Chapter 216: The Sweet Potatoes Have Ripened
Translator: YHHH Editor: Book_Hoarder
Ren Baqian got up from his bed and stretched after sleeping for more than two hours. He then shouted for someone to prepare the medicinal bath. It had been a long time since the last increase in his strength. Now that he’s back, he could finally enjoy the pleasure of rapidly increasing his strength again.
An increment of 75 newtons a week was already considered very fast to him.
That would be 300 newtons in a month, 600 newtons in two months, and over 1500 newtons of improvement in three months. The thought of that left him feeling a little excited.
After soaking in the medicinal bath, Ren Baqian felt that the empress must be exhausted from the journey as well. She would probably be resting at Yangxin Palace Hall after the meeting in another place. Then, he went back to his room and waited until almost dinner time before visiting the empress at Yangxin Palace Hall.
Everyone who saw him along the way rolled their eyes at him. Even though the empress had returned, they were all very worried and on edge during the period she was away.
And Ren Baqian was the main cause of their worry.
When he arrived at Yangxin Palace Hall, the empress was yawning. It seemed like she had just woken up not long ago.
“Your Majesty, how was your rest?” Ren Baqian went forward and asked.
The empress kept silent and shook her head, and it seemed like she was still a little tired.
Ren Baqian knew for sure, that she must have really tired herself out over the past few days.
Qing Yuan brought a chair from the side, and Ren Baqian sat down with the empress for a while. He said to her that the sweet potatoes planted in the beast park had already ripened, and should be dug up for inspection.
“Is that the crop that can be grown in abundance?” The empress sobered up after hearing this.
“Yes. I can’t say for sure that it will have a potential output of 10000 catties, but there should be at least 6000 catties of it. What’s important is that it can be grown anywhere. It can be grown on any type of soil, even on the mountains,” Ren Baqian replied.
“That’s good. I will bring some people over tomorrow morning.” The empress nodded. Provisions were very important, especially such high yielding crops that could be farmed anywhere.
Dayao had low crop production, and not much were imported from other nations as well. They relied solely on raising livestock. Especially in the mountains, their primary resources were gathered by hunting as well as picking wild herbs and fruits. If those sweet potatoes were like what Ren Baqian described them to be, then it would be of great help.
“Your Majesty, do you have land estate?” Ren Baqian asked yet another question.
“What’s that?” The empress was a little puzzled.
“That means royal landfills that belong to Your Majesty,” Ren Baqian explained. The spices for those sweet potatoes should have ripened as well. Also, he had planned to grow some other things such as cotton, which could be used to make cloth. They couldn’t possibly just rely on that plot of land at the beast park which couldn’t serve much purpose.
“Everything in this world belongs to me,” the empress replied.
After hearing those words, Ren Baqian understood that the imperial family of Dayao actually didn’t have any proprietary land estate. It was truly unexpected.
Without land estate, and with only two merchant caravans mainly responsible for purchasing from other nations while incidentally selling some goods, it was no wonder that the empress lived a simple life. However, this was also because the successive emperor did not put much thought into it. After all, the condition of Dayao’s economy wasn’t considered good, and they didn’t have much left over capital to lead an extravagant life.
But, hadn’t the former emperor considered their ability to pay the palace maids’ monthly wages? It wasn’t surprising that there were so few palace maids in the palace.
“Then who does the land outside Lan City belongs to?” Ren Baqian questioned.
“It has all been distributed to those officers and soldiers with meritorious services back then,” the empress answered.
“Is it possible to buy some of it?” Ren Baqian looked at the empress, and she looked back at him with a pair of glittering eyes but was full of bewilderment.
At the look of that, Ren Baqian thought to himself, “I understand, the empress has no knowledge of this at all. It is better that I consult someone else.”
“Later on I’ll get someone to find out if it’s possible to buy some. If we could grow and sell some spices, the profits will be huge,” Ren Baqian said.
“You shall arrange for that.” The empress couldn’t be bothered. She really had no interest in such things.
“Your Majesty, what is the imperial family’s main source of revenue?” Ren Baqian still felt that he should ask.
The empress replied without hesitation, “The imperial family has a share of the gold and silver mines.”
Now Ren Baqian knew where the imperial family’s money came from. He didn’t have much knowledge about the minerals in Dayao, but he felt that the imperial family couldn’t possibly have much of them.
He had better come out with solutions in future.
“Rest early, Your Majesty. I shall not impose on you any further.” Ren Baqian cupped his hands and left.
Early next morning, he left the palace and headed for the beast park. It had been about two months since the last time he had been to the beast park. He let out a sigh as he stood at the entrance of the beast park.
When he first arrived in this world, he had nothing much to do and always pondered about how to make money. He also managed a shaved ice shop with Caretaker Shi.
Who would have thought that things would turn out this way in just a few months’ time.
It’s not that he didn’t understand, it was just that things were changing too rapidly.
This time, it was not just two people following Ren Baqian when he went out, but a group of ten men. The look of it was pretty impressive.
After entering the beast park, Caretaker Shi could be seen behaving as frantically as crabs from afar. Seeing that group of people, he promptly went over to welcome them. He was pleasantly surprised when he saw Ren Baqian’s face.
“Deputy Prefect Ren!” Caretaker Shi paid his respects. As Ren Baqian had a different status now, he didn’t dare address him as Brother Ren anymore. The empress would peel his skin off if she were to know of it.
“Caretaker Shi, I finally had time to come back and take a look.” Ren Baqian was all smiles.
It was still that familiar scent, that familiar mate, and that as loud as a big trumpet voice.
“Deputy Prefect Ren will always be welcome to visit anytime.” Caretaker Shi patted on his own chest.
“What’s the status on those two plots of land?” Ren Baqian questioned, as that was his main objective here.
“There’s someone constantly taking care of them.” Ren Baqian was very satisfied with Caretaker Shi’s response.
“How are Tiantian and Gungun?” Ren Baqian asked. He hadn’t seen them for a long time, and he still missed those two chaps.
“They have grown fat. Let me take Caretaker Ren for a look.” Caretaker Shi laughed.
Ren Baqian nodded, and walked alongside Caretaker Shi.
He bumped into a couple of familiar faces along the way. Some of them were the odd-job workers who used to be under his care. He saw Teng Hulu and Tie Dao as well, and they all greeted from afar.
Ren Baqian didn’t speak much, but had intended to ask those two guys over to work under him. After all, he had planned to ask about the fields, and he couldn’t possibly do it all on his own. There were also some other odd jobs that could be assigned to the pair of men.
There was still the house that he used to stay in, but the entrance had been fenced up into a courtyard. Tiantian was stepping on top of Gungun, peering through the window into the house. They could be wondering why he hadn’t returned after so long.
When Tiantian sensed that someone was approaching, it clumsily turned over, immediately falling off Gungun’s body.
When Ren Baqian opened the door, those two fellows stared blankly at him for quite a while before realizing who he was. Then, they crawled over to his side unhurriedly and hugged his legs, asking for food.
Ren Baqian stroked the both of them. They had indeed grown fatter as compared to before and were almost like balls. They looked much cuter and lovable now.
I shall bring the both of them back to Pingle Park later.
Just simply looking at them makes me pretty happy.
It was just that their teeth had gotten somewhat sharper and somewhat in the way. He accidentally got wounded on the back of his hand by Tiantian’s teeth, and that made him infuriated which resulted in giving Tiantian a flick on its forehead.
After teasing them for a bit, Ren Baqian stood up and left to follow Caretaker Shi to have a look at the fields.
It was a sheet of green looking from afar.
First they went to the sweet potato field and got someone to dig along the vines and roots with a shovel. A huge bunch of muddy sweet potatoes were hauled up immediately. The bigger ones were the size of a fist, and the smaller ones weren’t too much smaller. Ren Baqian held it for a while, and it weighed about 5 to 6 catties.
He then got someone to dig up another two spots, and every spot contained a pretty decent harvest. More than 10 catties worth of sweet potatoes were dug out in total from those three places. There should be a harvest of at least 6000 to 7000 catties of sweet potatoes from this mu of land, which met with their expectations.
Ren Baqian felt good seeing the whole bunch of sweet potatoes piled together. After all, this was the change he brought to Dayao. He said to Caretaker Shi,
“Get these cleaned up, and have the kitchen steam half of them and roast the other half. I will be expecting someone to bring them over later.”
Following that, they went to check out the other plot of land. The pepper and star anise grew into small trees and would probably take a long time to ripen. Even the sesame plant would take another two months. Only the cumin looked like they were ripe.
But, the people at the beast park didn’t know how to harvest those crops and were afraid of spoiling them, so they just left them there. They had piled all those that had fallen to the ground together and waited for Ren Baqian to come back and handle them.
Ren Baqian stayed at the field until it was almost noon when he saw someone approaching from afar.
In one look, he noticed that lady in red was in front of him.
