Transmigrated Farmgirl's Scheme to Get Rich - Chapter 9
Fighting
Mrs. Liang knew that her son had messed up and scolded him in a low voice, “Feng’er, shut up! What kind of nonsense are you talking about?”
“I haven’t been speaking any nonsense! Isn’t he just ……”
Before he could finish his sentence, Lu Junming had already leapt in front of him and landed a fist on his cheeks.
When she saw that her beloved son had been beaten, Mrs. Liang was furious. She stood in front of her son and yelled at Lu Junming, “How could you hit others! Do you not have any manners? Do you not have any manners?”
It was incredibly hypocritical for Mrs. Liang to mention manners after she’s raised such a failure of a son!
Lu Junming rubbed his fist, scaring Mo Feng so much he hid behind his mother. He glared angrily at the mother and son, and knowing he wouldn’t be able to wait for them to apologise to him, he said coldly, “I might not have manners, but at least I know how to fight. Your son has nothing!”
Governing official Wu came over and patted Lu Junming’s shoulder, “Junming, calm down. This boy’s words aren’t worth taking to heart.”
Mo Feng rubbed his cheeks and spat out a mouthful of spit, which was flecked with blood. He turned to Mrs. Liang and said, “Mum, I’m bleeding!”
Mrs. Liang had never had the heart to lay a single finger on her precious son. This sight made her incredibly distressed, to the point she could only wordlessly try to comfort her son.
Everyone felt that Mo Feng deserved to be beaten, and no one tried to stand up for him. Mo Yan saw that Lu Junming’s face was white with anger, so she tried to comfort him in a small voice, “Lu Junming, don’t be angry, I’ll tell you a story if you want me to.”
As soon as he heard her speak, Mo Feng returned to his senses, and started shouting at Mo Yan, “Tell what stories? It’s all your fault for causing this trouble!”
“Come at me if you have the guts. Pick on someone your own size!” Lu Junming had calmed down and spoke evenly as he put his arms behind his back in a dignified manner.
At this moment, Cao Zhang came over to Lu Junming and said, “Brother Lu, please don’t take this personally. Mo Feng doesn’t have a filter on his mouth, but he bears no ill will.”
Mrs. Liang tried to support Cao Zhang’s words, “Yes! He doesn’t mean any harm”
Lu Junming didn’t bother to say anything to Mrs. Liang and Mo Feng and gestured towards governing official Wu, “Sir, Mo Yan is a really good storyteller, and they’re all new stories that I guarantee no one here has ever heard before. Why don’t we let her tell one and let everyone decide whether she’s good or not?”
Mo Yan was incredibly embarrassed, and whispered to try and stop him, “Lu Junming, don’t be ridiculous. I can’t do this!”
“We’ll find out whether or not you actually can become a storyteller after you try. Just tell me the story you owe me today.”
Lu Junming dragged Mo Yan to the front, and spoke towards the old storyteller who had been standing there in shock, “Old man, your story isn’t interesting. How about letting this girl tell a story for a change?”
Mo Yan still wanted to refuse, but Lu Junming pushed her behind the desk without saying anything and smacked the table with the storyteller’s gavel, saying, “It’s time for a story!” With that, he stepped back and stood next to Cao Zhang.
This time the crowd was silent, and there wasn’t any chatting and giggling. Mo Yan looked to the side, and both Mr. Tian and Cao Zhang smiled and nodded towards her, indicating that she should start.
Mo Yan cleared her throat and asked, “Is there a particular story you want to hear?”
“Asking what we want to hear? You certainly talk a big game!” Someone in the crowd said.
The storyteller was resentful that Mo Yan had stolen his job, and couldn’t believe a young girl knew how to tell stories. How could he have known that Mo Yan had graduated university with a degree in Chinese culture in her previous life, and knew much more than he did?
“Then tell us about the story of Fan Li’s retirement!” [1]
He thought he had given Mo Yan a challenge. Not many of the villagers present knew who Fan Li was, and even if they did, they only knew that he had assisted King Goujian in restoring his country. Even Mr. Tian only knew a little about what happened after his retirement, and even Cao Zhang knew nothing about it, let alone anyone else.
Still a little nervous, she cleared her throat again before beginning, “Alright then. After assisting King Goujian restore the Kingdom of Yue, Official Fan saw that they could only work together in troubled times, but not in times of peace and prosperity, so he resigned from his post. During his retirement, he lived in Ludi, near the riverbed, and earned a living as a farmer. One thing you might not know is that he was actually one of the first people who developed trade as we know it today. He was also known as Sir Taozhu, or Chi Yizi…”
Mo Yan’s voice hadn’t changed yet, and was clear, crisp and pleasant to the ear. She spoke with deftness and enunciated each word well.
After she finished, Lu Junming was the first to clap and complement her, and even Cao Zhang and Mr. Tian couldn’t help but clap their hands in admiration!
The storyteller walked up to governing official Wu and bowed. “Sir, I am ashamed to not even be as good of a storyteller as a young girl. I will take my leave now.”
Looking at the old storyteller’s despondent back, Mo Yan felt a little guilt. She saw his gavel lying on the table, and picked it up and went after him.
“Sir, you forgot this!”
The old gentleman took his gavel, as he looked at Mo Yan with a helpless face, “Young lady, just which saint had descended from the heavens into your body?”
Mo Yan’s heart shook. She was so focused on storytelling she had forgotten her current identity. Where did she learn this story from? And how would she explain her knowledge to the villagers?
“I dream a lot. This story and others were all told to me by the saints in my dreams.”
“There is a time when the clouds and flowers in a dream will disperse!” After saying that, the storyteller straightened his back and walked away swiftly. Mo Yan didn’t understand what he meant by this. Was he saying that I wouldn’t be a storyteller for very long?
When Mo Yan returned, she saw that the bowl for collecting wheat had been placed on the desk, but very few people had gone to put wheat inside. The crowd was whispering, and the people who had collected wheat slowly stepped back in twos or threes before running back into the crowd.
The amount of wheat Mo Yan received today was less than half of that the storyteller received yesterday. Governing official Wu put the wheat into a linen bag and handed it to Mrs. Liang, which Mo Feng grabbed, “Is that it?”
Mo Yan went up to governing official Wu and curtsied, “Sir, I didn’t do a very good job telling stories. I can’t accept this!”
Mo Feng clutched the wheat bag tightly, “Why not? If you don’t accept this wheat, I’d have been beaten up for nothing. You have to continue telling stories tomorrow!”
After he mentioned being beaten up, Mo Yan thought about Lu Junming, but when she looked for him, she saw that he had already gone far away.
Cao Zhang fanned himself with a folding fan as he came over, and asked, “Yan’er, you spoke very well, but where did you learn this story?”
“I, I…”
Mo Yan didn’t want to say that a saint had told her these stories in her dreams. Mr. Tian came over and said, “I have some miscellaneous stories, and Mo Yan has borrowed and read all of them. She probably learnt this story from one of them.”
Cao Zhang was sceptical. He should have read all of Mr. Tian’s books as well, so why didn’t he see any of these stories he was talking about?
Mo Yan nodded gratefully towards Mr. Tian, who smiled at her slightly.
After the crowd dispersed, Mrs. Liang returned home and inspected her son’s cheeks carefully under an oil lamp, so worried she kept sighing with distress.
When she heard Mo Yan and Mo Ling laughing in their room, she was furious and shouted, “Yan’er! What kind of relationship do you have with that boy from the Lu family? Tell me every single detail!”
“I just met him at the pond. He was fishing while I was looking after the ducks.”
“So you’ve been talking to a bastard for days on end? From tomorrow onwards, you aren’t allowed to go to the pond anymore!”
“What about the ducks?”
“Stew them, sell them, I don’t care. In any case, you’re forbidden from hanging out with him anymore!”
PS: Edited Sept 3, 2023, to try and get the rest of the story up to the current standards. This includes using the current terms and polishing up the translation. Thanks for reading!
[1] Fan Li is a strategist and businessman from the Warring States period who lived in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE. I made a mistake by calling him a physician in the original edit.