Courtyard House: My Hidden Wheat Seeds Caused a National Sensation

The moment Li Jianye opened his eyes, countless unfamiliar fragments of memory flooded into his mind.

He sat blankly on the edge of the earthen bed, his fingertips unconsciously tracing the coarse cloth quilt, the past events that did not belong to him as clear as if he had experienced them himself.

Qin Huairu.

This name keeps resurfacing in my turbulent memories.

They were childhood friends from neighboring villages, playing together by the stream in summer and whispering by the stove in winter. Everyone assumed they would naturally become a couple.

However, three years ago, eighteen-year-old Qin Huairu quietly left the village. When she heard the news again, she had become the wife of a fitter in Beijing, Jia Dongxu, who worked at the Hongxing Steel Rolling Mill and was said to have apprenticed under an eighth-level master craftsman.

The message that came along also included the name of a cousin named Qin Jingru.

"Oh, that story..."

Li Jianye muttered to himself.

He was originally a 21st-century scholar studying crop genetics, but after an accident, his consciousness sank into a body that shared his name.

The original owner's life trajectory can be described as miserable: after being abandoned, he was subjected to all sorts of unsavory rumors spread by the Qin family in the village. With weak family ties, he suffered all kinds of exclusion and finally died alone in a cold at the age of twenty-six.

He got up and found a blurry bronze mirror.

The eyebrows and eyes reflected in the mirror were seven or eight parts similar to those in his previous life, which made him breathe a slight sigh of relief.

However, the current situation is not optimistic: In 1958, as an ordinary farmer, he earned meager work points every day, barely enough to make ends meet.

Even more alarming, his memories reminded him that the coming years would be exceptionally difficult.

The shadow of hunger pressed down on my heart like a leaden cloud; tree bark, grass roots, kaolin clay... those words alone were enough to make my stomach churn.

"We can't do that."

Li Jianye said to himself in the mirror.

His knowledge could have been put to good use, improving seeds and increasing yields, which might have truly given many people an extra bite to eat.

But reality is harsh; breeding requires cycles and a stable environment, and he could already foresee the storms to come.

Are we really going to be stuck here, wasting our youth?

Just as this feeling of despair arose, everything went black before his eyes.

It wasn't fainting, but rather my consciousness being drawn to a strange space.

There floated a patch of black land, about an acre and a half in size, its soil gleaming with a damp sheen.

Beside the land stood a small warehouse and a slightly larger workshop, which, though simple, exuded a certain indescribable orderliness.

An instinctive realization arose—he could control the flow of time in this area.

Sowing, growing, and harvesting can happen in the blink of an eye.

This small space is enough to be an endless granary, and also a testing ground for simulating various extreme environments.

Seeds have become the only hurdle to overcome at this moment.

He also sensed the existence of some kind of list, where completing certain tasks would yield a reward.

The warehouse and workshop also exuded an extraordinary aura: the warehouse seemed endless, and time stood still within it; the workshop stood silently, waiting to be put into use.

Li Jianye regained his composure and looked at the mirror again.

The previous confusion and anxiety in those eyes had been replaced by a calm determination.

The road ahead is still shrouded in mist, but at least we hold a glimmer of dawn in our hands.

He can store countless items within it! Whether it's the produce of that strange land or anything brought in from the outside, it can hold it all.

As for that wondrous workshop, it could help him process all kinds of crops.

For example, wheat grains can be ground into fine powder, live pigs can be automatically cut into pieces, and raw meat can be transformed into a steaming hot dish in an instant... The wonders are too numerous to describe.

"Excellent! With this, my progress in cultivating new wheat varieties will be greatly accelerated!"

A surge of overwhelming joy welled up in Li Jianye's heart.

He immediately turned and walked to a secluded corner inside the room, quickly moved aside the cover, and took out a small cloth bag.

The bag contained about a pound of wheat kernels.

In those years when hoarding grain was strictly prohibited, every household ate together in the commune's canteen. This bag of wheat was secretly left behind by the previous owner of this body when the public grain was collected, in case of extreme hunger.

In retrospect, the bag of wheat was preserved at just the right time—without these seeds, his magical land would have been useless.

"It's time to start cultivating new wheat varieties."

With a thought, Li Jianye took the bag of wheat and entered that unique space.

He first carried out several rounds of sowing and harvesting, rapidly multiplying the initial one pound of seeds into a thousand pound.

He then used these abundant wheat grains as a basis to conduct detailed experiments.

He constantly adjusted the intensity of light, the temperature, and even simulated different humidity and disease environments to select individuals with superior traits from thousands of plants, and then carried out repeated hybridization and breeding.

After about four hours of continuous work, Li Jianye finally obtained the wheat seeds he had been looking for, and their performance even exceeded his initial expectations.

"It seems that in an environment where time can be greatly accelerated, many ideas that remain in theory can become reality."

He was very pleased because he had successfully cultivated a new wheat variety with extremely stable self-pollination traits and an amazing yield.

Its yield level is comparable to that of early hybrid wheat.

However, ordinary hybrid wheat cannot be saved for replanting, otherwise the yield of offspring will be severely reduced; but this kind of wheat perfectly overcomes this defect and can reproduce generation after generation, maintaining high yield.

Therefore, this can no longer be simply called hybrid wheat, but is a completely new variety.

He named it "Dongyu No. 1".

.

Just as he was celebrating his success, a message quietly surfaced in his mind: [Congratulations on achieving a wheat yield of 600 jin per mu]

[Achievement!] [Reward: Divine Body Tempering Essence x1]

"Perfect timing!"

Li Jianye was overjoyed and immediately took out the bottle of shimmering tempering essence, drinking it down without hesitation.

In an instant, a warm current swept through his body, and he could clearly feel that his body had undergone a complete transformation, with his strength, endurance, and agility all rising to a peak that ordinary humans could hardly reach.

"It feels extraordinary... However, the wheat yield per acre seems to have reached the limit under current conditions."

To break the 700-jin mark, it would probably be necessary to collect a more diverse range of wheat varieties.

As he was pondering this, a series of "clangs" rang out.

The sound of gongs could be heard from outside.

Li Jianye immediately understood that this was a signal that the commune canteen was opening for meals.

The date was October 3, 1958. According to regulations, commune members were not allowed to cook on their own and had to go to the canteen to share a communal meal.

Although he had mountains of wheat in his space, which could be made into steamed buns at any time through the workshop, he knew he couldn't be too unconventional.

Moreover, he had other plans in mind and needed to find an opportunity to discuss them with the production team leader.

So he tidied himself up a bit and then headed toward the cafeteria.

The canteen was bustling with noise; almost everyone from the entire production team had arrived.

However, what was contained in that large urn was nothing more than a thin corn porridge that could reflect a person's image.

This is today's dinner—just congee, no dry food in sight.

As for the cooking pot? It was requisitioned a few days ago to support steelmaking.

"Sure enough, by the end of the year, food has become scarce."

Looking at the scene before him, Li Jianye sighed silently in his heart.

This year saw favorable weather and abundant harvests, resulting in an unprecedentedly good national grain harvest. The total output is said to have exceeded 400 billion jin, an increase of 30 billion jin compared to previous years.

However, the trend of various regions competing to exaggerate production and exaggerate the overflowing granaries has complicated the actual situation.

Good news kept coming from all over the country.

Before the news of a yield of 1,000 jin per mu had subsided, the good news of 10,000 jin per mu followed one after another.

People say that the more open your heart is, the more the land will reward you.

As a result, the amount of grain handed over to the state increased day by day.

The amount of grain remaining in the hands of farmers naturally became thinner day by day.

Therefore, even though 1958 brought a rare bumper harvest, the villagers' rice bowls remained empty.

Looking at the scene in the village, Li Jianye secretly clenched his fist.

He had to do something for the land he loved so much.

After putting down his chopsticks, Li Jianye went straight to the production team office.

"Captain, Secretary, I have something urgent to report."

"Jianye? Are you feeling better?"

The captain looked up, a familiar smile on his face.

The secretary next to him didn't say anything, just puffed on his pipe, the grayish-white smoke rising slowly.

"What is it? Speak."

"I... hoarded some food."

As Li Jianye spoke, he pulled a small cloth bag out of his pocket.

Inside were three pounds of heavy wheat grains.

"you--!"

The captain's smile froze instantly.

"Li Jianye! Do you even know what kind of problem this is?!"

"Captain, please let me finish!"

Li Jianye stepped forward hastily, his voice low and steady, "This is not ordinary grain; it is a wheat variety that I have secretly bred over several years."

If you plant it in early October, you can harvest it at the end of May the following year.

I guarantee the yield will be at least 500 jin per mu.

"What?!"

The captain and the secretary stood up from their stools almost simultaneously, their eyes fixed on him.

Everyone knows that the village is currently planting winter wheat, but the harvest won't begin until mid-June.

Don't underestimate the difference in just twenty days.

Before the wheat harvest, the worst thing is rain. Once it gets wet, the ears of wheat will rot and sprout, and all the hard work of the year will be wasted.

June is the season when rain can come down unexpectedly, and every year large fields of wheat are destroyed by sudden downpours.

If the harvest can be completed by the end of May, the dreaded rainy season can be avoided.

Moreover, nowadays, a yield of 113 jin of wheat per mu is considered a good harvest.

Li Jianye casually mentioned 500 jin (250 kg) – a number that would surely shock the two old farmers.

"Li Jianye, I'm warning you, don't follow the crowd and spread rumors!"

The Party Secretary slammed his pipe down on the edge of the table, sparks flying. "Do you also believe that nonsense about 'the bolder the man, the greater the harvest'? Let me tell you, that's utter rubbish! Our ancestors toiled in the fields for generations. Don't we know how much grain an acre of land can produce? I've lived most of my life, and in the best years, with the most fertile land and the most abundant fertilizer, the wheat yield was at most four hundred jin—and that was only a once-in-a-lifetime miracle, a favor from heaven! In ordinary years, a yield of two hundred jin per acre is something to pray for! The rumors of three thousand or five thousand jin are just a pipe dream!"

"I can sign a pledge."

Li Jianye stood ramrod straight, his gaze unwavering. "If we don't reach the number I set, I won't eat a single grain of rice for the entire next year."

He spoke with absolute certainty.

Deep down, he knew that if the source of this generation of wheat seeds hadn't been so scarce, he was fully confident that he could have increased the yield per mu to 1,000 jin, or even higher.

"you--"

"Wait a minute."

The team leader raised his hand to stop the secretary from uttering the insults that were about to come out.

He walked up to Li Jianye, his expression more serious than ever before. "Jianye, I'm asking you one last time: did you truly believe every word you just said?"

"really."

"it is good."

The captain was silent for a moment, then nodded emphatically, "I approve."

How much land do you want?

"There are only three catties of seeds; two fen of land will be enough for me."

These days, it takes about 30 jin of ordinary wheat seeds to sow per mu (unit of land area).

But Li Jianye's seeds are different; the grains are plump and the ear-bearing rate is high, so 15 jin per mu is enough.

Upon hearing that he only wanted two-tenths of an acre, the team leader and the secretary exchanged a glance and remained silent.

Text cleaning and core analysis have been completed.

**Rewritten version:**

The soft sound of the door closing hadn't even faded when only two people remained inside.

The Party Secretary whirled around, his chest heaving, and said in a low voice, "Are you just going to let him run wild like this? Don't you have any idea how much food can be dug out of the fields?"

The brigade leader didn't reply, but walked to the window and looked out at the sun-baked, white earthen field.

His face remained expressionless for a long while before he finally spoke slowly: "Two plots of land, I can afford to try."