Courtyard House: My Time Travel is a Bit Too Strong

"Working" sounds inferior, but "helping" conveys warmth and importance.

"No need to go to Haizhou, I'll set up a braised vegetable shop for you after the New Year." Lin Quan's tone was very steady.

Let my cousin's family stay in our hometown, so that if my parents get sick, they will have someone to take care of them.

Besides, he is currently an unemployed technician at Huaxia Industrial Group, and it's common for him to be temporarily transferred there one day.

"You can even make braised dishes?" Chung Chih-kai was taken aback.

"I have the recipe. I'll just find a shop in the county town and open it. I'm not aiming for great wealth, but making tens of thousands of yuan a month isn't difficult at all," Lin Quan said confidently.

As soon as the car entered the village, Lin Quan parked it and turned to say, "Come to my house for lunch."

"Okay." Chung Chih-kai readily agreed, opened the door, got out of the car, and walked away with light steps.

Lin Quan drove the car into the villa's yard, opened the trunk with a whoosh, and pulled out large and small bags.

"When did you set off?" Grandpa Lin Jiacheng asked as he came up to them.

"We set off yesterday." Lin Quan carried the small reactor in one arm and walked straight to the basement.

This three-story building was specially designed by him—one basement level and two above-ground levels, each floor being 180 square meters.

Once the reactor is placed in the basement, it only needs to be refueled once and will last for a hundred years, thus completely eliminating electricity costs for the household.

"Buying so much tobacco and alcohol?" Mother Zhong Yunxia frowned.

"They forced it on me, I didn't take any money," Lin Quan answered directly.

"Now you've learned to fool people? Sending a case of wine is understandable; sending a whole case of cigarettes? Who would believe that?" Zhong Yunxia immediately retorted.

"Mom, you can't find these cigarettes and alcohol anywhere else." Lin Quan casually opened a pack of cigarettes and handed it over.

Zhong Yunxia looked down at the words on the packaging box, her hand stopped, and her heart skipped a beat.

"How much is this bag?" Zhong Yunxia asked, pointing to a bag with a slight smile.

"A little over ten thousand." Lin Quan didn't beat around the bush. Things that can't be hidden are better said outright.

"What about the other three?" She gestured with her finger, pointing to several women beside her.

"They're all about the same, Mom. You pick one, one for your eldest aunt, and one for each of your two cousins-in-law," Lin Quan said decisively.

"You really don't know how to manage money," Zhong Yunxia complained, but her voice softened slightly.

"Dad, Grandpa..." Lin Quan opened the watch boxes one by one, letting the elders choose for themselves.

"How much is this watch?" Father Lin Weijun picked up a watch and weighed it in his hand.

"The men's watch costs over 50,000 yuan, and the women's watch costs over 60,000 yuan," Lin Quan stated clearly.

Zhong Yunxia silently calculated with her fingers, then couldn't help but mutter to herself:

Fourteen watches, totaling around 700,000;

Five women's handbags, around 70,000 yuan;

Fifteen brand-new Xiaomi mobile phones, with a market value starting at 150,000 yuan;

These three items alone cost over 900,000 yuan.

This amount of money is enough to buy two new houses in the town; it can also buy two decent houses in the county seat.

After the industrial park was built in Baoshan Town, housing prices have long since caught up with those in the county seat.

Twenty years ago, houses in the town cost just over 600 yuan per square meter; now they've risen to over 4,000 yuan.

The cheapest apartments in the county town cost just over two thousand yuan per square meter; for the more expensive ones, it's not uncommon to find them costing over six thousand.

Of course, detached villas are a separate matter and cost far more than that.

Those resettlement houses still have a little over two thousand people, and some even less than two thousand.

In Zhong Yunxia's mind, spending over 900,000 yuan on bags, watches, and cell phones would be less reassuring than buying two real houses.

As soon as his grandparents entered the door, Lin Quan handed them watches and cell phones one by one.

"We're going to town to buy some groceries, and we'll pick up your sister on the way." Lin Weijun stood up and patted the corner of his clothes.

"Ah Quan, Uncle, we don't need to buy fish. I'll go to the river and catch a couple right now," said Zhong Zhiqiang, the second cousin, smiling as he rolled up his sleeves.

"I'll go with you." Zhong Zhikai picked up his fishing rod and followed him out the door.

"Mm," Lin Quan responded, nodding slightly.

My younger sister, Lin Guoxiu, is twenty-five years old this year and got married two years ago.

He went to town to buy some braised vegetables, drove to Wangjia Village, and picked up his sister, brother-in-law Wang Shicheng, and nephew.

"Brother, when did you get back?" Wang Shicheng asked.

"I just arrived this morning," Lin Quan replied.

"Are you going out again after the New Year?" Wang Shicheng asked again.

"It's not decided yet, we'll see how things go," Lin Quan replied casually.

Less than ten days after returning home, Lin Quan and Wang Shicheng took their fishing rods and went to his uncle's fishpond.

The fishpond wasn't large, about fifty meters long and wide, and less than two meters deep.

My uncle has three ponds in total, and the one in front of us is the largest, which is specifically for people to fish.

The other two are fattening ponds, specifically for raising small fish—once the crucian carp grow to the size of a palm, they are caught in a net and transferred to this pond.

The crucian carp, grass carp, and common carp in the pond are sold to fishmongers at a fixed price of around eight yuan per jin (500 grams).

However, in the town's market, the retail price of these three types of fish has already risen to thirteen or fourteen yuan per pound.

The hilly terrain makes large-scale mechanized farming impossible, and there seems to be no way out for growing wheat and rice.

More than 20 years ago, rice sold for a little over one yuan per kilogram; now, it only costs a little over two yuan.

Seeds are expensive, fertilizers are expensive, and agricultural mulch film is expensive...

However, the price of rice has remained almost unchanged compared to twenty years ago.

Those rice varieties that sell for 20 or 30 yuan per kilogram are mostly just hype; 99% of the fields are still planted with ordinary rice varieties.

With hundreds of acres of contiguous fields, the land is tilled, rice seedlings are planted, and harvested by machine, and some money can be earned every year.

But each person only has a few acres of paddy fields, scattered here and there, high and low, not forming a cohesive whole. Transplanting and harvesting rice all depend on hiring people, and after a whole year of hard work, they end up losing money.

The money you earn from farming for a year isn't even as much as what you make working away from home for a month. Anyone with a clear head knows what the right choice is.

It's not that nobody wants to farm, it's that you really can't make money from it.

Ten years ago, tangerines transported from other places sold for ten yuan per jin (500 grams); now, ten yuan can buy three or four jin in town.

Five years ago, Wogan oranges cost seven or eight yuan per kilogram; now they can be bought for three yuan per kilogram in town.

Local golden pears, ugly tangerines, and papa tangerines, which used to cost more than ten yuan per kilogram, have now dropped to two or three yuan per kilogram.

After working hard to build an orchard, you might make a little money in the first two years, but the profits will only get thinner and thinner after that.

After deducting the costs of seedlings, fertilizer, labor, pruning, bagging, pesticides, harvesting, and transportation, after several years of hard work, there are hardly any coins left in my pocket.

"It's too cold today, and the hook hasn't bitten for a long time." Zhong Zhiqiang scratched his head, a little embarrassed.

"Big cousin, let's oxygenate the pond for a while," Lin Quan said.

Zhong Zhikai took out his phone, tapped a few times, and remotely started the oxygenator.

"I'll try sprinkling some cornmeal." Chung Chih-chiang grabbed a handful of cornmeal and sprinkled it evenly around the float.

The fish in the pond eat cornmeal, sweet potato chips, and fried dough cakes.

The meat was firm and more flavorful than the meat bought in town.

Chung Kuo-hung often says that fish raised in ponds by the fields are more flavorful than those caught in reservoirs.

Many people say "river fish are the freshest," but they are just echoing what others say.

Currently, most rivers are already murky due to domestic sewage and agricultural wastewater.

Less than ten minutes after the oxygenation stopped, the tip of Linquan's pole suddenly sank.

"About eight ounces, a crucian carp, not bad luck."