Chapter Eleven: New Peach Replaces Old Token

  They circled around Baili Zhou and turned back, the four of them abandoned their boat and went ashore, returning to Yiling State by land. After all, Chinese New Year was approaching, and it's a tradition for families to reunite during this time. If one person is missing, it feels like the new year hasn't been properly celebrated. Therefore, no matter where they are in the world, as long as circumstances permit, people will return home for the new year.

  Starting from December 24th, firecracker sounds began to echo throughout Yiling State, a sign that children had already entered the festive mood and were eager to experience the joy of setting off firecrackers. Adults followed suit, after all, it was time to celebrate the new year. As long as families could afford it, they would make new clothes for their children and prepare delicious meals, so every child looked forward to the new year.

  It is often said that during the New Year, women are busy to death while men eat and drink to their heart's content. Indeed, women have to prepare meals for the festival, buy gifts for worship, and entertain guests who come to visit. Meanwhile, men just stroll around from east to west, eating and drinking, with nothing much to do. However, these only apply to families that are well-off. Many poor people face survival challenges every day and don't have the luxury of leisure time.

  It was not far from the city of Yiling State, in Changlinggang Village, five miles away, where Li Xiuciai's family lived. His wife was scolding him. "It's already the 26th of the twelfth lunar month, and we still haven't got the money to make new pants for Cheng'er and Yu'er. The rice jar is almost empty, how can we get by?" As she spoke, tears began to fall from her eyes, and she sat there wiping away her tears. Li Xiuciai watched, feeling anxious in his heart, but he had no solution. Although the Hongwu Emperor encouraged education and culture, as a scholar, Li Xiuciai's status was quite high. He didn't need to kowtow when meeting the county magistrate, and the villagers respected him. Every day, he received one sheng of rice as a stipend. Li Xiuciai's full name was Li Chongde. In his early years, the Li family had chosen him from among many sons to study, following the local custom. Unfortunately, after becoming a scholar, Li Chongde was unable to pass further exams, and several attempts at taking the imperial exam had depleted the family's savings. Adding to this, a serious illness a few years ago had forced them to sell their only remaining land, leaving them with nothing. Now, they relied on Li Xiuciai copying books, writing letters, and drafting documents for others, barely scraping by. This was the most difficult life among his brothers, and his sister-in-law had mocked him many times, making him feel extremely depressed.

  It's unbearable to stay at home, looking at his wife's tearful eyes makes him uncomfortable. Why not go out for a walk? The sunshine outside is nice, warm and cozy on the skin. He strolled to Yiling City, slowly walking towards the riverbank, which happened to be Huangbo Dock, where the clear Huangbo River flows into the Yangtze River. From here, you can also see Gezhou Island in the middle of the river, although it didn't improve his mood, but not too bad either. Suddenly, a commotion came from the dock, and he couldn't help but feel puzzled. Now that the New Year is approaching, the dock should be relatively quiet, why are there so many people? So he strolled towards the dock, wanting to find out what's going on.

  As I walked over to take a look, I found that in the middle of the crowd there was a log of more than 200 catties, behind which a table was set up, and behind the table sat two people, about 40 or 50 years old, with piercing eyes, who loudly said: "Lin Boss has made a rule, whoever can carry this log for 500 steps can go logging together!" These two men were Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong.

  A murmur immediately spread through the crowd, carrying over 200 pounds and walking 500 steps is not a simple matter. Someone even cursed: "This is simply bullying everyone!" Some people were eager to try, but thinking of so many eyes staring at them, they didn't dare take a step forward.

  At this time, a guy rolled up his sleeves and stood out, scolding: "Damn it, I'll give it a try!"

  After finishing speaking, he hugged the log with both hands and put it on his shoulder, walking forward with a slant. The crowd saw this person come out and fell silent, neither cheering nor ridiculing him, as if they hadn't seen him at all. It turned out that this man was called Wang Er, a local tyrant in Yiling who had gathered more than a dozen people to bully and extort money from merchants every day. Everyone was afraid of them, and those who were extorted also felt unlucky and didn't dare to investigate further. The government had arrested him several times, but he hadn't committed any serious crimes, so they would release him after detaining him for a while, and he would become even more ruthless after his release.

  Wang Er walked for about 30 steps and was already sweating profusely, his two nostrils puffing out air like a pair of bellows. When he persisted to 100 steps, his legs could no longer move, so he had to throw the log to the ground with a thud and sit down, panting heavily. Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong saw this and couldn't help but laugh, because although there were many strong men who could carry 200 catties easily, it was difficult to persist for 500 steps. This required not only great strength but also years of physical labor.

  Now that someone has taken the lead, the rest of the people no longer hesitate and one by one follow in order to carry the wood for 500 steps. Before long, five people have completed the task and signed a contract according to Zhou Wang's instructions at the beginning, receiving an advance payment of one or two silver coins. The crowd looks on with envy, regretting that they don't have such skills.

  Li Xiuzai looked and shook his head as he walked away, sighing: "A strong man is worth more than a scholar, a bookworm is useless!"

  Not far away, a sudden cry of surprise came from the crowd, accompanied by wailing. It turned out that Wang Er lost his way today and didn't even get a few silver coins, so he asked Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong to extort some money as compensation. Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong didn't care about him at all. Wang Er was furious and called on his brothers to beat up Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong.

  These people were no match for Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong, and with a few blows, more than ten of them lay on the ground, unable to get up. The crowd saw Wang Er and others being beaten, and they all applauded with joy, Li Xiucai also felt pleased, this Wang Er was not an ordinary annoying person.

  Wang Erwu shouted at them: "Aren't you two Zhou Wang and Lin Xiaosan? I'm going to the government office to report that you're in league with bandits. If not, where did you get so much money?" Lin Chunhong and Zhou Wang ignored him, continuing to tidy up the contract books and tables.

  "You think I'm afraid? You're not the ones who go deep into the mountains for several months at a time, are you? Let the widows and orphans in your family be careful, they have something good to look at!"

  Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong looked at each other, their eyes gleaming with ferocity, their killing intent bursting forth. Lin Chunhong nodded to Zhou Wang, then suddenly leapt out from behind the table, grabbing Wang Er's arm in a tight grip, his voice cold as ice: "What do you plan to do to settle this matter?"

  Lin Chunhong had been practicing martial arts for many years, and with the intense physical labor of this period, his strength was unparalleled, like a tiger's claw tightly grasping Wang Er's arm. Wang Er struggled desperately, but to no avail, and finally let out a series of painful groans.

  Lin Chunhong gritted his teeth and squeezed out two words: "How...?"

  Wang Er said with a tremble: "No need to say anything more, there's no misunderstanding between us."

  Lin Chunhong loosened his hand and slapped Wang Er's face, shouting: "Get out of here! If any of my family members lose a single hair, I'll make you wish you were dead, but you won't be able to die, and you won't be able to live!"

  Wang Er was knocked to the ground by Lin Chunhong, covering his left cheek which had instantly swollen. He shouted like a slaughtered pig: "I dare not, I dare not! I just boasted with my tongue!" After that, he led the group of rascals as they rolled and crawled towards the East City.

  Li Xiuciai sighed again: "A wicked person needs another wicked person to grind, and was about to leave when Zhou Wang heard this and asked: "What do you mean by 'a wicked person needs another wicked person to grind'? Are we two also wicked people?"

  "Two of you are already showing a fierce and violent aura on your faces, why do I need to explain more?"

  Lin Chunhong smiled and said: "I think those historical figures who could ride horses and determine the fate of the world were all bad guys, huh?"

  Li Xiuzai was taken aback and realized that he had indeed misspoken, so he didn't try to make excuses. Instead, he immediately apologized: "It was my mistake, please don't mind it, both of you."

  Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong saw that this bookworm was quite straightforward and didn't put on airs, so they hastily said: "You're too polite, sir."

  Li Xiuciai just heard Zhou Wang tell everyone how to calculate wages, Li Xiuciai arrived late and didn't hear the whole thing, instinctively feeling that this method was good, couldn't help but ask: "Just now I heard this big brother say that each month there is a minimum of one or two silver coins, each group calculates wages according to the amount of wood cut, what's with the 70% and 30%, it seems quite complicated, can you two explain it to me?"

  Lin Chunhong smiled and said: "Even Mr. Lian didn't hear clearly, it's indeed complicated enough. It's like this..." Lin Chunhong explained the method of distributing wages one by one.

  Li Xiuciai stood still for a moment after hearing, then patted his thigh and said: "No wonder everyone is saying that Old Lin has made a fortune. With this method, it's strange if he didn't get rich!"

  "It's all just rumors spread by neighbors, where did he get rich from? It's laughable!"

  "Heaven has its timing, earth has its wealth, and man has his governance!" Li Xiuciai concluded with this sentence, then bid farewell and left. This made Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong stunned, not knowing what the scholar was thinking. Lin Chunhong originally felt that this scholar was not simple, why was he so interested in the distribution of wages for goods?

  The New Year of Chongzhen 2 was the most comfortable one for the Lin, Zhou and Chen families. The reunion dinner was extremely sumptuous, everyone wore new clothes, Chen Jixing got his lucky money as expected, even little Feng'er was overjoyed holding the lucky money given by her parents and aunt. On the first day of the lunar month, every household visited each other to exchange New Year's greetings and auspicious blessings. Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong had nowhere to go except for visiting Li Mujiang, otherwise they would have nothing to do. Correspondingly, there were also few people who came to visit them.

  But on the third day of the first month, the main hall at home was packed with over a dozen people. This group of people were Wang Er and others, who knelt in the main hall, calling Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong "master" and asking them to accept them as their disciples. Originally, Zhou Wang saw Wang Er and others bring gifts and was prepared to drive them out, but he did not expect that they had come to pay homage to him as a master.

  Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong were at a loss, looking at each other, unable to speak. Finally, Lin Chunhong said: "Wanting to make Zhou Shu his master is not impossible, but he must agree to our three conditions."

  "Master Lin, just give us your orders, we'll follow them unconditionally!" Wang Er swore solemnly.

  "One, you can't use my and Zhou Shu's names to cause trouble outside!" Wang Er was stunned. It turned out that in the city of Yiling, another powerful group of thugs led by Du'er Ma were entrenched in the west city. Although Wang Er and Ma usually didn't interfere with each other, they had recently clashed over territory. Wang Er thought that since he wasn't strong enough, he would use Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong's names to intimidate Ma, making him not dare to act recklessly. After all, Zhou Wang and Lin Chunhong were skilled in martial arts, and the thugs in Yiling knew this.

  Wang Er was immediately stunned, and his primary goal was vetoed. Wang Er's brain was quick-witted, thinking that even if he couldn't openly fly the flag of the two families, running back and forth between the Zhou and Lin families would be enough to scare Ma Zi. So, he readily agreed to Lin Chunhong's first condition.

  "Secondly, if anything happens in Yiling City from now on, you must inform Zhou Shu and me immediately." Lin Chunhong thought that the information about Yiling State was not timely enough at present, and if this continued, they would suffer losses. It just so happened that he could rely on these rascals to help gather intelligence, which was also one of the main reasons why Lin Chunhong agreed to let Wang Er and others become his disciples. Wang Er's heart was delighted, as this was their strong point, and he hastily promised.

  "Thirdly, from now on, the safety here will require everyone to be more mindful. Since I and Uncle Zhou are often not at home, you all must ensure the safety of the mistresses."

  Wang Er listened and hastily swore an oath, saying: "The safety of the family is now in our hands." Then he called on his brothers to pay their respects to their master, and both sides were delighted with what they had gained.