"This is your father."
The boy struggled with a fierce look on his face, "He is not daddy, daddy is dead, and daddy is not that strong."
The strong man looked at his somewhat unfamiliar son with mixed feelings in his heart.
"Boy, do you remember the toys that daddy made for you? The little pony and the little stool."
"I took you fishing before."
"When your eldest father was here, my father wanted to beat you, but your eldest father beat you instead."
The boy stared blankly at the strange and familiar strong man in front of him.
After a long time.
With a cry of "Wow", the child hugged his father tightly, tears like a flood bursting from a dam.
"Ah, dad, he, they said you were dead. People in the village said you were a deserter and looked down on our family. They bullied my mother and aunt. I, I fought with them to the death!"
There was no emotion or joy on the face of the strong man. This day, his outlook was shattered all over again. Looking at the village where he grew up, he felt disgusted for the first time.
Living in Zhuangzi, the atmosphere is definitely not like this.
Some tenant farmers have a good harvest. Although the land does not belong to them, as long as they pay taxes and do not harm others, generally no one will care about you, and you can do whatever you want.
After many sharecroppers have money, they will gather in small groups to have fun for a while during slack periods, and they can live a comfortable life.
There are also some tenant farmers who are relatively poor, not because life in Zhuangzi is not good, but because they are lazy. Who can blame them? It is their own fault.
What makes people like the most is that there is no corvee. Even if there is corvee, it is only money and food.
Who can not love this?
Strong men are more diligent, but not the most diligent. After all, there is only one person who can cultivate so much land, and he has already relied on the help of semi-mechanized agricultural tools.
Many times, some domestic soldiers and Liao soldiers will come to find themselves.
I don't go to the county town, but I still get together in Zhuangzi every now and then to play a small game of money.
Occasionally I buy a stewed stewed toothpaste, and my life is pretty good.
But when I came back, I saw my father's tragic death, my mother who had been on the bed for a long time, and my relatives who were as thin as monkeys.
That's okay, but the village still looks down on him.
He was fighting for his country, and unknowingly, the strong man's mentality began to change.
The knowledge I learned in two years keeps popping up in my mind.
A soldier gathered them together and talked in the wilderness.
"In fact, all the vassal states in the Central Plains region have the same ancestor."
"We, the vassal states of the Central Plains, are fighting back and forth, which does us no good."
"In the war, we, the common people and the tenant farmers, are the unlucky ones."
"When there is only one country left in the Central Plains, then everyone's good days will come."
"As long as you live your life well, your children can be sent to school. With knowledge, whether it is farming or learning a craft, you can live a better life."
"If you have the chance, you can even become an official. Even if you are a petty official, you can support your family well."
In Zhuangzi, the soldiers' sincere teachings and gentle tone gave them, the mortally wounded soldiers who had been abandoned by their mother country, some comfort in their hearts.
"walk home."
"Brother, we haven't finished our work yet." The skinny Adi pointed at the crumbling banker, her eyes full of reluctance.
The strong man waved his hand, pulled Adi and walked towards home.
"If you don't work today, go home first!"
The few of them didn't say much and followed the only pillar of the family back home.
When everyone returned home, the strong man's wife hesitated for a moment and took out some remaining corn from the kitchen, with a look of exhaustion on her face.
"We only have this much. If we only eat it for three days at most, our family will be out of food."
The strong man immediately brought a big package and took out a lot of corn cakes.
"I'm going to make some porridge."
His wife immediately pulled him over with a look of surprise on her face.
"Don't, don't go. We're running out of time. We'll just eat millet cakes and order water. After two days, you can go to town to buy some food. I still have some savings, and grandma still needs to take medicine."
Seeing everyone looking at the millet cakes with salivating expressions, the strong man couldn't help but feel sad.
Millet cakes are placed in Yuntong County. They are dry food when going out.
Normally at home, not to mention big fish and meat, there is at least some meat, and corn can also be made into rice.
If the conditions are slightly better, just buy some pickles and vegetables.
Unlike now, millet cakes are directly regarded as delicacies.
"Eat, eat!"
As soon as the strong man spoke, everyone started to eat. He came to my mother's bedside and signaled that she didn't need to save food.
It's time to eat and drink. Anyway, I have plenty of money and plenty of food.
Everyone ate with joy on their faces, and it was considered a great time.
The big man's family was relatively poor, but the area was quite large. After playing with his son for a while, he kicked him out.
At night, the man and his wife lay under the covers and told each other how much they missed each other.
When his wife asked about his situation in the past two years, he immediately couldn't help but tell everything about his life in the past two years.
Some of them are delicious, useful, and semi-mechanized farm tools, and I will tell my wife about them all.
His wife was stunned for a moment after being told this. Fortunately, she knew what kind of virtue her man was, otherwise she might not believe it.
Mainly because what her man said was too exaggerated, and she had never heard of many things. Although she didn't doubt it, she did have a lot of questions.
"Don't people in Xia country have to go hungry?"
"With the semi-modified agricultural tools you mentioned, can you really sow and harvest by yourself as long as you have a cow? In this case, wouldn't one person be able to pull more than ten or twenty people?"
"What? Xia people can eat meat every few days?"
"Huh? Can you still drink wine every day?"
The big man took the trouble to explain to his wife, looking at her surprised look.
The feeling of pride arises spontaneously.
When the two returned to reality, they fell silent.
"I remember there was a cow at home."
"Sell it because of my father's funeral and my mother's illness."
The strong man's brows couldn't help but frown tightly.
The land is barren and there are no cattle. Even if he is included, he will not be able to cultivate much land. In addition, the yield is not high, and the output will be very limited if the land is cultivated for a year.
Although it is my own land, after deducting some taxes such as poll tax, there is not much left.
The strong man would rather pay taxes in Yuntong County. Although the tax rate is higher than that on his own land, the output is high and there is a lot of land to work on. Even if 40% of the tenant rent and some poll taxes are deducted, there will still be a surplus.
Let alone a year, even the food output in the first quarter is much more than here.
"Oh~~ I will go to the town to buy a cow and grain tomorrow."
The daughter-in-law was shocked and said, "This is not cheap. A cow costs two gold, and a good cow costs three gold."
The big man was shocked, "What? Why is it so expensive? A good cow in Yuntong County only costs one gold. Some cattle don't even cost one gold. When they are cheap, a cow only costs eight thousand."
"What? Why are cattle in Yuntong County so cheap!"
The big man suddenly became dejected. If he had known that he could make money in this way, he would have spent all his money on cattle and sold them here. He would have only one cow left. Life would not be so easy.
"Sigh~~Everything is cheap in Yuntong County. Prices are extremely low, but it is easy to make money, and food is not expensive. By the way, food in the town now costs one stone."
"It's cheaper this year, about two hundred yuan per stone."
The strong man calculated carefully and found that it was really expensive. You must know that 120 yuan per stone in Yuntong County is equivalent to one yuan per catty.
A stone from Ke Shang is lighter than a stone from Xia, probably only about a hundred kilograms.
If you think about it, it's even more expensive.
After calling each other messages, the two began to fall asleep.
The big man rested his head on his head and couldn't fall asleep. As the saying goes, it is easy to go from frugality to luxury, but it is difficult to go from luxury to frugality.
In Yuntong County, everything is good. As long as you work hard and don't spend money recklessly, your life will always be prosperous.
In a situation like ours, we can get one or two hundred acres of land, and the two Adi can still work in the factory.
Let alone ten thousand or twenty thousand a year, it is very common to save tens of thousands.
With money, there is no need to rent cattle and farm tools. If you buy them directly, your life will be much more prosperous.
But as soon as he returned home, nothing was satisfactory, and tears kept falling from the corners of the strong man's eyes.
He was deeply shocked by the news of his father's death. Although he had a strong body, he could not change the reality.
Such humiliation made this eight-foot tall man unable to hold back his tears.
Come to think of it, life must go on.
The next day.
The big man got up early, washed his face, had a snack, took his money and set off towards the town.
But before he went far, he saw a group of petty officials and their subordinates going in and out of the house.
At the beginning, the strong man didn't feel anything, but when one or two families came in and out.
The strong man's face gradually darkened. The place where these petty officials came in and out was clearly the residence of the soldiers returning from Yuntong County.
There are many people in their village who went to serve as soldiers, and there are at least a dozen people who came back this time.
Just when the strong man was thinking about his thoughts, a burst of curses sounded.
"You, how could you do this? We just came home to collect taxes."
"Humph, you are deserters, so of course you have to collect the deserter tax."
"Ah? Since when is there a military deserter tax? And we are not deserters."
"Yes, that's right. We, Shang State, have signed a letter of credence with Xia State. If we can't save people, we will send them to Xia State for treatment. We will farm for Xia State for two years before we can return."
The petty official's voice sounded.
"I don't care about that much. Anyway, you have to pay the money today, or you have to pay it even if you don't."
"How many?"
"Fifty dollars a head!"
"Damn it, it's so expensive, why don't you go rob it!"
"Click rub rub~~~!"
The sound of a bronze sword being unsheathed sounded.
The subordinates behind the clerk drew out their swords and pointed them at several returning objects, with ferocious faces on their faces.
Several soldiers clenched their fists tightly, their faces filled with resentment.
After a stalemate for a while, the soldiers retreated.
There is no way, form is stronger than people, it doesn't matter if they curse a few times, but if they really want to take action, even if they win, it will be useless. If they really fight, they will resist the government. Don't talk about yourself, the whole family will be in bad luck.
