Rebirth: Making a Fortune in Ancient Times

Xia Yu continued working in the space that evening, and by the next morning, there were over twenty bags of chili peppers in the yard, completely filling it and leaving only a narrow path for the oxcart to pass. Zhang Youtie, seeing this, knew his daughter had done it, and without asking any questions, he hitched up the oxcart, loaded the chili peppers, and headed towards the pond. When Zhang Youtie arrived, everyone who had bought the peppers the day before was already up. Aunt Ma, along with the woman who was supposedly a good cook and another woman, were preparing breakfast for everyone. Uncle Ma was in a room teaching everyone how to roast the chili peppers and what precautions to take when doing so.

Just then, they saw Zhang Youtie driving an oxcart over, loaded with many sacks. Uncle Ma and his men quickly came forward to help unload the sacks.

Each of these sacks weighed about 100 pounds. Men could carry them, but it took two women to lift them. Da Niu, who had just returned from fetching water, saw a group of people crowding together to unload their things. She quickly put down the two buckets she was carrying and ran to the truck to help.

Uncle Ma and Zhang Youtie were standing on high ground, putting a sack on a man's shoulder, when Da Niu squeezed to the side of the car, raised her hands, and said...

"Sir, Uncle Ma, give me a packet."

Zhang Youtie looked down and saw it was Da Niu, so he said, "Kids, don't crowd here, be careful not to get hit."

When Da Niu saw Zhang Youtie say that, she quickly explained

"Sir, I can move it. I'm very strong. If you don't believe me, let me try."

At this moment, Uncle Ma also spoke up to Zhang Youtie, saying, "Master, this girl is quite strong. Why don't we let her give it a try?"

"No matter how strong she is, she's still just a little girl. How strong can she be?!" Uncle Ma, who was closest to Zhang Youtie, only heard the first half of his words. Only Zhang Youtie himself probably knew what the last few words were.

Suddenly, the girl snatched the sack from the man's shoulder with one hand. Not only was Zhang Youtie stunned, but the man whose sack she had taken was also dumbfounded. This was incredibly humiliating. The others present were even more shocked, their mouths agape at the sheer strength of this girl.

Uncle Ma whispered in Zhang Youtie's ear, "This girl gets up and starts working at dawn. She's the one who fetched that water vat. She can carry one bucket full of water in each hand."

Hearing Uncle Ma's words, Zhang Youtie silently closed his mouth; any further surprise would have made him drool. Thinking of what his wife had said to their daughter yesterday, he wondered if Uncle Ma should teach her some martial arts if the child had good character.

"Come on, let's not waste time, let's unload this truck quickly," Uncle Ma called to the somewhat stunned crowd.

The truck only had seven or eight sacks loaded, and it was unloaded quickly. Zhang Youtie remembered that there were still a dozen or so bags of chili peppers in the yard, so he called Uncle Ma and Da Niu to go back with him to load the truck, while the others went about their business.

With Da Niu's superhuman strength, the dozen or so large sacks in the yard were quickly loaded onto a cart and transported to the pond. Xia Yu calculated that the chili peppers transported away weighed about 2,500 jin (approximately 1,250 kg). Based on the weight of the dehydrated peppers, roughly 3.5 jin of fresh peppers could yield 1 jin (approximately 0.5 kg) of dried peppers. Therefore, 2,500 jin of peppers would yield at most a little over 700 jin (approximately 350 kg) of dried peppers. Still not enough; this was far from what Lord Shen wanted. The quantity needed to be increased further.

When Zhang Youtie returned with the oxcart, Xia Yu told him the numbers she had just calculated.

“Dad, we still have hot pot base to make. A few hundred catties of dried chili peppers a day won’t be enough. Besides the room where Uncle Ma and Zhang the Cripple live, we have eight kang beds. We have to keep drying chili peppers day and night for the next few days. We definitely can’t make 100,000 catties, but we have to make as much as possible. After all, these things are for the soldiers on the front line to keep warm.”

"Okay, I'll go arrange things for Uncle Ma and Aunt Ma in a bit. They've been roasting chili peppers day and night these past few days, so they'll just sleep on the floor for now. The room has a heated kang bed, so it won't be cold." He then looked at Liu and asked...

"Mother, how should we arrange the meals? Today, Aunt Ma and the others had cornbread, cornmeal porridge, and pickled garlic. You need to come up with a plan for lunch and dinner."

Because buying so many people at once was completely unexpected, their family wasn't really prepared for many things. Hearing Zhang Youtie say this, Liu quickly started making plans in her mind.

After a while, when Xia Yu and the others had almost finished their breakfast, Liu Shi slowly said, "These next few days, the work is heavy and we need to work day and night. Breakfast will be the same as today's. Lunch will be meat soup noodles, and dinner will be two dishes, one meat and one vegetable, steamed buns made from two kinds of flour, and cornmeal porridge. We'll also have a late-night snack at 9 PM. Go to town and come back quickly. We need to meet these people and get to know them, otherwise we won't even remember their names."

“Okay, let’s try to get back before noon. I just spoke with Aunt Ma and Gensheng’s wife. Their main task is still to stir-fry the hot pot base. The task of roasting the chili peppers will be left to the new women. Da Niu is a bit older, so she can take care of one of the kangs by herself. Also, I’ve arranged for Uncle Ma to take those men and build another thatched hut to use as a large kitchen. For now, we’ll have to make do with this. But each of their rooms has a stove for heating the kang, so providing hot water for their own rooms won’t be a problem. However, we still need to prepare some other things. I see they’re all dressed very lightly. Should we buy some more linen to make clothes for them?”

"Yes, we need to buy some. A bolt of linen costs about forty feet. Go to the cloth shop and have them send ten bolts first." He then looked at his daughter and asked, "Do you have any cotton?"

"Yes, I have some. I'll put it in the storage room in a bit," Xia Yu replied.

"Okay, put in a lot, let's make one set for each person first."

During their meal, the group discussed their tasks for the day, and after finishing their meal, they went about their respective work. Although many people had made purchases, only Uncle Ma and Aunt Ma were truly capable of handling them, as they had many things to do recently and needed to do many things themselves.

Zhang Youtie drove the oxcart with Xia Yu to town. They first went to the cloth shop and ordered ten bolts of linen, four brown and the rest in earthy yellow. After paying the deposit and giving the shopkeeper their address, the father and son went to the general store.

One hundred large bowls, one hundred plates, twenty earthenware pots, sixteen wooden basins, two large iron cooking pots, two woks, an iron shovel, a water vat… Zhang Youtie bought everything he could possibly need. Actually, some items could have been cheaper at the kiln, but he didn't have the time to go to the kiln. Although it cost more, he bought everything he needed at the general store in one go. Just like with the cloth shop, he paid a three-tael deposit, left his address, and the general store delivered it to his home; any damage during the journey was the store's responsibility.

The general store owner was overjoyed, his eyes practically popping out of his head. He hadn't encountered such a big customer in years. To secure future business with the Zhang family, the owner offered numerous discounts. Yes, you read that right, the "Zhang family"—in the general store owner's words, Zhang Youtie's three-acre courtyard had been elevated to "Zhang Mansion." Looking at the shop owner's beaming face, Xia Yu couldn't help but sigh, marveling at the enduring power of money.