The Lucky Heiress

Chapter 581: Chapter 581 Reunion with Godmother_1

The Jiliao region is a bitterly cold area; this year’s harvest is difficult to guarantee, and there might be another poor grain yield this year.

Though the royal court annually provides a salary to the King Rui Residence, the current state of the court is already well known. With ongoing wars and natural disasters, the national treasury has become empty.

Even though the Emperor cherishes King Rui, he is now away from the capital. Whether or not the salary will be received on schedule and in full is now uncertain, given the Emperor’s distance.

Yun Zixiu, the butler of the Wang Residence, found Wei Ruo’s decision very inappropriate. He hurriedly explained his concerns to her, hoping Wei Ruo would reconsider and proceed with caution.

Wei Ruo calmly responded, “Don’t worry. I won’t let you starve.”

Wei Ruo was brimming with confidence.

This was not misguided confidence. She presently had eight plots of land in her possession. If all were planted on time, there would be no problem in providing for everyone in the Wang Residence.

Not to mention her warehouse was still eighty percent full. Even without further production, just consuming the food stored in this warehouse would be enough to feed everyone in the Wang Residence for three to five years.

When Wei Ruo insisted, Yun Zixiu and others had to comply. Not only was Wei Ruo their superior to whom they had to obey, the grain itself was brought in by Wei Ruo. How it was to be handled was up to her.

On the third day after the arrival of the King Rui Residence, the locals were astonished by the sudden good fortune.

This wasn’t the arrival of a prince; it was like the arrival of a living saint!

The Jiliao region had been without a prince for a long time, and people were unsure what it would be like to have a prince governing the land.

When they had first heard about the arrival of a prince, they were worried.

They feared that the prince would increase taxes, adding another burden to their already struggling lives.

But who would have expected such a scenario?

The King Rui Residence distributed grain directly to each household.

At first, when the news spread, people didn’t believe it.

It wasn’t until their turn came, watching the giant sack of wheat, that they truly believed the King Rui Residence had indeed distributed grain to them!

This was refined grain that they had not seen for several years!

It felt like they were in a dream!

Next, Wei Ruo announced that the Wang Residence was promoting the cultivation of potatoes and sweet potatoes. Seeds could be taken for free, and only a third of the harvest needed to be returned.

If the yield was less than three times the seed quantity, there was no need to return anything.

Most of the locals were illiterate, cloudy about these rules and couldn’t calculate whether it was profitable or not.

But since Wei Ruo had distributed grain upon her arrival, the large bag of grain was more valuable than these seeds.

Moreover, the King Rui Residence had publicized the fact that potatoes grew quickly, had a high yield, and could feed the whole family once grown.

Therefore, people enthusiastically joined the ranks of potato growers.

After all, they didn’t have a better choice.

Nothing grew well here, and with the poor climate of the past two years, they could barely eat, even depredating wild grasses.

Hence, taking new seeds and trying out new crops didn’t feel like a loss.

As the old saying goes, ‘the barefooted are not afraid of those wearing shoes.’ When one reaches a certain level of poverty, there’s nothing left to fear.

After the plantation began, Wei Ruo worked from morning till night almost every day, advocating in the fields.

The Jiliao region had one advantage: its land was vast and sparsely populated with a flat terrain, so almost every family had a considerable amount of land.

People were unable to get enough to eat previously because of the cold climate and frozen soil that made it hard to grow crops. Even those crops that did survive yielded low production.

In reality, this land was not barren; the climatic conditions were just not suitable for prior crops.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

With suitable crops to plant, the farming work was not troublesome but was even more time and effort-saving compared to when Wei Ruo was in Jiangzhe.

However, the distance Wei Ruo had to walk each day was tens of times the distance she used to walk in the Huzhou Prefecture countryside.

In the beginning, Wei Jinyi accompanied Wei Ruo in the guise of Wang Jin. As they gradually became familiar with the surroundings, Wei Jinyi didn’t accompany her every time.

When not with Wei Ruo, Wei Jinyi would stay in the residence to handle affairs from the Capital City.

He constantly kept in touch with the Capital City and monitored the movements of the political situation in the Capital City.

Although he had no ambitions for inheritance, he also needed to ensure the safety of himself and Wei Ruo. He couldn’t forfeit his defensive capabilities, so he needed to ensure the political situation was within his control and accurately know about movements of potential threats.

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On March 15, Uncle Xu and Aunt Xu arrived at the Wang Residence to reunite with Wei Ruo.

Xu Zhengyong’s military base was located further north at the border. His residence was in a small town by the border, where Xu’s parents should have been residing. Now that Wei Ruo was there, they naturally came to reunite with her.

The only regret was that Xu Zhengyong had already entered the military compound and could not travel freely, so he didn’t come along this time.

Upon seeing Wei Ruo in her current state, Aunt Xu was overjoyed and teary-eyed.

“Miss, I’m so happy! Things are really going great now!”

“Auntie, why haven’t you changed your habit yet? You can’t call me ‘miss’ anymore,” Wei Ruo corrected.

Aunt Xu embarrassingly replied, “It’s a habit. I can’t change it all at once.”

“Try calling me once,” Wei Ruo suggested.

“This…” Aunt Xu opened her mouth, but couldn’t find the words for quite some time.

“You can call me the same way as Second Brother, Ruoruo,” Wei Ruo said.

“Ru…Ruo…ruo…” Aunt Xu said, awkwardly pronouncing Wei Ruo’s name.

“Yes!”

Wei Ruo responded enthusiastically and cheerfully hugged Aunt Xu.

Aunt Xu stiffened for a moment before reaching out to hug Wei Ruo back.

The delicate little girl had not only grown up, she had also finally broken free from those restraints and started living her own life.

After a brief reunion, Wei Ruo discussed the upcoming plans with Aunt Xu.

We Ruo currently had no plans of establishing a business in the Jiliao area; all her plans revolved around how to increase production to feed the people living on this land.

Planting potatoes didn’t require any sophisticated skills; the main task was coordination and planning.

As long as they could peacefully spend these sixty days and welcome the first harvest, future matters should be easier to handle.

After discussing official matters, Aunt Xu brought up an issue with Wei Ruo.

“Miss…” Aunt Xu began, but was glared at by Wei Ruo, causing her to correct herself, “Ruoruo, there’s something I would like to discuss with you.”

“Mother, please speak,” Wei Ruo replied.

“Xiaoyong is no longer young, and he should start his own family. He’s currently in the military which might delay his potential marriage. However, if he doesn’t marry soon, I won’t be able to face our ancestors!”