After searching the floor and the roof, but found nothing, Wang Peng couldn't help but shook his head in disappointment. He didn't expect that the owner of this room had left nothing behind. He was about to leave and go somewhere else to have some luck. Suddenly, he tripped on his foot and almost stumbled. When he looked down, he saw that the floor had cracked.
He squatted down and looked into the crack, and there seemed to be a flash of light. Wang Peng excitedly inserted the handle of the protective dagger into the crack and pried it open, revealing an extremely hidden cellar.
"This is such a big harvest!" Wang Peng licked his chapped lips with satisfaction. The owner of the house hid a complete set of farm tools such as hoes, sickles, iron plows, and pickaxes in the cellar. Of course, the biggest harvest is not these. , but an earthen jar filled with full millet, weighing a full forty kilograms.
"My mother and brothers can have a full meal, and the neat-looking young widow in the village can be given half a bowl of millet and she can be taken back to the house to sleep overnight!"
Wang Peng brought the clay pot up with satisfaction. While he was thinking about it, he carefully poured the millet inside into his pocket. He was not going to take all the harvest back. Firstly, it was too heavy, and secondly, it was too obvious. , it can easily cause trouble if seen by other villagers.
Perhaps the ecstasy lowered his vigilance. When Wang Peng heard the noise, the voices were already outside the yard. He hurriedly put the jar back to its original place, trying his best to restore everything to its original state. In his panic, he knocked over the iron below. The noise is enough to wake a sleeping person.
"There's someone inside!"
"Yuan Fei, let your people go to the back of the house quickly, don't let him escape!"
Although Wang Peng couldn't understand Chinese, he could tell that it was a Tang Dynasty voice. He screamed in his heart and was about to escape from the back of the house, but he heard rapid footsteps from behind and knew that he had no chance. There is no way to run, and we are surrounded.
Yuan Aollie looked coldly at the Baekje man who walked out of the house. His face was sallow, as thin as a bamboo pole, his eyes were empty, and his feet wearing bark boots were stained with blood. They must have been accidentally scratched just now. .
"These were found from him. There is also a cellar in the house, which contains farm tools and some grain seeds!" Yuan Fei presented a short knife and a bag full of grains with both hands.
Yuan Aolie didn't touch his pocket and took the short knife. It was very crudely made and the blade was full of chips. He snorted disdainfully and said to Yuan Fei: "Ask him, who is he and what is he doing in this house?"
"Yes!" Yuan Fei responded and repeated Yuan Aollie's words in Baekje dialect.
Hearing the language of his country, Wang Peng raised his head in surprise. Only then did he realize that the soldier dressed as a Tang man was actually a compatriot from his country. He quickly begged: "I just want to find something to eat here, Master, can you do it?" Return that bag to me, my mother and two brothers are waiting for me to go back with food in the mountains!"
Yuan Fei said nothing. The man in front of him kneeling on the ground and begging made him seem to see himself a few months ago: the same thinness, the same despair, the same struggle for his family.
He hesitated for a moment and then said to Yuan Aolie: "Report to the captain, this man is the owner of this room. He fled to the mountains to avoid the war. He just returned home to get some millet and brought it back to the mountains! "
"The owner of this house?" Yuan Aolie looked at the scrawny Wang Peng kneeling in surprise, and then at the house in front of him, which was somewhat dilapidated but originally quite spacious and decent: "Will you do anything? Wrong, this guy doesn’t look like someone with such a nice house, does he?”
Now that he had told his first lie, Yuan Fei had no choice but to continue speaking. He pretended to be very sure: "Captain, you can't be wrong. When I just entered, this guy was Moving things from the cellar. The cellar is quite secretive and would be difficult for outsiders to discover. As for the appearance, this guy spent a whole winter in the mountains, so——"
"That's true. After enduring a winter in the mountains, it's no wonder that it's such a miserable scene!" Yuan Aolie nodded. He accepted Yuan Fei's words and nodded nonchalantly: "Then you give the Commander-in-Chief's Mansion a no-war order. Tell him to put up the notice and then we’ll go to the next village!”
"Yes!" Yuan Fei responded, turned to Wang Peng and said in a deep voice: "We are the military officials of the Xiongjin Governor's Mansion of the Tang Dynasty. Liu Duhu issued a military order that no offensive operations will be allowed in the next forty days. You can return to When you farm at home, forget about the past. As long as you pay the field tax in the autumn, the governor's office will issue a field deed and recognize you as the land owner!"
Wang Peng opened his mouth wide and looked at Wang Peng stupidly, as if he didn't understand. Yuan Fei knew that the other party still didn't understand: "It means that you can come back to farm. As long as you pay the field fees this autumn, the house and the fields will be It’s all yours!”
"Are they all mine?" Wang Peng seemed to be mumbling in his sleep. He stretched out his right hand and made a circle: "Are you saying these are all mine?"
"Yes, as long as you pay the field tax in autumn, two liters of grain per acre, two feet and five feet of cloth, and three pounds of hemp, then the land will be yours and will never be replaced!"
"Yes, yes!" Wang Peng finally understood and hurriedly kowtowed. The tax standard Yuan Fei mentioned was based on the tax rates of the Tang Dynasty at that time.
In the Tang Dynasty, it was stipulated that one ding was divided into 100 acres of land (an acre in the Tang Dynasty was roughly equal to 0.81 acres today). After autumn, each ding paid a field rent of two shi, which was evenly spread on the land, which was a field rent of two liters of grain per acre, and a cloth of two feet and five meters. Chi and three pounds of hemp are the adjustments.
By the standards of the time, the tax rate was very low, not to mention that 80 acres of the 100 acres of land allocated by the Tang Dynasty had to be returned to the state after death, and only 20 acres were permanent fields that could be passed down to descendants. And you can occupy as many acres as you pay in taxes, and all of them can be passed on to future generations.
"Okay!" Yuan Aolie saw Wang Peng kowtow and thanked him. Knowing that he had understood, he took the book brush from his subordinate's hand and licked the brush in his mouth: "Let this guy tell me his name. Dingkou at home. Fortunately, Register your name in the field register!”
"Yes!" Yuan Fei responded and asked Wang Peng: "Tell me your name and how many people are in your family so that we can make a list and issue a land deed to you!"
"The villain's surname is Wang and his given name is Peng!" Wang Peng hesitated for a moment and then replied in a low voice: "I have a mother and three younger brothers at home!"
"Have you ever been married?"
"No one wants to marry a poor man!" Wang Peng replied in a low voice.
"You have such a big house and land, but your family is poor?" Yuan Fei smiled: "Go back and find a wife quickly. Remember, as much as you plant in this field, you will be able to pay as much rent as possible after autumn, and those fields will become yours." That's right! The more people there are, the more fields there will be, do you understand?" At this point, he winked at Wang Peng.
Even though Wang Peng was just a piece of wood, he understood now. His eyes widened in surprise: "You, you all know——"
