amaotonovel Chapter 220: Harvesting Wheat
Chapter 220: Harvesting Wheat
A few days ago, Han Zhibai said that the map was very detailed. She thought that some important landmarks along the way were marked. Now, when she took it in her hand, she was surprised to find that there were more than just landmarks. Some of the maps along the way had fruit trees, waterfalls, wild boars, wolves, tigers and other ferocious animals painted on them, and some places had houses painted on them.
Looking at it, there is a black dot next to the places where ferocious beasts are drawn, and there are red dots next to the places where there are flowers, fruit trees and streams.
"Does this still distinguish which places are dangerous and safe?" she speculated.
On the entire map, the valley is in the northwest corner. There are three routes to reach the Wei Hai in the southwest corner. Different routes have different distances, danger levels, and scenery.
She found the shortest route and discovered that starting from her county, she would have to pass through three prefectures: Qianzhou, Yunzhou, and Wuzhou.
Wei Hai is located in the southwest corner of Wuzhou, surrounded by the sea on three sides and deep mountains and old forests on one side. The wooden house is located on the seashore on this side, and is surrounded by many tall trees like stars surrounding the moon.
A few sides of Linhai are a vast ocean. This sea area is marked with a name, called Xipingyang. From the map, across the Xipingyang is the neighboring country Beiyue Kingdom.
“I wonder how far the actual distance is?”
She held the map and looked at it over and over again for a long time. Finally, she couldn't resist the sleepiness and climbed into bed to sleep.
Little did he know that Han Zhibai in the opposite room had not yet fallen asleep. He was holding a candle and grinding some medicinal herbs in a stone mortar to make a skin-nourishing facial cream.
That night, Xia Qingyue dreamed of a wooden house by the sea and a sea of flowers. She was dancing happily on the beach. When she was tired, Han Zhibai brought her a coconut to drink. The coconut water was sweet and delicious.
Xia Qingyue was lying on the bed sleeping, having sweet dreams, with a smile on her face and smacking her lips from time to time.
Early the next morning, the two had breakfast, packed up and prepared to go down the mountain. They didn't have much to take, so they carried the backpacks and didn't lead Xiao Hei.
On the way down the mountain, Xia Qingyue was thinking about the map and curiously asked Han Zhibai about some relevant information. He told her everything he knew.
After hearing this, her heart was filled with turmoil.
It turns out that the Western Pacific is the largest sea area in the world. On the map, Wuzhou looks not far from Guyue Kingdom, but in fact it is very far away.
She also learned that the sea area of Wei Hai was not only full of reefs, but also prone to storm disasters. It was a world-famous dangerous place for maritime shipping, and people were terrified of it and stayed away from it.
The deep mountains and old forests behind the Wei Hai are surrounded by poisonous fog all year round and are full of poisonous creatures. Few people dare to set foot there.
Even so, Han Zhibai's parents still set up a formation in the woods outside the beach house to protect that isolated and secluded place.
After hearing this, her yearning for Wei Hai increased greatly.
Xiushui Village, Li family.
Chen Yuzhen was very happy to see the two of them.
Chen Dawei and his son went to the carpenter's house to look at furniture. Li Benfu and his two sons went to the town to make earthen bricks for someone. They were not at home.
Sitting in the main room and chatting about trivial matters, Xia Qingyue said to Chen Yuzhen:
"Aunt, we have a lot of duck down. After we finish making our clothes, there will definitely be half left. I will only take the amount of duck down that we need, and the rest will be for you."
"That won't work. You won't need it. You can make warm clothes or nests for Heihei and Xiaobai."
"Theirs are also included. We will have new duck down next year. Take it and make several sets of clothes for each of you. The extra ones can be used to make quilts and shoes."
Han Zhibai also came to persuade Chen Yuzhen to accept it.
The two of them tried to persuade Chen Yuzhen, but she couldn't win and finally accepted it.
The duck down was shared among the people. Xia Qingyue, Han Zhibai and Chen Yuzhen took the duck down to the Huang family and asked Guifen and her daughter-in-law to make winter clothes, quilts and shoes for them.
When they arrived at the Huang family, Xia Qingyue told sister-in-law Guifen and her daughter-in-law what they wanted it to look like, then measured the size, paid half of the labor fee, and the other half would be paid after it was finished.
At noon, I stayed at Li's house for lunch. After lunch, I sat for a while and then went up the mountain.
It was near the end of the year and everyone was busy. Chen Yuzhen understood and did not keep them. She pulled two baskets of fresh vegetables from the vegetable garden, two baskets of dried fish, caught two pairs of laying pheasant hens, some eggs, and a bag of flour weighing about 20 kilograms.
Li Benfu and his colleagues worked for a wealthy employer in the town. The employer bought food from somewhere unknown, and they paid a high price to buy some of it, including flour.
There was no shortage of food in the valley. Xia Qingyue and Han Zhibai didn't want any of it at first, but they were afraid of hurting each other's feelings, so they symbolically accepted the vegetables and eggs.
In the afternoon, it was still early to return to the valley and it was not dark yet, so the two went to the backyard to harvest wheat.
The autumn wind is blowing, and the slightly rolling wheat is like a golden ocean with waves. The wheat ears are full of fruits, so heavy that the wheat stalks are bent. In the wind, they rub against each other, making a pleasant rustling sound.
Holding a handful of wheat straw tightly in one hand, he cut down with the sharp sickle. As the sickle rose, the wheat fell, and the harvested wheat was put aside.
It was Xia Qingyue’s first time to harvest wheat. Although she grew up in the countryside in her previous life, her grandmother’s family had never grown wheat.
Farm work has a lot in common. For example, harvesting wheat is similar to harvesting millet. Your hands will feel itchy when they touch the wheat leaves. If you are not careful and scratch them, you will get a wound on your hand. The small leaves have great lethality, comparable to a blade.
From the beginning, she and Han Zhibai were standing on the same level and cutting. After cutting for half an hour, he was already several meters ahead, and his movements were as neat and smooth as ever, without any sign of fatigue.
In contrast, she was much slower. She had to bend over and cut for a long time, which made her body feel uncomfortable, so she worked slower and slower.
The sun sets in the west, and its faint afterglow shines on the earth. The clouds in the distance on the horizon darken, and the wind brings a cool breeze. The yellow leaves on the trees are blown off and swirled away in the wind.
Han Zhibai stopped what he was doing, turned around and said to her, "Qingyue, it's getting late, you go back and take a rest first, I'll finish the rest."
"I'm not that tired. The peanuts and mung beans have been drying in the field for several days. I'm carrying them back home."
She went back home and found the magical tool for pulling peanuts out of bamboo that she had made last year. She sat on the ground and pulled the peanuts. She tilted the backpack on the ground and threw the pulled peanuts into it.
After a while, he pulled up a backpack and two wooden barrels and carried them back.
After carrying the load for a few times, it was getting dark. The two men hurried to collect the cargo and went home to pick up the sorghum ears and red peppers that were drying in the front yard.
In the evening, they simply cooked some hand-rolled noodles.
For the next four days, they stayed in the valley to harvest wheat, pull peanuts from the fields, and thresh mung beans and carry them home.
After finishing these things and resting for a night, I went to the tiankeng the next morning to harvest the peanuts and mung beans there.
When the morning mist had almost dissipated, they led Xiao Hei out of the valley.
Walking in the dense forest, Xia Qingyue sniffed, the air was chilly, "It's been even colder these past two days, it's been cloudy, I looked up at the night sky last night, I couldn't see any stars, I think it's going to rain soon."