Transmigrated as an Unwanted Ugly Girl

Chapter 455: Chapter 239: A Young Couple’s Affection

Juhua stood to the side with a smile, watching Zhang Huai unload the cart. He led the ox to one side, opened the cart’s gate to reveal the blue bricks inside, then glanced at her with a grin and asked softly, "What did you do at home today?"

Juhua smiled. "We went to the round pond to pick water bamboo shoots today. Changxing and Sanshun went down in a big wooden tub to pick them. It was a lot of fun. I’ve boiled the mature ones, and they’ll be ready to eat soon."

Zhang Huai lifted a stack of five blue bricks and smiled. "Perfect, I’m hungry." As he spoke, he motioned for Juhua to step aside. "I’ll stack the bricks and tiles at the base of your family’s courtyard wall. It’ll save me the trouble of unloading them at my place and then having to carry them over to the mountainside later."

Yang Family rolled up her sleeves and was about to step forward to help when Zhang Huai turned, saw her, and quickly stopped her. "Auntie, you should just tend to your own business. Don’t get your hands dirty. My dad and mom are right behind us; they came specifically to move the bricks."

Hearing this, Juhua looked up and saw Zhang Dashuan and He indeed coming down the village path.

When the two of them reached the gate, they said to Yang Family with a chuckle, "Sister-in-law, we’re borrowing your space to store these bricks and tiles. It won’t be for long. We’ll be building the house in a few more days."

Yang Family, her face wreathed in smiles, replied, "Listen to you! Leaving your things here shows you trust me, so why say such things? The sooner you move over, the more often we can chat."

So, the group started stacking the blue bricks along the inside of the courtyard wall, chatting and laughing as they worked. Juhua, meanwhile, went to the backyard to pick some vegetables and prepare dinner.

Seeing Zhang Huai sweating profusely from his hard work, Yang Family asked with concern, "You’ll have to make a few more trips tomorrow, won’t you? You should have your father go with you to help. Qingmu is surely too busy to get away, and you’ll work yourself to death moving all these bricks alone."

Zhang Huai smiled. "Qingmu helped me load these blue bricks today, and the people at the brick kiln helped out too."

Zhang Dashuan’s face lit up with a grin as he said, "I’m definitely going with him. I’m afraid we won’t even finish hauling it all in one day tomorrow. We’ve decided to build an extra room—four rooms in total—so we ended up buying more bricks and tiles!"

Yang Family asked in surprise, "Weren’t you planning on building three rooms? Why four all of a sudden?"

She was well aware of the Zhang family’s financial situation. After buying a few acres of land this year, their funds were tight, so they could only afford to build three rooms. ’That’s fine,’ she thought. ’They can always add on later when they have more money. They might not even need to. If Yangzi becomes a Scholar, or even a Champion Scholar, he won’t be living in the countryside anymore anyway.’

He said happily, "The village chief heard our family was building a house and discussed it with his father. He said he wanted to buy our old house to set up a workshop, which would save the village the trouble of building a new one. His father agreed! So, now that we have a bit more breathing room financially, we decided to add another room."

Zhang Dashuan glanced at Huai Zi, who was busy moving bricks with his head down, and said, "Huai Zi was against it at first. He said he wanted to keep the house plot for an orchard. But the village chief told him, ’Instead of putting an orchard in the middle of the village, you’d be better off buying new land by the mountainside to plant fruit trees. It would be right near your new home and easier to look after. Are you really going to run back to the village and live there just to watch over an orchard in the future?’ When Huai Zi and I thought about it, we realized he was right, so we agreed."

Yang Family nodded repeatedly. "That makes things much more convenient for you. Next year, you can buy a few acres of wasteland out here and plant whatever you want. Otherwise, leaving a plot of land back in the village would just be a constant worry."

He smiled until her eyes crinkled. ’Selling the house plot like this might seem a bit like squandering the family assets, but in reality, having this extra Silver for cash flow means we can build a better house. Then, when it’s time for Huai Zi to get married, it won’t look so shabby.’

’As for land, once we butcher the two pigs this winter and make them into sausages to sell, won’t we have more Silver by the end of the year? Just like Yang Family said, we can buy a few acres of wasteland then and plant whatever we want.’

Zhang Dashuan laughed. "Isn’t that the truth? The village chief said if it weren’t for the fact that more families live in the village and fewer live out by the mountainside, he wouldn’t build the workshop in the village at all—it would be better to put everything out here. But, he did say the sausage workshop still has to be built over here. Since your family was the first to come up with it, it should naturally be centered around you."

Many hands make light work. They finished moving the blue bricks in no time. Huai Zi went to the well to draw water and wash his hands, then asked Juhua with a smile, "Are you stir-frying the water bamboo shoot greens for dinner?"

Juhua was vigorously rubbing the chopped water bamboo shoot greens in a bamboo basket. Having grown in water, the stems and leaves were covered in a layer of grime and had to be repeatedly scrubbed and washed. Then they had to be tossed into a hot, oily wok and stir-fried over high heat. Adding some crushed garlic would not only make it more fragrant but also help to sterilize it.

Hearing his question, she didn’t look up but simply nodded. "I picked quite a bit today. Do you want some?"