CH-020

After the rains passed, the time for spring plowing arrived.

The seeds in Elder Jager’s fields had already sprouted, and Shu Li had finished tilling the soil and making ridges, having just planted the first batch of seeds in his life.

Before his reincarnation, Shu Li had no experience in farm work, nor any desire to start a vegetable garden.

The helplessness lay in the fact that while the people of Huaxia consider food as their heaven, this world did not have much to eat. To make his life more bearable, Shu Li began his own farming life.

In this process, Shu Li received a lot of help from Elder Jager’s family.

For example, how to use a “heavy plow” to turn the soil.

To be honest, Shu Li tried his best not to trouble others if he didn’t have to; he didn’t want to add more burden to Elder Jager’s family because of his existence.

After all, he was an adult.

Thus, when he found a hoe in the church warehouse, Shu Li felt a bit of excitement in his heart.

This would be the first step of his agricultural plan.

Although he had never actually done farm work, he had seen plenty of video materials. The use of a hoe was simple; it just required some effort.

Though this agricultural process was inefficient, it was a return to basics and possessed a certain romance.

Until he actually picked up that hoe—

Heavy.

The iron head of the hoe made his wrist ache with the very first swing.

While this indicated that Shu Li might be using his strength the wrong way, seeing that the ground remained largely undisturbed made Shu Li hear the voice of protest from the reason within his mind.

At his current speed, to finish tilling the small plot behind the church (tilling, ridging, and digging furrows), it would take at least a week.

Within that week, Shu Li would lose all interest in farm work.

He gave a bitter smile.

As expected, only those with poetic sentiment can be like Tao Yuanming; those without it are just “facing the yellow earth with backs to the sky.”

Just as he was pondering whether to set aside his pride and borrow an ox from the Jager family, he heard the crisp sound of a bell outside the church.

Cecilia, Elder Jager’s daughter, came over leading an ox and bringing a heavy plow, smiling like a sunflower facing the sun: “Lord Alis, Father said your farming tools are all aged. If you rely only on brute force, this spring plowing will turn into an autumn harvest.”

Without Shu Li even having to ask, Cecilia skillfully set to work to help.

The small vegetable garden was finished in less than half a day, with both plowing and weeding completed.

Additionally, the twins Via and Xia would come over from time to time after the seeds sprouted to help watch the field, pull weeds, and even catch bugs.

This allowed Shu Li to devote himself entirely to his agricultural planting plan.

Before discussing the agricultural plan, it’s best to briefly organize the aftermath of the Finnian kidnapping incident.

After all, this had suddenly disrupted Shu Li’s original plans.

Shu Li had originally planned to wait for Raymond’s return and then properly deal with this year’s food storage issue, so that he wouldn’t be left without a single grain of food once winter arrived.

But after Edric died, Shu Li suddenly had many things to handle.

Like having to handle the man’s funeral; Shu Li wasn’t some saintly “good guy,” but since the dead are great, he still had to be laid to rest in the earth.

Furthermore, he had to release the couple who had assisted and instruct them not to talk nonsense.

And then there was the matter of dealing with the firearms left behind by the cavalry.

These firearms were very serious “controlled instruments.”

Shu Li’s first thought was to hand them over to the police, but then he considered whether to keep them secretly and modify them into more portable “handguns” as a means of self-defense.

However, he went back and examined the structure of the guns carefully.

He found that they couldn’t be turned into the modern handguns of his memory; from the ignition system onwards, they were completely different. Moreover, the structure of the gun body itself did not support a firing mechanism; modifying them would be worse than melting the guns down and remaking them.

To Shu Li, these guns were no different from scrap iron.

Thus, he handed the guns over in their entirety to the Constable for disposal.

He originally thought the matter ended there, but two weeks later, a stranger in military uniform arrived at the church door and delivered a heavy box.

There was no note in the box, only a metal block melted down to about three kilograms.

The inscriptions from the gun barrel were still preserved on the metal block, clearly visible.

This was a cold and hard reply.

In other words, after the cavalryman threw the gun down, he had already treated it as trash. Seeing the priest send it back, he had no intention of taking it back, let alone saying thank you; his heart held only indifference.

And now the metal block was distorted, cold, and heavy, much like that man’s temperament.

Shu Li was speechless for a moment and put the box away.

Originally, he wanted to let it gather dust in a corner of the church warehouse. Later, he remembered that this world wasn’t that safe. So, he studied the structure of the doorway, found a very tricky angle, and used the metal block as a doorstop.

At least when sleeping at night, he didn’t have to fear the lock being picked and the door being pushed open smoothly.

After using it for two or three days, the metal block was covered in a layer of dust and lost its sharp edge, but at least it was no longer scrap iron.

Thus, the lingering problem of the “firearms” was also successfully resolved.

Shu Li could finally catch his breath for a moment.

However, before he could immerse himself in the farming plan, a fourth problem emerged in a way Shu Li hadn’t imagined—”the church was actually open for business.”

At first, Shu Li didn’t notice. After all, he had to properly handle four or five things, ranging from inventorying seeds in the warehouse and arranging planting matters to handling the funeral, purification, and the firearms. His brain was simply too busy.

So, for five consecutive days, like a routine, he drank the milk sent by Finnian early in the morning, and after looking down and sighing, “Fresh milk is indeed more fragrant and mellow than milk from a cold storage,” he suddenly realized—

He was being fed.

No, could this be the legendary “offering from a believer”?

These past few days, he hadn’t thought deeply about it; others gave it, he smelled no strange odor, so he just drank it.

Oh, he remembered.

The first time he received it, Finnian said there was “poison” inside, and then Shu Li just took it and drank it.

Now, like waking from a dream, he realized the kid knew he wouldn’t accept it, so he found a way to make him drink it. Moreover, the wall of the ceramic cup still retained a bit of body heat—clearly, Finnian calculated his wake-up time accurately every day.

Regardless, he looked down at Finnian, who was waiting to collect the cup, and said: “Uh… I don’t know if you know, but the person who saved you was Herens.”

After Shu Li said this, he carefully considered the accuracy of the statement.

Strictly speaking, it was Herens who went to the forest keeper’s house to save Finnian, it was Herens who sent Finnian home, and it was even Herens who discovered Finnian had symptoms of a fever.

He hadn’t participated in the process at all.

“I know.”

As Finnian spoke, he pulled at Shu Li’s wrist, making Shu Li show him how much milk had been drunk. Upon finding a small sip left at the bottom, Finnian handed the cup back to Shu Li to make him finish it.

Shu Li downed it in one go.

Then, seeing him drinking, Finnian added nonchalantly: “But that Herens said he is ‘your man’.”

Shu Li nearly spat out the mouthful of milk, unable to help frowning as he tried to maintain his image, asking back: “What?” He suspected Finnian said such things on purpose just to see what other reactions he would show.

However, as Finnian spoke, he naturally pulled at Shu Li’s wrist again: “He said he is your ‘loyal servant’ or something, saying his actions all stem from your will and whatnot.”

Confirming Shu Li had finished, Finnian took the cup away and said: “If thanks are to be given, one should thank the Lord, the Church, and the Priest.”

Shu Li was speechless, even starting to suspect for a moment if Finnian was making up tall tales again.

Had that personality, which had settled down after the kidnapping case, started to become restless again?

Finnian blinked and added: “Anyway, my family told me to come and give thanks. My own thought is, since I have to thank someone anyway, if I’m really going to curry favor and repay a debt, I’ll naturally pick the one who makes me feel good.”

“Oh.”

That really was a rather childish way of putting it.

Shu Li stopped caring; he would wait until Finnian got bored of it himself.

Seeing that Shu Li had said a few extra words this time, Finnian followed up curiously: “Are all the priests in your church as good-looking as you?”

Shu Li hadn’t met any other colleagues until now.

Of course, he himself didn’t really want to associate with colleagues.

“I don’t know about that.”

“If you said everyone in the church was like you, I wouldn’t believe it.” Finnian began to think carefully, “Speaking of which, there might even be very beautiful girls in the church. Joining the church isn’t out of the question.”

Seeing Finnian constantly peeking at his expression to see what look he would give, Shu Li couldn’t help but find him a bit funny: “Such a thing should be decided by your parents, shouldn’t it?”

“I’m already 11 years old; I can certainly make my own decisions.”

Seeing that he had so much free time to chat with him, Shu Li then thought about how he always went around deceiving people out of boredom or running away from home; it was probably because he had no peers to play with that he was so idle.

He didn’t look for Herens because Herens was a hunter who left early and returned late, being very busy every day.

And putting aside the matter of the farmland for a moment, he himself was clearly relatively free.

Shu Li then asked: “By the way, what do you usually do?”

Finnian misunderstood Shu Li’s intention, thinking he wanted to mock him for not earning money and thus not being able to claim he could make his own decisions.

So, the young boy curled his lip quite disdainfully and said: “Don’t look at me being idle like this. Anything my father can do, I can do now—checking the ledgers, helping organize festival activities, and sometimes I even help contact nobles or knights. Some adults can’t even compare to me, and they can’t bully me either.”

“I’ll be the village chief next door in the future, even more powerful than you!”

After saying this, he smiled toward Shu Li, “If you’re a bit nicer to me, I’ll take more care of you in the future.”

How could Shu Li take a child’s words to heart? He said: “It sounds like you mostly associate with adults?”

Actually, his intention was to point out why Finnian wasn’t going to school at this age, or being an apprentice, to learn some clear skills for himself.

“The kids at school are all stupid; I don’t want to play with them.” Finnian crossed his arms, his expression quite defiant.

Shu Li wanted to ask if he would be bored, but then he thought that he had already tossed his parents and neighbors around enough and had long since started finding fun for himself. Perhaps it was because he was too smart and learned everything as soon as he was taught that he seemed impetuous.

The problem Finnian faced now wasn’t that he was unwilling to learn, but that this closed-off little place could no longer keep up with his growth speed.

He suddenly realized that Finnian might really not belong here; he should go further, see the bigger world, and then it would be better for him to decide his own future.

While Shu Li was thinking, Finnian continued: “Among my peers, only Leslie is quite smart. I saw him alone before and thought about playing with him, but he was very fierce to me, which was very boring. I don’t want to bother with him!”

If Finnian hadn’t mentioned Leslie, Shu Li would have almost forgotten the person’s existence.

Shu Li felt that his entanglement with that child was stuck on the “demon rumor.”

In fact, as long as he insisted the boy had no problem, there would be no intersection between the two.

Moreover, if the child really knew how his biological mother passed away, he would be even less likely to have an intersection with the church.

One should know that a child lacking maternal love often has psychological barriers.

Shu Li subconsciously wanted to rub his brow.

Children like Leslie are typical; they look like matches soaked by rain—appearing cold and hard, but actually still able to strike a warm flame. But whether this warms people or burns oneself depends entirely on whether the hand of the person striking the spark is steady.

A simple analysis of Leslie could be done using Jung’s “Anima.”

Leslie, who had lacked maternal love since childhood, clearly had a damaged “Anima” image in his heart.

This would lead to two outward manifestations: one is emotional indifference, and the other is emotional projection. The main theme of the original text, “revenge,” happens to be a combination of these two.

From a psychological analysis, it can be called both a release of emotion and an integration of self-personality.

This could lead to two endings: one being the protagonist’s darkening, and the other being the protagonist’s own healing.

Although looking at the living environment in the Savoy pasture now, even in an environment that didn’t welcome him, what this child displayed was only being occasionally a bit indifferent, eccentric, and having a rather warm side toward people. However, this was because in this period, he still had a craving or appeal for his father’s affection.

The absence of maternal love would inevitably leave deep scars in his heart.

A person’s self-protection awareness will constantly seek compensation to make up for this deficiency.

If he cannot fill the void in his heart, he easily develops a kind of obsession due to the mother’s absence—namely, a long-term emotional hunger.

According to the novel’s description, the early Leslie always regarded his rarely seen father as the role model in his heart, both fearing and worshipping him, with an almost stubborn admiration. Thus, this led Leslie to actually do many good things silently for the Savoy pasture, restraining his grievances and anger, never speaking of it, just waiting for the day his father returned so he could see everything he had done.

In the end, the young Leslie hoped to get the recognition and acceptance he desired.

However, after his father locked him in the basement, Leslie also began to feel despair regarding his father’s existence, and would even kill his father with his own hands without hesitation when he finally learned the truth.

From the tone of the whole story, Shu Li felt that getting involved with the novel’s protagonist would be very troublesome.

On the surface, one might think this child is quite easy to appease, as long as one is kind to him. But at the end of the day, he is just emotionally hungry, drinking whatever water he sees. But once the day comes when he finds he drank the wrong thing, the first one to be flushed down the drain will definitely be the person who thought they were his good friend.

This wasn’t originally so difficult to resolve.

Because such characters usually appear in novels with a romantic subtext, and it’s enough to arrange a romantic character who can stay with the protagonist through thick and thin.

However, that’s where the difficulty lay.

This revenge novel had no female lead in any real sense.

Shu Li remembered that there was a plot where Leslie felt attracted to a girl he liked at the military academy. The two were at odds with each other, their personalities complementary, but just as the affection had started to bud and before it could develop, the girl died because she became involved in political struggles.

Therefore, summing up all the above, whether from character analysis or plot analysis, Shu Li believed that showing kindness to Leslie was also a futile effort.

Of course, this was the setting of a novel character, especially given that the background was relatively turbulent, and the protagonist’s personality was more easily intensified by an unstable environment.

In a peaceful and normal real life, such people are mostly just introverted and emotionally detached, but can still integrate into groups smoothly through socialization.

Just as Shu Li thought this, the image of bumping into the white-haired young Leslie in the basement flashed back in his mind, and he couldn’t help but feel resistance.

He was unwilling to get close to Leslie for another reason—he actually knew how to guide someone to build a healthy personality, but this part required not only professional knowledge but also the ability to engage in long-term emotional exchange.

But Shu Li didn’t like building emotional connections with people. Once he established a stable long-term connection with someone, and that person started to invade his life, he would feel anxiety, tension, irritability, unease, rejection, and even anger.

Or to put it another way, what Shu Li feared was not building the relationship itself, but the loss of control and self-exposure that the relationship brought.

So in guiding Leslie, Shu Li didn’t think he would be a qualified attending physician. Moreover, Shu Li’s professional direction wasn’t psychological treatment.

…

Finnian had finished venting his own emotions and thoughts and hadn’t noticed that Shu Li’s thoughts had drifted beyond the horizon.

He asked Shu Li curiously: “Priest Alis, then what do you usually do?”

That indeed was a good question.

“Maybe you can give me an answer.”

Shu Li didn’t feel he was caring about the child’s education, nor was he participating in guiding Finnian to learn any knowledge or skills from him.

He just suddenly felt curious in this simple and somewhat trivial busy life—what would a child like Finnian, with a flexible mind, execution power, and endurance, turn into if he happened to be by his side.

It was like doing an experiment—he provided the conditions and observed the results, nothing more.

Finnian was already curious about Shu Li; hearing him suddenly issue such a challenge, his interest was instantly piqued. He raised his chin and said quite proudly: “Isn’t that simple! I’ll come and observe you every day!”

From then on, Shu Li had an extra little tail during his usual times.

To the outside world, some people began to spread rumors that Finnian was Shu Li’s believer.

But the true believer was the silent Herens.

As early as when Herens could cite the church’s regulations to the villagers who came to clamor, Shu Li realized that the other party had likely held a position in the church before. Later, he used a mission to escape and rid himself of his status as a church member, until Shu Li said God knew exactly what he was thinking.

Herens finally couldn’t bear the condemnation of his conscience and confessed to Shu Li.

Shu Li remembered that what he had said at the time was whether he wanted to rejoin the church was still his own personal choice. After he finished saying that matter, the Lord had forgiven his choice at that time, and he didn’t need to dwell on it.

Herens hadn’t given a clear answer then, nor did he participate in any of the church’s daily prayer activities, so Shu Li thought he had no intention of joining.

Now, after this exchange with Finnian, Shu Li more or less knew the other party’s awkward inner world.

In summary, the aftermath of the Finnian kidnapping incident was completely over.

Thus, Shu Li could devote himself entirely to the agricultural activities he looked forward to most.

Raymond felt that this trip to Carson City was a total failure.

First of all, the salt brought back was old salt retired from the Carson City church; it had been piled up for several years and had clumped into blocks like stones, and even the color had some difference from new salt.

He hadn’t discovered this at first.

Until it rained, and he saw that the holy ointment and spices were splashed with rainwater. While checking the goods, Raymond discovered the holy ointment and spices were old stock, likely leftovers from preaching processes. He felt uneasy, so he checked the salt bags and found the salt was all problematic.

The salt not only had dust but also carried a strange odor because of the long storage time.

The second thing was that Raymond went to buy seeds; basic fruit and vegetable seeds could be bought along the way, but things like alfalfa, red clover, and alyssum were instead more expensive. Especially alyssum; according to the buyer, this was a flower unique to the south, usually grown in the gardens of noble holy courts.

Raymond thought that Priest Alis must want to look at the flowers to soothe his homesickness, so he concentrated most of the seed money on alyssum.

As a result, on his way back, he heard that this alyssum was just a common southern flower and was actually not that rare in the Northern Territory; it shouldn’t have been sold so expensively.

Because of this matter, Raymond delayed his return home for a while to argue with the peddler.

The peddler originally didn’t want to pay attention, but upon learning that although Raymond was from the countryside, he was also a member of the clergy, he feared he would go to the Carson City church to complain. So the peddler pacified Raymond by saying that although the money couldn’t be refunded, he was willing to give Raymond wheat for free.

One should know that wheat was much more precious than rye and barley.

He usually just heard a lot about wheat but saw little of it.

Seeing the peddler was willing to give it, Raymond quickly agreed.

During this second return journey, Raymond again met the farmer who had given him the reminder before, and discovered that the wheat given by the peddler included long-straw and short-straw varieties, and most of it was short-straw.

Short-straw wheat had been popular in the southern regions for a time because the plants were short and didn’t fear lodging during heavy winds and rain. But the problem was that this type of short-straw wheat had few grains per ear, low yield, and the kernels were not full; it was scrap that only people who didn’t understand would buy.

If planted, it would mean a wheat harvest failure for the entire year.

The farmer suggested taking the kernels of the short-straw wheat to a stone mill to grind into powder and sell as wheat flour; perhaps he could earn a bit of extra small change.

Raymond felt deep despair because of his mistakes in handling things—his first mission was done so poorly. He loitered outside for half a day not wanting to go back, but finally, not wanting to delay Priest Alis’s time, he went back to report.

However, Priest Alis wasn’t the least bit unhappy about the results Raymond brought back.

At the time, Raymond’s fingernails were digging deep into his palms out of shame, yet he heard the priest say easily and calmly: “Salt itself has no such thing as being expired or not; use water to precipitate impurities, and if there’s still an odor after drying the salt, just give it a simple stir-fry. This just requires a bit of time for simple processing. And it looks like the other church gave a bit extra to clear out old stock. We’ve gained.”

“The most critical thing is that you actually brought back short-straw wheat!”

Raymond couldn’t understand Priest Alis’s point of excitement regarding the short-straw wheat at all.

Seeing that he seemed even happier than when he brought back the alyssum, Raymond followed the previous farmer’s example, peeling open a wheat ear to let Alis look closely at the shriveled wheat kernels.

He himself kept his head lowered, like a wheat seedling hit by frost, “Lord Alis, look at this wheat first…”

But the priest rubbed a wheat kernel with his fingertip, his pupils looking like they were burning with a spark of fire, “Raymond, do you know what this wheat is like?”

“…Like a bad seed with malnutrition?”

That wasn’t some metaphor, was it?

The priest gave a light laugh: “This is like a gold mine.”

Shu Li didn’t care about the size or shape of these wheat kernels.

Because the two types of wheat Raymond brought over made him think of a keyword: “hybridization.”

In Jia Sixie’s “Qi Min Yao Shu,” it was mentioned that short-straw varieties themselves have the potential to increase yield. And modern Western agriculture also realized during the first “Green Revolution” that there is a positive correlation between short straw and high yield.

After the wheat hybridization succeeded, Shu Li could preserve good quality seeds and maintain a seed field. At the latest in three years, the church could achieve wheat freedom.

“Do you know what wheat can be used for?”

“Wheat flour?”

“No, it can produce glutenin.”

“Glutenin?”

“That is gluten.” Shu Li explained seriously, “This stuff can make dough become soft and fluffy; by then, making mantou, baozi, noodles, or cakes will be simply too easy.”

“What? What are those?”

Shu Li remembered that the so-called concept of gluten in Western society wouldn’t arrive until after 1745; all along, they had been eating rock-hard bread.

Shu Li felt a bit of regret: “I don’t have wheat flour, otherwise I could show you.”

“Can’t barley or rye do it?”

“No.”

Raymond thought for a moment and said: “Actually, our family has a bag of wheat flour kept for holiday eating.”

“Can you let me try?”

Hearing the priest’s request, Raymond’s heart instantly leaped with joy. He was eager to help Priest Alis more, so he immediately puffed out his chest and answered for the whole family, saying: “Of course!”

But he didn’t expect that Shu Li’s “making gluten” actually involved making the precious wheat flour into a dough and then pouring it into a large basin of clear water, beginning to knead it vigorously as if washing clothes.

The surface of the water immediately turned white.

The members of Elder Jager’s family nearly fainted upon seeing this scene.

Lona, Elder Jager’s wife, had a flushed face and her lips trembled as if they were beating time; she pulled hard at Elder Jager’s sleeve, murmuring in a low voice: “Is he washing the wheat flour? Is he really washing it? How much money is that?”

The muscles on Elder Jager’s face also couldn’t help twitching, as if he were calculating how many loaves of bread he had lost.

Cecilia couldn’t help opening her mouth: “What can this be made into?”

Raymond also had no idea.

Until the dough was thrown into clear water and washed again, the air in the whole kitchen froze, and even the hot water in the pot beside them seemed to bubble intensely out of nervousness.

Priest Alis turned around with an apologetic expression, cleared his throat awkwardly, and asked: “That… perhaps, can I have a bit more wheat flour?”

This sentence was instantly like a bolt of lightning splitting everyone’s hearts.

Elder Jager’s heart was bleeding, as if he were performing some sacred martyrdom ritual. Until his wife Lona gave his lower back a fierce pinch, Elder Jager closed his eyes and handed over the bag: “Lord Alis, use it as you please! Failure doesn’t matter, feeling good is the most important thing…”

He paused, learned from the painful experience, and said with great heroism: “It’s just a mere bag of wheat flour! Don’t be afraid! Use it as you wish—!!!”