately stirred in her heart, and she insisted on going to take a look.
The village chief glanced at her.
This intention was far too obvious.
“Do you know her? Why are you asking to go look at someone’s place?”
He deliberately emphasized the word “place.”
Whether the little girl didn’t understand or was pretending not to understand, no one knew.
“In the future, we’ll all be revolutionary comrades. This is only proper. Besides, she lives alone over there and must be lonely. Now we can go over and keep her company. More people means more safety too, right?”
She failed to notice the villagers’ strange expressions and was just about to pull Li Min and Li Hongling along.
She thought that if she dragged those two with her, then if anything happened, it wouldn’t fall on her alone.