Chapter 33: The Hu Cavalry Withdraws, Tenant Farmers
As Yang Zhengshan had expected, three days later, Yang Family Village received news that the Hu cavalry had withdrawn from Anning County.
The entire village of Yang Family Village was filled with joy and celebration. The tense and anxious atmosphere was replaced by a relaxed one. Even Yang Zhengshan felt a sense of relief.
To be honest, the pressure on him had been immense during this time. With the lives of nearly a thousand villagers on his shoulders, he couldn’t even sleep soundly, fearing that the Hu cavalry might raid the village at night.
Luckily, everything had passed now.
“It’s finally over!”
Yang Zhengxiang came to Yang Family Village, beaming with joy. “Yes, it’s finally over!” Yang Zhengshan let out a sigh of relief. “But we still have many things to do!”
Previously, they had prepared many things that weren’t used, such as transporting goods to the mountains ahead of time. They still needed to retrieve those items.
Yang Zhengshan didn’t think it was a waste of time. To be honest, he was happy that Yang Family Village didn’t have to flee to the mountains.
Don’t think that fleeing to the mountains would solve all problems. It would mean abandoning Yang Family Village, and taking the entire family, including the elderly and children, into the mountains, which carried great risks.
So, Yang Zhengshan was willing to waste all the preparations rather than let the villagers of Yang Family Village flee to the mountains.
Besides, there was another matter to attend to – spring plowing.
It was already March, and according to the local season in Anning County, spring plowing usually took place from the end of March to April. After the heavy snow, the weather had warmed up, and people should start preparing for spring plowing.
The spring plowing here was different from his previous life. In his previous life, large machinery could be used, allowing one to plow several dozen acres of land in an hour. Here, plowing one acre of land in a day was considered good.
Speaking of which, Yang Zhengshan had been worried that the Hu cavalry’s invasion would delay the spring plowing. Before the new year, he had bought a hundred acres of land, and during the Spring Festival, he had asked the Lu family to find him several tenant farmers. If the Hu cavalry hadn’t withdrawn before the spring plowing, his purchased land would have been wasted for a year.
Luckily, the Hu cavalry had withdrawn.
Yang Zhengxiang chatted with Yang Zhengshan for a while before leaving to take care of the funeral arrangements for the deceased soldiers. Their bodies had been lying there for over ten days, and the funeral had to be prepared quickly.
The Yang family members would be buried in the ancestral graves in the rear mountain. After knowing that the Hu cavalry had withdrawn, Yang Family Village was busy for two days, finally completing the funeral arrangements.
Because the bodies had been left for too long, and the current situation was still uncertain, the funeral was kept simple.
As time passed, the frozen earth began to thaw, and the cold northern wind began to dissipate. Yang Family Village also began to emerge from their sorrowful mood.
It was as if the entire world had come back to life.
The originally desolate countryside was now bustling with people, and vendors came to Yang Family Village. People who had hidden in the mountains returned home, and county officials began to persuade farmers to till the land.
It seemed as though everything had returned to normal, but Yang Zhengshan knew that this invasion by the Hu tribe was a major disaster for the people of the northern border.
Anning County, which was over three hundred miles from the border, had suffered losses, not to mention the people living closer to the border.
Moreover, this incident was far from over. If the Hu tribe could invade once, they could do it again, and the Great Rong Empire had suffered a great loss, so it was unlikely to let the matter drop.
It could be foreseen that the peaceful twenty years on the eastern border would no longer be peaceful in the future.
This invasion by the Hu tribe was just the beginning, marking the resurgence of the Hu tribe and the end of peace on the eastern border of the Great Rong Empire.
However, these were not Yang Zhengshan’s concerns. He was just a ordinary person, unable to change anything, and could only go with the flow.
On this day, Yang Zhengshan went to Jiang Family Village to visit Yang Yunyan.
After Yang Yunyan returned from the mountains, her pregnancy was unstable, and the Jiang family had called a doctor for her. However, Yang Zhengshan was not at ease, so he personally went to the county town to invite Song Yuanbo.
Song Yuanbo was the best doctor in Anning County, and Yang Zhengshan had to spend two taels of silver to invite him.
This was still due to Song Yuanbo’s favor towards him for selling him the old mountain ginseng in the past; otherwise, the old man would not have come.
“The big girl’s foundation is good, although she has been affected by the pregnancy, but it’s not serious. Just take two doses of the calming fetal pill, and she’ll be fine!”
Song Yuanbo said after examining Yang Yunyan’s pulse.
The Yang family girls were all martially inclined, and Yang Yunyan was no exception. Although Yang Yunyan’s martial arts skills were ordinary, her body was much stronger than the other girls.
Yang Zhengshan finally felt relieved, “Then it’s good, Old Jiang, let’s get the medicine from the county town this afternoon.”
“Good, good!” Jiang Cheng couldn’t refuse Yang Zhengshan’s request.
Currently, Jiang Cheng had some respect for Yang Zhengshan, who had saved his family. Although Jiang Cheng was older than Yang Zhengshan, he didn’t have the qualifications to act superior in front of him.
It wasn’t just that Yang Zhengshan had saved his family; the Jiang family had also taken advantage of Yang Family Village’s preparations to hide in the mountains.
The place they temporarily lived in and the supplies they consumed were all arranged by Yang Family Village beforehand.
“You take care of yourself at home, I’ll be back!” Yang Zhengshan whispered to Yang Yunyan.
Perhaps even Yang Zhengshan himself didn’t realize that he had become more gentle and kind towards the children in his family.
He had the demeanor of an old father.
People’s mental states could change with their environment.
At first, Yang Zhengshan felt burdened when he saw his children and grandchildren gathered around him, but now he had truly become one with Yang Family Village, treating the villagers as his own family.
He cared about his children and grandchildren, and took great pleasure in them.
From a big, young, and hot-headed youth, Yang Zhengshan had become an old father, a good grandfather.
The key was that Yang Zhengshan still hadn’t realized the change in his own mindset.
“Dad, I’m fine, you can go back!” Yang Yunyan said with a happy smile.
“Good, rest well!”
Yang Zhengshan left with Song Yuanbo, rejecting Jiang Cheng’s invitation to stay for a meal.
He wasn’t lying; there were indeed matters waiting for him at home.
After returning to Yang Family Village, Yang Zhengshan first arranged for Yang Mingzhi to send Song Yuanbo back to the county town. Then, he took Yang Mingcheng to the west of the village.
Yesterday, Lu Wenqun had brought him four tenant farmers. These four tenant farmers would live in Yang Family Village and work for Yang Zhengshan.
As Yang Family Village didn’t have any spare houses for them, Yang Zhengshan had asked Yang Zhengxiang to allocate a piece of wasteland for them to build their own houses.
For now, the houses hadn’t been built, and they could only set up tents on the wasteland.
The houses needed to be built by themselves, but Yang Zhengshan would provide the labor costs. The built houses would naturally belong to Yang Zhengshan.
Of course, they wouldn’t build any good houses, just earthen huts. Yang Zhengshan had only allocated a piece of land and roughly planned it out; the rest was up to them to build.
He came today to take these tenant farmers to divide the land for cultivation.
The four tenant farmers, totaling twenty-eight people, had sixteen people who could work on the land, excluding the elderly and children.
As tenant farmers, their lives were even harder. Previously, these four tenant farmers had worked in Qinghe Town and were unwilling to move to Yang Family Village. Yang Zhengshan had offered them a 10% reduction in rent, and they had agreed to come.
(End of Chapter)
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