Chapter 2: A Way to Live

Early the next morning, Chen Yuan woke from his sleep, got dressed, and pushed open the door.

It was still early, and the morning sun was just beginning to rise. The distant Chimang Mountain Range was shrouded in a thin layer of morning mist; the green hills were faint and the ancient trees lush, appearing like a fairyland.

Legend had it that someone had once seen immortals in the Chimang Mountain Range, flying through the heavens and earth, moving mountains and shifting peaks.

Even now, there were elders who would offer sacrifices to the immortals in the mountains every year, praying for their protection.

Smoke curled from the chimneys in the village, and the sounds of people could be faintly heard.

The bustle of yesterday’s wedding had faded, and the farming families had begun another day of toil.

Chen Li-shi was busy at the stove in the courtyard. Seeing Chen Yuan come out, she called out

"Erniu, go wake up your little sister. It’s time to eat."

"Alright."

Chen Yuan replied and went back into the house to wake his little sister.

His little sister didn't have a real name; she was just called Chen Xiaomei.

Girls in farming families were all like this, having only a nickname for ease of address.

After waking Xiaomei, Chen Yuan moved the yellow wooden table out of the main hut and into the courtyard.

Chen Li-shi brought over four bowls of freshly cooked thin porridge, Chen Tiezhu took some coarse flour cakes from the cupboard, and scooped a bowl of pickled vegetables from the jar in front of the house. The family sat around the table and began their breakfast.

Since Chen Yuan had undergone the starlight infusion, his appetite had grown larger and larger. Having spent the night in a state of half-hunger, he was famished. He picked up a coarse flour cake, ate it with the pickled vegetables, and began to wolf it down.

Before long, one cake was gone, and Chen Yuan reached for a second.

But as his hand touched the cake, he paused and turned to look at Chen Tiezhu.

The cake in Chen Tiezhu’s hand was barely a third finished.

Seeing Chen Yuan’s movement, the wrinkles on his face seemed to deepen as he said

"Eat."

Only then did Chen Yuan pick up the second cake and eat it in large bites.

By the time he finished the second cake, the other three had barely eaten their fill.

Chen Tiezhu had eaten one cake, Chen Li-shi had eaten a little over half, and Xiaomei, having the smallest appetite, had eaten only a little less than half.

Chen Li-shi picked up the thin porridge in front of her and asked with concern

"Erniu, are you full?"

Chen Yuan was naturally not full, but he didn't ask for more. He picked up his porridge and said

"Mother, I’m full."

He knew that if he spoke up, his parents would certainly not let him go hungry.

But to eat three coarse flour cakes without having done any work in the morning was too shocking.

He could only endure the hunger in his stomach and pretend he was already full.

...

After the family finished breakfast, Chen Li-shi tidied the stove and washed the bowls and dishes.

After Chen Yuan fed the only old hen in the house, he picked up his farm tools and followed Chen Tiezhu to the fields to tend the crops.

The Chen family farmed five mu of land, spending their days scratching a living from the soil.

Xiaomei wasn't idle either. She followed Chen Yuan and Chen Tiezhu out, met up with familiar children her age, and went to the riverside to gather pigweed.

The Chen family was poor and couldn't afford piglets, but there were a few well-off families in Chen Village who raised pigs.

By helping the children of those families gather pigweed, Xiaomei could earn a little food at noon, easing the burden on her family.

Chen Yuan dropped Xiaomei off at the riverbank, then went to the fields with Chen Tiezhu to begin weeding and loosening the soil while the weather was still cool.

Chen Yuan was strong and had good stamina; he worked much faster than Chen Tiezhu.

A quarter of an hour later, Chen Li-shi also arrived at the fields, picked up her tools, and joined them.

The three of them worked until nearly noon, stopping to head home before the sun reached its zenith.

At lunch, Chen Yuan ate three cakes.

The wrinkles on Chen Tiezhu’s face deepened further.

In the afternoon, once the heat had passed, Chen Yuan followed his parents back to the fields to continue working.

It wasn't until the sun set behind the mountains that the three of them returned home.

Xiaomei had already prepared the meal. Just like in the morning and at noon, it was thin porridge, coarse flour cakes, and pickled vegetables.

Farming families couldn't afford anything better; being able to barely fill their stomachs was already no small feat.

Chen Yuan ate two cakes, and the feeling of half-hunger that had persisted all day finally vanished.

An ordinary person would eat only one coarse flour cake per meal, but Chen Yuan had eaten seven today, and five the night before.

It took the equivalent of four days' worth of food for an ordinary person for him to fully digest the gains brought by the starlight infusion.

After dinner, Chen Yuan went to chop wood as usual. Feeling his strength increase by another fraction compared to yesterday, a faint smile appeared on his lips.

*Crack! Crack!*

Chen Yuan split one log after another, feeling not the slightest bit of fatigue.

Xiaomei watched from the side with great interest, recounting the fun things that had happened during the day

"Second Brother, look, the flowers I picked, are they pretty..."

Chen Yuan looked over. Xiaomei was smiling, her head tilted, a bright red flower tucked into her slightly dry, thin hair.

Chen Yuan felt a pang of heartache, but he praised her nonetheless

"Pretty, Xiaomei is the prettiest. Even if you tucked a piece of foxtail grass in your hair, you’d still be pretty."

"Hmph, Second Brother is a liar, foxtail grass is the ugliest..."

In the main hut, Chen Tiezhu sat before the yellow wooden table, watching his brother and sister laughing in the courtyard, silent.

He held a dry tobacco pipe in his hand, opened the pouch, took a deep sniff of the dry tobacco leaves, and then slowly exhaled a long breath.

The Chen family was too poor; he only smoked his pipe every few days. Usually, he could only smell the leaves to satisfy his craving.

Chen Li-shi sat on the other side of the table, eyes wide, using the last bit of daylight to mend a coarse cloth shoe sole.

Chen Tiezhu suddenly spoke up

"Mother of the children, when I went to the banquet at Dahua’s house yesterday, I sat at the same table as his second son and talked for a while. Chen Lao-er is doing well in the county town, specializing in finding apprentices for shops. Should we ask him to help Erniu find a job..."

Chen Li-shi’s hands stopped. She rubbed her eyes and said

"Send Erniu to the city? No! He’s so young, what if he gets bullied?"

"It’s precisely because he’s young that they’ll take him. If he gets older, his temperament will become wild, and they won't want him then."

Chen Li-shi still wouldn't have it

"Those shopkeepers and managers are all black-hearted. The third son of Chen Huaishu’s family went to the county to be an apprentice and was beaten half to death. How could Erniu endure that kind of suffering?"

Chen Tiezhu tapped his pipe and sighed

"Erniu’s appetite is getting bigger and bigger. He ate seven cakes today alone. If we don't let him go out and find a way to make a living, and he just stays here with us scratching at the dirt, he won't even be able to get a full meal. That is what you call suffering!"

Chen Li-shi’s face dimmed. After a long while, she spoke

"Are they willing to take Erniu as an apprentice?"

Seeing his wife waver, Chen Tiezhu felt a sense of relief

"They will! Chen Lao-er knows Erniu is strong. He gave me his word—as long as I hand Erniu over to him, he’ll have no trouble finding him work."

Chen Li-shi clutched the patch-covered shoe sole in her hands and said softly

"Then let’s try it."

"Alright, I’ll go find Chen Lao-er tomorrow and get it settled..."

Chen Li-shi remained silent. Suddenly, she stood up, took a wooden box from the head of the bed, counted out twenty copper coins that had been polished clean, and handed them to Chen Tiezhu

"Give this money to Chen Lao-er. Ask him to help Erniu find a good job so he suffers a little less."

Chen Tiezhu took the coins and put them into his coarse cloth pouch

"Dahua’s son got married and built a house this time, and Erniu and I put in a lot of effort. Chen Lao-er is his uncle; he can't ignore that favor. With this extra money, he surely won't treat Erniu poorly."

Chen Li-shi picked up the shoe sole again and sighed

"It’s up to Erniu’s fate. I only pray he doesn't resent me for being hard-hearted."

...

*Crack—crack—*

In the courtyard, Chen Yuan kept his head down and his lips pressed together, his wood-chopping movements slowing down significantly.

Although Chen Tiezhu and Chen Li-shi had deliberately lowered their voices, their conversation had been heard by him, word for word.

After twenty-two starlight infusions, Chen Yuan’s physical body had been improved in every aspect; not only had his strength increased greatly, but his five senses were also far beyond those of an ordinary person.

Hearing that his parents were going to send him away to be an apprentice, Chen Yuan felt a complex mix of emotions.

Since he had transmigrated, Chen Tiezhu and Chen Li-shi had treated him extremely well, and he truly regarded them as his own parents.

Over these three years, Chen Yuan had many times wanted to change his fate and let his family live a prosperous life.

The first thing he thought of was business, but the Chen family was poor and had no capital.

The computer science and finance he was most proficient in had no use in this era.

He didn't know how to make glass, liquor, or soap, and even if he did, he wouldn't dare to bring them out.

All profitable businesses were occupied by landlords, powerful families, officials, and gangs.

Chen Yuan was a mere commoner; he shouldn't even think about touching them, or he would surely be swallowed whole.

Since business was out, Chen Yuan thought of studying, passing the imperial examinations, and becoming an official—this was also his strength.

There was a private school in Chen Village, funded by the village’s only landlord, Chen Rongcai, who had hired an old scholar over fifty to teach.

Chen Yuan went to beg the old scholar to teach him to read and write.

But he couldn't afford the tuition, and the old scholar remained unmoved.

The Chen family was too poor; after paying the heavy taxes and levies, it was hard enough to maintain basic sustenance, let alone pay tuition.

Unable to attend the private school, Chen Yuan wanted to steal knowledge.

But he couldn't afford books, and it was impossible for anyone to lend them to him.

Later, after the starlight infusion, Chen Yuan became light and agile, and he would climb over the wall in the middle of the night to steal the old scholar’s books to read.

But without anyone to guide him, and without auxiliary tools like dictionaries, he couldn't even cross the threshold; he still couldn't learn the characters.

With no path to study, learning martial arts was even more impossible.

"Literature is for the poor, martial arts for the rich." The money required to apprentice for martial arts was far more than tuition—often dozens of taels of silver—which Chen Yuan simply couldn't produce.

In this feudal society, the hierarchy was strict, and poor families could only accept their fate.

However, Chen Yuan actually had one last way to change his fate: to go into the Chimang Mountain Range to become a bandit and rob travelers.

Relying on his strength, even if he didn't know martial arts, he should be able to make a name for himself.

But he was too young—just a child—and even if he wanted to be a bandit, no one would take him.

With all paths blocked, Chen Yuan had considered going into the mountains to hunt, which would at least fill his stomach.

But hunting wasn't that simple. Although he was immensely strong, he didn't know how to track, set traps, or lay snares, which were the keys to catching prey.

Wild animals hid in the vast mountains and forests, were extremely vigilant, and were very difficult to find.

The few hunters in Chen Village would never pass on such skills for making a living.

There was only so much game in the nearby mountains; they didn't have enough for themselves, so how could they allow others to get a share?

Helpless, Chen Yuan could only extinguish these thoughts and wait until he grew up in a few years to make other plans.

Having been given a second chance at life and possessing the magical jade pendant, he was absolutely unwilling to farm for the rest of his life.

Hearing that his parents were going to send him away to be an apprentice, while he felt reluctant to leave his family, he also felt a sense of anticipation.

No matter what he did, it would be better than staying in Chen Village to farm.

At the very least, he would be able to eat his fill and could safely continue his starlight infusions.

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(End of chapter)