”It’s impossible that not every household in the village remembers your kindness. Not even half of them would remember it—” Li Da glanced at Gu Zhao’s wrist as he moved the stool. It was thin. If he got old and couldn’t work anymore, at least the villagers would think of ways to fertilize the fields and would help his family during the harvest.

　　Otherwise, how can we rely on Zhou Zhou alone?

　　”Dad?” Gu Zhao stopped talking halfway through listening.

　　Li Da: “It’s okay, it’s good that I don’t charge any money.”

　　Gu Zhao didn’t ask any more questions. What his father said was what he thought. It’s good not to charge money. If you do charge, it doesn’t matter how much you charge.

　　After washing up, the family of three went to bed early.

　　In this village, people don’t go to bed so early. Even those who get on the kang toss and turn and can’t fall asleep. Especially when the men came back from Li’s house, Aunt Wang didn’t go inside or outside, but she was annoyed when she heard the men coming back and talking about how good Li Da, Li Zhouzhou, and Gu Zhao were.

　　Why doesn’t she believe it and not take the money?

　　Is Mr. Li really that kind? Would he not charge you a penny for such a good idea?

　　In the next few days, the men in the village were busy paying taxes and sending grain to the town. Li Da from the Li family went. This year, Li Da paid 180 kilograms of grain tax, half of it in previous years, or even less. Li Da carried it to the town without bothering anyone, but this year it was more, and he didn’t feel tired even though it was heavy.

　　Li Zhouzhou was worried and told his father to split the sacks. He carried half and his father carried the other half. As a result, the village chief’s youngest grandson came running, knocked on the door, and said crisply, “Uncle Li, my grandfather said that your family has a lot of crops this year, so you can take our ox cart tomorrow, so Uncle Zhouzhou doesn’t have to go.”

　　It can be seen that the village chief is well aware of the situation of the Li family. Li Zhouzhou is filial, and Li Da cannot carry the 180 kilograms of food alone. Gu Zhao, a scholar who cannot lift anything with his hands, is also not suitable. Only Li Zhouzhou can do it.

　　He hurriedly sent his eight-year-old grandson who was playing at home to run to the Li family and told them in advance. The village chief gave him detailed instructions.

　　”Okay, got it. Go back and tell your grandfather we thank him.” Li Da was not polite. The village chief took the initiative to make friends with him, but he still used Qiao to refuse. Isn’t that giving the village chief a loss of face?

　　I also grabbed a handful of peanuts from home and gave them to the child.

　　The village chief’s grandson was not polite. He happily said thank you to Uncle Li and ran back home.

　　At dawn the next day, men from every household in the village came out carrying food and gathered at the village entrance. Some families had more people and more fields, like Xingger’s family, where Wang Shitou, his brother and his father, three men, came out carrying sacks.

　　It was like this in previous years. If there were too many people working, it meant that there were too many people in the family, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to work the fields. If there were no cows, everyone would share some food and carry it to the town. For those who were physically weak, like Uncle Wang’s family, they couldn’t rely on Wang Ergou and his father. One of them was away from home, and the other said that he couldn’t lift his arms, so Uncle Wang had to push the wheelbarrow over.

　　The journey is long, and I can’t carry it all on my back.

　　However, the road to the town was full of potholes and the wheelbarrow got stuck when moving. It was also difficult to drag it, so some men felt it was more convenient to carry it on their backs.

　　The two cows from the village chief’s family and Li Er’s family were parked at the entrance of the village, and the ox carts were filled with the grain that each family had to pay.

　　In the past in the village, when Li Er saw Li Da, he would act as if he didn’t see him. When chatting with other people, he would always talk about how great Li Da was or how great the boss was. It was rare to hear him call him “big brother”.

　　Today, when Li Er saw Li Da coming out with food on his back, he hurried over to greet him and said, “Brother, you’ve carried a lot this year and it’s very heavy. Put it on my ox cart and it will be lighter.”

　　The village chief said nothing. Although Li Da and Li Er were distantly related, the two brothers could not write two Li characters with one stroke. They were connected by bones and tendons. If Li Er wanted to get close to Li Da, it would depend on Li Da’s attitude.

　　He can’t take the initiative to do this.

　　Who knew that Li Da ignored Li Er and went straight to the village chief’s oxcart. When the village chief saw it, he spoke up and said that there was a place for it and it was already set up. Li Er’s smile faltered and he felt a little embarrassed.

　　The village chief took a glimpse and gave him an excuse: “I asked my grandson to talk to Li Da yesterday. This year, I will let him carry the grain over. We can’t carry it all the way because we have so much grain.”

　　The others then agreed, yes, that’s right, and started chatting with Li Da again, asking about how to apply fertilizer to the paddy fields, the harvest and so on. Li Er, who was laughing awkwardly nearby, also listened secretly.

　　”The village chief has to make the decision on this matter.” Li Da said.

　　The wrinkles on the village chief’s face were relaxed by his smile. He said, “Don’t worry, don’t worry. I’ll tell everyone at Dam after we deliver the grain. Then ask Li Da and Gu Shulang to come over. We can talk about any problems we have.”