Rebirth: Making a Fortune in Ancient Times

"Hey, look, Old Zhang's little idiot is here!" Before Xia Yu could even settle accounts with her, Wang Pingping saw Xia Yu and started spewing nonsense.

"Who ate shit today? Your mouth stinks!" Xia Yu was quick-witted now, and her retort was quite fluent.

"You idiot, who are you calling a jerk? Who has a foul mouth?" Wang Pingping was instantly flustered when she heard her being insulted.

"Whoever answers me is whoever it is?" He then glanced at her, his eyes looking at her as if she were a complete idiot.

"You...you...you dare to curse me, you idiot!" Wang Pingping was so angry that she couldn't even speak coherently.

"Tch..." Xia Yu was too lazy to reply to her. With this level of skill, she still liked to bully people. She couldn't even stand these simple words. If Xia Yu were to level up again, she would probably be sitting on the ground crying.

Xia Yu was still inwardly despising Wang Pingping's incompetence when, with just a dismissive "tch," Wang Pingping's eyes welled up with tears.

"You bullied me, I'm going to find my brother!" She didn't even want the bucket anymore, and ran away crying!

"Is this person crazy? She can curse at me, but I can't curse at her?" Xia Yu said, looking at the other two girls from the village.

"Xiaxia, you'd better go home quickly. His family is very protective of their own. They'll definitely yell at you when they get here," one of the girls said worriedly.

"Who's afraid of who? She has a brother, don't I?" Xia Yu didn't care at all.

The two girls were very nice. They were older than Xia Yu and rarely played together, but they still poured the water from their buckets into Xia Yu's bucket and urged her to leave quickly so that she wouldn't run into troublemakers.

Xia Yu accepted their kindness, but also thought about the chores at home and didn't want to cause any trouble, so she thanked them and prepared to go home.

But things just happened to be so coincidental. She hadn't walked ten meters carrying the two buckets of water when she heard a shout of abuse behind her: "Which unwanted idiot bullied my granddaughter? You think you can just walk away? Stop right there...stop!" Xia Yu put down the water and turned around. A woman in her fifties or sixties, wearing a gray-blue linen cross-collar top and black trousers, had her slicked-back hair held up with a wooden hairpin. She seemed like a neat and capable old woman, but her eyes were triangular with upturned corners, and she had a small mole near her mouth. Xia Yu knew this old woman was not to be trifled with.

"You annoying little fool, how dare you bully my Pingping! You slut, a worthless piece of trash that no one wanted from birth! Because of you, your parents were kicked out by your grandma! You're a born jinx, bringing bad luck from the moment you were born! With you in your family, your uncle still wants to be an official? Bah! I bet he'll never pass the exam in his entire life..." Blah blah blah, Xia Yu felt like her brain was about to explode from all the noise. She really wanted to grab a handful of mud and stuff it into that mouth that kept spewing filth.

"Who are you calling a slut, you secondhand old hag?" Suddenly, a louder voice rang out behind Xia Yu.

Before Xia Yu could turn around, she was pulled forcefully behind her, causing her to stumble and almost fall to the ground.

"You dare insult my granddaughter, you secondhand old slut! I bet you've been itching for a beating for years, haven't you? I'll teach you to insult my granddaughter, I'll teach you to curse my son, you secondhand slut!" She cursed as she scratched several bloody marks on the other woman's face. Xia Yu was helped to her feet and looked up to see her older sister, Chun Yu. Looking at the old woman fighting, Xia Yu recognized her immediately from the back of her head – it was Liu Shi, the grandmother who constantly called her granddaughters "money-losing goods."

At this time, the people who had gone to work in the fields hadn't returned yet. Although the two old ladies were making quite a commotion, not many people gathered around. Xia Yu could tell that her grandmother was clearly more capable of fighting than Wang Pingping's grandmother. But they couldn't just let them fight like that, so Xia Yu and Chun Yu exchanged a glance and then stepped forward to break up the fight.

"Grandma, stop hitting her! Stop hitting her!" she cried, but her hand was actually on Wang Pingping's grandmother. The old woman was being held by the arm by Chunyu and Xiayu, and Liu had slapped her across the face again. She was furious, shouting, "They're killing someone! The Zhang family is going to kill someone! The old and the young are bullying an old woman like me!"

The two people who were trying to take sides were indeed worried that she would get hurt, so they secretly began to exert force to separate the two of them. Several onlookers also came over to persuade Liu and pull the old lady of the Wang family. With their help, the two of them were finally separated.

Before leaving, Liu spat at Old Lady Wang again and said, "If I hear you cursing my granddaughter or my son again, just try it. You think I'm a pushover just because I haven't shown my power all these years?"

"Spring Rain, Summer Rain, let's go home!" Liu said with great authority, leading her two granddaughters away.

Old Wang, still fixing her hair, watched their retreating figures with rage. She was furious, but she couldn't win a fight or a verbal argument. She had many sons, and they had even more. She had no choice but to accept this. Besides, fighting was a woman's business; if she dragged her sons into it, things would escalate. Turning her head, she saw her granddaughter and was about to scold her for not helping. The other two granddaughters were so good at supporting their grandmother, while her own granddaughter was good for nothing except being pretty. But remembering her daughter-in-law's words, she swallowed the words she was about to utter, secretly harboring resentment towards Liu.

Xia Yu carried water and followed behind Liu Shi. Chun Yu wanted to help her, but Liu Shi refused. She knew that this older sister usually had a lot of housework at home and didn't want to burden her with more. The group walked in silence. When they were almost at the old house, Liu Shi suddenly turned to look at Xia Yu: "What are you doing following me, you brat? Your father will be back from the fields soon, so hurry home and cook! Liu Shi doesn't even know how to teach you to be a mother." Seeing that her mother was about to be burdened, Xia Yu immediately said obediently to her grandmother: "Grandma, I'll go back and cook now. I've already washed the vegetables, it'll be ready soon."

"Okay, go ahead." Hearing her speak so obediently, Liu's expression softened a little.

Xia Yu carried the water and hurried towards her home. Seeing that the sun was almost at noon, Xia Yu put the water buckets aside as soon as she got home, poured the brown rice that had been soaking for half an hour into a large pot, added enough water, added enough firewood to the stove, and started cooking over a high flame.

While cooking, Xia Yu poured the water she had brought back into a large basin. She rinsed the *Anoectochilus roxburghii* (a type of orchid) in the water and then transferred it to another clean basin. Xia Yu quickly washed the *Anoectochilus roxburghii*, checking the fire in the kitchen every now and then and adding some firewood. Just as she was busy like this, Chang Yun came running back from outside, covered in sweat. He scooped up a ladle of water from the water vat and gulped it down in one go. Xia Yu wanted to remind him that there was cool boiled water on the table in the main room, but he was too fast; before she could even speak, Chang Yun had already finished the ladle of water.

After drinking the water, Changyun saw Xia Yu rinsing the herbs and asked curiously, "Xia Xia, why are you washing them? Aren't they clean enough?"

"Brother, didn't Manager Li say last time that we could dry it, but we had to remove the soil and weeds before drying it? It's a medicinal product, so even though it's not dirty, it's still better to wash it."

"Hehe, I forgot. Xiaxia, I'll wash these. You go cook." Changyun scratched his head sheepishly. If he had known his sister would be so busy today, he would have stayed home to help instead of going out to play.

Xia Yu left the task of washing the herbs to her brother and went to the kitchen to focus on cooking. Thinking about how Liu had treated her well today, she decided to send a bowl of the fried shrimp to the old house as well.

I scooped a large spoonful of lard into the wok and heated it. Then I poured all the shrimp from the small bowl into it. With a sizzling sound, a fragrant aroma wafted out.

"Xiaxia, did you stir-fry shrimp again? I can smell the aroma!" Changyun called out from outside.

"Yeah, brother, I caught a whole nest of small river shrimp while I was doing laundry, and quite a lot of them!"

"Stir-fry it with chives too. The dish was delicious last night."

"Okay!"

Actually, it's best to use some scallions and ginger to remove the fishy smell when cooking river shrimp, but Xia Yu searched all over the house yesterday and couldn't find any. She was thinking of asking Liu Shi last night, but she forgot to ask when the topic of money came up. So, she still has no scallions or ginger to use today.

Stir-fry the shrimp in a pan until they turn red and dry. Remove half of the shrimp from the pan and place it in a large bowl; put the other half in a clean sink.

"Brother, don't wash that yet, take this bowl of shrimp to Grandpa and Grandma, okay?" Xia Yu called to her brother, standing at the kitchen doorway with the bowl in her hand.

"Okay, I'll go now." Changyun wiped his hands haphazardly on his clothes, took the bowl of shrimp, and strode out.

Hearing adults greeting each other outside, Xia Yu knew the people working in the fields were returning, so she hurried back to the kitchen. First, she lifted the lid of the large pot of cooking brown rice and found the water was almost gone. She stirred it with a large spoon to prevent it from burning, then scooped out a few grains to taste; it was cooked but still not soft enough. Xia Yu put the lid back on, weighed it down with a brick, and let it simmer for a while longer. There was still oil in the pan from frying the shrimp, so Xia Yu decided to use it to stir-fry the bok choy. She heated the oil, added the washed bok choy directly, stir-fried it, added a suitable amount of salt for seasoning, stir-fried it a few more times, and then served it in a large, coarse porcelain bowl.

Add more oil to the pan, heat it up, then add the chopped chives and stir-fry quickly. Sprinkle with salt, then add the fried river shrimp from the bowl and stir-fry briefly with the chives before transferring it to a plate. There were noticeably more shrimp today than yesterday; amidst the green chives, the shrimp seemed to outnumber the chives. "My parents didn't dare pick out any shrimp yesterday, but today they can eat without worry," Xia Yu thought, feeling happy that her family could enjoy a delicious meal.