When Ergouzi returned to Snake Mouth Mountain, the sky was already growing late, and it was time for dinner once more.
He truly seemed fated never to eat meat. Today he had finally parted with his hard-earned money to buy a piece of pork, only to give it away to Li Banxian.
Fortunately, he had finally bought an iron pot today, meaning he no longer had to chew through dry roasted rice.
He poured a portion of rice grains from the gourd, placed them on a stone slab, and gently tapped them to crack the husks. After blowing away the chaff, he poured the grains straight into the pot, added water, and set them to boil.
These grains had been stored inside the gourd for over three days. He wondered if they would undergo some magical transformation like the water.
Once the rice was cooked, Ergouzi remembered that he should have bought a bowl and chopsticks.
Yet he was hardly a fastidious person. Two wooden twigs and a broken tile shard solved the problem entirely.
As long as there was food to eat, such details mattered little.
He shoveled a large mouthful of rice into his mouth. Though it still retained some bran, it tasted immeasurably better than roasted grains—fragrant, soft, and remarkably chewy.
Pulling out his treasured piece of bitter salt, he took three large bites of rice before lightly touching the salt block with his tongue. The flavor was exquisite.
That evening, he cooked an entire sheng of rice and polished off every last grain, leaving his belly rounded and full.
After eating his fill, he lay down to rest in the stack of straw, feeling a persistent warmth radiating from his stomach.
Gradually, this warmth spread throughout his entire body, resembling the comfort of soaking in a hot bath.
He maintained that state as he slept through the night in the straw. When he woke the following morning, he felt robust and vigorous, his body brimming with boundless strength.
With such formidable strength, it would be a waste not to clear the wasteland. He immediately picked up his hoe and woodcutting knife and headed toward the barren patch.
This rocky hollow contained roughly three mu of land, though it was uneven and riddled with stones of all sizes, interspersed with thorny bushes and wild saplings.
Clearing the land first required cutting down the trees and thorns, a task he had partially finished during his spare moments over the past few days.
The hardest part was leveling the ground. The wasteland was choked with stones, some as large as a zhang and weighing hundreds of jin, others no bigger than a fist or an egg.
Every single stone had to be cleared away, and over the coming years of farming, he would undoubtedly have to keep picking out smaller pebbles.
But with water from the gourd, the rice was hardy enough that he did not need to be so particular; he only needed to move the large stones away.
At that moment, he shoved a massive boulder weighing over three hundred jin and rolled it to the side.
Old Stubborn Donkey had also cleared away many stones in the past, piling them into a large heap.
Perhaps the rice stored in the gourd truly possessed miraculous properties, for he spent the entire morning moving stones without feeling overly fatigued.
Over the following days, his suspicions were confirmed. Eating the rice from the gourd genuinely staved off exhaustion and steadily increased his strength.
Every day he felt an inexhaustible reservoir of energy within him, which vastly accelerated his land-clearing progress.
As long as he rolled away the boulders, dug out the wild trees, planted the rice grains, and watered them, fresh seedlings would sprout by the very next day.
As the days passed, the patch of paddy fields expanded steadily. At last, after six or seven months, nearly all three mu of land were blanketed with thriving rice shoots.
During those six-odd months, alongside his land reclamation efforts, he used large stones to construct a stone dwelling.
The house measured two zhang long, one zhang wide, and one zhang high, topped with a roof of thatch.
The gaps between the stones and the layers of thatch were thickly plastered with mud to keep out the wind and rain.
Inside, he piled up stones to form a platform bed, filling the uneven spots with soil and stamping it firm.
Over this he laid a thick layer of straw, making it exceptionally comfortable to lie upon.
Against the wall near the head of the bed sat over a dozen hemp sacks bulging with harvested grain.
In truth, he had stored far more than that inside his gourd; combined, he had amassed at least eighty shi of grain.
These were the fruits of his labor over the past half-year.
As long as he ensured the seedlings received sufficient water, they matured and were ready for harvest roughly every half month.
Each mu yielded around four shi per harvest.
The moment a harvest concluded, watering the stubble caused it to sprout anew, saving both the cost of seeds and the time required for propagation.
Now that all three mu were fully cleared and planted, yielding a crop every half month, each harvest produced about twelve shi. With two harvests a month, he obtained twenty-four shi of grain.
When rice prices hit their lowest point, they dropped to ten wen per sheng. With one shi containing one hundred sheng, it could fetch one thousand wen.
During periods of high prices, a shi could soar to nearly three thousand wen.
One thousand copper wen equaled one guan, which was equivalent to one tael of silver.
Even calculated at the lowest possible rate, the grain he produced each month would net twenty-four taels of silver.
Exchanged for silver, this sum would be more than enough to demonstrate his sincerity to Li Banxian and pay the fees for martial apprenticeship.
Transporting the grain down to Sanchazi Town to sell simply required a bit of time.
On that particular day, after finishing breakfast, Ergouzi hoisted a pole laden with grain and headed down the mountain. This chapter is updated first at novelping.com.
Before leaving, he dragged a massive pile of thorny brushwood to block the mountain path.
To prevent anyone from discovering his secret of farming with gourd water, he had spent the past half-year doing everything in his power to ruin the trail.
The path had become exceptionally treacherous, with certain sections completely choked off.
Even he had to rely on several long ropes to navigate a few steep drops when going up and down.
Fortunately, his strength had grown immensely, allowing him to endure such trials.
He had been plotting for some time: once he saved enough silver, he would approach Old Moneybags Huang to see if he could purchase the land on Snake Mouth Mountain.
Once acquired, it would become his private property, allowing him to legally fence off the entire mountain and keep outsiders away.
Carrying two heavy hemp sacks of grain a distance of twenty li this time, Ergouzi felt remarkably little fatigue.
The only nuisance was the oppressive summer heat while he still wore his heavy cotton trousers. Even stripped to the waist, he baked under the sun.
There was no help for it; this was his sole set of garments. Once he sold his grain today, he could commission a light summer outfit and a pair of trousers.
Upon entering Sanchazi Town, he walked straight to the Zhou Grain Store.
It was the only establishment in town capable of buying and selling grain on a large scale, reportedly run by the Zhou family, the wealthiest household in Sanchazi Town.
The acquisition price here was slightly lower than the retail rates charged at street stalls.
Since Ergouzi had a large volume of grain to dispose of, efficiency mattered most, so he naturally did not quibble over such minor price discrepancies.
With the autumn harvest fast approaching, grain prices had already begun to slide. Today’s purchase price stood at a mere one thousand six hundred wen per shi—equivalent to sixteen wen per sheng.
His two large hemp sacks totaled twelve dou and six sheng, netting him two thousand and sixteen wen.
With these coins in hand, he visited a tailoring shop to have a summer outfit custom-made.
He also purchased a few bowls, a pair of chopsticks, and various other daily necessities in town.
Over the subsequent days, he made the trip to Sanchazi Town daily, hauling a load of grain each time.
As the autumn harvest drew closer still, and with the year blessed by favorable weather so that no one lacked provisions, the purchase price at the Zhou Grain Store dropped lower with each passing day.
After selling continuously for over ten days, the acquisition price for a single shi of grain had plummeted to one thousand and eighty wen.
Having already saved enough silver for his apprenticeship, he refused to let his grain go at such a cheap rate.
In any case, his gourd could store vast quantities of grain without spoilage, meaning he was under no pressure to sell.