bestfiction Chapter 39 Dividing Taro
Chapter 39 Dividing Taro
"Dad, the mule cart is too wide and inconvenient for traveling on narrow roads. Let's remodel it into a flatbed cart so that we won't have to carry the cart along narrow roads anymore."
Pointing to the mule cart and his own handcart, Wen Zisong suggested to Wen Dashan that this would reduce unnecessary trouble.
After listening, Wen Dashan nodded thoughtfully, indicating his agreement with his son's view.
“The eldest brother is right. Converting the mule cart into a handcart is indeed more convenient, and it also avoids attracting the covetous eyes of others. After all, our family is the only one in the village with a mule cart with a carriage, which is quite conspicuous.”
So the father and his three sons immediately sprang into action, quickly beginning to modify the mule cart. Using the tools and materials they had, they transformed the cart's cargo box into a flatbed shape.
Then they reduced the width of the flatbed and added wheels, and a flatbed truck appeared before them.
The family had three mules and two carts, but there was still one mule without a cart. Wen Dashan looked at the pile of planks left on the ground.
Suddenly, a brilliant idea struck him: "Let's load the remaining planks onto the cart and take them with us. Tonight, when we're resting, we can cut down a tree and make another cart."
“Father is right. If we make another cart, all three mules will be useful. The children can rest on the cart when they get tired,” Wen Zihua said with a smile.
At this moment, Yang Lizheng struck the gong, signaling the departure of the famine-stricken fleeing group. Wen Dashan quickly told his family to load the grain and luggage onto the cart, and they slowly moved forward with the fleeing group.
As evening fell, the group found an open space to rest. Wen Dashan and his sons found a suitable tree and began working on their third cart. After some effort, the new cart was finally completed.
The next day, just as the sun rose, the Wen family's three mules pulled three carts loaded with supplies, and they continued their journey of fleeing famine, following the villagers.
Looking at his three sons and daughters-in-law, who had become even more united due to their escape from famine, Wen Dashan was very happy. However, he also felt a little worried when he thought of Wen Yuxia and her brother, who had fallen behind.
Even though Wen Yuxia and her brother managed to escape the pursuit of the bandits, they still couldn't leave the Wang family during their later escape from famine. Wen Dashan sighed and muttered to himself, "I wonder where Daya and the others have gone. I hope they haven't gotten separated from the Wang family."
Along the way, Wen Yuxia and her group encountered the village chief of Xiaowang Village and villagers who had narrowly escaped the pursuit of the madmen. Village Chief Wang then led everyone onward.
As dusk fell, the villagers of Xiaowang Village were situated at the border of Anyang County and Zhujiang County. The official road was flanked by towering mountains. Village Chief Wang led the villagers to a spacious spot on the hillside to rest.
As soon as the group stopped, Village Chief Wang made arrangements: "Yang Gang, Li Erwa, Zhang Jiaping, the three of you go find a water source. Wang Bazhu, Wang Gui, Wang Wen, the three of you go hunting in the mountains..."
After the bandits stole their food, Village Chief Wang, upon finding the surviving villagers, had them temporarily eat from one pot, consuming whatever they could find each day.
The brothers Wang Ping and Wang An also offered up the rice and chestnuts they had.
During each break, to prevent anyone from slacking off, Village Chief Wang would assign tasks to the men in the village.
The women, the elderly, and the children were assigned tasks by Guo, the village chief's wife.
Wang Bazhu said with a grin, "Village chief, my daughter is quite good at hunting, why don't we have her come along?"
Village Chief Wang knew that Wen Yuxia knew how to hunt, but Wen Yuxia was only 7 years old, and he simply couldn't bring himself to ask her to go hunting in the mountains.
This was Wang Bazhu's own suggestion, and Village Chief Wang readily agreed, saying, "Da Ya is young, so the three of you should take good care of her when we get up the mountain."
"Understood," Wang Bazhu said as he led the group up the mountain.
In the dense forest, Wang Bazhu was in charge of picking up small stones for Wen Yuxia, who used the stones to hit the birds in the trees. Wang Gui and Wang Wen were responsible for collecting the spoils.
Passing through the woods, in the dim moonlight, Wen Yuxia saw a thicket of bushes ahead. The bushes were lush with vegetation; there were bound to be pheasants inside.
Wen Yuxia stopped and said, "Eighth Uncle, let's go check in the bushes. Be careful of snakes, and watch your step so you don't crush the wild eggs."
Wang Bazhu quickly pulled Wen Yuxia aside and asked her to wait outside. He, Wang Gui, and Wang Wen took wooden sticks and went into the bushes.
"Wild eggs! There's a nest of wild eggs here!" Wang Gui shouted excitedly.
“Pheasant, hehe, I caught a pheasant that was incubating its eggs in its nest,” Wang Bazhu said proudly, shaking the pheasant he was carrying. “One, two, three… there are twenty-four eggs in the nest.”
Wang Wen carefully tapped the weeds on the ground with a wooden stick. Suddenly, he dropped the stick and lunged at the weeds in front of him. When he stood up, he was holding a black snake in his hand.
Wen Yuxia wasn't idle outside the bushes either. She went into the woods. There wasn't time to dig a hole, but luckily the rotting leaves were half a foot high. She took out the more than 500 jin of taro she had harvested recently from her spatial storage and buried it under the rotting leaves.
Given the food shortage, no one would doubt the plausibility of taro being here, Wen Yuxia reassured herself as she quickly buried the taro.
The backyard wall was covered with taro plants, planted by her grandparents before their passing. There were probably two or three hundred plants. She had just dug them up a while ago and weighed them; there were 580 jin (250 kg) of taro.
To complete the charade, Wen Yuxia took out the taro stems from her spatial storage and threw them haphazardly on the ground. Taro stems are the branches and stalks of taro plants.
"Eighth Uncle, Eighth Uncle, come quick! I've found something good here!" After doing all this, Wen Yuxia feigned surprise and excitedly shouted.
The villagers of Xiaowang Village were starving, relying on rice and chestnuts donated by Wang Ping and the others to make wild vegetable porridge to sustain them each day. Since it was inconvenient to take the food from her spatial storage, she intentionally came up the mountain this time to bring out taro to feed the villagers.
"Taro, how did it get here?" Wang Bazhu asked, looking at the taro that Wen Yuxia had unearthed from under the rotting leaves.
Wang Gui pointed to the taro leaves on the ground and said, "There are so many withered taro leaves on the ground, these taro must have grown here. Da Ya has already dug out the taro, why are you still thinking so much?"
Wen Yuxia said, "Uncle Wang Gui, you can pick taro here. I'll go back and ask the village chief to send a few more people over."
"Da Ya, you've done a great job today. Go back and rest well. I'll leave the task of leading the men up the mountain to your eighth uncle."
No matter how capable Wen Yuxia was, Wang Gui was still worried about letting her go down the mountain alone. So he asked Wang Bazhu to escort Wen Yuxia down the mountain and take the prey with her, and then lead the men up the mountain to carry taro.
There were 145 surviving villagers in Xiaowang Village. Village Chief Wang distributed the taro according to the number of people, and each person received exactly five jin.