The road to wealth of a peasant widow

Another hard day of felling trees.

Chen Cui took the two older children to the mountain to cut trees, leaving Changfu at home to look after his younger sister.

Although she had prepared herself mentally well before going up the mountain, Chen Cui still felt a little regretful when she was struggling to drag the branches through the forest.

It’s so tiring!

So, after returning home to rest at noon, she decided to go up the mountain by herself in the afternoon and not let the children go. In this way, the cut branches could be placed in a space and taken out when they were almost home, which could save a lot of effort.

So Chen Cui asked Changping and Changan to rest at home in the afternoon, and she went by herself.

Changping wanted to go with them, but was persuaded by Chen Cui to give up.

"I can't climb trees, so I'll only cut down the low ones. I'll cut down as many as I can. It won't take too long, so don't worry."

In fact, she chose to go alone because she felt sorry for the two young children and wanted to let them take a break.

The last time they cut down trees, Changping and Changan's faces were scratched several times by tree branches. The old wounds have just scabbed over, and today they got new wounds, so their entire faces are covered with scars.

When washing hands after eating, Chen Cui found that the skin on the hands of the two children was also abraded. She poured clean water over the wounds to wash out the dirt inside, and Chang'an grimaced in pain.

Changping silently picked out the sawdust from the wound and continued to wash his hands as if nothing had happened.

She looked at the two children, feeling sad, and decided to do it herself in the afternoon.

After finally convincing them all, Chen Cui set off with a bamboo tube, an axe and a machete.

When they arrived at the area where they had cut down trees before, she saw that the iron oak trees there were too tall and she could not reach their branches and twigs, so she walked to the side and looked for those that were slightly smaller to cut down.

In fact, she had tentatively expressed her desire to learn how to climb trees from her two sons. After learning, she would be able to climb up and cut trees, and work faster.

But she didn't expect the two boys to react so strongly.

"Mom, how can a woman climb a tree? She will be laughed at." Chang'an was horrified at the time.

"That's right. Although your father is gone, you still have three sons. There's no need for you to climb up and down." Changping also advised earnestly.

They can accept men cooking, making meals and doing housework, but they cannot accept women climbing trees!

She didn't know before that it was difficult for them to accept a woman climbing a tree, so she had to give up the idea for the time being.

She has not been here for long, so she cannot be too different from Chen and change too much all at once.

She has not yet shaped the children's mindsets and made them accept her new ideas. Even if she wants to do something extraordinary, she can only do it slowly, step by step.

Chen Cui sweated in the forest, cutting down piles of branches. After saving them for a while, she looked around and after making sure that there was no one around, she put them into the space.

The setting sun shone through the branches onto the forest. The birds around began to return to their nests. Chen Cui stopped chopping trees and walked home pulling the last pile of branches she had cut.

When she reached the back door, she took out half of the branches that she had stored in the space earlier, and then went to knock on the door.

When the three brothers saw the pile of branches at the back door, they were surprised that their mother’s afternoon work far exceeded their morning achievements.

"Mom, how come you are so awesome that you managed to cut so many!" Chang Fu exclaimed in amazement as he held Sui Sui in his arms while looking at the branches and leaves in front of him.

"Of course, mother is capable!" Chen Cui wiped the sweat from her forehead and said proudly with her head raised.

Several people worked together to pull the branches into the house and into the yard. Only then did Chen Cui discover that they had already divided the branches that they had pulled back in the morning into appropriate lengths and neatly stacked them aside for drying.

She had clearly told them to rest at home, but these few people couldn't sit still and did the work secretly!

Chen Cui stepped forward and took Changping's hand. Sure enough, the skin at the base of the middle finger had fallen off, revealing red tender flesh. She could even see lymph fluid oozing from the surface.

Chang'an's hand wasn't much better either. The wound was a little red, and a small piece of skin at the base of his ring finger was almost fallen off, with only a little bit left connected to the hand.

Chen Cui felt both distressed and angry. This was not the modern era. If you got hurt, there were Band-Aids and disinfectants, and even big wounds could be sutured.

This was in ancient times when medicine was not well developed. A cold could kill a person. Similarly, an infection from a small wound could also take a life!

She had a lot of things she wanted to say, and wanted to scold these two kids for not knowing the importance of a matter. However, looking at their sincere eyes and honest faces, she couldn't utter a single word of the words that were on the tip of her tongue.

In the end, Chen Cui said nothing, but just put her arms around the two children's shoulders, held them close to her, and remained silent for a long time.

At this time, Changfu reported a good news to her: "Mom, the two mud piles are cold, can we open them and take a look?"

Before it got dark, Chen Cui unpacked the two piles of firewood again.

After knocking open the outer mud shell and seeing the long strips of black charcoal inside, Chen Cui was even a little afraid to touch it, for fear that it would break like last time.

Changping picked up one of them, shook it in his hand, and found that it was still intact. He said in surprise: "Mom, it's not broken, it works, it works!"

They can actually make the same charcoal sold in stores!

Chen Cui was calm now. She picked up another piece of charcoal and broke it in the middle with force. A crisp sound was heard.

Well, it should be okay, but whether it is truly successful or not still needs further verification.

After all, charcoal is meant to be burned, not just to look good.

She built a small fire nearby, and when it was dying she put in some broken pieces of charcoal.

Soon, the charcoal was ignited, but there was only heat but no smoke, only the red light flashing on the charcoal.

Chen Cui didn't know what burning charcoal in ancient times looked like. She had only seen the charcoal used for modern barbecues, which looked similar to this when used to grill things.

This should be considered a success, right?

Chen Cui smiled and said to the children who were watching: "We should have really succeeded this time. We can make charcoal according to this method in the future."

Changping, Changan, and Changfu were all farmers. At most, they had only seen people warming themselves by a fire in a ceramic pot in the winter. However, those were open flames made by burning tree branches, and they had never seen charcoal burning. So they couldn't help but feel curious.

They put their hands on the charcoal, feeling the heat from its burning, and could not help but marvel at it. It turned out that this was the charcoal fire that the rich people used to roast!

The pieces of charcoal burned for more than half an hour before they went out, which once again proved their durability.

According to the standards given by the grocery store owner, the charcoal they produce can be classified as top quality.

In other words, a pound of such charcoal can be sold for four cents!

Chen Cui looked at the two inconspicuous charcoal piles in front of her, and in her eyes they turned into strings of copper coins!