Chapter 22

Sang Luo knew nothing of the goings-on at the Chen household.

After she and the two children had gathered enough leaves from the "fairy tree," they returned home. She took a small portion—enough to make about four servings—washed them clean, and prepared to make "fairy tofu."

Shen Ning had watched her do it a few times and had already mastered the process. Seeing that her sister-in-law had hardly rested for the past two days and had barely slept the previous night, she stepped in. "Sister-in-law, let me do this. You take a rest."

There was no great difficulty in the task, and Shen Ning was indeed capable, so Sang Luo thought for a moment and agreed. "Very well."

Leaving the task to Shen Ning, Sang Luo did not rest herself. She took a bowl to the mountain spring, filled it with water, and turned to attend to the hemp fibers drying on the bamboo rack outside.

Having been out for half the morning, the hemp had dried a bit too much. Sang Luo examined it closely; she estimated that the fibers would turn a mottled reddish color when bleached. This meant the hemp threads wouldn't be white enough to sell, though they would suffice for their own use.

Now that she had a way to earn money, Sang Luo was less concerned about that. Besides, the household needed thread and rope, and she had the patience. She fetched water several times, carefully sprinkling it over every strand of hemp. After letting it dry for another day, it should be ready for spinning.

Shen An had already retrieved an old cloth bag to store the millet. Seeing that his sister and sister-in-law were occupied, he ran over to Sang Luo. "Sister-in-law, what should I do?"

Usually, at this time, he would be out with his sister hunting for edible wild herbs or berries, but since they had no need for those today or tomorrow, he was at a loss.

"Should I go cut some more hemp?"

"Not for now," Sang Luo said, looking at the wild grass growing everywhere around the house. "Grab a basket. We're going to the creek to look for some things, and we'll set a fish trap while we're at it."

Upon hearing they were going to set a fish trap, Shen An’s eyes lit up. He ducked into the house and emerged carrying an empty basket.

After instructing Shen Ning to stay home, Sang Luo took Shen An and left.

Setting the fish trap was secondary; her main goal was to find stones along the mountain creek suitable for making small hoes. Iron tools were too expensive, and she couldn't afford to procure them in the short term. She couldn't rely on borrowing from the Chen family for everything, especially agricultural tools—after all, farmers needed those every single day.

Until she had the surplus money to buy proper farm tools, she had to make a functional temporary substitute.

Once she explained they were looking for stones for a hoe, Shen An knew exactly what kind to search for. The aunt and nephew spent a long time stooped by the creek, turning over stones until they found several that could be used with minimal grinding. They didn't even need to move; they began grinding the stones right there by the water.

By the time the sun reached its zenith and Shen Ning came to find them, they had fashioned two stone hoes and a stone axe, and had even used the newly sharpened axe to trim some wooden branches into suitable handles.

"Let’s go back, finish processing the handles, and secure them with hemp rope, and they’ll be ready to use."

Shen Ning watched with astonishment. In her eyes, her sister-in-law’s capabilities had soared to a new level!

When they returned home, the mallow porridge was already cooked. After the three of them finished lunch, Sang Luo shaped the ends of the wooden handles, took some of the hemp drying outside, and twisted it into rope. Two simple stone hoes were thus born in her hands.

Limited by the materials and craftsmanship, the tools were more akin to scoops in how they were used, but when Sang Luo tested them in the weed-choked yard, she found that while they required more effort than a proper hoe, they worked fine for weeding and turning the soil.

Shen An and Shen Ning tried them out too. Thrilled with their new tools, the siblings immediately headed to the small patch of hillside land behind the house where they used to grow vegetables. Sang Luo called them back, saying, "You barely slept last night. Go take a nap now, and you can play with them all afternoon!"

Napping calmed the mind and helped with digestion. The children, being obedient, washed the new tools in the small spring and then went inside to sleep.

Judging by the fact that they hadn't slept the night before and had worked hard all morning, they were likely exhausted. Seeing them still fast asleep in the mid-afternoon, Sang Luo didn't wake them; she simply climbed off the bed quietly.

The fairy tofu in the pottery basin had set. She used a bamboo knife to cut it into four pieces. Two were left at home as a cooling snack for the children, and the other two she placed in the pottery basin she had borrowed from the Chen family, covering it with a clean lotus leaf.

She put the millet she had bought that morning into her basket along with the cloth bag, placed the basin on top, and set off for the Chen house.

When Sang Luo arrived, Old Mrs. Chen was sitting under the eaves of the main hall, spinning hemp with her granddaughter.

Sang Luo smiled and greeted the old woman as "Grandma" and the girl as "Xiao Ya."

Xiao Ya still remembered the fairy tofu and fish Sang Luo had brought their family; her eyes lit up when she saw her, and her voice sounded exceptionally sweet when she called out, "Sister-in-law Shen."

*Sister-in-law Shen...*

Sang Luo wasn't quite used to the title yet, but she responded with a smile.

Seeing Qin Fangniang through the kitchen window, she realized it was the time when most families prepared their afternoon meal—the second of the two meals a day.

Sang Luo still held a modern mindset; the habit of eating three meals a day was ingrained in her. When she told the children the day before that they were eating less but more frequently to nourish their bodies, it was actually just her own life habit.

Old Mrs. Chen put down her work and rose to meet her. "Why have you come at this hour?"

Sang Luo smiled and set down her basket. "I came to return your hemp-spinning tool, and I was hoping to borrow your mortar and pestle."

"Of course. The tools are under the eaves; I'll go get you the wooden pestle." Old Mrs. Chen had heard from her son that Sang Luo had bought millet, so she had guessed she would come to borrow the mortar to hull the rice, though she hadn't expected her to come so soon.

She took the hemp tool and set it aside, glancing at the basket Sang Luo had just put down. Seeing the pottery basin covered with a lotus leaf resting atop the bag of grain, she asked with some surprise, "Did you finish the rice I gave you the other day?"

It had been two liters, after all.

Well, two liters wouldn't last long in an average household, but given Sang Luo and the two children's situation, Old Mrs. Chen assumed they wouldn't be so extravagant as to eat pure white rice.

Sang Luo laughed. "Not at all, this is a different bag."

As she spoke, she took the pottery basin out of the basket, lifted the lotus leaf, and handed it to Old Mrs. Chen with a smile. "I made this after I got home. Consider it a small addition to your table. Thank you for your hard work today, Uncle Youtian helped me carry my load all the way back."

Old Mrs. Chen immediately saw the greenish, jelly-like fairy tofu in the basin.

She knew by now that Sang Luo sold these for two copper coins a piece—more expensive than eggs. She shook her head and refused, saying, "It was just a small favor, no need to bring these things."

Sang Luo placed the basin into Old Mrs. Chen's hands. Once the old woman had a firm grip on it, Sang Luo let go and said with a smile, "It was a huge help to me. I would have been in real trouble this morning otherwise. Besides, I was hoping to borrow this pottery basin for a few more days."

Old Mrs. Chen held the heavy basin, feeling conflicted. She glanced toward the courtyard gate but said nothing more, accepting the gift. She told Sang Luo to keep the basin as long as she needed it, adding only that in the future, she could come directly to borrow whatever she needed without feeling the need to bring something every time.

She then told Sang Luo to sit for a while, while she took the basin into the kitchen.

Sang Luo smiled and nodded, then took the bag of millet and walked straight to the mortar under the eaves.

In those days, almost every farm household had a mortar and pestle. Because millet was relatively easy to store and resistant to bugs, whereas hulled rice was prone to weevils, people didn't hull too much at once. Those with enough manpower would hull enough for several days, while those without would have the women of the house hull rice almost every day.

Old Mrs. Chen returned after putting the fairy tofu in the kitchen, holding a wooden pestle as tall as a person, and handed it to Sang Luo. "Go ahead. Do you know how to hull rice?"

Sang Luo nodded.

In truth, she had never hulled rice herself. In the modern world, rice was sold already hulled; it was hard enough to find a place that even sold unhulled millet. Even if she lived in the mountains and bought grain from local farmers, it was always machine-hulled.

However, the original owner of her body had been tasked with this chore by Mrs. Li from the moment she arrived at the Shen household. The two bags of grain they had after the family split were also millet, and the original owner had relied on the stone mortar to hull it. Naturally, it wasn't pure rice; thirty percent of it was just chaff.

When there was no food left, they would mix the chaff with wild herbs and swallow it down as a meal.

When the two children went to the Shen family to borrow food, the house had been so empty that even the chaff was gone.

Recalling the memory of the original owner’s arms being so exhausted they couldn't be lifted after hulling two bags of rice, Sang Luo felt a shiver of dread. She was grateful that she only had two liters of millet to deal with.

She poured the millet into the stone mortar and began to work the pestle. It was easy at first, but the soreness in her arms as she went on was something only she could truly feel.

No wonder hulling rice was used as a form of punishment during the Qin Dynasty; working without pause for a day was truly no different from torture.

Old Mrs. Chen placed the clean pottery basin back in her basket and watched from the side, shaking her head imperceptibly. She began to wonder about Sang Luo's background; she didn't look or act like a typical farm wife.

However, Old Mrs. Chen was a woman who respected boundaries. She kept her curiosity to herself; if Sang Luo didn't volunteer the information, she wouldn't pry. She went back to spinning hemp, chatting with Sang Luo here and there.

When she calculated that enough time had passed, Old Mrs. Chen went over and told Sang Luo to stop. She scooped up a handful of the rice-and-chaff mixture, examined it, and went to fetch a winnowing basket, a small reed broom, and a bamboo mat.

She laid the mat in the corner of the courtyard farthest from the kitchen and placed the broom on it. Only then did she tell Sang Luo to stop. She handed her the winnowing basket and asked with some hesitation, "Do you know how to winnow?"

It wasn't that she looked down on Sang Luo, but winnowing required more technique than hulling; without the proper skill, one would end up shaking all the rice onto the ground.

Sang Luo tapped into the original owner's instincts and nodded. "I do."

Only then did Old Mrs. Chen hand over the basket, returning to her spinning while occasionally glancing over.

Seeing that while she was clumsy at first, she slowly grew proficient, the old woman felt relieved.

This was the first time Sang Luo had followed the original owner's muscle memory to perform a task, and she was nervous enough to break into a light sweat.

The first attempt didn't hull everything; there was still a lot of millet mixed in. She poured the rice back into the mortar and started another round. After repeating this twice, the winnowing basket was filled with distinct, clean grains of rice, with only a tiny amount of millet remaining.

Sang Luo picked out the remaining grains—only a dozen or so—and tossed them into the mortar. The Chen family could hull them next time they prepared rice; nothing would go to waste.

She poured the rice into her own bag, borrowed a cloth from Old Mrs. Chen to wipe the water spots from the pottery basin, swept the chaff on the mat into a pile with the small broom, and then tipped the mat to pour the chaff into the basin.

The chore was finally finished.

Sang Luo swept the mat clean and rolled it up. Before she could ask where to put it, Old Mrs. Chen took over. Seeing Sang Luo’s hands covered in dust, she went into the kitchen, ladled out some water, and offered it to her so she could wash up.

Sang Luo shook her head. "No rush. Grandma, where is your measuring cup? You gave me two liters of rice earlier; I’d like to return one liter today."

At these words, not only Old Mrs. Chen but even Qin Fangniang, who was cooking in the kitchen, raised her eyebrows and couldn't help but look out at Sang Luo.

Both mother and daughter-in-law had heard from Chen Youtian that Sang Luo had bought a pottery basin today, and the remaining money was only enough to buy two and a half liters of millet—which would amount to barely more than one and a half liters of hulled rice. And she wanted to return a full liter now?

Old Mrs. Chen looked at the shriveled bag of grain in Sang Luo’s basket and shook her head. "If you return a liter, what will you have left for yourselves? Keep it for your own meals. It’s the thought that counts; there's no rush."

But Sang Luo was someone who hated being in debt. She laughed, "We have enough to eat. I won't hide it from you—I plan to find a way to sell more fairy tofu tomorrow, so you don't need to worry about us running out of food."

Old Mrs. Chen was surprised. "Isn't there no market tomorrow?"

"Yes," Sang Luo said. "I plan to make a smaller batch and carry it in my basket to Sanli Village to sell. It should work."

Old Mrs. Chen nodded, finally understanding why Sang Luo still needed to borrow the pottery basin. She went inside, retrieved the measuring cup, and measured out one liter of rice from the bag.

After Sang Luo had gone, Old Mrs. Chen remarked to Qin Fangniang, "That Sang woman... she really is quite a likable person."