All the members are good people, only the host is a pervert

Seeing that Lin Ruan was not satisfied with any of the houses she had looked at, the middleman thought for a moment and led her to the gate of a two-story house.

The middleman smiled and said, "Miss, why don't you come with me to see this two-story house? It's only a mile from Weizhou Prefecture School, so it's very close. Furthermore, this grandmother gave birth to four daughters, and each of them started their own families here. They had no choice but to buy the first-story house across the street. So, although this house only has two stories, it's larger than a typical three-story house."

After saying that, he opened the gate and led Lin Ruan in. The first thing they saw after entering the gate was a screen wall. In front of the screen wall was an alleyway, each with a moon-shaped gate on the inner wall. Walking east along the alleyway, there was a back house; walking west, there were five back houses side by side. To the west of the back house was a carriage shed and a stable.

Across from the back house is the front yard, separated by inner walls on the east and west sides, each with a moon-shaped gate for entry and exit. The east courtyard has three side rooms side by side, but no side rooms. The open space has been transformed into a small garden, with a ginkgo tree planted beneath it, and a stone table and benches. The west courtyard also has three side rooms, with a side room on each side.

Coming out of the west courtyard, you enter the inner courtyard through the hanging flower gate of the main courtyard. The three main rooms face north and south, with two side rooms on each side; there are three side rooms on the east and west sides, with an side room on each side.

It is really big. An ordinary three-courtyard house is just an extra back room behind the main house, instead of building the front yard like a single-courtyard house.

Lin Ruan was very satisfied with the house and asked, "How much does this house cost?"

The middleman smiled and said, "Logically, two thousand taels wouldn't be too much for a house of this size, fully furnished, in this location. But the owner isn't just selling the house; he's moving from the city, so he's selling it along with the 100-acre farm and its tenants. The asking price is seven thousand taels of silver."

Lin Ruan frowned and sneered, "Are you too greedy, or is the landlord not sincere in selling? Nowadays, an acre of good farmland is only ten taels of silver, medium farmland is five taels, and low farmland is one tael of silver. Could it be that all five hundred acres of land is high farmland? Add in ten tenants, and the maximum value will not exceed three thousand taels. I am sincere in buying it. You go and tell the landlord that if she sells it for five thousand taels, I will buy it."

The middleman smiled and said, "Miss, you are right. Just let me negotiate the price. But when I get the news, where can I find you?" Don't blame her for being flattering. This is really a big deal. If it is done, she can get dozens of taels of silver. How can she not be afraid that Lin Ruan will run away?

Lin Ruan smiled and said, "You should keep your mind at ease. If you have any news, you can come to Songyang Academy to find me. My name is Lin Ruan. But I can't stay long, so how about five days?"

Hearing that the person in front of him was this year's top candidate, Lin Ruan, the middleman's attitude became even more attentive. He nodded repeatedly and said, "Don't worry, Miss Lin. I will try my best to give you good news tomorrow."

Why was she so sure? It turned out the owner had already revealed the price: no less than 4,700 taels. The reason he'd asked for 7,000 taels was simply to exorbitant the price and then pay it back.

After separating from the others, Lin Ruan found a deserted place and took out a backpack from the space. Inside the backpack were three bags of ginseng, two bags under a hundred years old, and one bag over a hundred years old, with two ginsengs in each bag.

The system wasn't good at other things, but it was really good at screening. Lin Ruan made two requirements: first, someone had to be able to afford her ginseng; and second, someone who wasn't a big shop that bullied customers, forced sales, or robbed them. Following the system's recommendation, Lin Ruan walked into a pharmacy called Tong Ren Tang.

There was an old woman behind the counter sorting medicinal herbs. Lin Ruan was not afraid. She put down her backpack, placed three bags of ginseng on the counter, and whispered to the old woman: "Old man, do you buy ginseng here?"

The old woman stopped what she was doing and said calmly, "I'll take it, but the price depends on the age and completeness of the ginseng."

Lin Ruan didn't waste any time, opening all three packages of ginseng. The old woman behind the counter's eyes widened, especially the two that were over a hundred years old. She examined them meticulously, every inch of the ginseng. After a while, the old woman nodded in satisfaction and said gently, "You dug the ginseng well. The roots were intact, and the preparation was also very good. Do you also understand medicine?"

Lin Ruan laughed and said, "I don't know anything about medicine. I just skimmed through a few books on medicinal herbs."

The old woman didn't bother to find out if Lin Ruan was right. She pointed at the ginseng and said, "This ginseng is over 150 years old. I'll pay 20,000 taels of silver for the whole one. This one is 100 years old, I'll pay 10,000 taels of silver. The remaining four are less than 100 years old. The two that are over 50 years old will be sold at 50 taels of silver per turn, and the remaining two will be sold at 35 taels of silver per turn. If you agree, I'll weigh these four ginseng for you right now."

Lin Ruan calculated and found that it was more than she expected, so she naturally nodded in agreement.

The six ginseng roots were sold for a total of 34,975 taels of silver. Apart from the 75 taels in cash, the rest were all silver notes.

Lin Ruan took the money and returned to Songyang Academy feeling refreshed.

On the third day, the middleman found Lin Ruan and told her that the seller had agreed to her price. After Lin Ruan and the middleman went to the government office to sign the deed, he handed her a note for 4,300 taels of silver and gave her an extra 10 taels of silver for her hard work.

Now this house is her home, Lin Ruan thought, and changed the lock of the front door first.

She walked into the front yard. The back house remained untouched. Lin Ruan had used a renovation robot to neatly cut out the south-facing wing room in the east courtyard, along with the stone slabs in front, and placed them directly into the space. The hole was filled with soil. After having the system disguise the renovation robot as a worker, the roof was repaired. Then, using the cut stone slabs, a winding stone path was laid across the loosened soil, leading to the stone table. This path divided the open space into two parts: east and west. Lin Ruan had planted a half circle of early garden bamboo on the east side, along the wing room and the east outer wall, all the way to the ginkgo tree. In front of the bamboo forest, lilacs were planted, right next to the stone path. To the west of the stone path, hostas were first planted along the stone slabs, and then the space between the hostas and the inner wall was filled with bamboo.

Lin Ruan chose one of the two rooms as an outer hall for receiving guests. The tables, chairs, and benches were already there, so there was no need to buy any more. The northern room became the study. Lin Ruan tucked away the bed and cabinets and replaced it with a bookshelf, a table, chairs, and a few wooden tables for ornaments.

This wing room originally had only one door leading to the outer hall. Lin Ruan opened another door on the west wall and installed the door of the wing room that had just been removed. The main point was to make use of waste and live a good life.

After the East Courtyard was arranged, Lin Ruan came to the West Courtyard and asked the decoration robot to change the layout according to his own ideas.

After finally tidying up the front yard, Lin Ruan entered the inner courtyard through the hanging flower gate. She avoided the two side corridors and instead went straight to the three main rooms. She was quite satisfied with the main hall and the east room, but the west room was probably where the concubines lived. Lin Ruan removed all the furniture and set it up as a male study. To the north was a table and chairs, and behind it was a bookshelf, which only contained the Four Books for Men. Seeing it a little empty, Lin Ruan picked through the space and placed a pile of embroidery pattern books she had bought from some unknown world. To the south was an embroidery frame, and behind it was a storage rack. The top was only two layers, and several small bamboo baskets were placed on them. The baskets were filled with thread, needles, embroidery frames, scissors, and other items.

The beds and cabinets in the two east side rooms were also taken away. Lin Ruan used the easternmost room as an ancestral hall, and placed shelves, incense burners and tables in it according to the ancestral halls of Qingshan Village; the remaining room was temporarily used as a warehouse, and although there was nothing inside, Lin Ruan still locked it.

The two side rooms to the west originally served as a kitchen and a woodshed, with a back door cut into the outer wall for shopping. She entered the kitchen, realizing that the pots and pans had all been used by the previous household, so she put them away and replaced them with new ones. She also filled the kitchen with rice, flour, grain, oil, radishes, and cabbage, and stocked the adjacent woodshed with firewood.

She did not make any changes to the west wing, and only converted the south-facing room in the east wing into her own study, which was decorated exactly the same as the outer study in the front yard.

After everything was in order and the housework robot cleaned the room thoroughly, Lin Ruan locked the door and returned to the school.