Surviving in the General's Mansion - Chapter 18: Farming

Chapter 18: Farming

“Ah…”

“Well, you know… staying alive comes first. Heh. Hehehehehe…”

Xia Heng spoke in a trembling voice, her grip tightening again and again around the basket in her hands.

As if quite satisfied with her reaction, Cang Chuli nodded.

“Indeed. What could possibly be more important than your life?”

Xia Heng pretended not to hear the sarcasm in his voice and gave a dry, stiff laugh.

“Regardless of your reasons, since you have pledged yourself to the General’s Mansion, the General’s Mansion naturally won’t mistreat you.”

Cang Chuli walked past her from behind, then abruptly changed the subject.

“However, your father came to find me after court today. He asked me to hand you over.”

“!!!!”

Startled, Xia Heng spun around to look at him.

“I told him he could take you back, as long as he paid three hundred gold.”

Xia Heng immediately relaxed, turned back around, and lowered her head again.

Seeing her reaction, Cang Chuli let out a soft laugh.

“You really do understand that wonderful father of yours.”

Xia Heng felt it was necessary to explain.

“Um, General, not to brag, but three hundred gold? You might as well ask for his life outright.”

Seeing that she made no attempt to hide her disgust toward Xia Yun, Cang Chuli did not press further.

His gaze swept to the basket in her hands, and he lifted his chin.

“What’s all that?”

“Oh, I ran into a foreign peddler and bought some unusual seeds. Would you like to take a look, General?”

Xia Heng held the basket up in front of Cang Chuli.

“Seeds? You plan to farm in my General’s Mansion?”

“Um…”

Xia Heng said cautiously, “There’s such a big empty stretch of land in front of and behind the house. It’d be a shame to let it sit there. I thought I could plant some vegetables. If it works, I can even give some to Chef Xiang and have him add a dish for you.”

“Is that so?”

Cang Chuli was amused. This was the first time anyone had tried to curry favor with him by growing vegetables.

And one glance was enough to tell that this person had never done farm work in her life.

Forget it. The Xia Mansion probably had no room for her now anyway.

If she wanted to plant a few vegetables, it could hardly be called trouble for him.

“Then I shall wait for your fresh vegetables.”

With that, he waved a hand, dismissing her.

Even when she was almost back at her own little courtyard, Xia Heng still could not figure out what exactly Cang Chuli had called her over for.

“Master, this woman entered the residence with ulterior motives from the start. She cannot be fully trusted!” Mo Bai reminded him with a cupped-fist salute.

“Mo Bai, you’ve followed this young master for so long. Why is it that even you think I would suffer a loss at the hands of a woman?”

Mo Bai hurriedly apologized, then asked again, “Then are we still keeping her?”

“Mm.”

Cang Chuli admired the sight of his own attendant being left speechless and breathless.

His mood improved once more.

Mo Bai watched his general stroll away without a care in the world.

He was practically choking with frustration. General, oh General!

If you don’t court death, you won’t die!

After Xia Heng returned to her little courtyard, she began sorting through the seeds she had bought and compared them with the ones in the shop.

Huh. Say what you would-her luck was actually pretty good.

Some of the seeds looked almost the same as the chili peppers and garlic chives in the shop. She had no idea whether these seeds that had been soaked in water would actually survive, so Xia Heng spent points to buy some from the shop as well.

Winter was just around the corner now, but the weather was abnormally cold!

Sweet potatoes would be rather difficult to plant, but she could still grow crops like potatoes and garlic.

Since she had decided what to plant, Xia Heng gritted her teeth and exchanged for five seeds of each in one go.

System-made products had a one hundred percent survival rate.

After getting the seeds, Xia Heng began preparing them according to the system’s instructions, cutting up what needed cutting and soaking what needed soaking.

Once she finished organizing everything, she grabbed her little hoe and ran out into the courtyard to turn the soil.

There was a small patch of ground right by her door, now covered in weeds.

Xia Heng thought it would probably look quite nice planted with chili peppers.

There was no way she could turn all the soil in one go, so she would just do a bit today and a bit tomorrow. By the time she finished, the seeds would just about be ready to plant.

When Qiulin returned to the courtyard, she saw Xia Heng with her back to her, butt stuck out, gripping a hoe and huffing as she worked.

The posture was extremely unladylike.

It felt as if, were she not worried about dirtying her clothes, she would have sat right down on the ground to dig.

“Qiulin, you’re back~”

Xia Heng finally spotted Qiulin after moving to another spot. She quickly raised her little hoe and greeted her.

“What are you doing?”

Qiulin’s eye twitched slightly. The girl before her could somehow raise a hoe and still fling dirt all over herself.
She had her head lowered, spitting ptooey, ptooey, ptooey. It was honestly too embarrassing to watch.

“Heh. I picked up some seeds. The vendor said they were cold-resistant, so I figured I’d try planting them.”

“You… don’t get enough to eat in the communal kitchen?”

Qiulin could hardly believe her ears.

“Ah! No, no, I do! I get plenty!”

Xia Heng nearly jumped out of her skin. If Chef Xiang found out about this, her usual two ladles of rice would definitely turn into three!

“That vendor was just really persuasive. Such a big bag of seeds was only thirty wen, and since I already bought them, who knows? Maybe they’ll add another dish to our meals.”

Xia Heng scratched her head. She absolutely could not admit she had bought them because she was craving vegetables.

Qiulin gave a small nod, finally understanding. Another poor sucker taken in by an Imperial City peddler.

Oh well. It was good to give her something to do.

“Well, well. What’s going on here?”

Zhao Die came swaying out of her room, Zhao Siyan following behind her.

Xia Heng had no choice but to explain all over again.

“Planting vegetables? You? With this? One hack here, one chop there, and you’ve dug pits all over the ground?”

Zhao Die was deeply dissatisfied with Xia Heng’s attempt at tilling the soil.

“You’re just scraping off the top layer. Digging this shallow, what could you possibly plant?”

“Huh? I… ahem… Is that not how it’s done?” Xia Heng asked guiltily.

She had learned the planting method from the description on the seed packet, but it hadn’t said exactly how deep to dig.

She herself had never farmed in the twenty-first century. The only experience she had was planting a few scallions and garlic sprouts when she was little, which she had learned from her mother.

She remembered they hadn’t been planted very deep either, so she had only dug a shallow layer.

She hadn’t expected her utter lack of common sense to be pointed out on the spot.

Hastily, she brought the hoe down several more times. Seeing that the pit had gotten quite a bit deeper, Xia Heng looked up.

“How about this? Is this okay?”

Zhao Die looked like she wanted to smack sense into her. She strode forward, bumped Xia Heng aside with her hip, and took over the little hoe.

With a few solid strokes, she put just the right bit of finesse into her movements. Just watching her, it was obvious she was far more efficient!

In no time at all, she had tidied up a square meter of soil.

“See? This is how you do it!”

Xia Heng and Qiulin applauded together.

“Brilliant! Brilliant!”

Zhao Die suddenly snapped back to herself.

What was going on? Hadn’t she been taking her younger sister out to look for the general? How had she ended up here tilling soil?

Had she not turned over enough earth in her own backyard before?

She looked up and saw Zhao Siyan staring at her with a wordless expression. Then she lowered her head to look at the new dress she was wearing today. The hem was already stained with mud.

In a fit of anger, Zhao Die flung down the hoe and was about to start cursing.

But Xia Heng darted forward and took the hoe, then copied the motions Zhao Die had just used and started tilling the ground beside her.

Watching Xia Heng’s little face turn rosy from the labor, Zhao Die suddenly lost the urge to scold anyone.

“One look and I can tell you’ve never planted vegetables at home. Why are you running to the General’s Mansion to plant them?”

“Heh, I’ve got nothing else to do anyway! If they grow, we’ll have something fresh to add to the table!”

Zhao Die gave her a complicated look, then turned and led Zhao Siyan back to their room to wash up and change clothes.

Qiulin watched with great interest for a while, then went back to her room as well.

Xia Heng tilled the ground by herself for a bit longer. Only when she felt like she had used up every last ounce of strength did she finally stop.

Sure enough, not just anyone could farm! There was knowledge in everything!

Never mind that she had been bent over with her backside in the air for half the day-she still hadn’t done as good a job as the delicate-looking Zhao Die had managed in just a short while.

She still had to practice. Otherwise, if she couldn’t even farm in this ancient era, how was she supposed to survive?

==========

“Elder Sister, are you all right?”

Zhao Siyan looked at her sister, who had changed clothes and then sat on the bed staring into space, and spoke up worriedly.

Zhao Die came back to herself, her gaze falling on her younger sister.

It seemed that a long, long time ago, she and her sister had been just like this too…

Their mother had originally been a farmer’s daughter, but because she was in poor health, her skin was comparatively fair and her looks were decent. That was why, when their father went to the estate to escape the summer heat, he had taken her as a concubine.

But it had not been long before she lost his favor.

Naturally, the servants in the household treated people according to their status.

Their legitimate mother hated their mother for becoming involved with their father while she was pregnant, yet she had never considered how a mere peasant woman like their mother could possibly have refused…

But their legitimate mother did not hate only their mother.

After the two sisters were born, they often went hungry as children too.

They were clearly young ladies of an official’s household, yet from childhood, they had followed their mother in planting a few vegetables in their own little courtyard.

Only by relying on those had they barely managed to survive.