During times of famine: I have a spiritual spring space

Zhuang Lihui left the village and arrived at the agreed-upon location with Master Wang and the others. It was a three-way intersection, quite far from Zhuang Lihui's village, with four or five villages in between.

Zhuang Lihui didn't have to wait long. About twenty minutes later, Master Wang and his team brought cement and lime.

"Unload it here?" Master Wang asked, surprised and puzzled.

This place is in the middle of nowhere.

They didn't actually mind taking Zhuang Lihui directly to the village. Since they were already doing it, it didn't matter how far it was; it wouldn't take too much time or effort.

Actually, the main reason was that Master Wang wanted to maintain contact with Zhuang Lihui, so that he might be able to exchange cement and other materials for grain in the future.

Therefore, he wanted to deliver the items to Zhuang Lihui as a gesture of goodwill.

Zhuang Lihui nodded and pointed, "Unload it here! My men will be here soon. Master Wang, you can come to me again if you need these materials next time."

He also wanted to have more channels to obtain supplies.

Upon hearing this, Master Wang happily replied, "No problem! Shall we unload it here then?"

He realized that Zhuang Lihui didn't want them to know his exact address.

One should not have the heart to harm others, but one must be wary of others! Master Wang could understand this. Since that was the case, he wisely refrained from doing anything that would annoy others.

So he had the cement and lime unloaded.

"You've all worked hard, have a smoke, everyone." After unloading, Zhuang Lihui went up to offer cigarettes, which helped to build rapport among everyone.

Master Wang, smoking a cigarette, told Zhuang Lihui, "We should be able to deliver the remaining cement to you before the 5th of next month."

"How about we meet at the same place and at the same time on the 5th of next month?" Zhuang Lihui suggested.

"OK!"

After chatting for a bit, Master Wang didn't linger and led his men back to the commune.

After they had gone far away, Zhuang Lihui used his mind to collect all the cement and lime into the spiritual spring space.

Not long after, Master Zhou from the furniture workshop arrived with five truckloads of furniture, including the bed Zhuang Lihui needed, as well as tables, chairs, cabinets, and three of them were made of pure wood planks.

Zhuang Lihui planned to use the wooden planks to build a house in the Spirit Spring Space. Sawing the planks himself would take too much time, so why not use them since they were readily available?

It's just a matter of paying a little more corn.

"We'll get the grain storage bin and the oil pressing equipment ready for you as soon as possible. It should be done around next Wednesday," Master Zhou said.

Zhuang Lihui: "Then just deliver it to me next Friday at the same time."

"Should we send it here too?"

"That's right!"

Master Zhou nodded, asked no more questions, and had someone quickly unload the furniture and wooden boards.

After unloading, Zhuang Lihui still offered cigarettes, then saw Master Zhou and his group off, packed the furniture and wooden boards into his space, and left quickly.

Then, Zhuang Lihui walked back to the place where the brother and sister might be.

Unsurprisingly, they were found on the mountain, struggling to cut down a tree. Honestly, with all that work, would those few ears of corn even replenish the energy they'd expended?

Zhuang Lihui walked over, but before he got close, Xiao Fan and Xiao Yu noticed him.

The two were pleasantly surprised: "Big brother, what brings you here?"

They wiped the sweat from their faces; Xiao Fan's hands were already blistered. It seemed that cutting down trees really wasn't suited for them.

Zhuang Lihui nodded slightly to them and handed them the gourd in his hand: "Have some water!"

The gourd contains a magical spring.

Xiao Fan and Xiao Yu didn't think much of it and took the water and drank it. Only then did they realize that the water was cooler and sweeter than usual, and they thought that Zhuang Lihui had added sugar to it.

"Cutting down trees isn't suitable for you; it was my oversight. Here's what we'll do: you go back first, and come find me in that ravine at this time tomorrow. I'll give you an easier job," Zhuang Lihui said to them.

At first, the two siblings thought that Zhuang Lihui didn't want them to cut down trees in exchange for corn! They were anxious, but when they heard the end, they realized that the older brother felt sorry for them and had given them an easier job.

"Big brother, I can do it..." Xiao Fan wanted to prove himself.

Zhuang Lihui waved his hand: "Go back! Listen to my instructions."

"Then I'll finish cutting down this tree first."

It's been cut in half, so it's done from start to finish.

Zhuang Lihui glanced at it and saw that it was a cedar tree, also about thirty centimeters in diameter. Relatively speaking, the wood of this type of tree is softer.

"Give me the axe," Zhuang Lihui said, holding out his hand.

"I'll do the chopping, brother, you..."

"Get out of here! Look at your hands, you've got three or four blisters already."

Zhuang Lihui took the axe and told the two siblings to stay away. He then began to chop the tree methodically, felling it in just a few minutes. Xiao Fan and her brother were dumbfounded and full of admiration.

After cutting it down, Zhuang Lihui also trimmed off the branches and cut off the crown, leaving only the trunk.

"Alright, you can go back now! Come find me over there at this time tomorrow," Zhuang Lihui said to them, handing the axe back to them.

Fearing that Zhuang Lihui would get impatient, the two siblings didn't waste any words, took the axe, and headed home.

Without saying a word, Zhuang Lihui stored the tree trunk in his spatial storage. He suddenly remembered the trees that he and Jian'an had cut down a couple of days ago; it was time to collect them.

So he bypassed the village and headed towards the mountain, secretly taking away the felled trees without anyone noticing.

Not only that, he went to other mountains and cut down some more trees, only stopping when he felt it was enough to build a house.

Without a watch and not knowing the exact time, Zhuang Lihui could only look up at the position of the sun and feel that it must have been past noon.

So he circled back to the village entrance, now carrying a burlap sack on his shoulder.

Zhuang Lihui had to buy the burlap sacks from someone else; he prepared quite a few and stored them all in his spatial storage.

If it weren't for the fact that his physique had been modified by the spiritual spring these past few days, even professional athletes probably couldn't handle this amount of exercise.

When he got home, he found that his second uncle and others had already paved the floor with cement and even plastered the base of the walls with cement to a height of twenty or thirty centimeters.

With so little cement, it's impossible to apply it very thickly; it'll probably only be one or two centimeters thick.

enough.

Nowadays, very few families can afford to cement their house floors; you can find only a handful in the entire village.

"Lihui's back? The lime won't be applied until tomorrow," said Uncle Zhuang Zhenmin.

Zhuang Lihui took out a pack of cigarettes and offered them to his second uncle and the Chen brothers: "Thank you all for your hard work. No rush, tomorrow is fine!"

"Why are you smoking this all the time? You should save your money. You still have to get married later," Uncle nagged.

Chen Jianan: "Brother Hui, what were you busy with today?"

Zhuang Lihui laughed and said, "I'm just doing someone a favor, and this cigarette was given to me by them."

As for who they're working for, everyone has already guessed, so there's no need to ask too many questions.

"Lihui, why don't you and Liming stay with us for the next couple of days?" Auntie said.

The house has just been plastered with cement, so we should wait at least a day or two before moving in.

"Okay! Thank you, Second Aunt."

"You silly child, you're being too polite with your second aunt."