Chapter 845: Chapter 838: A Busy First Day of the Year in the Great Tang

The first day of the new year is the happiest day for children, especially since the village’s conditions have improved these past two years—there are new clothes for the new year and lots of good food.

Although Lin Wanwan’s mood was dampened by Baye Feng early in the morning, the atmosphere recovered quickly. After all, it’s the New Year; nothing should affect your good mood.

Qingyu and the others had already laid out dried fruits, snacks, and Copper Coin in the main hall early on, ready to hand them out to the children who came to Lin Wanwan’s place to offer New Year’s greetings.

Besides the children, there were also the Manor Guests who farm for her, the Embroideress in the embroidery workshop, the Shopkeeper and staff of the Silk Shop, the accountant of Red Face Smile, the resident old physician and junior apprentices at the Chinese Medicine Hall, the various Teacher at the school, and so on. They all came by one after another to pay their respects and offer New Year’s greetings.

These people are all commoners working for Lin Wanwan, not of lowly status, so of course they have to come pay respects and show their faces during the New Year.

As for those slaves directly bought by Lin Wanwan, they had already offered their New Year’s greetings before the year ended, and Lin Wanwan even gave everyone a year-end bonus—a set of personal hygiene items.

Aside from the local employees of Mao County, Sun Chuyao, who was far away in Chang’an, also returned to Lin Family Manor in the afternoon.

He mainly came to report to Lin Wanwan on the affairs of the Chang’an Manor and the two workshops, and to deliver the account books and assets—a sort of performance report.

Originally, according to the schedule, he should have arrived before the year’s end.

But because he encountered river bandits on the way, although there were no major losses, it still delayed him several days, so he ended up arriving at Lin Family Manor on the first day of the new year.

Before setting out, Sun Chuyao had spent heavily to hire a capable escort team for protection, which was why they came out of the incident unscathed and managed to keep all the money and goods that had to be handed over to Lin Wanwan.

Lin Wanwan praised his foresight. Although Sun Chuyao has never studied, he is indeed very quick-witted. Lin Wanwan is quite satisfied with this little brother.

And in Sun Chuyao’s heart, he has always kept the secret that Lin Wanwan is an Immortal, fantasizing about cultivating blessings for his next life. So he’s even more loyal to Lin Wanwan than the average slave.

Lin Wanwan no longer needs to scare him with those human pills pretending to be poison; she relies purely on winning people over with virtue.

"Stay at the residence for half a month, keep your mother company, and leave after the Lantern Festival." Lin Wanwan grabbed a handful of golden grain she had specially bought at the Great Tang Gold Store, as a reward for Sun Chuyao.

"Thank you for the reward, Lady."

Since he arrived late and it was the New Year, Lin Wanwan had no desire to check the accounts, so she set them aside for now.

Besides, Xiao Yixun, who’s great at arithmetic and also very skilled with poisons and insects, had been borrowed by Baye Feng to assist with interrogations. With no one to share the work, she was even less inclined to look at the books right away.

This time, Sun Chuyao also brought his daughter back. Although the journey was hard, he couldn’t bear to leave his young daughter alone in Chang’an.

Little Qingyu was very happy to see Rongrong, the former personal Maid she hadn’t seen in a long time, and grabbed her to go play together.

The two of them actually don’t get along like mistress and servant, but more like playmates.

Now that Sun Chuyao is in Chang’an guarding the manor and workshops for Lin Wanwan, while his old mother stays at Lin Family Manor in Mao County to serve Lin Wanwan, it also counts as a disguised form of hostage.

For people of the Great Tang, wherever their old mother lives is where their hometown is. So to travel a thousand li at year’s end to make a performance report, Sun Chuyao doesn’t feel it’s hard at all. It’s just like modern people who work away from home rushing back during the Spring Festival travel season.

Being able to return to Mao County for the New Year to reunite with his family and brush up his presence in front of his master is a good thing; he doesn’t fear the toil.

Now that there are many more servants in Lin Wanwan’s residence, in consideration of Sun Chuyao, his mother has been excused from the tiring tasks and only does some light work.

By the time afternoon came, Baye Feng and Xiao Yixun returned together, and Lin Wanwan was sitting at the Lin Clan Leader’s house, discussing plans for the new year with him.

"Lady, Chief Steward Baye is back," Qingyu came to report.

"Oh." Lin Wanwan rose from the mat and bowed to the Clan Leader. "Uncle Clan Leader, let’s stop here for today. I still have some matters at home, so I’ll go back first."

The Clan Leader stood up to see her off. "Alright, go take care of your business. Are you going to Qiantang to your mother’s family for the New Year this time?"

"No, this year I’ll stay with the clan and spend the New Year properly." Standing at the doorway to put on her shoes, Lin Wanwan waved with a smile. "Uncle Clan Leader, no need to walk me out, I’ll be off."

"Alright." The Clan Leader stood in the doorway, watching Lin Wanwan lead her Maids away, their figures receding.

Today Lin Wanwan had brought over a jin of crayfish and told him that next year she wanted to raise some crayfish. She’d chanced upon them with her master in a mountain pool back then, then started raising them herself, and they were extremely delicious.

This so-called crayfish, the Clan Leader had never even heard of.

They do look a lot like the sea lobsters they occasionally catch in their nets, but he doesn’t know what they taste like, or whether the nobles will like them.

Lin Wanwan told him this is an incredibly tasty freshwater crayfish that’s easy to keep alive and reproduces quickly. Though it’s several times smaller than the lobsters from the sea, its deliciousness is no less.

He only half-believed it. He’s never cared much about things with shells anyway; there are more than enough shrimp in the sea.

Still, Lin Wanwan learned all her skills from a master, so you can’t go wrong listening to her.

If she wants to raise them, then the clan will raise them. It’s just a bit more work; nothing serious, as long as it doesn’t delay proper fishing and farming.

As for why Lin Wanwan suddenly got the urge to farm crayfish, that’s purely her own little scheme; she’d been thinking about it for quite a while.

Because she rather likes eating crayfish, and she realized that resources are scarce in the Great Tang. Meat is meat, even if it’s tiny lobster meat. Bringing them in to enrich everyone’s dining table is no bad thing.

And she can conveniently enjoy wild, naturally grown, pollution-free crayfish in the Great Tang—killing several birds with one stone.

Crayfish generally start coming onto the market in the third month, reaching their peak in the fifth, sixth, and seventh months when they’re at their plumpest, then declining from the eighth month and turning skinny by the ninth.

As for winter farming, it usually starts from December in the solar calendar, so it’s actually already a bit late now, but it doesn’t really matter.

Because Lin Wanwan can just buy larger crayfish fry to stock the ponds with—basically, cheat.

She owns three great mountains; she just has to say she sent people to fish them from the mountain pools, and the clan won’t doubt it.

To the Lin Clan members, they won’t question anything that Lin Wanwan produces.

Firstly, because they live on the seashore and are relatively cut off; secondly, thanks to Lin Wanwan’s repeated miracles—high-yield grains, white-feathered chickens, multi-egg ducks, and so on—their trust in her has maxed out.

At this point, the clan members are basically in blind-following mode toward Lin Wanwan; her prestige in the clan has even vaguely surpassed that of the Clan Leader.

The Lin Family has always fiercely protected its own. Now they have a Village Lady of Direct Lineage like Lin Wanwan, leading everyone to get rich and live a moderately prosperous life.

Don’t say raising fish and shrimp—if she wanted to rebel, they’d still do everything they could to help.

After all, for the family, when one prospers, all prosper; when one loses, all lose. If one person rebels and nine clans get dragged down, you might as well all do it together.