Now that she had the land deed in hand, the next major task was to renovate the house.
But before that, there was another matter to deal with—the eight mu of farmland she had just acquired.
Have her actually work the fields herself?
No way.
She’d rather die than farm!
In modern times, large machines were used for planting and harvesting, so there was at least some convenience to farming. But this was ancient times. Everything had to be done by hand.
Tang Yuan felt that she would probably work herself to death before she could finish cultivating the land.
Besides, she had enough supplies stored in her space to last her a lifetime and then some. Why would she make life difficult for herself by exhausting herself farming?
It would be much better to rent the land out to someone else.
After discussing it with Granduncle’s family, everyone agreed that a little girl like her couldn’t possibly farm eight mu of land by herself. If she wanted to rent it out, then she should.
In the end, Granduncle helped her find tenants.
The eight mu were divided into two portions. Four mu were rented to Old Ox Grandpa’s son, while the other four mu went to Sister-in-law Taohua’s family.
Both families would pay Tang Yuan rent according to the going market rate and according to the agreed schedule.
From the original owner’s memories, Tang Yuan knew that winters here were long and bitterly cold. The ground remained frozen for roughly seven or eight months of the year.
So while the busy farming season hadn’t started yet, she had to hurry and get her house repaired!
Before beginning the renovation, Tang Yuan went to Old Medicine Grandpa’s house and spent ten wen on several packets of medicine designed to smoke out snakes, insects, rats, and other pests.
The method was simple.
They just had to build a pile of firewood inside the house and throw the medicine packets into the flames.
Tang Yuan brought Yingzi and Lanzi along, and the three of them spent an entire day continuously fumigating the house.
Quite a few creatures were driven out.
The following morning, Granduncle arrived at the stone house at the foot of the mountain early in the morning, bringing Eldest Cousin, Second Cousin, Eldest Cousin’s two teenage sons, and two other male relatives from the clan.
The group split into two teams.
Granduncle and one of the clan uncles went into town to buy blue bricks.
Tang Yuan wanted the house remodeled according to a layout similar to a modern northeastern farmhouse: an outdoor kitchen area, a central fire wall, and heated brick beds inside.
They wouldn’t need many bricks. Most would be used to build the partition fire wall, the stove, and the heated kang.
The largest quantities needed would actually be tiles and stone.
Stone was especially important because she wanted to build a stone wall around the courtyard.
Since the house was close to the mountain, what if some starving wild beast wandered down?
She needed a fairly high stone wall to keep the animals out.
Tang Yuan gave Granduncle ten taels of silver and told him to try to make everything fit within that budget.
According to Eldest Cousin’s estimate, it should be enough.
She also instructed Granduncle that if he happened to see cement for sale, he should bring back several bags.
She wanted to fill the gaps between the stones inside the house with cement. It would make everything look much neater.
Actually, Tang Yuan already had plenty of cement and sand in her space.
Back in her previous life, the company she worked with had been involved in a construction project whose client suddenly ran into financial problems and couldn’t pay.
The project had stopped, and since Tang Yuan was the one communicating with the client, she had gone to inspect the site after it was abandoned.
At the time, she realized that the drawings she’d spent half a month working overtime on had all been for nothing.
The client had gone bankrupt, her company couldn’t recover the remaining payment, and her bonus was gone too.
Angry and frustrated, Tang Yuan had taken more than twenty tons of cement, over ten tons of sand, and more than a dozen steel plates that had been laid on the ground for heavy machinery from the abandoned construction site and stored everything in her space.
Of course, she couldn’t openly take those supplies out and use them.
So she had Granduncle buy several bags and put them on the surface.
That way, when she secretly used the rest, it wouldn’t look so suspicious.
The others stayed behind to clean up the house.
Cleaning it was actually fairly straightforward.
First, they cleared away the weeds surrounding the building.
Then they removed everything that had accumulated inside the stone house.
Since the stone walls were already intact, the final step was simply to dismantle the collapsed roof completely.
With many hands working together, the entire little courtyard was renovated in only about ten days.
Looking at the neat little stone courtyard in front of her, Tang Yuan was absolutely delighted.
If she could, she would have moved in immediately.
Unfortunately, she still had to wait a few more days.
There was practically nothing inside yet, and the heated kang hadn’t dried completely.
Tang Yuan also wanted to have a kang cabinet built into the kang, along with a large wardrobe, a cupboard, tables, chairs, and other furniture.
Eldest Cousin was the best carpenter within a dozen or so surrounding villages.
Other than the kang cabinet, he already had most of the furniture ready-made.
Early one morning, her two nephews, Dakui and Erkui, arrived pushing a flatbed cart.
The cart carried two large sacks of wood shavings and more than half a cartload of firewood.
A newly built house and a newly constructed kang needed to be heated with a strong fire for two or three days.
For one thing, it would help everything dry faster.
For another, it would reveal whether the walls and chimney had been properly sealed and whether there were any places where smoke leaked out.
Once the new house had dried sufficiently, Eldest Cousin brought in all the furniture he’d made.
Tang Yuan felt deeply touched by the furniture.
At first, Eldest Cousin absolutely refused to take any money.
He felt that Tang Yuan was an orphan and had a difficult life. If he could help her whenever possible, he should. It would also be his way of giving an explanation to the late Second Granduncle and allowing him to rest easy.
But Tang Yuan couldn’t simply treat other people’s kindness as something she was entitled to.
Ever since she had arrived in this world, she had been eating their food and drinking their water. Granduncle’s entire family had spent both money and effort helping her.
They were treating her like family.
Now, if she let them give her all this furniture for free, she simply couldn’t accept it.
After a long back-and-forth, it was finally Great-Grandma who spoke up and told Eldest Cousin to accept two taels of silver.
Even that was already far below what the furniture was worth.
Just the several large beams used for her roof alone were worth quite a bit.
Tang Yuan could only keep their kindness in her heart.
She would have to see whether she could find some way to help them make money in the future.
After all, she had no shortage of anything.
But they still had families to support.
The house could now be lived in.
However, she still had no bedding, cooking utensils, pots, bowls, or other household necessities.
She obviously couldn’t simply take everything directly from her space.
Maybe she could go into town tomorrow.
That would give her an excuse for having bought everything.
She also wanted to buy some vegetables and ingredients.
Then she could prepare a proper feast at home and invite Granduncle’s entire family, along with the uncles and relatives who had helped renovate the house.
They had done such a huge favor for her.
She had to show her gratitude.
The next day, Tang Yuan went to Old Ox Grandpa’s house.
She offered thirty wen to hire his family’s ox cart to take her into town.
There were simply too many things she needed to buy.
The person driving the ox cart was Old Ox Grandpa’s youngest son, Hanwa, whom Tang Yuan had to address as Uncle.
He was a rather simple, honest, and straightforward man who didn’t talk much.
When they reached the city gate, Uncle Hanwa said he wouldn’t enter the city.
He would simply stay there and watch the ox cart.
Tang Yuan thought about it and decided that was actually better.
If Uncle Hanwa accompanied her, it would be inconvenient to secretly take things out of her space.
She also wanted to get everything she needed in one trip.
This time, Tang Yuan didn’t head toward the eastern part of the city like she had last time.
That area was prosperous and mostly catered to wealthy people.
For ordinary people buying things for everyday life, the western side of the city was more suitable.
It was almost lunchtime when Tang Yuan finally returned to the ox cart.
She had a basket on her back and was carrying a large number of things in both hands.
Seeing her from a distance, Uncle Hanwa quickly climbed down and went over to help her.
“I should’ve gone with you. Look at all the things you’ve bought! You must be exhausted.”
Tang Yuan put everything onto the ox cart and took a breath before answering.
“Uncle, it’s not that much. I also bought some things at the general store. Since I bought quite a lot, the shopkeeper had a worker deliver them here later.”