A Spring in Their Step

Time flies.

Autumn has arrived in the blink of an eye.

As the autumn wind begins to blow, yellow leaves fall all over the country lanes, and the distant mountains are also dyed with patches of red maple leaves.

Various animals in the mountains, forests, and fields began to come alive.

This is their food-hoarding season.

The amount of harvest determines their survival probability in the following winter.

Ordinary people who follow the ancient law of autumn harvest and winter storage also follow this principle.

After a busy autumn harvest, the villagers of Xiushui Village immediately began planting winter wheat.

Only after all the labor for making a living was completely finished did everyone finally have time to take stock of their harvest for the year.

Thanks to the Lingxian Sect, the villagers of Xiushui Village have had good incomes in the past two years, with almost every household earning a considerable amount.

Farmers who trust their land exchange most of their income for land deeds that give them peace of mind.

In previous years, there were still many tenant farmers in Xiushui Village who made a living by renting other people's land to cultivate.

The reason people become tenant farmers is usually because they have too little land at home, or even no land at all, making it impossible for them to survive.

In this era, tenant farmers had to pay not only the taxes collected by the imperial court but also a portion of the harvest to the landowner.

However, human resources are ultimately limited, so even if these tenant farmers work diligently all year round, the grain they receive in the end is only enough to make ends meet.

It would be even more difficult if there were any natural disasters or famines.

So after incomes increased in the last two years, almost everyone in the village's first reaction was to buy land.

In the past few years, most people in Xiushui Village have acquired enough land for their own cultivation, or even have some surplus, and have completely stopped being tenant farmers.

The few families still renting land are also working hard to save money, just waiting to buy land as soon as they have enough.

Therefore, there are now many more plots of land in Xiushui Village that cannot be cultivated.

These lands were then leased by their owners to people in other nearby villages.

This made many tenant farmers in the surrounding villages, who had plenty of strength but couldn't rent much land, extremely happy.

After the winter wheat was planted and the autumn harvest was dried and weighed, with some taxes paid and some stored in the granary, the people of Xiushui Village were overjoyed by something exciting.

Something they had never imagined before.

Xiushui Village is about to be developed into Xiushui Town!

Since before the Lunar New Year, the village chief and several clan elders had been discussing this matter with the heads of each household.

However, because things were still undecided at the time, it wasn't said very clearly.

Although everyone felt it was somewhat unrealistic—after all, a village turning into a town was something that even their ancestors had never experienced, let alone them—the fact that word of this thing, which they had never dared to even think about before, had surfaced, coupled with the changes in the village in recent years, made them all hold a little hope for it.

Then, just yesterday...

Early in the morning, the head of each household was summoned by the village chief to the threshing ground.

In front of everyone, the village chief solemnly announced this matter.

When their expectations came true, everyone was overjoyed!

Furthermore, the village chief also made it clear to everyone about the Lingxian Sect's funding and loans, which was something that all the Lineage elders had agreed to.

The villagers of Xiushui Village had no objections to this.

These days, landlords who are willing to lend money are all great people, especially since the Lingxian Sect directly provided a sum of money as a subsidy.

In the future, when Xiushui Village becomes Xiushui Town, all the villagers will suddenly become town residents!

That would be so impressive to say!

From now on, all the girls who marry into their village—no, their town—can be considered to have married up!

This was an incredible temptation for the villagers of Xiushui Village, who could boast about their village's beautiful scenery and outstanding people simply because they lived by Mountain Stream and the North Mountain!

This means I'll have even more bragging rights to share from now on!

Look, a village has been upgraded to a town! Have you ever seen anything like it? Our Xiushui Village is one of a kind!

Previously, the appearance of the Lingxian Sect made the villagers of Xiushui Village feel proud, but it was only a distant relationship. This time it's different; they are the main characters in this whole affair!

As a result, the villagers have been walking with a brisk pace these past few days.

The bleak feeling of the autumn wind blowing the corners of their clothes seemed to become a tool to highlight their elegant and dashing demeanor.

This news naturally reached the ears of the high-ranking officials and dignitaries who had settled in Xiushui Village in recent years.

Two days later, Village Chief Du received another batch of donations.

The total amount is almost equal to the amount of funding provided by the Lingxian Sect.

In this way, the original construction budget for Xiushui Village can be increased even further.

It is foreseeable that once Xiushui Town is successfully built, it will soon become the most magnificent town under the jurisdiction of the entire prefecture.

People are in high spirits when they encounter happy events.

Village Chief Du sat in a wicker chair at home, waving to his son who was chopping firewood in the yard.

"Changsheng, I just remembered something. Remember that shack we built on the west side of the village? We need to build a new one. That old shack doesn't hold up well in the winter; it's really tough."

The shack on the west side was there two years ago. However, it was initially built because as the population of Xiushui Village increased, some destitute elderly people and children gradually came to wander here to beg for food.

Some were destitute and homeless people from various villages and towns, while others were ostracized by other powerful beggars in the city.

When they arrived in Xiushui Village, they didn't stop people to beg for money or food. They just quietly hid in a corner. If a kind-hearted person saw them, they would give them some money or food, and they could barely make ends meet each day.

Back then, some villagers saw that they had no roof over their heads every day, so they told the village chief that they wanted to find a secluded place to build them a small shack.

The old and the young, barely clothed and homeless, looked quite pitiful.

So later, with the village chief's approval, several villagers found an open space in the western corner and built them a simple shack, where they could barely make ends meet.

If this had happened three years ago, when most of the villagers in Xiushui Village were struggling to make ends meet, no one would have cared for these beggars.

It's only because they've had enough to eat and wear these past few years that they can offer this gesture.

The beggars were deeply grateful to the villagers of Xiushui Village and often helped them with whatever they could.

Later, more people in the village learned about this, and under the organization of the village chief, each family contributed their efforts to renovate the shack into a larger and sturdier structure. They also built walls around it with mud, straw, and bricks, making it half a house, which it still uses today.

The seven or eight elderly people and children living inside also cherish it, and when they have nothing to do, they will collect some stones and build them inside and outside the walls.