The Lucky Farmgirl
Chapter 699 - 688: Heavy Gift

Chapter 699: Chapter 688: Heavy Gift

Bai Shan packed up his book basket ready to leave when Wei Ting hurriedly grabbed his arm, "Are Erlang and the others not coming to read books today?"

Bai Shan pulled his sleeve out of his grasp and said, "They’re not coming."

"Why?"

"Fourth Brother Zhou is coming back from our hometown today, and I need to head home early too, alright, please step aside."

Wei Ting also quickly packed his things to leave, catching up to ask, "Right, our horseback archery class is about to start, are you buying a horse or renting one?"

"I’ll just rent one from the school," Bai Shan was now not very fond of the horses raised near Qixia Mountain; although it’s normal for a horse to go mad after being whipped, he still doubted its safety.

Wei Ting nodded and said, "Renting is not bad, it’s much cheaper too, then we’ll go pick out the horses together later."

Bai Shan curiously looked at him, "You’re renting a horse?"

The Wei family lived in Yizhou City, and their family background wasn’t low. Even if they didn’t go to Qixia Mountain to buy horses, they could just bring one from their own home.

Wei Ting explained, "This year, all the classmates in our class are renting horses, so I just went with the flow."

Bai Shan nodded, and upon reaching the door and finding Daji, he then bid farewell to Wei Ting, "I’m leaving."

Wei Ting waved goodbye regretfully. Ji Hao could not come to school yet as it takes a hundred days to recover from bone and muscle injuries, so it’s likely he wouldn’t be able to attend school this year, and whether he would advance to the next level with them or repeat a year is still uncertain.

Bai Shan seemed to not enjoy playing; how sad.

Once Master Shan was seated securely, Daji began to drive the carriage and reported in a low voice, "Zhou Si has come back, the Old Madam sent him with letters and clothes for the winter, and, today, the Ji Family sent invitations to our home along with many precious gifts."

After a pause, Daji continued, "County Magistrate Tang has come, he’s at home playing chess with Mr. Zhuang."

Bai Shan was surprised, "So much has happened today?"

"Yes," Daji replied.

The carriage quickly returned to the small courtyard, and Bai Shan hopped down, pushing open the gate to enter. He saw many gift boxes arranged in two piles in the courtyard.

Manbao and Bai Erlang were opening the boxes and exclaiming in the midst of one pile of presents, but the loudest exclamation came from Zhou SiLang, whose face beamed with excitement.

Upon seeing Bai Shan’s return, Manbao immediately waved excitedly, "You’re back! Come and see the gifts from the Ji Family; there are so many."

Curious, Bai Shan approached and opened a gift box, noticing a jade carving inside, and he couldn’t help saying, "Didn’t they already send gifts? Why are they sending more?"

Manbao thought for a moment, then shook her head, "I don’t know, the master told me to accept them, so I did."

Bai Shan glanced at the study and seeing the master and County Magistrate Tang playing chess, he quietly asked Manbao, "Why has County Magistrate Tang come? Have we caused trouble again?"

Manbao shook her head, "I don’t know, he went straight to playing chess with the master as soon as he arrived and didn’t interrogate me. You should check what’s in your gift boxes first, is there any gold?"

Zhou SiLang also came over immediately, saying excitedly, "The Ji Family sent Manbao a box full of gold, with twelve ingots in total spread over two layers."

Bai Shan also became curious, rolled up his sleeves, and began to open his gift boxes.

After Daji finished tying up the horse, he came over to help and soon found a very heavy large box. Once opened, they saw two rows of gold ingots, three rows in total; removing the top layer revealed another row underneath, also twelve in total.

Everyone exclaimed with a "wow," filled with envy.

Bai Erlang looked at Bai Shan and then at Manbao, full of regret, "Why didn’t I go to Qixia Mountain that day? So much money; it’s even more than our estate makes in a year."

Zhou SiLang reached out and touched Bai Shan’s gold ingots, drawing a breath and said, "Even if you’d gone, it wouldn’t have helped; see, even though Lijun and I went that day, we didn’t receive any gifts."

Bai Erlang: "That’s because you two didn’t play any part."

"Even if you had gone, it wouldn’t have been much use," Zhou SiLang sized up Bai Erlang and said, "Could you ride a horse like Young Master Shan to rescue someone, or could you weave a needle to save someone like my Manbao here?"

Bai Erlang was left speechless.

"Right, Daji, you have a gift too, where’s yours?" Zhou SiLang turned to ask Daji.

Daji went back inside to bring out a small box, opened it to show Bai Shan, inside were two round, plump gold ingots, each weighing about twenty taels.

Manbao and the others exclaimed with a "wow" again, touching them over and over in their arms.

Zhou SiLang couldn’t let go, his eyes sparkling with stars, "I’ve never seen such plump gold ingots before; they’re so pretty."

Bai Shan also took it and felt it, then, looking at the gold ingots in his own box, said, "I want mine to be made like these too."

Daji: "... Master, if you like it, how about we swap? Otherwise, it’ll cost a fee to have them remade at the silver store, not to mention the wear and tear."

Bai Shan immediately hugged the gold ingot and said, "Alright, let’s swap; you’ve made a merit at Qixia Mountain this time, and I was intending to reward you too, so I’ll give you another gold ingot."

Then Bai Shan was about to give him five gold ingots when Manbao quickly stopped his hand, "I have two plump gold ingots too; I want to swap one as well."

Daji, looking at his young master, generously gave the other gold ingot to Manbao.

Manbao hugged it tightly, smiling so much her eyes squeezed shut, and from her box, she picked out two gold ingots to give back to Daji.

Zhou Lijun watched enviously, "Cousin, are you tired of holding it? Let me help you hold it for a while."

Bai Erlang also said to Bai Shan, "Shanbao, are you tired? Let me help you hold them."

The group of them played with the two plump gold ingots, laughing and giggling for a while before they started looking through other gift boxes.

This time, the Ji Family’s gifts for them were exceptionally high-grade; for Manbao’s, there were two sets of jewelry she hadn’t even seen before, looking particularly pretty and precious.

So precious that with her little understanding right now, she wouldn’t really be able to wear them.

As Zhou SiLang unpacked gift boxes, he said, "Keep them, we’ll bring them home later for mother to put away for you, to be part of your dowry when you marry."

Manbao was unwilling, "I don’t want that, I want to keep it for myself."

Although she couldn’t wear them now, just looking at them made her happy every day.

Zhou SiLang was puzzled, "Manbao, where exactly do you keep all your money and precious things? Can your little cubicle even hold all that stuff? Isn’t it better to take it back home and keep it there, what if there’s a thief here?"

Bai Shan nodded, pointed at several boxes, and said, "These, these, and these, Fourth Brother Zhou, next time you go home, please take them with you, hand them over to Grandma to keep."

Zhou SiLang nodded and then looked at Manbao.

Manbao insisted, "I want to keep them for myself."

"Fine, but don’t come crying if they get stolen."

Manbao was overly confident, "They won’t get lost, but I’ll take these fabrics back for mother and my sister-in-law to make clothes."

"You better not, the clothes you sent last time were all converted to money," Zhou SiLang said, "Mother said those fabrics were obviously very nice, and everyone at home works in the fields. Wearing such clothes would be a waste, you might as well keep them to make your own clothes."