Traveling through ancient times, I led my family to prosperity

After talking about her cousin's studies, Xiaolan and her family returned to the inner courtyard. She took out the silver left by Zhao Dongjia and said to Shengxuan, "Dad, buy as much lard as you can tomorrow. I'm going to start making soap next."

Mr. Zhao and Shopkeeper Xu discussed the soap with Xiao Lan, and Sheng Xuan was there the whole time. Although he didn't see how his daughter made the soap, he heard Zhang muttering that Xiao Lan's work this time was very expensive.

"My girl, there is only one butcher shop in town, and they only sell one or two pigs a day. I can only buy a limited amount of suet tomorrow."

Xiao Lan thought about it, then turned to Xiao Wen and said, "Xiao Wen, go call your eldest uncle, second uncle, and grandpa. We need to discuss this matter."

After a while, Zhang and his son came over.

"Grandpa, eldest uncle and second uncle asked you to come over to discuss making soap." Xiao Lan saw the three of them coming and quickly stood up to give them her seat.

"Dad, uncle, Xiaolan needs a lot of pig fat to make soap, but the town only kills one or two pigs every day, and the amount I can buy every day is limited."

There are quite a few wealthy families in the town. They all have their own farms, and they get their oil and meat from the farms instead of buying them from butcher stalls.

Zhang Shanfeng pondered for a while and said, "Brother Xuan, let the boss accompany you to the county town tomorrow."

"Grandpa, my second uncle and I will go pick up clam shells tomorrow. The demand for these is also high."

"You don't have to go. Let your second uncle take Xiaohu, Xiaocheng, Xiaoqiang and the others. You stay at home and take care of your own things."

Zhang Qingfeng and Zhang Qingnian quickly agreed.

"Grandpa, uncle, second uncle, I won't hide it from you. Today, Manager Zhao came over with a piece of news, saying that the Hu people might move south, and asked us if we want to move to the provincial capital." Xiao Lan said.

Zhao Dongjia treats Xiaolan as his own, otherwise he would not reveal such confidential information to outsiders. Zhang Shanfeng was silent for a while and said, "Shen Liuye of the Shen family in Fucheng is in charge of the military power. If the Hu people go south, we will be the first to bear the brunt. Fucheng is indeed the safest, after all, there are the most troops there." Zhang Shanfeng said this and sighed, "But Fucheng is big, it's not easy to live there."

This is also what Xiao Lan is worried about. The family only has 800 taels of silver from the last sale of the deer. 800 taels of silver seems to be a lot in Shengjia Village, but if they live in the capital, with so many people in their family, they don’t know if this money is enough to buy a three-story house. Even renting a house is not suitable. The time when the Hu people will go south is uncertain. If they live in the capital now, the cost of living will be too high. Living in the capital, you have to spend money on food, clothing, housing and transportation. The prices in the capital are definitely higher than here. Living in the village, growing vegetables in the fields and cutting some firewood in the mountains are enough for the family. But in the capital, all these things have to be bought with money.

"Grandpa, let's earn some money first. In case things are really as Mr. Zhao said, we will have some confidence to live in the provincial capital. It will be a heavy burden to go now." Xiao Lan said.

Moving is not an easy task. There are too many things in the house. If you move, there will be some damage. If there is damage, you have to spend money to buy more. It is too expensive. Xiaolan told the family the news that Zhao Dongjia told her, and also to remind them to be more careful when they go out, so that they can be prepared in advance if there is any disturbance.

"Dad, I will go to the county town with you tomorrow to see what we want to buy, and by the way, buy some pens, ink, paper and inkstone for Xiaowen, Xiaohu and the others." Xiaolan said.

"How can I let you spend money on this? I will go to the county town and buy it for them." Zhang Qingfeng said.

"That's right. How can we ask you to spend money on everything? We are already very grateful that Xiaohu and the others can go to school. We don't ask them to pass the imperial examinations, but just hope they can learn more words and not be blind." Zhang Qingnian said hurriedly.

The family cooks with firewood, and needs to clean the pot every few days, so the family has a lot of plant ash. The accumulated plant ash was originally intended to be spread on the land to fertilize the land when it is time to plant crops, and now Xiaolan can use it to make soap. Xiaolan's family initially planned to leave the land uncultivated this year, because they were afraid that even if they planted crops, they would be harvested by others and they would not be able to get back the money they paid for the seeds.

In the evening, Xiaolan taught Xiaoting and Zhang how to make alkali water using wood ash. She will go to the county town with Shengxuan and Zhang Qingfeng tomorrow, so the task of making alkali water at home will be left to Zhang and Xiaoting.

As soon as she arrived at the county town, Xiao Lan noticed that there were far fewer refugees in the county town than before. "Dad, there are far fewer refugees now."

When Xiao Lan saw the official document posted by the government office, she understood what was going on. It turned out that the refugees had already gone to serve in the army.

The corvée labor of this era was almost always bloody and tearful. It was definitely not as simple as doing some physical work. In this era, as long as you were old enough to serve, even if you were only 17 or 18, you would be tortured like you were 70 or 80. Rich families could hire people to do corvée labor, but if the family was poor, serving corvée labor was like visiting the gates of hell.

Corvée and labor service are separate.

In this era, the most common corvée was to be a night watchman. Night watchmen only needed to do labor near their homes, such as clearing wasteland, repairing bridges, roads, water conservancy projects, and transporting food and grass. This kind of corvée happened every year, and each cycle lasted for a month or so. Night watchmen not only did not receive any wages, but also had to bear all the expenses on the construction site by themselves, and even had to bring their own tools. During the months of service, they had to live on the construction site. The living conditions on the construction site were very poor. The servicemen were crowded in the public shed like animals, and the stench was so bad that it was unbearable for anyone. It was so dirty that flies were disgusted when they entered, and mice had to walk on two legs when they entered, and cover their noses with the other two legs. If there was anyone with a fever or malaria, they would soon be infected. During the service, they could not rest even if they were sick. The construction period was fixed, and the monitoring was very strict. Even if they were sick, they had to get up and work, otherwise the whip would fall. This era was not like the modern era, where people could talk about feelings. The whips of the supervisors could beat the servicemen to pieces. There were no safety measures during the service, and no machines. Every few days, someone would get into an accident, either dead or disabled. If you were unlucky and got into an accident, there was no pension. Some families had gone to the government to ask for compensation before, but once they entered the government, they never came out again. To put it bluntly, being a night watchman for the court was like working like a cow or a horse, and you had to bring your own fodder.