Today the two of them were wearing matching outfits. Inside was a standing-collar inner garment, with a round-collared robe layered over it. The neckline was fastened with mandarin-duck clasps.
Xie Yan wanted to go out and have some fun. Lu Yang had agreed yesterday to take him out, and now he wanted to go immediately—out in public to show him off, so that everyone who saw them would know they were a couple.
Lu Yang asked where he wanted to go play, and Xie Yan answered at once, “The opera house!”
He had listened carefully. Lu Yang had not yet taken his younger brother to the opera house, so he wanted to go there together with Lu Yang.
Lu Yang burst out laughing as soon as he heard this. He tried several times to hold it in but failed, and even on the way to see the opera he was still laughing.
The neighbors on both sides saw how neatly the two of them were dressed and all asked what they were heading out to do.
Xie Yan did not have much interaction with the neighbors. He said, “I’m taking my husband to watch an opera.”
It wasn’t a holiday or festival—what opera was there to see?
Xie Yan thought to himself: of course, whatever opera the opera house is performing, that’s what we’ll watch.
But out loud he said, “We’re watching The Marriage of the Heavenly Maiden.”
Lu Yang laughed again.
This fool—he really was adorable!
In the ninth month, the mountain stronghold was busy and thriving.
It was the season of abundant mushroom harvests, and people from the stronghold went up the mountain in groups.
Over at the new village, many people were also heading into the mountains, traveling in clusters. Quite a few set out before dawn.
After autumn arrived, the wives and husbands of each household also made time to produce leather goods.
This year, the leather goods had a market. Lu Yang’s shop wanted some, and Li Feng also planned to take some to the docks to try selling them.
They did not produce many leather goods here, nothing compared to the grassland merchants. With such small quantities, they would not sell in bulk outside, only to vendors setting up stalls at the docks. When the weather turned colder and leather clothing became useful for blocking the wind, they would see if anyone wanted to buy.
Lu Liu did not want to fall behind. After finishing the household chores, he hurried to make padded cotton clothes, all the while still thinking about the matter of printing books.
This time when Li Feng returned home, he brought back a medicinal herb gatherer who was also a physician, saying he would teach them how to identify herbs.
Their home was already full. The house was large, yet still could not accommodate more people. Wang Meng’s family had space, but Chen Jiu truly had no tact with words, and they feared he might offend someone, so they settled this physician in Da Qiang’s home instead.
The physician’s surname was Hu, about thirty years old, with a small mustache and a solid build. He usually traveled around collecting medicinal herbs, working as an itinerant doctor, and rarely stayed at a clinic.
Yao’s husband was about to give birth. He treated Doctor Hu to a good meal and wine and asked him to check his pulse again.
Several families lived close together. When Wang Meng heard about it, he also invited Doctor Hu over to his place to examine Chen Jiu.
Li Feng saw that Lu Liu was doing fine and had not originally planned to invite the doctor, but when he saw that both of the other households’ husbands had their pulses examined, he immediately went to invite Doctor Hu as well.
When Lu Liu saw this, he even wanted the doctor to check his older brother’s pulse too.
Doctor Hu: “……”
He had come with business to attend to. After resting for one day, he would be heading up the mountain.
Li Feng had brought him back with the intention of doing medicinal material business in the future, so naturally he would accompany him.
It was agreed that the medicinal material business would give a larger share of profits to the stronghold leader’s family. This time, they also brought along the stronghold leader’s two sons.
In addition, they called along the four brothers who were partners with them, and brought Da Qiang as well.
Er Huang had not gone up the mountain for a long time, so Li Feng took Er Huang with him.
Wei Feng was still young and stayed at home for now.
Seeing how busy Li Feng was, heading out early and returning late again, Lu Liu went to help his mother sort mushrooms.
Recently, Shun-ge’er loved going to the new village to watch people build the drying ground. He was excited every day and got along well with Miao Xiaohe. When he came home, he told Lu Liu, “Sister-in-law, Brother He has a really beautiful inkstone, and he’s learning to recognize characters too. I want to learn as well!”
Lu Liu had long since started teaching Shun-ge’er to read, but Shun-ge’er always felt it wasn’t very useful and didn’t study seriously. Seeing everyone working so hard now made him anxious.
So Lu Liu used The Hundred Family Surnames to teach him. Common characters were too scattered, so when Shun-ge’er named a character he recognized, Lu Liu would write it down for him. If he didn’t recognize it, they would switch to another. In general, they still focused on The Hundred Family Surnames, first making sure he became familiar with this small book.
Lu Liu said, “When you finish learning this book, I’ll buy you a beautiful inkstone too.”
Shun-ge’er was full of motivation!
Li Feng would come home in the evening to eat. Seeing that it was almost time, Lu Liu went to the kitchen to prepare dinner.
Last time, Li Feng had been too busy and left in too much of a hurry. He ordered a lot of dishes but barely ate any.
This time, Lu Liu made it up to him: a big plate of stir-fried sour and spicy lotus root cubes, then he peeled some chestnuts and braised them with pork ribs.
The weather had turned cold, and it was time to drink distilled liquor again. For everyday living, they were not overly particular, so they used a teapot to warm the liquor.
With liquor on the table, Lu Liu also stir-fried a plate of peanuts for Li Feng.
Doctor Hu had been invited back by Li Feng, so it would not be appropriate for him to keep eating at Da Qiang’s place. Lu Liu cooked two mushroom dishes and steamed an egg as well.
All told, the only substantial meat dish was the pork ribs—affordable enough.
It was easy to estimate when they would come down from the mountain. They never went too far on their usual trips. The forest in the mountains was dense, and since they had not gathered herbs much before, even a single day’s round trip allowed them to see many medicinal plants.
At dusk, everyone came down the mountain together.
Li Feng offered to have them stay for dinner, but it was just polite words. Everyone returned to their own homes.
Doctor Hu stayed behind and drank with them at their place.
During the meal, he talked about methods of processing medicinal materials—completely different from the rough explanations given by herb traders.
There were over a dozen methods, such as cleansing, boiling, steaming, stewing, and so on. Even within the same method, the specifics differed depending on the herb. Some required gentle heat, others high heat. Some herbs needed to be sliced, with variations in thickness and cutting methods. Some needed blanching, others soaking. Certain herbs were toxic and had to be handled with even greater care.
In the mountains, it wasn’t just plants that could be used as medicine—many insects could be used as well. They had caught some that day. Lu Liu recognized several familiar insects that he had previously fed to the chickens.
His heart ached. What a loss.
Not knowing their value, he had treated treasures like pests. Sigh!
These things took a long time to learn. Doctor Hu had decided to teach them so much only after seeing the size of the mountain, as well as their control over and familiarity with the hunting grounds.
West Mountain held many treasures. He showed some sincerity, planning to make money together with them in the future.
After eating and drinking their fill, Li Feng escorted Doctor Hu to Da Qiang’s place to rest.
The processing techniques would take a long time to teach, so Doctor Hu was not suited to staying long-term at Da Qiang’s home.
Conveniently, around October—roughly when Yao’s husband would give birth—the drying ground should be completed. At that time, Doctor Hu could move into the new house by the drying ground.
San Miao and the others would come over from the new village to learn herb gathering, and could bring Doctor Hu along with them.
Meals would be easy to arrange—the drying ground would have its own kitchen.
They would also need to open another small drying ground specifically for drying medicinal materials.
That evening, after tidying up and washing, Li Feng and Lu Liu counted money together.
Recently, what Li Feng earned were all large sums. He even had several banknotes.
From the ginseng money, Li Feng gave five taels to Er Jun.
This ginseng had been found by Li Feng himself, so he did not need to give a share to others. Er Jun had accompanied him on a trip into the deep mountains, so the five taels were compensation for his hard work. The remainder all belonged to Li Feng.
Out of five ginseng roots, one was given to Lu Yang. Two were sold to Wu Pingzhi for one hundred taels of silver. The remaining two were sold to a herb trader for eighty-four taels of silver.
Altogether, they received one hundred seventy-nine taels of silver. Adding the dividends from selling mushrooms over the past two rounds—small batches both times, totaling forty-three taels—the grand total was two hundred twenty-two taels of silver.
Wu Pingzhi and the herb trader paid in banknotes: three fifty-tael notes and one thirty-tael note. The rest was broken silver and several strings of copper coins.
Banknotes were easy to count, and silver could simply be weighed. It was the copper coins that took time to count.
Normally, they would not carry so many copper coins when going out. They would string them together, one hundred coins per string, which made them easier to spend.
It was late, so they did not count the copper coins that day. Lu Liu watched Li Feng look for places to hide the money. Seeing him searching here and there, he asked, “Why don’t you put it in the glove?”
Li Feng used to keep his silver in the glove.
Li Feng said, “I didn’t have this much money before.”
After searching around, he still ended up stuffing it into the glove, making Lu Liu laugh for quite a while.
After counting the money, they washed their hands again.
Lu Liu’s belly had grown larger, and he no longer liked lying down. Before going to sleep, he leaned against the kang cabinet and sat there.
Li Feng sat cross-legged facing him, holding and kneading his hands, talking to him about their plans for the future.
“Renting a house and shop in the prefectural city is expensive. There are still a few months before the end of the year—if we save a bit more, we can move there and settle down. Things will be tight, but we can manage. The county town is cheaper. A year’s rent is just over twenty taels of silver, including both house and shop. A family can live comfortably, and life would be very pleasant. Where do you want to go?”
