The more you believe me, the more real it becomes.

Chapter 239 Rice Paddy (4k)

After leaving the southwestern region, Du Yuan noticed a subtle, inexplicable change in the surrounding landscape—it was as if the thin veil covering her eyes had been removed, or as if the humid weather had become refreshing.

But when asked to describe this difference in detail, Du Yuan was speechless for a moment: the fragmented sensations were scattered haphazardly at his fingertips, like drifting clouds that could not be grasped, and he could only give a rough description based on the sudden realization in his heart.

Upon careful deduction, this must be what the old white ape and the others meant by the restoration of the heavenly secrets.

Looking at the sky above, Du Yuan paused for a moment, then smiled and continued forward.

He planned to visit his good friend in Qingzhou first.

One last trip to Kyoto.

This time, there's no need to gather any information along the way; we can just go as fast as we can.

With the watermark from that little cat, Du Yuan is now unstoppable, no matter how high the mountains or how far the waters!

Just as Du Yuan was passing by a rice paddy, someone suddenly called out to her from afar.

He paused, looked up, and saw an old man standing between the ridges of the field, barefoot in the soft mud, his trousers rolled up to his knees, still covered in yellow mud.

The old man was holding half a bamboo stalk in one hand, calling out softly to the water buffalo in front of him, while gesturing with his other hand towards Du Yuan, beckoning him to stay.

"Oh, young man, could you spare a moment and chat with this old man for a few minutes?"

Du Yuan respectfully returned the greeting with clasped hands:
“Sir, it’s still early, of course you can.”

"That's great! Wait a minute, I'm coming right now!"

The old man driving the water buffalo walked towards Du Yuan with a smile.

The water buffalo was quite obedient, following him at a leisurely pace without needing to be led. When they got close, it found a patch of tender grass, lowered its head, and slowly began to nibble on the grass. Even the way it flicked its tail to swat away flying insects exuded a lazy and carefree air.

The last time he saw a water buffalo was when he was a child in the countryside. He couldn't help but take a few more glances at it, his eyes filled with a mix of nostalgia and curiosity.

After looking at it for a moment, he suddenly pointed at the buffalo's nose ring and laughed: "Old sir, this nose ring of your buffalo isn't made of wood or rattan?"

Du Yuan always remembered that the nose rings on water buffaloes were originally made to make it easier for farmers to lead these huge animals.

No matter when, farmers always treat water buffalo as their precious treasures. When making nose rings, they need to be practical and durable, but they also need to avoid hurting the buffalo. Therefore, they mostly use hardwood soaked in tung oil or rattan for convenience.

But the nose ring on this water buffalo gleamed with a cold, silvery light—so it was made of steel?
The old man waved his hand, his palm still covered in mud:

"It is indeed rare, but this thing is durable. So what if it's heavy? It doesn't matter."

As they spoke, the water buffalo seemed to understand, snorting dismissively as if to say, "It's not like you're the one hanging this thing." But then it lowered its head again and slowly began chewing on the grass roots.

"Hey, young man, sit down! What kind of business is it to stand like this?" The old man patted a smooth bluestone beside him. "It's just that there's no proper place to sit here, so I can only ask you to keep this old man company."

He had barely finished speaking when he plopped down on the warm bluestone, finding it quite comfortable. Du Yuan, unperturbed, smiled and replied:

"How can this be considered a compromise? Surrounded by beautiful mountains and rivers, the scenery is so pleasant to look at!"

After saying that, he sat down next to the old man on the soft grass.

There were no decent stools on the ground, but two rough porcelain bowls lay upside down—the rims still bore the light brown marks of kiln firing, and the glaze was uneven, yet they were spotless, as if they had anticipated that someone else would come.

Seeing Du Yuan's gaze fall on the bowl, the old man grinned and said:
“I live far from the village, just making a living by tending these few acres of land. I’m all alone most of the time, it’s so lonely, I always hope someone will come and talk to me. Look, I’ve already prepared these teacups.”

As he spoke, he pulled a gourd out from behind his back. The gourd was a common earthy yellow color, with no carvings or paint on it; it was just an ordinary old gourd.

After uncorking the bottle, the old man said:
"It's not a very good tea, just some Maojian tea grown on the back mountain. It's been roasted a bit rough, so please don't mind it."

Du Yuan chuckled and shook her head:

"I hope you won't mind that I'm not good with words and can't say anything decent, and that I'll waste your tea!"

The two smiled at each other, and after their laughter subsided on the ridge of the field, the old man picked up his gourd and poured a bowl of coarse tea for Du Yuan and himself. The tea was light amber in color, with a few fine tea hairs floating on it, and it looked quite refreshing.

After taking a sip, the old man looked back at the path Du Yuan had taken and said:
"Young man, you look delicate and fair-skinned, not like someone who often walks mountain paths, yet you've come all this way to this desolate wilderness. You must have walked quite a distance and suffered a lot along the way, right?"

Du Yuan nodded first, then shook her head gently, her tone very calm:
"It was tiring to walk all the way, but not bitter. After all, the scenery along the way was completely different from what I had seen before. Every step I took brought a new look, and it was worth it to take a few more glances."

"Besides, I just came from the southwest. Compared to the suffering of the people in the southwest, what is my little bit of fatigue?"

Upon hearing this, the old man suddenly waved his hands repeatedly, his brows slowly furrowing. It wasn't anger, but fear that the young man might misunderstand; his tone also became more serious.
“Hey, young man, you’re wrong about that.”

Before Du Yuan could speak, the old man leaned forward and stared straight at him:
"Those disaster-stricken areas in the southwest still break my heart when I think about them. The officials fled, the rich fled, and those who stayed there were mostly poor people like me, toiling in the fields for a living. But no matter what, the southwest is the southwest, and you are you!"

Du Yuan smiled helplessly, her tone carrying a weariness she herself didn't realize:

"I understand the reasoning you're giving. But what if there's something you could do to help?"

He paused, looked up at the old man, and his eyes held a stubbornness that he himself was unaware of.

"It's like, it's like there's a group of disaster victims who are about to starve to death, and you happen to have enough food on hand to feed them and yourself for several years. Tell me, how many people in this world could really just stand by and watch them starve to death in front of them?"

The old man waved his hand again, this time with more force, slamming the teacup against the stone, causing the tea to slosh over.
"Save them! Of course I will save them! My heart is made of flesh and blood, not carved from stone or cast in iron. How can I not lend a hand when I see someone in trouble? But then again, once I've saved them, why should I keep this in my heart and worry about it day and night?"

Du Yuan paused, her hand holding the teacup, a hint of bewilderment in her eyes.

The old man ignored his dazed expression, picked up the teacup again, and slowly took a sip:

"Remembering the suffering of others and always thinking about how to help them out is naturally a good thing, a great thing indeed. Say hello to everyone who comes."

“But look at these seedlings.” The old man casually broke off a section of rice seedling and handed it to Du Yuan. “When they first sprouted ears, they were very tender and swayed in the wind. But when they reached the grain-filling stage, they were covered with ears, yet none of them were weighed down. Last year, there was a plot of land where too much fertilizer was applied, and the ears were too full. A gust of wind knocked down most of them—so much so that they tried too hard to carry the weight, but couldn’t bear it.”

"You and I are just ordinary people, not God. Our hands are only so big, how much can we grab? If you can help others with their difficulties, then help. If you can't, then don't force yourself to help. And don't think about it all the time. Take a break when you need to. Once you've done your job, then let it go."

The old man put down his teacup, picked up the gourd again, and poured Du Yuan another bowl of cool tea.
“You are a young man. The spirit of a young man is like a seedling in the ground, it only lasts for one season, and then it’s gone. Don’t be like an old man like me, always remembering this hardship and complaining about that difficulty, and wearing down your good spirit.” Du Yuan remained stunned and did not reply or move.

Just then, the water buffalo that had been silently chewing on grass roots suddenly let out a "moo".

The sound was long and drawn out, which also woke Du Yuan up. She looked at the smiling old man in front of her and the refilled cup of cool tea in her hand.

Du Yuan paused for a moment, then held up her teacup and said:

"Juniors have learned a lesson."

The old man waved his hand dismissively:

"It's not enough to just learn from you; you must keep it in your heart. You look like a scholar, but you should understand better than this old country bumpkin that youthful spirit is a precious and irreplaceable quality!"

The old man's hand slowly landed on Du Yuan's shoulder, as if giving her a word of advice or a warning:
"Young people should walk with the wind in their feet, have light in their eyes, and shoulder the warmth of spring!"

Du Yuan didn't reply, but nodded earnestly and then slowly sipped the cool tea in her hand.

Seeing this, the old man smiled and stopped talking about it. The two sat on the edge of the field, drinking tea one sip at a time, without saying anything grand about responsibility, only occasionally chatting about the growth of this year's rice and when the wild fruits in the mountains would ripen.

As dusk approached, Du Yuan rose to take her leave:
"Sir, it's time for me to take my leave!"

The old man also stood up and patted the bits of grass off his clothes:
“I shouldn’t keep you here any longer. You are different from me. I am destined to live my whole life tending these few acres of paddy fields. You, on the other hand, should go and see the new world under this bright sky.”

He gazed at the birds returning to their nests in the distance, his tone carrying a hint of relief.

"I'm getting old, the future should belong to you young people!"

Du Yuan bowed respectfully with her hands clasped.
"Thank you for your guidance, sir."

Having said that, he turned to leave, but just as he took a step, the old man suddenly called out to him:
"Hey, young man, wait a minute!"

Du Yuan stopped and asked:
"Does the old gentleman have any further instructions?"

The old man shook his head, then pointed southwest, a slightly amused smile on his face:
"There's no such thing as giving advice or not. I just saw a young man like you looking gloomy all day long, and you can't even see yourself clearly, so I said a few words."

As soon as he finished speaking, the old man's smile deepened, and his tone became even gentler:
"Old man, I just heard you say you came from the southwest. Young man, do you know what the legendary elixir formula that the immortals borrowed from the heavens actually looks like?"

The old man pointed to the fields behind him and the water buffalo still grazing on grass roots, and said:

"I'm just an old man who toils in the fields, and when I heard about such a mysterious elixir formula, I was really curious! So, young man, what do you think?"

Du Yuan nodded and smiled:

"I remember, I've always kept this recipe in mind!"

After saying that, Du Yuan looked around and then picked up a small stone from the ground.

He lightly rubbed his fingertips against the stone surface, then raised his hand and began to carve, stroke by stroke. Stone chips fell into the soil through his fingers, and soon the character "丹" (dan) for "乞活丹" (qi huo dan) was clearly imprinted on the stone surface.

Immediately afterwards, Du Yuan picked up the stone with both hands and steadily handed it to the old man, saying:

"Old sir, this is the formula for the Beggar's Life Pill!"

The old man quickly accepted it with both hands, as if afraid of handling it carelessly, and brought it close to his eyes to examine it closely. In no time, his brows relaxed, his face lit up with a smile, and even his voice became brighter:
"Great! Excellent! Such a fine item hasn't been seen in years!"

Seeing the old man so happy, Du Yuan smiled and then cupped her hands in greeting:
"Sir, Du Yuan takes his leave!"

This time, the old man didn't try to stop him. He simply raised his calloused hand and waved it gently before standing motionless in the twilight.

The wind swept across the grass clippings on the ridges of the fields. He watched as Du Yuan's figure gradually disappeared into the distant mist until that patch of green completely vanished at the end of the ridges before slowly withdrawing his gaze.

When only he and the water buffalo, still eating grass roots, remained, the situation changed.

The old man had just pointed at the ox and cursed:

"Eat, eat, eat! All you ever think about is eating! I'm afraid you'll eat all my savings away sooner or later!"

The cow seemed not to hear him, only raising its head and snorting at him with a grassy smell, its tail slowly sweeping away the flies that had landed on its back, before burying its head again and munching on the grass roots with a rustling sound.

The old man wasn't really angry; he was just joking. Seeing this, he could only shake his head helplessly, brush off the bits of grass stuck to his clothes, and sit back down on the stone where the two of them had been drinking tea.

But just as he lowered his eyes and stroked the stone tablet and the elixir formula in his hand, the scene before him suddenly changed—the rice that was originally just green shoots was now growing and thriving at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Before long, the bustling greenery transformed into a sea of ​​golden yellow.

The old man looked up, squinted at the paddy field in front of him, then grinned as he hugged the gourd in his arms:

"Wow, this is a fantastic harvest!"
-
After saying goodbye to the old gentleman, Du Yuan was walking through the mountains and fields.

Reaching a cliff, he suddenly stopped. The mountain path below was full of people: men carrying worn-out cloth bags, women leading bouncy children, and old men carrying bamboo baskets—all people who had heard that the drought in the southwest had been relieved and were eager to return home.

Seeing them like this, Du Yuan let out a long breath and then headed towards Qingzhou with a great sense of relief.

He paused for a moment, then suddenly looked up at a stream in the distance.

I've never used the watermark that the kitten sent me!
With one step, he stood firmly in front of the stream, and then tentatively stepped onto the undulating water.

Sure enough, nothing happened at all, just like flat ground!

Feeling incredibly curious, Du Yuan tried walking around on the water's surface before laughing heartily and stepping forward.

That night, water transport across the land surged, especially the waterways around Qingzhou!

Then, the mountain range gradually rose, startling the various immortals who murmured among themselves, wondering what this sudden change was all about.

(End of this chapter)