TATLC Chapter 82 — Autumn Harvest

“Granny, the autumn harvest is coming in a couple days. Let me find some helpers for you,” Lu Lin said.

There were always people in town looking for odd jobs. During harvest season, workers were in short supply, so wages would be a bit higher, but it still wouldn’t cost too much.

Granny Shen nodded. “No need. I’ll hire people myself. Villagers will do fine. I still know a few people in the village.”

Lu Lin thought it made sense. When hiring labor, it was better to start with people from the same village. Only if no one was available should you look outside. Hiring outsiders directly might come off as disrespectful to the villagers.

Before, when Lu Lin and Chen Xiaomi hired workers from another village to build their house, it was only because the village head said there was no one available in the village.

Now that Shen Chi and Chen Xiaocai’s engagement was settled, Granny Shen no longer treated Lu Lin as an outsider.

She figured that since she didn’t live in the village much lately, after harvesting the grain and paying taxes, she’d just have it all brought here.

Granny Shen had noticed something recently. Chen Xiaomi and Lu Lin said they worked for some big boss behind the scenes, but this big boss had never shown his face.

Even Wan Li’s slave contract was also signed with Chen Xiaomi. What kind of big boss would delegate so much authority? Granny Shen privately suspected this shop actually belonged to the couple, but she didn’t dare say anything. If the shop really belonged to Chen Xiaomi, and Grandma Chen found out, she’d probably jump through the roof.

Granny Shen thought, if the shop really is Chen Xiaomi’s, then things are going to get lively. Before, when villagers just heard Chen Xiaomi earned two taels of silver a month, they were already fighting to match their children with Chen Xiaocai. If they knew Chen Xiaomi was the boss, even though Chen Xiaocai was already engaged to her grandson, people would probably still keep coming to propose marriages. Even those older gentlemen in town might offer their daughters for free.

She kept this suspicion to herself, secretly worried for her grandson.

As the harvest season approached, Granny Shen counted the days and grew restless. She decided to check on the fields in person.

Since Lu Lin didn’t have anyone else available, he asked Qin Lang to accompany her. Qin Lang promised everything would be fine.

Qin Ming had already recovered from his injuries and was eager to work for Lu Lin.

Lu Lin assigned him odd jobs and sometimes asked him to keep an eye on Chen Xiaomai.

Qin Lang had become more mature lately.

As a mountain dweller, although he was still a bit young, he already had quite an imposing presence. Recently he’d been following the merchant caravans to deliver goods to Liu Town.

It wasn’t even mid-August yet, but the crops in the fields were already growing well. However, most farmers felt they could grow a bit more and hadn’t started harvesting yet.

Granny Shen walked around the fields and decided to start early to avoid any unexpected problems.

Once she made up her mind, she hired someone from the village directly, offering thirty wen per day in wages to hire help.

Many villagers lacked land, but there were plenty with extra hands at home.

“Granny Shen, the crops in your field could still grow more!”

Granny Shen nodded. “Yes, they could grow more, but if we’re unlucky and get heavy rain, everything would be ruined.”

“That’s right. They could probably grow better if left longer, but if we encounter a storm, the losses would be huge. Better to secure what we have.”

Granny Shen smiled. She also wanted to wait for them to grow more, but in another couple days, the villagers would be busy with their own harvests. It would be hard to find helpers then, and even harder to borrow tools.

The people Granny Shen hired were quite honest and hardworking. Everyone worked very diligently.

The hired workers all felt that Granny Shen had changed from before. The Shen family used to be poor, and all the farm work was done slowly by the old woman and her young grandson. She would never hire several people so casually like this.

Farming was already low-profit to begin with. With taxes to pay and people to hire, the money left over would be very little.

Many villagers knew that a lot of the dolls in the shop were made by Granny Shen. They guessed that Granny Shen had earned quite a bit, so she didn’t care about the cost of hiring people. Others thought that since Granny Shen had arranged Chen Xiaocai’s marriage to Shen Chi, she wasn’t worried about her grandson’s future anymore and was benefiting from her future grandson-in-law.

“Granny Shen, where did Shen Chi go?”

After working in the fields for a while, Granny Shen went back to prepare lunch. Several women, whose husbands were among the hired laborers, volunteered to come help.

Granny Shen smiled. “Oh them? They went out to do business.”

The women looked at each other in surprise. “Business? Shen Chi is still so young, and he’s already out doing business?”

Granny Shen smiled. “He’s just fooling around.”

The journey from Lin Town to Liu Town was quite far. Granny Shen had once followed the delivery team there and seen the shop they opened in Liu Town. Although it was smaller, it had everything. The two boys were doing very well there. After seeing it once, Granny Shen felt at ease.

“How is that fooling around? Shen Chi is doing big things now. You’ll get to enjoy good fortune later in life because of him.”

Granny Shen smiled. “At my age, what good life is there to enjoy?”

“Exactly because you’re at this age, you should be enjoying the good life!”

“Granny Shen, you have five mu of land now, and you’re living in town. That’s not easy to manage!” one woman said.

Granny Shen nodded. “Yes, so I’m thinking of renting out some of the land.”

Granny Shen had been worried about this lately. Since she was always in town, if someone with bad intentions secretly pulled up her seedlings, she wouldn’t know.

For crops to grow well, they had to constantly pay attention to weeding, fertilizing, and watering. She couldn’t take care of it from town.

Renting out the land was Lu Lin’s idea. Granny Shen was reluctant, but with so few people in the family, there was no other choice.

When the women heard that Granny Shen wanted to rent out land, they all got excited. The families of these women were all short on land. If there was land to rent, they were certainly hoping to get some.

After the harvest, Granny Shen had all the grain transported to town.

Lu Lin was surprised by Granny Shen’s decision, but when he wanted to give Granny Shen money for the grain, she wouldn’t take it. After much persuasion, she only accepted half.

“This Granny Shen really has made money! Hiring so many people, she’s already wealthy enough to be extravagant.”

“How much wages does Granny Shen have? The fields didn’t yield that much, but she spent a lot hiring people.”

“I heard Granny Shen plans to rent out all her land.”

“Rent out the land?!”

As soon as Zhang Jin arrived home, he saw several villagers crowded inside his house.

“Dad, why are so many people here?” Zhang Jin asked.

Zhang Cheng glanced at his son and said, “Granny Shen says she’s getting too old to farm anymore and wants to rent out all her land. She asked me to be a witness.”

Zhang Jin nodded. “I see. How does Granny Shen plan to rent the land?”

“She wants forty percent of the harvest as rent, and the tenants will be responsible for delivering her share.”

Zhang Cheng nodded. “Forty percent isn’t too bad.” Many big landlords collected half of the harvest. After paying rent, there wouldn’t be much left.

“Granny Shen is renting out all her land?” Zhang Jin asked.

Zhang Cheng nodded. “Yes, all five mu of land.”

In the courtyard.

“Granny Shen is being too generous,” Lu Lin said, feeling embarrassed that the old woman had gone through the trouble of bringing over the grain she had worked so hard to grow.

“It’s better that Granny Shen transported the grain here to town,” Chen Xiaomi said, taking a more practical view. “Since we’re rarely in the village, if the grain had been left there, it could easily have been stolen.” He felt that now they were practically family, there was no need to be too particular about such things.

Lu Lin thought about it and agreed. weren’t inherently bad, but when people were hungry, they were capable of anything. Leaving the grain unattended in the village would have made it an easy target for thieves.

“This year’s harvest seems pretty good,” Chen Xiaomi said.

Lu Lin nodded. “Yes, fortunately.” Fortunately they didn’t encounter a disaster year. Historically, during disaster years, refugees would wander everywhere, and robbery was common.

Granny Shen’s autumn harvest went smoothly, but things were different for the Lu family. During harvest season, even the women in the village were expected to work in the fields. But Lin Xiu’er and Li Fangyue were both pregnant. They barely did housework, so naturally they couldn’t work in the fields.

Lu Chengyu was a scholar, and the family didn’t dare trouble him with farming work. The only able-bodied laborers left in the family were Lu Ming and Lu An.

Old Man Lu knew what kind of people his two sons were, so he went to the village to find helpers, offering twenty-five wen per person.

Twenty-five wen would normally be generous, but during harvest season when many families were short-handed, it wasn’t low but wasn’t high either.

Although he managed to hire workers, everyone privately compared how Granny Shen had offered thirty wen to find helpers, while Old Man Lu only offered twenty-five wen. He seemed stingy in comparison.

Since Lu An had lost his job, Wang-shi’s private savings were dwindling, making her increasingly fixated on every bit of silver.

As soon as the harvest started, Wang began scolding the hired workers. She constantly complained that they worked too slowly, threatened to dock their pay, and wouldn’t let them leave at sunset, insisting they work a little longer.

Wang had a sharp tongue. Even when Lu Lin’s parents were alive, she would often nag and scold them. If they dared talk back, she would curse even more crazily. Over time, they had learned to just endure it silently.

Lately, Lu Ming and Lu An had been fighting a lot. Wang doted on both her sons and didn’t want to add fuel to the fire. Now that they’d hired workers for the harvest, she vented all her pent-up frustration on them. She accused one of slacking off and scolded another for wasting grain by letting it fall to the ground.

Wang was used to cursing her sons and didn’t think there was anything wrong with it.

The villagers were being paid, so they had no choice but to endure her scolding, but privately, rumors about Wang being sharp-tongued and mean started to spread.

Some people even compared her to Granny Shen, and the comparison showed that Wang was far inferior.