Chapter 7: Working for Me Means You Get Fed!
Taoya stopped in her tracks, turning her head with some hesitation. “I’ve eaten.”
“You’ve eaten?”
“Yes, I took back a lot of wild vegetables yesterday, so my younger brother, sister, and I ate our fill.”
Taoya wasn’t lying about that. To people in a year of famine, even those bitter roots and tree bark that hardly counted as wild vegetables were food. With four or five pounds of wild vegetables, each person got over a pound. It wasn’t exactly a feast, but at least their stomachs were no longer empty.
“I fed half of the steamed bun slice to Mother. Mother is sick and can’t keep anything down. She threw up every bite of the wild vegetables, so I broke the steamed bun slice into small pieces and let her hold them in her mouth, and she slowly managed to eat it.”
Jian Xingxia listened for a moment before realizing that the “steamed bun slice” the girl was referring to was the sandwich bread.
There were still leftovers of the flatbread and salted duck eggs Auntie Lu had brought yesterday.
Jian Xingxia lifted the white cotton cloth covering the basket, took out a piece of flatbread for Taoya, then cracked open a salted duck egg, peeling off half the shell before handing it to her.
Taoya’s mouth watered, but she was reluctant to eat it and didn’t dare to.
She gently placed the flatbread back onto the white cotton cloth.
“Sister, please let me work! The Mountain Goddess said that only by working can one have food to eat. I have to work.”
Taoya had never enjoyed any luxury in her life, so she didn’t dare dream of a good thing like eating white flour flatbread without doing any work. She stared at Jian Xingxia, only hoping that Jian Xingxia would have plenty of chores for her.
“Eat first. Only when you’re full will you have the strength to work.”
“From now on, if you come to work for me, I’ll provide one meal.”
Jian Xingxia didn’t haggle either. Both the old house and the desolate land needed helpers. Furthermore, that Manor Management System had also stated that hiring temporary workers was her right as well as her obligation.
Hearing that meals were provided, Taoya’s eyes instantly lit up.
Only then did she dare to put the bread into her mouth.
Jian Xingxia watched her eat half of the flatbread.
No matter what, Taoya refused to eat the remaining half of the flatbread and the salted duck egg.
“I’ll eat it in a while.”
Jian Xingxia knew she wanted to take it back. Given Taoya’s situation, she couldn’t just feed herself and ignore her family, but since she didn’t ask Jian Xingxia for extra flatbread, Jian Xingxia didn’t interfere.
“Go pull all the weeds in the courtyard, as well as the ones in the washroom… I mean the latrine, and the kitchen.”
Taoya answered and went quickly.
Jian Xingxia got up to put the clothes she had changed out of yesterday, along with the coarse blue cloth bedsheets from her grandmother’s bed and several pieces of cloth used to cover the furniture chests, into a large wooden basin to soak.
On the outer window sill of the firewood room sat a piece of dried, cracked soap. Jian Xingxia picked it up and rinsed it in the water; it didn’t affect its usability.
Having trudged along the yellow-mud path into the mountain yesterday and sweated heavily from the work, she had very few clothes in total and had to be diligent about washing them. Fortunately, the summer sun was free and fierce, so she wasn’t worried that the clothes wouldn’t dry after being washed.
After washing the clothes by the well, she hung them one by one on the wiped-clean clothesline.
Looking up, she saw that all the weeds in the courtyard had been pulled and were arranged in a neat row by the back courtyard fence.
Taoya said, “Sister, once they’re dry, they can be used to kindle a fire.”
Weeds couldn’t serve as firewood, but they could be tied into bundles and used for kindling.
Not only that, but Taoya had also used a stick to clear away the spiderwebs on the walls and beneath the eaves, then wiped the areas down with wild grass. The few farming tools scattered around the courtyard had also been picked up and placed neatly against the base of the wall.
The vines and weeds in the washroom had all been cleared out. When Jian Xingxia stepped inside, she discovered that her grandmother had renovated the washroom. The washroom was tiled, and the old-fashioned pit latrine had been converted into a flushing squat toilet. However, there was no flush tank; instead, a large water jar was placed there, used to flush the toilet with well water.
By the time Jian Xingxia walked in, Taoya had already scrubbed the washroom inside and out, revealing the bright and clean appearance of the porcelain tiles.
Seeing that Jian Xingxia remained completely unfazed by such “white jade tiles,” Taoya felt even more strongly that she was an immortal. Only immortals could afford to use such fine white jade tiles.
Taoya had never seen jade, but back when her mother wasn’t sick and worked as a washerwoman washing clothes for wealthy families, she had tagging along and touched the white marble screen wall in someone’s home. Only the wealthiest family in town could afford to use such a piece of white marble, and it could only be used as a screen wall. Yet here at Fairy Sister’s place, the floor and even the walls were covered with full stretches of “white jade” tiles.
Moreover, without exaggeration, she found the white jade tiles here at Fairy Sister’s place to be countless times smoother and cleaner than that white marble screen wall!
In a place like this, Taoya didn’t dare to speak recklessly and simply worked with all her might, hoping that Jian Xingxia would be satisfied with her labor so she could hire her again next time.
Jian Xingxia let out a sigh of relief, though she couldn’t help but feel a bit ashamed—she hadn’t even dared to enter the washroom yesterday, terrified that it might be an old-fashioned pit latrine like the one from her childhood. She would have preferred to relieve herself in the wild grass rather than touch it. Yet Taoya, who was ten years younger than her, didn’t complain a bit. She had used a loofah sponge to scrub the washroom inside and out until it was gleaming.
She then came to help Jian Xingxia draw water, filling up the water jar in the washroom.
After the two of them cleaned up, they went to the kitchen.
Probably because it wasn’t tiled, the kitchen had even more overgrown grass than the washroom. Jian Xingxia tapped around several times with a stick before she dared to venture inside.
Following Jian Xingxia’s instructions, Taoya wrapped her palm with the loofah sponge before she went to pull the weeds. She felt that Jian Xingxia was truly kind-hearted. Although a loofah sponge wasn’t an expensive item, people couldn’t even afford to eat in years of famine, so they would never be willing to keep a loofah sponge. Even when it wasn’t a famine, taking a loofah sponge to the town to sell would fetch one copper coin for two pieces. Using it to pull weeds meant it would probably be ruined after a couple of uses.
Faced with such a good master, Taoya couldn’t bear it; she quietly let go of the loofah sponge and pulled the weeds with her bare hands. Cuts on her hands would heal, but once the loofah sponge was ruined, it would be gone.
“If I catch you throwing away the loofah sponge again, you can stop doing this work.”
Jian Xingxia glanced at her.
Taoya shuddered, quickly picked up the loofah sponge by her feet, and didn’t dare let go of it again.
Only after clearing away the grass at the kitchen doorway did the two see that a corner of the kitchen roof was broken, through which the sky was visible.
The bad news was that the roof had been broken through by a peach tree.
The good news was that they had peaches to eat.
The wild peaches in July were just in season, each growing to the size of a fist. Left untended, some had been eaten by insects and birds, but the larger half remained, ripening safely on the tree. Most of the peaches were pink and plump, blushing with an enticing red.
Beneath the hole in the roof, a good number of over-ripened peaches had fallen. The scent of fermentation was sweet yet decadent, carrying a subtle hint of alcohol.
Jian Xingxia was overjoyed.
With some gathering and picking, they filled two large bamboo baskets in no time.
The bottom of one old bamboo basket was somewhat damaged; a basket of peaches weighed fifty or sixty pounds, and Jian Xingxia didn’t dare to lift it, fearing the bottom would fall out. She fetched some old rags to place beneath the bamboo basket, carefully moving the peaches into the main hall.
Taoya gathered another twenty or thirty pounds, piling them next to the bamboo baskets.
Jian Xingxia calculated in her mind that although peaches weren’t worth much in the countryside, they could always be sold for at least one yuan per pound, so these peaches would bring in at least a hundred yuan or so. If there were a vehicle to transport them to the town, they could easily sell for two or three yuan per pound. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a vehicle.
Taoya drew some well water, and Jian Xingxia washed six peaches—three for herself and three for Taoya.
The ripe peaches were sweet and smooth. Although they weren’t honey peaches, the flesh was just as succulent, melting in the mouth.
The two sat beneath the eaves of the back door, fully focused on munching on the peaches.
Taoya covertly wanted to put down the good peaches and pick out the half-rotted ones on the ground to eat instead, but hearing Jian Xingxia let out a “hmph,” she didn’t dare move again.
After finishing one peach, Jian Xingxia used her hand, which was sticky with peach juice, to pick up a second one. She didn’t forget to ask Taoya, “Try to see if you can take this pile of peaches away, and see what the sys… what the Mountain Goddess says.”
Taoya tried, then shook her head. “The Mountain Goddess won’t let me take them. She says this isn’t the fruit of my labor, but something picked up for free. However—”
Taoya hesitated a bit, feeling that she would be too greedy if she spoke up.
“However what?”
“The Mountain Goddess says that the rotten ones can be taken away.”
Presumably, it was because the good peaches could be sold for money and counted as rewards, so taking them in excess wasn’t allowed. Jian Xingxia didn’t know in what form the system communicated with Taoya, but since Taoya said it was fine, Jian Xingxia didn’t look into it too closely either.
“Then hurry up. I’ll find a sack, and you can pack all the rotten peaches that can fit.”
But after searching all over the old house, there were only a few woven bags that used to hold rice and fertilizer, none of which Taoya could take away. After trying for a long time, only the bamboo basket worked—and it had to be the broken bamboo basket. The kind that had been left in the courtyard for over a year with no one cleaning it up, nearly falling apart from sun and wind exposure. The kind that couldn’t be sold for any money.
It seemed the system didn’t intend to leave any loopholes for them.
But this was even better, as it made Jian Xingxia feel even less burdened when giving things away. “This basket is just about entirely ruined, even the rim has burst open. Try it and see how much you can carry.”
Rotten peaches were useless, and the broken bamboo basket was worthless too.
This time, Taoya didn’t stand on ceremony. She thick-skinnedly packed a vast amount of rotten peaches into the bamboo basket. To fit even more, Jian Xingxia even fetched a paring knife to slice away the rotted parts of the peaches and the pits, leaving only the peach flesh.
The ground was covered with too many rotten peaches to ever finish picking. Exercising all her strength, Taoya could barely lift about twenty pounds of peaches. Fearing that her thin, stick-like arms might snap, Jian Xingxia stopped.
“Alright, just take these.”
As Jian Xingxia spoke, she stood up. “Is the time almost up?”
Before Taoya could even rejoice over holding the bamboo basket, a look of shock crossed her face. “The time is up already? I haven’t done any work yet!”
She had only pulled a tiny bit of weeds and washed a toilet, that was all. The rest of the time had been entirely spent picking peaches, eating peaches, and packing peaches. What… what should she do!
Taoya’s face turned pale with panic, feeling that she was greedy and lazy, making her the worst helper imaginable!
But Jian Xingxia merely blinked and said with a smile, “How have you not worked? You cleared all the trash off the kitchen floor!”
She wasn’t lying. With these rotten peaches paired with the big hen—one gathering peaches, and the other peck-peck-pecking at the insects hiding beneath the rotten ones—if she had relied solely on herself, who knows how long it would have taken her to clean it up.
Anxiously clutching the basket of rotten peaches, Taoya truly couldn’t believe that she could have such good luck to encounter such a kind master.
On her end, Jian Xingxia was calculating: “The medicine is about six or seven yuan, and there’s still a remaining allowance of three yuan. Why don’t you take another piece and a half of flatbread back with you?”
The flatbread Auntie Lu baked wasn’t small, about the size of an adult’s palm; one piece could easily sell for one yuan and fifty cents. Jian Xingxia had Taoya test it out, and as it turned out, it was even more than that—the system only allowed her to take one and a half pieces. It seemed a piece of flatbread was worth two yuan.
Jian Xingxia decisively tore off half a piece of flatbread and stuffed it directly into Taoya’s mouth.
With her cheeks puffed out, Taoya nearly choked.
Cradling the bread and medicine while holding the peaches, Taoya vigorously chewed the flatbread in her mouth, swallowing it dry right before her figure turned transparent.
It was quite a choke, but the sense of fullness brought by the flour flatbread gave her immense confidence.
This time, facing the pitch-black cave, Taoya no longer felt devoid of strength or so cold and dizzy that she just wanted to faint. The long-awaited satiety filled her entire body with strength.
Traversing the cave of unknown length all the way through, Taoya returned to her home.
