Chapter 24: Zhu’s Family

Jin Xiaoye didn’t mind Li Qingzhi getting close to her, but Li Qingzhi taking the opportunity to touch her hands… she wasn’t used to it.

Besides, Li Qingzhi’s health was still not good, so it would be better not to think about these things!

Li Qingzhi didn’t actually have any intentions; he just wanted to have skin contact with someone, especially with Jin Xiaoye.

Jin Xiaoye was his wife, exclusively belonging to him. Just thinking about it made him excited.

Their bed was less than 1.5 meters wide. After Li Qingzhi and the two children lay down, there was no room for Jin Xiaoye, so she had been sleeping on the floor all this time, even today.

After lying down, Li Qingzhi first told two stories to the children, then helped them review multiplication tables… When the two children fell asleep, Li Qingzhi called out, “Xiaoye.”

“Hmm?” Jin Xiaoye responded. She hadn’t fallen asleep yet and was thinking about what to do next.

Li Qingzhi said, “Xiaoye, Master Zhu said that when I finish copying the books, he will give me more money, and then we will buy a bed…” It was fine in summer, but sleeping on the floor wouldn’t work in winter.

The winters in the south were not too cold just judging by the temperature. Even in winter, people in Miaoqian Village could still have vegetables like cabbage and radishes.

However, it was very humid here. Sleeping on the floor would make one feel cold due to the dampness rising from the ground.

Their house had mud floors!

Li Qingzhi was thinking about buying a bed for what? Jin Xiaoye coughed lightly and asked, “How much reward will Master Zhu give you?”

“It’s not clear yet,” Li Qingzhi said, “but if I do a good job, it shouldn’t be too little.”

Unexpectedly, there would be more income, which made Jin Xiaoye quite happy, and she began to talk about what they lacked at home.

In addition to a bed, they also needed a table, a water jar, and Jin Xiaoye wanted a rice jar, a dung bucket, a rice bucket…

“Our family has too few belongings; we need to save some, but we have to pay off the debt first…” Jin Xiaoye made plans for the future.

Li Qingzhi listened eagerly.

Jin Xiaoye’s words were all about trivial matters, but it was precisely these trivial matters that supported a family.

Now that he had a family, he wanted to work hard to accumulate assets and make life better for his family.

The next day, Li Qingzhi woke up early as usual.

It was still dark outside, but Jin Xiaoye was already awake. Hearing the movement on Li Qingzhi’s side, Jin Xiaoye said, “Ah Qing, lie down for a while longer. I’ll make breakfast.”

Before, when Li Qingzhi stayed at home all day with nothing to do, Jin Xiaoye entrusted him with cooking. But now that Li Qingzhi had found such a good job… she planned to take over the cooking herself.

Their family usually didn’t have breakfast this early, but since Li Qingzhi was going to work today, they needed to eat something before going out.

“I’ll help you,” Li Qingzhi said. Master Zhu said they would provide meals, but he didn’t know the specifics. It was the first day today, so he planned to eat something before going out.

He could withstand a bit of hunger, but the two children couldn’t go hungry all the time.

Naturally, Jin Xiaoye had no objections, so the two of them went into the kitchen together.

The Yao family next door had already started cooking. Jin Xiaoye went over to get some firewood and brought it back.

There was still some white rice left from the pounding they did before. She decided to cook white rice and steam the salted fish they bought yesterday.

After that, all they needed to do was start a fire, and Li Qingzhi took care of that.

The fire in the stove illuminated Li Qingzhi’s face, flickering intermittently. After some thought, Jin Xiaoye suddenly said, “Li Qingzhi, I want to rent a boat for business in the future.”

“Sure, Xiaoye, what kind of business do you want to do?” Li Qingzhi agreed readily. He had noticed that Jin Xiaoye wasn’t the type to be content with staying at home every day to tend to the fields and take care of the children.

This girl had ambitions!

Their family only had two acres of land. While they were busy during farming seasons, they were quite idle during slack periods. Jin Xiaoye didn’t need to stay at home all the time.

Jin Xiaoye then talked about her ideas.

In Chongcheng County, besides buying boats, one could also rent them.

Some people specialize in the boat rental business. After buying several boats, they rely on renting them out to people in the vicinity to make a living.

There are also some households that own boats but don’t want to work as boatmen. Instead, they simply rent out their boats to collect rent.

Buying a boat is not cheap, but renting a boat only costs fifty cents a day.

During the first three years of Li Qingzhi’s disappearance, Jin Xiaoye didn’t have any thoughts of doing business.

Pregnancy, childbirth, managing the household’s fields, and Li Laogen’s debts were all pressing on her. She simply didn’t have the time to consider anything else.

At that time, she was not very familiar with the outside world and didn’t dare to act rashly.

But in the past two years… she had entertained the idea of renting out boats to do business more than once.

However, she had two children to take care of. Occasionally going out for a few days was fine, but going out every day was out of the question.

She was still a woman, and going out alone was prone to danger. As for bringing the children… Li Laogen was unreliable.

At that time, she planned to start with some small businesses like selling needles, thread, and cloth. She intended to wait until the children grew older in a couple of years, then leave Li Laogen to look after the house and take her younger brother, Jin Xiaoshu, to rent a boat.

“The boat rental business isn’t urgent. I don’t have the capital now, but once you finish copying the books and Master Zhu gives you the reward, then I can go.” Jin Xiaoye said.

She didn’t plan to start renting boats for business immediately. She intended to wait until the family’s debts were paid off before proceeding.

Writing books like this was a one-time opportunity for Li Qingzhi. There was no guarantee they would find another one. Relying solely on the reward would not be sustainable in the long run. It would be best to have another way to earn money.

She wanted to earn more money to buy more land so that she could distribute it to her sons in the future.

Li Qingzhi thought about it and agreed.

He had to write Master Zhu’s autobiography well so that it could earn startup capital for Jin Xiaoye!

Early in the morning, seeing that there was white rice to eat, Li Damao and Li Ermao were extremely excited!

After changing into clean clothes… the two children happily surrounded Li Qingzhi: “Dad, look at my new clothes!”

“Dad, do I look good?”

“Dad…”

“Damao and Ermao are the best-looking. There are no children in the world who look better than Damao and Ermao!” Li Qingzhi kept praising them non-stop, and then they all sat on the doorstep to eat.

After finishing their meal, it was almost time for Mr. Yao and the others to go to the county town. Li Qingzhi took the two children onto Mr. Yao’s boat.

Yao Zhenfu arrived late and complained after boarding the boat: “Dad, why do we have to leave so early every day? It makes me the first one to go to school every day.”

Li Qingzhi felt a bit helpless hearing this. Being the first one to go to school wasn’t a bad thing, right? When he was in his third year of high school, he used to go to the classroom early every morning to study.

At that time, he felt it was very hard, but when the apocalypse came… the once very difficult third year of high school became beautiful in his memories.

At least he didn’t have to go hungry or worry about someone eating him while sleeping.

Seeing Yao Zhenfu’s attitude, it seemed that he wasn’t very focused on studying. But Yao Zhenfu wasn’t his child, so he couldn’t say anything.

Mr. Yao felt embarrassed and just smiled awkwardly without saying anything when he heard his son’s words.

Actually, if his son didn’t mind going to school too early, he would definitely leave half an hour earlier to earn a little more money.

When they arrived at the county town, Yao Zhenfu got off the boat and went to school.

He told others that his family had a lot of land, but he never told them that his father was a boatman because he felt it was embarrassing.

He even didn’t want to get off the boat at the pier next to the school for fear that his classmates would see Mr. Yao.

Not everyone in their school was wealthy; some were even poorer than him, but there were also some who were very wealthy.

For example, Master Zhu from the Shunlong Trading Company. Every time he came to school, he would bring a servant to help him run errands, and at noon, someone would carry a load of food for him.

Seeing how luxurious others’ lives were, but his father was just a boatman…

Li Qingzhi waited for Yao Zhenfu to leave before slowly getting off the boat and heading towards the address Master Zhu had mentioned yesterday. 

The Zhu family.

After returning home yesterday, Master Zhu had already told his family about hiring someone to write his biography.

Hearing that there was a poor scholar who would write a book about Master Zhu’s life for a silver coin a day, everyone in the Zhu family was very curious.

Master Zhu had been busy with his business in his early years and got married relatively late. His wife was more than ten years younger than him and had given birth to two sons and a daughter for him.

The eldest son, was fifteen years old and studying in school. The second son was only seven years old and in poor health, so he planned to send him to school when the weather cooled down. As for his daughter, she was eleven years old and still looked like a child, learning bookkeeping at home with her mother.

The most curious one about writing books was Master Zhu’s eldest son, Zhu Xunmiao.

Zhu Xunmiao had been studying in school since he was six years old and had already studied for nine years. He was doing well in his studies, but every time the teacher asked him to write an article, he was in great pain. Now someone wanted to write a book about his father?

“Dad, when will that scholar Li come? Can you let him help me write a book too?” Zhu Xunmiao asked.

One silver coin a day, three taels a month. He had five taels of pocket money every month!

“You’re just in your teens and haven’t experienced much in life. Why would you need someone else to write a book for you?” Zhu Qian looked at his son speechlessly.

He was different.

Now that he was living a good life, he often recalled the past. Back then, he truly suffered.

While he was alive, he could still talk to his family about it, but once he was gone, no one would remember these things.

But if he could write a book… his future descendants would all know how he earned his wealth and made the Zhu family rich!

Last night, Zhu Qian tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep, just thinking about what to write in the book.

He didn’t know if Li Qingzhi could write his book well.

Just as he was thinking, the gatekeeper came in. “Master Zhu, Mr. Li is here!”

The Zhu family was nouveau riche and didn’t have many formalities. Zhu Qian had already instructed the gatekeeper in advance, so Li Qingzhi came in with him.

The Zhu family was much smaller than he had expected. Although the house was beautiful, it didn’t take up much space.

It made sense; the county town of Chongcheng was not very big, so how big could the Zhu family’s house be?

Moreover, when he visited the water town in his past life, the houses there weren’t big either.

There was a small courtyard after entering the main gate, and beyond that was the reception area. Zhu Qian was waiting there, accompanied by a round-faced young man who was curiously looking at him with his round eyes.

“Master Zhu,” Li Qingzhi greeted with a smile.

“Mr. Li,” Zhu Qian smiled back.

After exchanging pleasantries with Li Qingzhi, Zhu Qian sent his son to school and then took Li Qingzhi to the study he had prepared in advance.

It was a small room facing south in the front courtyard, furnished with a desk, chairs, inkstone, and some books. The environment was very good.

Li Qingzhi calculated based on the original host’s memory that just the inkstone, ink, paper, and brush in front of him would cost at least twenty taels of silver.

He had been memorizing some books these days and had been wanting to practice writing. Now he could use the Zhu family’s stationery to practice writing for free.

As for writing the book for Zhu Qian, he wanted something similar to vernacular novels, and Li Qingzhi was indeed capable of writing in that style.

The original host wasn’t good at studying but loved reading vernacular novels and had read many of them. As for Li Qingzhi…

During the years of the apocalypse, he had actually been using pen and paper to record his experiences, as well as writing about the people around him and various events before the apocalypse.

Now, he might not be able to write immortal poems or prose, but writing about Zhu Qian’s experiences as described by Zhu Qian himself wouldn’t be a problem.

Of course, before starting to write, he wanted to have a chat with Zhu Qian.

Zhu Qian also planned to have a good conversation with Li Qingzhi. He had someone bring pastries and tea and began talking about his past experiences.

Li Qingzhi first took two pieces of pastry for Li Damao and Li Ermao, then took one for himself. He listened to Zhu Qian while enjoying the pastries.

After fifteen minutes of Zhu Qian enthusiastically talking, there wasn’t a single piece of pastry left on the table.