Chapter 9: Power Surges

When Er Gouzi returned to Shekou Mountain, it was already late and it was time for dinner.

He might not be able to eat meat, so today he finally spent money to buy a piece of pork and gave it to Li Banxian.

Fortunately, he finally bought an iron pot today, so he didn't have to eat fried rice.

He poured some rice out of the gourd, put it on the stone slab and tapped it gently for a while to crack the husk, then blew the chaff casually and poured it into the pot and added water to cook rice.

These rice grains have been stored in the gourd for more than three days. I wonder if they will undergo some magical changes like water.

When the rice was cooked, Er Gouzi remembered that he should buy a few bowls and chopsticks today.

But he was not a pretentious person, so he used two branches and a broken tile to get it done.

As long as there was a meal, other details were not important.

He took a big mouthful of rice into his mouth. Although there was still some chaff, it was much better than fried rice. It was very fragrant, soft and elastic.

He took out the treasured bitter salt, ate three mouthfuls of rice, and licked the salt gently. It tasted delicious.

That night, he cooked a liter of rice, and he ate it all, making his stomach round.

After eating, he lay in the straw to rest, and he felt warm in his stomach.

Gradually, this warm feeling spread to his whole body, just like taking a hot bath, very comfortable.

He slept in the straw in this state for a night. When he woke up the next morning, he felt vigorous and full of energy.

With so much energy, it would be a pity not to dig the soil and open up the wasteland. He immediately picked up the hoe and hatchet and walked towards the wasteland.

There are about three acres of land in this stone nest, but it is not flat. There are many large and small stones, and some thorns and miscellaneous trees grow between the stones.

The first thing to do to open up the wasteland is to cut off the miscellaneous trees and thorns. He had cut off some of them when he had time a few days ago.

The most difficult thing is to level the land. The wasteland is full of stones. Some are as big as ten feet, some are several hundred kilograms, and some are as big as fists and eggs.

All these stones must be cleared away, and in the next few years of farming, small stones must be picked out constantly.

However, Er Gouzi uses gourd water for irrigation, and has a strong adaptability. There are not so many requirements. He only needs to move the big stones away.

At this time, he pushed a big stone weighing more than 300 kilograms and rolled it aside.

In the past, the old stubborn donkey also cleared a lot of stones and had accumulated a lot of them.

Er Gouzi planned to keep the big stones cleared by the land reclamation to build a stone house for himself.

Maybe the rice stored in the gourd really has a miraculous effect. He didn't feel too tired after moving the stones for a whole morning.

The next few days confirmed his guess. Eating the rice in the gourd really doesn't make you tired easily and can increase your strength.

Every day I feel that I have endless strength, and the speed of land reclamation has increased greatly.

As long as he moved the big rocks, dug out the weeds, planted rice, and then watered it, rice seedlings would grow the next day.

As time went by, the rice field became wider and wider. Finally, after six or seven months, almost all of the three acres of land were planted with rice seedlings.

During the past six months, in addition to clearing the land, he also built a stone house with big stones.

The house is two feet long, one foot wide, and one foot high, with a straw roof on it.

The gaps between the stones and the interlayers between the straw are all covered with a layer of mud to prevent rain and cold.

Inside the house, he built a stone bed with stones, filled the uneven places with soil, and then pressed it tightly.

A thick layer of straw was laid on the bed, which was very comfortable to lie on.

In front of the bed, against the wall, there were more than a dozen sacks full of rice.

In fact, in addition to these, he stored more rice in his gourd, with at least 80 stones on both sides.

These are his harvests for more than half a year.

As long as he keeps the rice seedlings well watered, they will be ready for harvest in about half a month.

Each acre of land can yield about four shi at a time.

Immediately after the harvest, water the rice stubble so that it can sprout again, saving both seed costs and breeding time.

Now the three acres of land have been reclaimed and planted with rice. A harvest cycle is made every half a month, and each crop can yield about 12 shi. If it is harvested twice a month, there will be 24 shi of rice.

When the price of rice is the cheapest, it is 10 wen per liter. One shi has 100 liters and can be sold for 1,000 wen.

When the price is expensive, it can rise to about 3,000 wen per shi.

1,000 wen copper coins are equal to one guan, which is equal to one tael of silver.

Even if calculated at the lowest price, he can earn 24 taels of silver from the grain he produces every month.

Converted into silver taels, it is more than enough to show his sincerity to Li Banxian and become his disciple to learn martial arts.

It takes some time to transport the grain to Sanchazi Town to sell it.

On this day, Er Gouzi finished his breakfast and carried a load of rice down the mountain.

When he left, he also brought a lot of thorny thorns to block the way up the mountain.

In order to prevent people from discovering his secret of using gourd water to grow crops, he has been doing his best to destroy this way up the mountain for more than half a year.

As a result, this road has become extremely difficult to walk on, and some places are even completely blocked.

He has to use several long ropes to go up and down the mountain by himself.

Fortunately, he has gained a lot of strength now and can withstand such tossing.

He has been thinking that when he saves enough money, he will go to Huang Laocai to see if he can buy the land on Shekou Mountain.

If he buys it, it will be his private territory, and he can justifiably fence the mountain and prevent outsiders from going up the mountain.

Er Gouzi didn't feel tired carrying two large sacks of rice for 20 miles this time.

Even in the hottest weather, he was still wearing the same pair of cotton pants. Even with his bare chest, he was still very hot.

There was no other way. He only had this set of clothes. After selling the grain today, he could sew another set of clothes and pants to wear in summer.

After entering Sanchazi Town, he went directly to Zhou's Grain Store.

There was only this grain store in the town that could purchase and sell grain on a large scale. It was said that it was opened by the Zhou family, the richest family in Sanchazi Town.

The purchase price was slightly cheaper than the retail price at the market.

Er Gouzi had a lot of grain to sell now, and efficiency was more important, so he naturally couldn't care about these small price differences.

As the autumn harvest was approaching, the price of grain had begun to fall. Today's purchase price was only 1,600 coins per stone, equivalent to 16 coins per liter.

His two large sacks had a total of 12 dou and 6 liters, which earned him 2,016 coins.

With this money, he went to the tailor shop to tailor a set of summer clothes.

He also bought some bowls and chopsticks and other daily necessities in the town.

In the next few days, he went to Sanchazi Town every day to sell a load of rice.

As the autumn harvest was approaching, and the weather was good this year, everyone had no shortage of food, and the purchase price of Zhou's grain store was getting lower and lower.

After Er Gouzi sold for more than ten days in a row, the purchase price of one stone of rice was only 1,080 Wen.

He had saved enough money to become a disciple, and didn't want to sell it at a low price.

Anyway, his gourd could store a lot of food and it wouldn't go bad, so there was no need to rush to sell it.