Nearly Settled

"You thirty-two people, come up to me one by one and introduce yourselves. Tell me your name, your age, whether you are married, how many people are in your family, and how old your children are. Take turns saying it," Zhao Ruxi said.

A boy of about sixteen or seventeen, who was standing first beside the sapling, stepped forward upon hearing Zhao Ruxi's words and bowed, saying, "Hello, young lady."

After straightening up, he looked up at the sky and began to introduce himself, "My name is Qian Youyu, I am seventeen years old and not yet married. There are six people in my family." His pronunciation was quite clear.

Just now, Zhao Ruxi heard Qian Duoduo shouting "Youyu" and "Yousheng," and when she heard his surname was Qian, she knew he was his grandson.

"Okay, stand over there. Next." She nodded without saying anything more.

Of those thirty-two people, they had all rushed to the front to stand up earlier, driven by herd mentality and pressure from their parents. But now that they had to perform alone without companions, some of them became timid. Moreover, some had never left the village in their entire lives and had a natural fear of the outside world, so they shrank back and dared not step forward.

Zhao Ruxi's decision was essentially an exam, so she naturally wouldn't give them much time to hesitate. Moreover, she didn't intend to select too many people at once; otherwise, with so many fewer people at Zhuangtian, the autumn harvest would be impossible.

So, after estimating the time and seeing that no one else was coming up, she announced, "Alright, that's it. Anyone who hasn't come up yet has given up."

She said to the thirteen of you who had introduced themselves, "You don't need to work in the fields for a while. Come directly to the manor and train with the people inside. You'll be given two sets of clothes. Whether you can stay after the training depends on your performance. If you don't perform well, you'll have to go back to being servants."

Upon hearing that they wouldn't have to work and would even receive clothes, the servants were all amazed. Those who hadn't stepped forward to introduce the clothes were filled with regret, and their families complained about them.

Zhao Ruxi then reassured everyone, "Don't be anxious, just work on building your courage. I'll give you another chance when I need people again. However, I'll also take your usual performance into account. No matter how bold someone is, I won't hire someone who's cunning and deceitful."

In the future, she will select more talented people from among the servants to train. People who go from adversity to prosperity will cherish opportunities more; on the contrary, some servants of corrupt officials, who used to live in luxury in their mansions, feel uncomfortable living in her small temple. They want to do less work but also want better treatment. She doesn't want such people.

Qian Duoduo was already incredibly excited when Zhao Ruxi told her that the thirteen people could participate in the training.

Tears streaming down his face, he knelt down, kowtowing repeatedly and crying out, "Thank you for your mercy, young lady, for giving my children a future!"

Reminded by him, the others quickly knelt down and kowtowed to Zhao Ruxi.

"Get up quickly." Zhao Ruxi joked that she was from the exploiting class, but still had a conscience. Feeling uncomfortable with so many people kowtowing to her, she quickly stood up and turned to the side, saying, "Get up quickly, get up quickly."

But Qian Duoduo insisted on kowtowing three times before she could stand up.

Zhao Ruxi instructed Gao Weiqiang, "Lead them in. The men stay outside, and the women go into the inner courtyard."

Gao Weiqiang then gave a shout and led the thirteen men into the house.

"You stay, money lender; everyone else, go back to work."

Qian Duoduo quickly stepped forward, bowed slightly, and said respectfully, "Don't worry, young lady, even without those thirteen, we can still harvest today's autumn crops without any problems."

Zhao Ruxi waved her hand. "What I wanted to ask is, are you all able to manage these fields all the time? Do you have enough people, or not enough? If not, I'll buy some more servants. But managing them well will probably take more effort."

Qian Duoduo hesitated for a moment. "If it's not the busy farming season, we can manage. We'll be a little short-handed during the harvest season, but not by much."

He looked at Zhao Ruxi tentatively and said, "How about we have these people come back to help for a while during the busy farming season? That way we won't have to spend money to hire people, and it won't delay the harvest."

"No." Zhao Ruxi still needed to implement a series of reforms to the farm's crops, and hiring people was essential.

Her only concern now is Qian Duoduo's actual capabilities. If she buys twenty or thirty strong laborers, will Qian Duoduo be able to manage them well?

She can sell out the troublemakers and keep the newcomers in check. But how to establish authority in their eyes, get them to follow her orders, and how to assign tasks—that all depends on Qian Duoduo's abilities.

"You should prepare yourself mentally and get the land ready for building houses for them. I might send people over in a few days. You'll have to figure out how to arrange their food, lodging, and work," she instructed.

"Yes, young lady." Qian Duoduo was both excited and nervous. After bowing, she walked away with uneven steps.

When Zhao Ruxi returned to the house, she found that the team, which had just begun to take shape, had become a mess again due to the addition of those thirteen people. Both Ma Sheng and Lady Luo were in a state of chaos. To her surprise, she found that Lady Luo was more resourceful than Ma Sheng. Lady Luo had Ling'er lead the old team in practice while she herself reorganized the new team.

The people in the village were all illiterate, and they couldn't even count from one to ten smoothly. Lady Luo had to put in a lot of effort to teach them this, and then teaching them to walk was another chaotic affair, with almost half of them unable to distinguish left from right.

But the method was at least correct. After teaching them slowly for a while, they got better. Especially after hearing that there would be meat to eat if they trained well, the servants were all very motivated and quickly got into the swing of things. They could be put into a training team. With new people chasing after them, the competition in the old team became more intense. They dared not relax at all and trained even more seriously than before.

Ahead, Ma Sheng was still sweating profusely, correcting each of the newly arrived servants.

Zhao Ruxi asked Dianjiang to summon Ma Sheng and tell him to learn from his wife.

After watching the training for a while, she called Zhou Chun's family and Sister-in-law Li over and said to her, "So many people need their meals prepared, so the five of you don't need to participate in the training. You can help them prepare the food."

No matter how well these five people trained, she was going to keep them. Besides, after watching for a while, she found that Zhou Chun's family did an excellent job in both following instructions and executing movements precisely, and Sister-in-law Li no less impressive.

The others understood what she meant and Gao Xing agreed.

With everything arranged, Zhao Ruxi left the manor with Gao Weiqiang, Qingfeng, Dianjiang, and returned to Beining.

It was almost Wushi by then.

Zhao Ruxi did not go to Kang Shilin's place, but instead had Qingfeng open the door next door and entered Wu Zong's courtyard.

She was just about to instruct Uncle Lu to find Broker Li in Beining when, unexpectedly, Broker Li came to her door the moment she sat down.