Reborn with a Space: Building a Fortune Amidst Famine

Chapter 58: 58 fishing for aquatic plants

The children were very curious, but because the family warned them, they really didn’t dare to ask.

One cart couldn’t hold it all, so she spread it out on the shore, laying it out flat to drain the water, which also saved effort.

She went down for a second round, quickly filled it up again, and when all the children had left, she was alone by the reservoir eating her lunch on the water.

Lunch was simply a pancake and a glass of milk. After playing for a while with childlike innocence, she continued. This time, she delivered more than in the morning, and several more children came over.

Su Yuanyuan didn’t bother with them, just carried on with her work, while the kids watched from the shore.

Some of the children even discovered tiny shrimp in the waterweed.

By a little after three in the afternoon, Su Yuanyuan decided not to go back down.

The waterweed she had painstakingly gathered was safest left at her own home.

The children watched her load the cart from a distance, and none approached.

By now the waterweed had drained its moisture. So, it was piled high on the small cart, with sheep pulling it even though they couldn’t see the road ahead clearly. But with sheep, there was reassurance.

In a whole day, she pushed five cartloads of waterweed, enough to cover the open space in the courtyard for drying.

She planned not to go back the next day, needing to wait for the waterweed to dry, crumble it, store it, and then return.

The shoreline was sandy, so the waterweed was particularly clean.

The next day, Su Yuanyuan got up to pump water for the vegetables.

She was always busy. The little pigs at home were growing very fast. They weighed around ten pounds when bought and now weighed at least over twenty pounds. Now they loved to drink sheep’s milk. There wasn’t much stock in the space. She needed to add small fish to their diet, hoping it would help them grow quickly.

She was considering going to ask Hu Chunhua when the sheep could mate.

Even if in a few months the current pigs couldn’t have any, she could still use it for raising pigs next year.

At noon, with the sun high, she turned over the waterweed to dry it faster. She thought she needed to find an opportunity to buy a fork to speed up the work.

After finishing, she went to Hu Chunhua’s house and called for her at the door.

”Yuanyuan, what’s the matter?”

”Aunt, I don’t know when my sheep can mate? It’s the sheep that gave birth.”

”You go back, I’ll have your uncle take a look later.”

Su Yuanyuan returned home and let out the chickens, ducks, and geese. The sun was perfect now. She contemplated what would be good to use as a chicken feed tray, thinking she should have ordered two small stone troughs from the stonemason last time.

”Girl, I just checked. The day after tomorrow, I’ll go to the livestock market.” How could a little girl handle such matters.

”By the way, do you still need to mate your old sheep?”

”Uncle, there are more than four months until the big fall. I’m hoping it can help me work; if it mates, it can’t work, right? Let’s just mate the young sheep.”

”Okay, I got it. Is that waterweed drying in the courtyard?”

”Yes. Once dry, I’ll crumble it to feed the pigs and chickens.”

”How did you manage to gather it?” Yang Minggang asked with a frown.

”Uncle, come and see.”

The two went to the west room and saw two black tire tubes.

”Uncle, if you want to go water-gathering, take this truck’s inner tube. I got it from the blacksmith Yang in the county; it floats in the water.”

Yang Minggang picked it up and looked at it, ”It’s actually useful. I’ll come and get it when I cast the fishing nets.”

”Uncle, alright.”

After seeing Yang Minggang off, Su Yuanyuan lay down, wanting to take a nap. She thought about harvesting corn by October and then planting wheat. Anyway, when the wheat was in autumn, she could plant seeding corn. She had already asked, and there were seeds for seeding corn. Half asleep, she took a nap and woke up with a headache.

After taking a walk outside, she felt much better. Returning, she worked on making clothes; this kind of cotton fabric wasn’t very durable and would wear out quickly during work.

Fortunately, she had made several pairs of shoes in the winter, which could last until after autumn, and then she would have time to make more.

In a few days, it would be time to harvest the wheat. She didn’t have any wheat fields herself and was embarrassed to glean from someone else’s fields. Perhaps she should buy some wheat from the village chief’s family.

However, the village chief knew she had almost spent all her money. It was hard to explain.

She planned to help the village chief’s family with work in a few days. She wondered if she could take on some work on credit then?

She could handle wheat harvesting, so helping each of the two families for two days should be fine.

But Hu Chunhua’s family hadn’t split up, and returning favors wasn’t easy; she wasn’t sure if it would be acceptable. She noticed Hu Chunhua wanted to separate his household, but the elders seemed to disagree.

In one afternoon, she cut out two pairs of pants and a top. It was getting hot soon; wearing this would be just right, though a bit thicker, but the pure cotton absorbed sweat well.

On the day of the big market, she gave Yang Minggang two yuan and asked him to bring back a fork for her, as she didn’t want to go to the market. She had livestock at home to care for.

Su Yuanyuan knew that the next day the village chief would be harvesting wheat, so the next morning, she set the trap, tidied up the house, wore a straw hat, and took a sickle to the village chief’s field.

”Uncle, I’ve come to help you harvest wheat.”

”No need.”

Ignoring what he said, Su Yuanyuan crouched down next to the village chief’s wife and began cutting wheat.

She was quite fast, not as good as the village chief’s couple, but not that much slower than the young men. Sweat trickled down her neck; it was scorching and felt prickly. The village chief’s family was full of strong workers and worked very quickly.

The Yang Hongwen family was quite surprised. They always thought this little girl was capable but didn’t expect her to be this competent. Surprisingly, she was cutting three furrows and hadn’t fallen much behind.

After three rounds, Su Yuanyuan discreetly checked the time; it was already past ten.

At the end of the field, she straightened up, ”Aunt, I’m going home. The livestock at home needs feeding. I’ll come back after lunch.”

”Girl, come have lunch at my house,” Xu Chunjiao hurriedly suggested.

Su Yuanyuan shook her head, ”Aunt, don’t make it difficult for me. I don’t eat at other people’s homes. My uncle takes such good care of me, and I have nothing to repay him with. I’ve already prepared lunch this morning; I’m heading back.”

”Girl, it’s alright, we don’t believe in such things at my house.”

Still, Su Yuanyuan shook her head, ”Aunt, let’s not be formal. I really won’t eat, even if you bring food to the field, I won’t eat it.” With that, she took the sickle and left.

It was indeed tiring. Harvesting wheat was incredibly exhausting, but she managed to cut a third of an acre in the morning, so planting wheat on her two acres should be no problem.

After returning home, she brought the sheep back to drink water, boiled water to cook pig feed, and brought out the chicken feed too.

Half an hour later, she finally finished tending to the open-mouthed ones at home and went back into the space to bathe. Her neck and face were prickly.

Today’s meal was braised beef with rice, mixed cucumbers, and spicy shredded potatoes.

She somewhat overate. Turning the waterweed outside, it had already dried considerably; she planned to crumble it and store it away later that evening.