Chapter 93: Got a Raise, Hehe
Heavens!
She was a manager now!
Lin Sanniang felt extremely excited, yet she also found it hard to believe. I’m a manager too?
Heaven knew that in the Great Liang Dynasty, the highest-ranking people she ever interacted with were merely the managers of wealthy households. Whether she was looking for work, exchanging rice and grain, or selling clothes, she always had to beg in front of those manager ladies. She had to speak sweet words and act humbly, terrified of being rejected.
To someone who did odd jobs, a manager lady was the biggest official in the world.
But now, she had become a manager lady too?
While Lin Sanniang was completely dazed, Jian Xingxia loudly confirmed her question. “Yes! Starting today, you are the manager lady of this estate.”
Jian Xingxia smiled and said, “Now that you know how to use the appliances, you can come inside the house from now on. You’ll be in charge of everything indoors.”
Jian Xingxia then told Lin Sanniang about her plan to open a guesthouse.
Lin Sanniang was still a bit split from reality. “Miss, you want to open an inn? Right here?”
“Yes, there are six rooms on the second floor. From now on, the two of us will handle the cleaning for those six rooms. Of course, it’s just the two of us for now. If I can recruit new people in the future, you’ll lead them and work together.”
“There’s also the reception…” Jian Xingxia looked at Lin Sanniang. “I’m hoping you can take on a portion of that.”
This might be a bit difficult for an ancient person. But Jian Xingxia felt Lin Sanniang could do it.
Lin Sanniang’s heart surged like a crashing wave. The young mistress was making her a manager, letting her enter the house, letting her lead new people… Lin Sanniang didn’t mean to cry, but tears welled up and spilled over on their own.
“Thank you, Miss! I will definitely work hard!”
Jian Xingxia smiled and patted Lin Sanniang. “You’ve been promoted, but I can’t raise your wages right now. How about this? Think about what kind of benefits you want while you’re at the estate. Food, clothing, housing, transport—anything goes, as long as it can be provided here on the estate.”
Lin Sanniang shook her head. “Miss, I don’t want anything.”
The young mistress making her a manager lady was already the best benefit she could ever ask for.
“That won’t do. A manager is a manager. More work and greater responsibilities mean your benefits must increase accordingly. Mmh, let me think. Do you want new clothes? We have a type of undergarment here that’s more comfortable than the ones in the Great Liang Dynasty, and it makes working easier too…”
Before Lin Sanniang could answer, Jian Xingxia suddenly choked back her words. Because the system had actually spoken.
[System has detected that the temporary worker Lin Sanniang (Great Yu Dynasty) has improved her working capabilities. Her rank has been upgraded from Level 2 Skilled Worker to Level 3 Technical Worker. Her compensation is now 10–15 yuan per hour.]
This time, it was Jian Xingxia’s turn to get excited.
“Wait! I can give you a raise! Fifteen yuan an hour!”
Jian Xingxia never expected that promoting a temporary worker could actually increase their rank! Looking at the system notification, it seemed Lin Sanniang’s working capability had improved during her time here. Why? Could it be because Lin Sanniang had learned to use these appliances?
While Jian Xingxia was still pondering the reason, Lin Sanniang was already completely dizzy with joy. She had been here so many times that she already understood the meaning of “hours” and “one yuan.”
She was deeply shocked by the upgraded compensation. “Fifteen yuan an hour? Then one double-hour is thirty yuan… I come for three double-hours every day, which means ninety yuan!”
Heavens! Ninety yuan! Even if she exchanged all of it for grain, she could get dozens of catties! If she exchanged it for fabric, over twenty catties of fabric made entirely into clothes…
Lin Sanniang felt her head buzzing. It felt like she wasn’t just becoming a manager; with this kind of income, she could become a wealthy squire back in the Great Liang Dynasty!
Having become a manager lady, Lin Sanniang worked even more meticulously and diligently than before. Her initiative soared. Because she was grateful for the young mistress’s trust, she abandoned her previous principle of “do less to make fewer mistakes” and proactively took charge of many tasks instead.
With Lin Sanniang handling the household, Jian Xingxia felt at ease leaving things to her while she went to watch the construction crews work.
The mung bean soup and peaches she had delivered the day before had sat untouched through the night. At night, the construction crew slept inside their large flatbed trucks—trucks equipped with ultra-large cargo boxes, so Jian Xingxia couldn’t see what the situation inside was like.
However, the construction progress was visible to the naked eye.
By the end of the first night, the main road had already been leveled once. The pits that needed patching and the sections requiring stones and gravel had all been filled. They had also installed the gate barrier and the fenced gate that unlocked via facial recognition and passcode.
Over at the greenhouse, the ground had similarly been prepared, and half of the steel reinforcements were already erected.
On the second day, one-third of the road was paved, and the roadsides were widened. They said they were only building a single road, but it was six meters wide, flanked by three meters of land and lawn on either side.
The greenhouse had already been covered with a translucent thin membrane. Jian Xingxia had gone to test it; it looked and felt a bit like plastic, but when she tested it on a corner by scraping a sharp rock against it, the plastic membrane didn’t budge at all. She yanked it, but it still didn’t budge. She bit it with her teeth, with the same result. The only reason she didn’t continue testing was that she was driven away by the construction crew.
On this day, the villagers still came to watch from time to time. When they saw the construction crew blocking off the road, a quarrel broke out in the village. The general argument was about what right the construction crew had to close the road.
The commotion grew so loud that Hu Da rushed back to the village in a frantic hurry to handle it, leaving even the grain procurement negotiations for this season unresolved.
A dispute over road rights in the countryside was no minor matter. Dozens of people wielding hoes, shovels, and scythes was a major incident anywhere. Hu Da rushed back and gave the few people leading the trouble a severe tongue-lashing.
“Don’t you all have any shame about why this road wasn’t finished back then? Whose land is this? Don’t you know?”
The villagers looked sheepish. This land belonged to Jian Xingxia’s grandmother. Now it belonged to Jian Xingxia.
The construction crew was merely building a road on land that belonged to Jian Xingxia; this wasn’t a village road. It was true that the road built by the construction crew was of a high standard, but in reality, it was a private path for her own household to use. The blocked-off area belonged entirely to her own family, and she had even yielded over a dozen meters of space.
But some villagers were still a bit resentful. “We’ve walked through here for generations. What does Jian Xingxia mean by blocking it off now? What right does she have to block it?”
Hu Da snapped furiously, “This is her land. She can block it however she wants. Why don’t you talk about your own courtyard? Why don’t you talk about your own pigsty?”
Someone else wasn’t as aggressive, but still disagreed. “Then does that mean we won’t be able to go into the mountains to gather mountain goods in the future?”
“That’s a mountain peak she leased. The mountain goods you gather belong to her.”
“Her grandmother used to let us gather them.”
Wei Liang said, “So you know her grandmother ‘let’ you gather them! What, when she kindly let you gather them in the past, you didn’t say thank you, and now that she just isn’t letting you, you want to hit people?”
Hitting people would make it a serious offense. Someone quietly pulled back their hoe and scythe. “We weren’t hitting anyone, we just brought these out to put on a show…” In a civilized society, who still hit people? If you lose the fight, you end up in the hospital; if you win, you end up in prison. How boring.
Hu Da and Wei Liang led the village officials, along with the villagers who remembered the kindness of Jian Xingxia’s grandmother and sided with her, to debate and refute the complaints. It took over half an hour before the matter was finally suppressed.
Throughout the entire ordeal, the construction crew kept working on their own, completely ignoring the quarrel. However, when someone tried to vandalize the newly paved road, two crew members walked over, hoisted the person up directly, and tossed him over the newly built railing.
The throwing force was calibrated perfectly—dazing him without causing injury. He landed on his feet without falling over. The vandalizer was still dazed, wondering how on earth he had been thrown over a two-meter-high iron railing.
