Farming for Three Meals a Day [Farming Life] 9

Chapter 9

Due to the drought, Shanxiu Village announced the opening of the irrigation channels the next day. However, every household needed to irrigate their fields, so they had to queue up and take turns.

The Ye family’s field was further back, and their turn wouldn’t come until the third day. Rice was crucial to the family’s livelihood, and every household treated it with utmost importance.

Father Ye and Ye Shan went to the field ridge before dawn, hoping to see the river water flow into their field through the ditches. However, after waiting all morning, they didn’t see any water, and the Ye family became anxious.

Ye Shan threw down his harrow. “Father, I’ll go along the ditches and check. Maybe some heartless person blocked the channel!”

Father Ye stayed by the field and sighed. “If there’s still no water by afternoon, I’ll go complain to the village chief.”

Ye Shan walked along the ditches, winding and twisting, for about a hundred meters before he saw the ditch blocked with mud, the water diverted to a neighboring field.

He was furious and wanted to confront the culprit.

The ones responsible were the village’s notorious freeloaders, the Liu Ma-zi family. They were known for taking advantage of others. Even if there were fruit trees planted by someone else’s door, they would steal a few fruits to take home.

Past grievances aside, irrigating the fields was the top priority for farming families, and they dared to interfere with this.

Ye Shan raised his harrow, intending to remove the mud from the ditch, but the Liu Ma-zi family was also waiting under the shade of a nearby tree. Seeing Ye Shan, they hurried over.

“Hey, Ye family boy, what are you doing!” Liu Ma-zi shouted.

Ye Shan spat and said fiercely, “Today is our turn to irrigate, but your family blocked the ditch and diverted the water to your field! Do you have any conscience!”

Liu Ma-zi’s wife shouted, “The crops in our field are also about to die from drought. Besides, our field is in front of yours, so we should irrigate first!”

Ye Shan retorted, “Your family irrigated yesterday, today it’s our turn. Just because your field is drying up, doesn’t mean ours isn’t! How can you be so unreasonable? Let’s go to the village chief and settle this!”

Liu Ma-zi’s two sons also surrounded Ye Shan, wielding wooden plows menacingly. “We don’t want to waste words with you. We’re taking the water today!”

Ye Shan was a man of strong character and hot blood. Hearing this, he immediately rolled up his pants, ready to fight Liu Ma-zi’s sons, not afraid of being outnumbered.

Just as a fight was about to break out, the mud pile in the ditch was suddenly broken down. Without the blockage, the river water instantly flowed forward along the channel.

Everyone turned to see Lin Jiangshan standing by the ditch, holding a hoe, calmly looking at them.

Liu Ma-zi angrily tried to grab him. “You outsider, what are you meddling with!”

Lin Jiangshan blocked him and, in the blink of an eye, threw Liu Ma-zi into his own muddy field, crushing a patch of rice seedlings.

Seeing their father being attacked, Liu Ma-zi’s two sons tried to surround Lin Jiangshan. Lin Jiangshan gripped the hoe handle tightly and said coldly, “Be reasonable, don’t cause trouble for yourselves.”

Liu Ma-zi’s wife screeched, “Stop acting like a big shot! Who knows if you were ever a decent person, talking about some righteous nonsense! What business is it of yours if we irrigate our field!”

Ye Shan spat at them and stood beside Lin Jiangshan. “What nonsense are you spewing? Although Brother Lin is an outsider, he’s now a proper villager of Shanxiu Village, with official documents. Stop making things up about him!”

Lin Jiangshan was tall, even half a head taller than Ye Shan. Liu Ma-zi’s two sons seemed small in front of him. Liu Ma-zi’s wife pursed her lips, somewhat intimidated.

Lin Jiangshan glanced sideways at the Liu family and said in a deep voice, “The land I bought is also downstream. If you block the water, you’re blocking my water too. This is naturally my business. I’ll stay here today and see who dares to block the channel, cause trouble for me, and make things difficult for me.”

His words silenced the Liu family. With Lin Jiangshan’s intimidating aura, who would dare to provoke him? Perhaps he was a bandit or robber in the past, skilled in martial arts. Who would be his match in a fight?

Liu Ma-zi’s wife helped Liu Ma-zi up from the muddy field, and the family, along with their two sons carrying wooden plows, left resentfully.

Ye Shan said gratefully, “Thank you, Brother Lin. Without you today, the Liu Ma-zi family would have been difficult to deal with. The irrigation would have been delayed for who knows how long. The rice in the fields can’t wait!”

Lin Jiangshan sat down by the ditch. “You go back. I’ll stay here and make sure your family has water to irrigate today.”

Ye Shan bowed his thanks and hurried back to irrigate his field.

He went back and told Father Ye about what happened. Father Ye said, “This young man has guts and loyalty! He helped us, he’s a good person!”

Ye Shan said, “Isn’t it because his land is downstream from ours?”

Father Ye shook his head. “He just bought the land, he hasn’t planted anything, why would he need to irrigate? He just couldn’t stand it and helped us!”

Ye Shan immediately decided to become brothers with Lin Jiangshan. “I said he looked like a Hu barbarian before, I shouldn’t have made that up about him. Father, I think this person is worth befriending. Let’s invite him to our house for dinner one day.”

Father Ye nodded. “We should.”

When they returned home from work in the evening, Ye Shan told Ye Xi and Liu Xiufeng about it. Liu Xiufeng immediately agreed to invite Lin Jiangshan to their house for dinner.

Ye Xi hadn’t expected him to help their family again, so he volunteered, “Then I’ll buy two catties of good meat and prepare a feast, and also buy a jar of good wine from the east end of the village.”

Liu Xiufeng’s cooking wasn’t as good as Ye Xi’s, so she let Ye Xi take charge and gave him fifty wen.

The next day, the pickled cucumbers Ye Xi stored in the cupboard were ready. He took out a small jar and prepared to give it to Lin Jiangshan.

Taking advantage of the quiet time when few people were outside, Ye Xi followed the mountain path and quickly reached Lin Jiangshan’s house. The door was open this time, he must be home.

Ye Xi stood at the door and looked up to see Lin Jiangshan eating. He was holding a large earthenware bowl in his left hand, squatting on the bluestone steps at the entrance of the main room, eating noodles from the bowl with chopsticks, his manner hearty but not rude.

Ye Xi stood in the doorway, smiling, and softly called out, “Did I come at a bad time, disturbing your meal?”

Lin Jiangshan put down his chopsticks, looked up at the sound, swallowed the food in his mouth, and then asked, “Why are you here?”

Ye Xi smiled and raised the small jar in his hand. “As promised, I brought you a jar of pickles.”

Lin Jiangshan stood up and brought out a small stool from inside the house. He could sit on the ground, but he couldn’t let the young man sit on the ground.

Ye Xi didn’t stand on ceremony and pulled the stool over to sit next to Lin Jiangshan. Since there were no other houses around and no one could see them, he didn’t bother with formalities.

“Um, what are you eating?” Ye Xi couldn’t help but look.

Lin Jiangshan tilted the bowl towards him so he could see.

The bowl contained a dark mass that vaguely resembled noodles. Ye Xi wasn’t sure if Lin Jiangshan was eating noodles; he had never seen noodles like this.

“What are you eating?”

Lin Jiangshan said frankly, “Can’t you tell? Noodles.”

Ye Xi: “…”

He touched his nose awkwardly. He really couldn’t tell they were noodles. This man’s cooking skills were truly terrible. Last time, it was rock-hard steamed buns, and this time, it was a dark lump of noodles.

“How did you make the noodles?” Ye Xi blinked curiously.

Lin Jiangshan replied, “Boil the water, then add the noodles.”

Ye Xi said, “But they wouldn’t turn out like this… What seasonings did you add?”

Lin Jiangshan looked at him and said, “By the time I took them out, they were already a sticky mess. I added some salt and poured in some soy sauce.”

Ye Xi didn’t believe he only added “some” soy sauce. It must have been half a jar.

But this man, as if he had no sense of taste, continued to eat the noodles without changing his expression.

Ye Xi couldn’t stand it anymore and snatched the bowl from Lin Jiangshan’s hand. “Stop eating, it’s too salty. You’ll be thirsty all night.”

Lin Jiangshan pursed his lips and, after a long while, said, “I’m not full.”

His tone was slightly aggrieved, and Ye Xi couldn’t help but chuckle. “Wait, I’ll cook something for you, it’ll be quick.”

After saying that, Ye Xi went into his kitchen. Just like last time, the kitchen was cold and cheerless. Apart from the half pot of noodle soup left over from cooking, all the other pots, bowls, and utensils were covered in a layer of dust, clearly unused for a long time.

Lin Jiangshan was a clean man who kept himself tidy, and his house was also well-organized and not messy, except for his lack of culinary skills.

Ye Xi opened the cupboard and looked. There were only two stacks of earthenware bowls, not even an egg. There were only a few measures of rice in the rice jar, truly a case of “a clever wife can’t cook without rice.”

In the end, he had no choice but to scoop out two handfuls of rice, wash it with clean water, and cook it in the pot. Ye Xi also took out two of the pickled cucumbers he brought, sliced them thinly, and stir-fried them with oil.

While he was cooking, Lin Jiangshan stood at the kitchen door, looking somewhat at a loss, not knowing how to help, the tall man just standing there.

Ye Xi thought he was hungry, so he said, “It’ll be ready soon, we can eat in a while.”

Lin Jiangshan nodded and sat back down on the stool by the door. Listening to the sounds of pots and pans coming from the kitchen, he couldn’t help but turn to look. He saw the slender figure moving skillfully around the stove, enveloped in the rising blue smoke.

Since he moved here, this was the first time he felt a sense of warmth and life in the house, like an ordinary family, with a warm stove and cooking.

He was momentarily captivated.

After stir-frying a small plate of cucumbers, Ye Xi went to the shade outside the courtyard and picked a handful of bamboo leaves. They were tender and green, and this was the best time for bamboo leaves. Simply stir-fried with oil and garlic, they would have the fragrance of wild vegetables and a hint of bamboo, very delicious.

“Let’s eat,” Ye Xi called out from the kitchen.

Lin Jiangshan entered the kitchen and saw Ye Xi washing the wok with water from the jar. On the low table were two simple vegetable dishes and a bowl of glistening white rice.

“Aren’t you eating?” Lin Jiangshan asked.

Ye Xi deftly washed the wok with a brush and shook his head. “I’ve already eaten at home. You eat.”

Hearing this, Lin Jiangshan sat down and started eating. A mouthful of soft white rice, a bite of perfectly seasoned stir-fried vegetables. He hadn’t had such a delicious meal in a long time. Although there was no meat or fish, the taste warmed him to the core, making him feel comfortable and at ease.

Ye Xi didn’t disturb him while he ate, wiping the stove and wok clean with a cloth, occasionally glancing at him from the corner of his eye.

Although Lin Jiangshan ate quickly and heartily like other men, he wasn’t messy. He ate cleanly and quickly, not dropping a single grain of rice.

In a short while, the food on the table was swept clean. Lin Jiangshan even scraped the last grain of rice from his bowl and poured the vegetable broth into the rice to eat it all.

Cooks loved to see people enjoy their food. Ye Xi was happy and smiled. “I just made something simple, I hope it suits your taste.”

Lin Jiangshan nodded and sincerely praised, “I’ve never had such a delicious meal, even better than the restaurants outside.”

Ye Xi said, “You’re good at flattery. If my cooking is so good, I should become a chef in a restaurant.”

Lin Jiangshan wasn’t good with words, let alone flattery. He quickly said, “I’m not exaggerating, I truly think your cooking skills are excellent!”

Ye Xi stopped teasing him. Seeing that he had been there for a while, he decided to go home quickly, lest someone with ill intentions saw them and started spreading rumors.

He straightened his clothes and said, “I have to go. Besides bringing you pickles today, there’s another thing. I’d like to invite you to my house for dinner tomorrow evening.”

Lin Jiangshan asked, “Why?”

Ye Xi smiled. “Because you helped my brother with the irrigation yesterday, our family remembers your kindness and wants to invite you for a meal.”

Lin Jiangshan then remembered that he did help a man yesterday, but he didn’t know that was Ye Xi’s brother. “It was just a small effort, no need to take it to heart.”

Ye Xi said, “Farming families value kindness, even small favors should be repaid. Just remember to come to my house for dinner tomorrow evening, to accept our gratitude. Otherwise, my family will always feel indebted to you.”

Lin Jiangshan finally nodded. “I remember, I’ll come tomorrow evening.”

Ye Xi smiled with satisfaction, bid him farewell, and turned to go home.