“Dali, go get two baskets and come with me and Er Ya up the mountain to gather some herbs and wild vegetables,” Wang Chunhua ordered as she brought Xia Yan to Xia Da Ya, who was sweeping the courtyard.
“Mother, I can go with you alone! I’m quick and capable! Er Ya is still injured, shouldn’t she stay home and rest instead? C-can she…?” Xia Da Ya’s voice grew softer and softer.
“You brat! Now you’re telling me what to do? She’s not dead—why can’t she go? Do my words not matter anymore?” Wang Chunhua said sternly.
“No, Mother, I didn’t mean that! I’ll go right away.” Xia Da Ya quickly ran off to get the baskets from the chicken shed.
“Mother, are you going out?” Xia Tie Chui awkwardly approached Wang Chunhua and asked carefully.
“Are you blind or deaf? Didn’t I just tell Dali to get baskets and come with us to the mountain?” Wang Chunhua paused, then added, “Do you have something to tell me?”
After a struggle, Xia Tie Chui finally steeled himself and shouted, “Mother, tomorrow is Pan Di’s third-day return visit! I’ll be going back to her parents’ home with her, so I won’t be working in the fields tomorrow.”
Wang Chunhua was startled by his loud voice. After a moment she finally understood and thought to herself: So this cheap son’s wife is called Pan Di. With a name like that, she’s clearly not favored at home. But he’s just going back to his wife’s family, why shout so loudly?
Xia Tie Chui thought she was unhappy and quickly tried to speak again—
Before he could, Xia Yan stepped in and tugged Wang Chunhua’s sleeve.
“Mother, big brother means he needs money to prepare gifts for sister-in-law’s family.”
Xia Da Ya immediately tensed up, afraid Wang Chunhua would get angry. But to her surprise—
Wang Chunhua slapped her forehead. “Oh right, I forgot about that.”
She pulled out one tael of broken silver and shoved it into Xia Tie Chui’s hands. “Go buy more things. Don’t let her family think she’s not well treated here.”
Xia Tie Chui froze completely, stunned. He hadn’t expected anything like this—he thought at most he’d get a few dozen coins or even be scolded.
Even Pan Di, who was hiding in the kitchen doorway, was deeply moved and quietly cried. She swore she would treat her mother-in-law well for the rest of her life.
Wang Chunhua, however, had no time to linger. “Anything else? If not, we’re leaving.”
The three of them slowly walked toward the edge of Daqing Mountain.
After looking around, Wang Chunhua frowned. “Everything edible has been picked clean. Let’s go deeper.”
“Mother, we shouldn’t go too far. There are bears and tigers in the deep mountain,” Xia Da Ya quickly warned.
Hearing this, both Wang Chunhua and Xia Yan stopped at once.
“Dali is right. Let’s go back,” Wang Chunhua decided.
“Mother, we have no rice and no seeds. Since we’re not going into the mountains, why don’t we go to the village head’s house to buy seeds and then go to town tomorrow for grain? We have money now,” Xia Yan suggested.
Wang Chunhua agreed.
At the village entrance, Wang Chunhua told Xia Da Ya to go home first, then headed with Xia Yan to the village head’s house.
On the way, Xia Yan began calculating excitedly: “Mother, I don’t know how to farm, but how many seeds do we need for six mu of land? I want rice! Let’s buy rice seeds and vegetable seeds. We should store food—famine might be coming.”
Wang Chunhua sighed. “We don’t need many seeds. Ten jin is enough. We can also exchange through the system. Crops in the space grow in one day outside time is one hundred days.”
She looked at the dry fields and added, “Even the river water might dry up soon.”
Xia Yan nodded seriously. “But Mother, we must keep our supplies secret. No one can know we have food.”
Wang Chunhua tapped her head. “Do you think I’m stupid? I know that. Don’t worry.”
Soon they arrived at the village head’s house.
“Village head, are you home?” Wang Chunhua called.
A woman came out and greeted them warmly. They were invited inside.
After explaining they wanted rice seeds, the village head was shocked.
“You want ten jin? That much can seed nearly an entire field!”
He finally gave them only two jin, saying that was all he could spare.
Then his wife even added vegetable seeds and eggs. Wang Chunhua paid her a small amount of money, but the woman refused to accept it at first. After persuasion, she finally took it and added more supplies.
By the time they left, they were carrying a full basket of seeds and eggs.
On the way home, Xia Yan gasped. “One hundred coins bought this much? Then didn’t we overpay by giving Big Brother one tael earlier?”
Wang Chunhua sighed. “I had no idea either. In the original memory, she lived a wealthy life and had no concept of prices.”
Xia Yan sighed. “No wonder we looked like fools.”
Later, they discussed rebuilding the house, but decided against it for now to avoid drawing attention.
On their way back, they ran into Old Madam Liu.
She immediately tried to snatch their basket, but Wang Chunhua dodged her and coldly warned:
“If you keep causing trouble, don’t blame me for settling old accounts.”
Old Madam Liu froze. Fear flashed across her face as she suddenly remembered Wang Chunhua’s mysterious background and the consequences if she truly investigated everything.
Terrified, she ran away.
Xia Yan gave a thumbs-up. “Mother, you’re amazing.”
Wang Chunhua rolled her eyes. “I was just bluffing.”
She then revealed the truth: the original owner was actually the daughter of a convicted official’s family, once sentenced to exile and worse. If exposed, they would all die.
Xia Yan immediately panicked. “Then we definitely can’t tell anyone!”
Back home, Wang Chunhua began organizing supplies while ordering everyone to work. Chaos quickly turned into routine household life.
Meanwhile, Xia Yan was left thinking:
We really are broke peasants with no concept of money… but at least we survived today.