Ch 40: Reborn to Raise My Husband

The young man stubbornly chased after them for a few more steps. The constable drew his blade. “If you keep causing trouble and disturbing public order, don’t blame us for being rough!”

He didn’t dare push forward anymore and could only stop slowly in place.

As the crowd dispersed, the young man collapsed to the ground, powerless, falling to his knees. His hands braced against the dirt, and he broke down sobbing.

Xiao Yuanbao gripped Qi Beinan’s hand tightly, finding it hard to lift his eyes to look at the young man’s bloodied face, his forehead torn and caked with flesh and blood.

He pressed close to Qi Beinan, his voice trembling. “So pitiful.”

“How can someone just leave a body out like that.”

Xiao Yuanbao tugged at Qi Beinan. “His father is gone. Give him some coins so he can buy a straw mat at least.”

Qi Beinan gently patted the hand clutching his sleeve, offering some comfort.

He, too, had lost his father as a youth and knew the pain well—how could he not feel sorry for this boy?

“Merchants are restricted by imperial law from purchasing land. You said you wanted to bury your father in a field, but to a merchant, that would seem insulting—they’d think you were looking down on them. How would they be willing to help you bury your father?”

Hearing the voice, the boy on the ground lifted his head. Through his tear-filled eyes, he saw a pair—one older, one younger.

He stopped crying and was stunned for a moment, then suddenly realized and regretted aloud, “I really was being stupid. Talking such nonsense!”

Qi Beinan took a string of coins from his person and handed it to the boy. “Falling into hardship in a strange land is already hard enough. Now that your father has died far from home, it’s even more heartbreaking. The weather’s hot. Let your father be buried as soon as possible, to rest in peace.”

The boy stared blankly for a moment, clearly not expecting the plainly dressed young man to give away so many coins, helping a stranger in such hardship.

Alongside the surprise was deep gratitude.

He had already pushed his body to its limit while begging along the way. Ling County had suffered days of heavy rain. His father had caught a chill and developed a fever. After sleeping one night under the eaves, he never woke again. And now, even with autumn here, the weather remained hot. With his father gone, the pain was unbearable—but if he left his father’s corpse to rot on the street, wouldn’t that be the height of unfiliality?

But with so many refugees in the city, many dead and injured, there was no pity to be found just by begging.

He’d wandered for two days without managing to get even a straw mat. His lips were cracked with ulcers from the stress. And watching how even the wealthy merchants refused to help, he’d felt all hope was lost—only to now run into a kind soul.

After receiving that little nudge from the young gentleman earlier, he was afraid to say anything wrong again and offend someone. Not knowing how else to express his gratitude, he simply kowtowed again. “Thank you, young gentleman, thank you!”

Qi Beinan and Xiao Yuanbao rushed forward to stop him. “If you keep knocking your head like that, you’ll be bleeding all over. If something happens to you, what would your father think?”

Clutching the heavy string of coins, the boy’s eyes were filled with tears. “If I don’t kowtow to you, young gentleman, I truly don’t know how else to thank you for this immense kindness.”

“My home, my land—it’s all been washed away by the floods. Today I met a living Bodhisattva who’s helping me lay my father to rest, but I have no idea where to go after this.”

“If the young gentleman doesn’t mind, then please let me serve you, be it as a beast of burden or a servant, to repay this favor.”

After saying this, he didn’t knock his head again, but instead knelt deeply by Qi Beinan’s feet, sincerely and earnestly.

Seeing this, Qi Beinan said, “Let’s not mention that I’m just an ordinary person myself, with no estate to speak of to keep a servant. Once you’ve sold yourself, you’re no longer free. Now that you’ve got money in hand, enough for a few days of meals and warmth, you’re a healthy young man—you should be able to find work to survive. Why give up your status as a free citizen?”

The boy raised his head. “I’m not afraid of hard labor. Now that I’ve got enough to get by for a bit, I’ll do without pride and find a way to make a living before the money runs out.”

“But if I just go off and live my life, while the young gentleman—an ordinary person—was still so generous in spending all that money to bury my father, how could I ever repay that kindness? Even if I had a smooth life from now on, I would never be at peace.”

“I’m not selling myself to some rich noble house. I just want to repay the favor. I’ll do any hard, bitter work. Please let me.”

Qi Beinan let out a soft sigh. He’d already said everything he could, but seeing the boy so insistent…

After a moment’s thought, he said, “Fine. If that’s your wish, then so be it.”

The boy’s eyes lit up when he heard Qi Beinan relent. He immediately kowtowed. “Thank you, young gentleman!”

Qi Beinan pointed out a patch of unclaimed forest outside the county for the boy to lay the mat and bury his father. They agreed to meet at the county office gate at mid-morning the next day.

Then he went off to take care of the matters he originally came to town for.

He returned a book at the bookstore, then finally made his way back to the village.

Although he had already agreed, he still needed to talk to Xiao Hu first. After all, if the boy were to stay, it would be at Xiao’s household.

Even if he had say in household matters and Xiao Hu usually let him make the call, it still wouldn’t be proper to just bring someone back without saying a word.

“If you’re worried about getting scolded, let me go tell father first,” said Xiao Yuanbao loyally, taking his hand as they walked.

Qi Beinan had been quiet on the way back, his mind elsewhere. He kept thinking how that boy’s face looked vaguely familiar, as if he had seen him somewhere long ago.

He’d met so many people in his life. No matter how good his memory, he couldn’t remember them all clearly.

He was just lost in thought and hadn’t said anything.

When he heard Xiao Yuanbao speak, he came back to himself. Seeing Xiao Yuanbao’s earnest face, he couldn’t help but smile—though he pretended to look nervous and afraid.

“I’m feeling really uneasy. What if Uncle Xiao gets angry? It’s one thing if he refuses to let that older brother into the house, but what if he kicks me out too—what then?”

“Father’s not that fierce!”

Xiao Yuanbao widened his eyes and immediately defended Xiao Hu.

Seeing Qi Beinan’s worried look, he gently patted the back of his hand and tried to comfort him.

“If it really comes to that, then just say I was the one who brought that brother here. Father surely wouldn’t throw me out. And if he does throw me out, he’d not only lose his good child, but also the one who cooks for him!”

Qi Beinan nodded. “That does make sense. But… does Uncle Xiao have any reason to kick me out?”

Xiao Yuanbao thought carefully, then said:

“If Father really insists on driving Brother out…”

“Hmm?”

Qi Beinan turned his head to look at Xiao Yuanbao.

“Then I’ll give Brother all the money I’ve saved in my jar, so he doesn’t go hungry.”

Qi Beinan pinched the tip of his nose. “What a generous young master!”

They both laughed for a bit, then Xiao Yuanbao grew worried again.

“What if that brother doesn’t show up at the county office tomorrow? Or what if he’s scared we won’t keep our word?”

“Give him this day to think it through. If he doesn’t show up tomorrow, then it means he’s changed his mind. It’s better to figure that out early than regret it later. We genuinely wanted to help him, and that string of coins wasn’t wasted. In the meantime, he doesn’t need to be in constant fear—he should trust that we’ll keep our word.”

Xiao Yuanbao nodded.

Once they got home, Qi Beinan brought up the boy’s situation with Xiao Hu.

Xiao Hu said, “Even Ling County has had so much rain this year. Villages by the Lin River are bound to have suffered. I just didn’t expect it to be this bad.”

“Natural disasters and human misfortunes… Thankfully, the county magistrate has taken action. Otherwise, those refugees might’ve all died from hunger or sickness.”

Qi Beinan said, “If nothing were done under such weather, disease and death would spread. Without timely resettlement, plague might break out. By then, it wouldn’t just be the refugees’ problem—it’d affect the whole county.”

Xiao Hu fell silent. He hadn’t considered things from that angle.

In terms of perspective, he truly didn’t see as far as Qi Beinan.

But when it came to whether or not to take that boy in, he could see it clearly enough.

“If sheltering a refugee can reduce some of our taxes—even a little—it’s better than nothing. It’s just one more pair of chopsticks at the table, no harm in letting him stay.”

“Once the new fields we bought after autumn are harvested, we’ll have grain in hand. By then, my leg still won’t be fully healed. Having someone extra to help with the land won’t hurt.”

Most of their land was rented out for others to farm. After autumn, they collected rent and grain.

Typically, each mu of dry land brought in five to seven hundred wen a year in rent. For paddy fields, one to two tenths of the harvest was collected.

Taxes were paid by the tenant farmers themselves, which meant rent and grain income were pure profit.

On the surface, it looked pretty good. Renting out twenty mu of land could bring in over ten strings of coins annually.

But this was regular leasing—it didn’t compare to families who had their own tenant farmers.

With your own tenants, twenty mu could bring in more than twice that.

Tenant farmers were usually of humble status, entirely dependent on the landlord’s land to eat. They had no property, and all their living expenses were provided by the master—no different from the servants in wealthy households.

So long as the master paid the imperial tax on the land and fed the tenants, everything else was profit.

Places like Pingzhuang, where the landlord was a government official, even had tax exemptions, making it all pure income.

Xiao Hu did envy that life. But their family had already emptied their savings just to buy a few more mu of land. They simply weren’t in a position to keep a large group of tenants.

As respectable commoner farmers, even if the court didn’t limit land ownership, they hadn’t gone into business nor held official titles to gain tax exemptions. How could they manage to run a large estate?

So, they could only keep leasing land year after year, saving little by little.

Once they had more in hand, they’d renovate their small courtyard to make it roomier. Then, during disaster years, buy a servant or two for cheap and climb step by step.

With that slow, steady effort, they’d eventually rise from humble farmers to village landlords.

Once life was stable and no longer worried about food and clothes, they’d send their sons or nephews to school. If an ancestor’s tomb emitted some lucky smoke and someone passed the scholar’s exam, their lives could reach a new level.

Since Xiao Hu had chosen this path, there was no need for more advice from Qi Beinan. And now that the county was offering a three-year tax exemption, how could he possibly refuse?

Taking in one or two more wasn’t a problem at all.

And with an extra set of hands, they might not need to lease out those last two mu of land.

So, the next morning, Qi Beinan made another trip into town.

The boy had taken care of his father’s burial and had gone straight to the agreed-upon spot. By the time Qi Beinan arrived, he had already been sitting on the stone stool outside the county office for quite a while.

“Did you bury your father properly?”

“I buried him on the outskirts of town, on Jiaozi Hill, under a big banyan tree. It’s easy to remember. I can visit him during Qingming to offer incense.”

Qi Beinan gave a soft response—this boy was truly filial.

He then asked again to confirm the boy’s intentions hadn’t changed. Once he was sure, he took him into the county’s household registration office to complete the documentation.

That’s when he learned the boy was named Tian Ken, fifteen years old, originally from Shuishan in Jiang Prefecture—which actually wasn’t that far from Qi Beinan’s former home in Qiu County.

On the way back, the two of them walked.

Qi Beinan guided Tian Ken to recognize the route into the city and pointed out the nearby villages. He also spoke to him about the situation at home.

Though the boy seemed honest and dependable, one couldn’t judge by appearances. Qi Beinan still made sure to lay down the rules.

He used Xiao Hu’s status as a hunter to make up a few stories, hoping to instill some fear and respect in him.

By the time they arrived home, Xiao Yuanbao had already cleaned out the outermost little room, which had previously been used for storage.

In the early autumn, dust flew easily, so he had sprinkled plenty of water and opened all the windows and doors wide to keep it under control.

He had also prepared food and ingredients early on—they were going to have four dishes for dinner.

Although Tian Ken had sold himself into their household, Xiao Yuanbao didn’t really draw lines between master and servant. He only knew that since someone new had arrived, they should eat well.

So he planned to steam a bowl of glossy red cured meat smoked last winter, stew a pig’s trotter with three thick, sticky segments of lotus root, fry a plate of vegetarian radish, and finally open a pickling jar to scoop out some briny liquid to mix with cucumber to balance the flavors.

Tian Ken had been wandering for over two months, eating one meal and missing the next. He hadn’t had even a proper dish of boiled vegetables in days, let alone meat.

Seeing this kind of meal, he was deeply moved—it truly felt like he had come home.

At dinner that night, tears of gratitude fell into his rice as he ate three big bowls of polished grain rice.

…

The matter of the refugees stirred up some waves in the area.

Landlords and gentry in the village had all taken in one or two refugees who had sold themselves. Even Pingzhuang had a few new faces.

Some poorer families, unable to afford marriage with locals, had even found partners among the refugee crowd.

As the farming season ended in late autumn, there were more weddings this year than usual.

Xiao Yuanbao ended up helping out at a lot of wedding banquets.

But when he came back, he grumbled: many of those who married refugees skipped the proper wedding costs, and the feasts were just as frugal.

The ingredients they brought barely covered five tables, yet they invited eight tables’ worth of guests.

And he, as the head cook, still had to prepare ten dishes to make the spread look presentable.

They piled a few scraps of meat into a big bowl, and with eight people at a table, every plate was picked clean. They nearly mixed the rice directly into the sauce on the serving bowls to mop up every last drop.

No one dared complain at the table, but as soon as the feast ended, it was as lively as New Year’s in the streets.

The whole ordeal was exhausting, and Xiao Yuanbao didn’t even get a few copper coins of thank-you money. They even tried to shortchange Jiang Fulang from his due payment.

He came home empty-handed and collapsed straight into bed. This year’s wedding banquets had truly been the most thankless and exhausting yet.

That day, Fang Jie’er came to their home to collect the scripture copies Qi Beinan had transcribed for Master Fu.

A few long scrolls—Qi Beinan had earned six strings of coins for them.

Fang Jie’er sat in the Xiao household for a while and chatted idly with Qi Beinan.

“This year, many older men in the nearby villages have already settled down. I’m honestly getting worried about my older brother.”

She sipped some tea and said earnestly, “Ever since I learned this skill, I’ve been running around the city a lot. I haven’t had much time to properly see to matters at home—it’s truly unfilial of me.”

“Mr. Qi, since you often run into my brother in the village, please talk to him for me. Urge him to seriously think about his future.”

Qi Beinan raised an eyebrow. “What’s going on?”

A while ago, after the river swelled, Fang Youliang pulled a girl from the Bai family—Miss Liu—from the water.

And that rescue stirred up a whole lot.

Miss Liu had fallen ill after the incident.

She couldn’t sleep well at night, always tossing and turning, her mind replaying the moment when she was drowning, flailing helplessly in the water—until a strong arm wrapped around her waist and dragged her back from death’s door.

Just thinking of that face would make her cheeks burn and her heart flutter, and then she couldn’t help but laugh out loud.

She took out her finest silk thread and carefully mended every tear in the old work shirt that Fang Youliang had been wearing.

She scrubbed it clean with soapnut and made it smell lovely.

Then, one day, she shyly called out to him and returned the shirt.

“My older brother really drives people mad!” said Fang Jie’er. “Miss Liu returned the shirt just as he was bringing back a young yellow calf from the city. The calf was lively and hurt its hoof on the road—it bled a bit. My brother panicked, and when she gave him the shirt, he immediately used it to wrap the cow’s hoof!”

“When he got home, he even told our third brother what a strange scene it was. Said Miss Liu from the Bai family is afraid of cows—saw the little calf, covered her eyes, and ran. While he was bandaging the hoof, she was already gone.”

The shirt had been treated with such care that even after being unwrapped from a cow’s foot, it still smelled nice—just how much effort had she put into washing it?

Fang Jie’er shook her head. “My silly, clueless brother—what can we do with him? That Miss Liu, how many young men in the village have tried to curry favor with her and got nothing? And yet she clearly has feelings for him, and he goes and does this.”

Qi Beinan chuckled. Ever since he’d seen Fang Youliang heroically rescue the girl by the river and then immediately go back to worrying about his big green carp, he’d known this kid was something else.

Now hearing Fang Jie’er’s complaints, he found it both amusing and completely believable.

“Brother Fang has a proper appearance, strong and healthy—it’s no surprise girls fancy him.”

Qi Beinan spoke more seriously. “But he’s your older brother. In the past, life at home was tough. He had to care for your parents above and watch over you and your younger brother below. The burden on him was heavy.”

All that’s on his mind is the crops, picking up work, money for Father’s medicine, making sure his younger siblings are fed… His biggest wish is to buy a yellow ox, but even that is just so he can work better and lighten the family’s burden.

“He really doesn’t have any energy left to think about other things—or even about himself. It’s natural he’s slow when it comes to matters like these. You should try to be understanding.”

After hearing Qi Beinan’s words, Fang Jie’er’s eyes grew hot. She took out a handkerchief to wipe them, her voice slightly hoarse:

“Mr. Qi always sees things so clearly. I really do feel for him. My brother has given so much to this family all these years. Now that our situation is better, I just want him to settle down and find happiness.”

Xiao Yuanbao had gone inside to try out the new hair tonic Fang Jie’er had brought him. When he came out and saw her wiping her tears, he hurried over to comfort her.

“Don’t cry, Fang Jie’er. I’ll whip up a few dishes and have Brother bring Big Brother Fang over for food and drink. Maybe after a good chat, things will work out.”

He looked at Qi Beinan. “Right, Brother?”

“Yes. Just invite him over.”

Xiao Yuanbao lit up with joy. If the lovely Miss Liu were to marry Big Brother Fang, he couldn’t be happier.

The best part was, the banquet would be held nearby—he could sleep in that morning and still get there on time, and after the evening work was done, he could come back home to sleep. No need to stay overnight elsewhere.

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