“Gathering chrysanthemums under the eastern fence, I leisurely see the southern mountain.”
Even after more than a thousand years, the artistic conception of this line from Tao Yuanming’s “Drinking Wine, Part 5” still inevitably inspires yearning.
Unfortunately, modern society is a net, woven from familial love, friendships, money, and material desires, with everyone being a fish caught in its mesh.
Among the fish in this net, some cannot escape, while others do not wish to.
Wang Sheng was also one of these fish.
It’s just that when he first saw this poem, he was still studying in the countryside, untouched inside, how could he yearn for the daily toils of his life? Besides, farming was certainly not as carefree as described by Tao Yuanming; it was a matter of survival…
Later, he fell in love with healthy living and became interested in growing chrysanthemums.
The next time he came across this quote, he had already become a worker struggling in society.
He asked himself, do I want this kind of life?
Yes! He really did, who wouldn’t want a carefree life?
But once given a choice, he was like many others: he yearned for it, but when it came to actually doing it, it was impossible.
What he never expected was that his daily exercises and regular lifestyle were just in order not to fall ill and die early like his parents.
The first twenty years went very smoothly, blessed with a healthy body and in excellent physical condition, only to be unexpectedly taken out of the net by a car accident.
When he opened his eyes again, he found himself a fish in another net.
The car accident had helped fulfill his dream.
Now he truly could “gather chrysanthemums beneath the eastern fence.”
He became another world’s Wang Sheng, a medicine farmer from Qingshan Village of the Great Zhou Dynasty, who was fairly handsome; his main crop was chrysanthemums, which he supplied as medicinal herbs to the pharmacies in the large town.
Recently, in order not to be harvested like chrysanthemums, he was diligently planting them.
Gazing at the medicinal chrysanthemums in front of him, the blue luminescent characters changed from “Chrysanthemum: 86%” to “Chrysanthemum: Mature,” and the chrysanthemums went from buds to fully blossomed and ripe. Only then did Wang Sheng breathe a sigh of relief, for now, he wouldn’t have to contribute himself.
Indeed, it’s quite a sad story.
The place where he now lived was called Qingshan Village.
Qingshan Village was nestled against the mountains and the water, boasting scenic beauty, right next to a tributary of the Yellow Dragon River, the second-largest river of the Great Zhou Dynasty.
The waters of Yellow Dragon River were calm and most suitable for merchant vessels, a natural choice for commerce. Logically, Qingshan should have been named Lijiang Village or Lijiang Town and should have prospered from fishing, not solely from growing chrysanthemums.
But the first settlers came here to avoid the dynasty’s war chaos from 500 years ago, so they intentionally picked a dangerous and remote location where the water was too turbulent to build a port, and even access was difficult.
It’s said that at that time, two groups fought over this location.
In the end, the people of Qingshan Village won and secured this place.
The other group had to settle for second best, establishing a village dozens of miles away. Now, 500 years later, that village has prospered into Lijiang Town due to convenient transportation, and its commerce is thriving—it wouldn’t be an overstatement to call it a city.
Such is the impermanence of life.
The chrysanthemums grown in Qingshan Village are supplied mainly to Lijiang Town, where the medicine merchants make a killing transporting them, while the farming villagers barely scrape by.
Supplying chrysanthemums was Wang Sheng’s main trouble.
He had taken on an order that required him to deliver 500 jin (about 250 kg) of dried chrysanthemums to Sun Family’s Pharmacy in Lijiang Town within a month.
Don’t be fooled by the 500 jin—it’s dried chrysanthemums!
With roughly 80% water content in chrysanthemums, by that measure, it takes about 5 to 6 jin of fresh chrysanthemums to produce one jin of dried chrysanthemums, meaning he needed more than 2500 jin of fresh chrysanthemums.
The yield per acre of land for chrysanthemums is around 1000 to 1500 jin, but that’s with modern technology. In this era, it’s a bit lower, generally around 800 to 900 jin according to the memories of his original body.
His original body’s family owned a little over three acres of land for chrysanthemum cultivation, which should have been enough considering this year’s growth.
But unpredictable calamities occur, like the night the Evil Flood Dragon passed through, causing storms and flooding that affected every village’s farmland near the river, including the chrysanthemum fields of Qingshan Village.
Consequently, the supply of chrysanthemums was completely gone.
Normally, this wouldn’t be a big deal—just explain to the medicine merchant, and at worst, they would exploit the situation.
But the bad news was that the original owner, in order to earn a bit more money, had signed a contract with the Sun Family.
This Sun Family was well-known in Lijiang Town, but not for their medicinal herbs. They were famous for their brothel, which welcomed not only ordinary people but also men and women with special tastes.
Wang Sheng just so happened to possess a certain “charm.”
So while most who signed contracts with the Sun Family were only exploited, Wang Sheng, the unlucky person he was, had to fulfill his supply with no way out, not even by offering money as collateral.
Otherwise, he would have to become the animal that first senses the warmth of the river in spring.
Naturally, his original body did not want that, but in this world there were Flood Dragons and Martial Artists.
From First Grade to Ninth Grade Martial Artists, Grandmasters, Great Grandmasters.
The Sun Family had Martial Artists, and even the weakest Martial Artists had the strength of 500 jin.
Naturally, his original body couldn’t resist, and fleeing was not an option; the outside world was said to be already in chaos, with signs of unrest reminiscent of 500 years ago. Without a clear route out, it meant death.
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No choice, I had to make do.
But the village, which had just experienced the Flood Dragon’s passage, had its chrysanthemums planted together, all suffering severe losses.
As for buying from others at a premium, the Sun Family was the strongest around; no one would risk offending them to help him.
He had no connections farther afield.
How could he gather those 500 kilograms of dry chrysanthemums?
Should nothing unexpected occur, the original Wang Sheng would be in deep trouble.
To avoid humiliation, the original soul ended his own life. Three days ago, the same-named Wang Sheng arrived here, inheriting the entire mess.
This was the life of Wang Sheng “picking chrysanthemums beneath the eastern fence.”
“Maybe I should just go too!”
This is a desperately hopeless situation!
If there is no solution, he was going to end up being the one “picking chrysanthemums beneath the eastern fence.”
It was not until Wang Sheng saw a handful of chrysanthemum seeds in the house that a line of text appeared before his eyes.
“Chrysanthemum Seeds: 0%”
To save himself, Wang Sheng naturally tried every means to survive, whether or not these words were just his delusion.
Thus, he spent three days engrossed in deciphering this sudden appearance of text.
Eventually, he arrived at a conclusion.
As long as he worked hard at something, he would definitely receive feedback, which was the progress bar that had appeared three days earlier.
How amazing was this progress bar?
Put simply, it was like the forging and Alchemy system in video games—you don’t need to understand the principles; you just wait for the progress bar to complete, and the forging or alchemy would naturally succeed.
Golden Finger!
This was, beyond a doubt, a Golden Finger!
“I’m saved!”
That was Wang Sheng’s first thought.
Logically speaking, this Golden Finger seemed useless against the current predicament.
But the power of the Golden Finger lies in the fact that your own skill level would also have a progress bar, and once it’s complete, your skill would forcefully breakthrough.
What is considered a skill?
Cooking, driving, swimming—all are skills.
And the original Wang Sheng had a particularly formidable skill.
“Chrysanthemum Planting: Breakthrough +1 (1%)”
The original soul grew up on charity and had a strong sense of pride. As soon as he could support himself, he began to cultivate wasteland and plant chrysanthemums.
After cultivating chrysanthemums for over a decade, he finally maxed out his chrysanthemum planting skill at 99.99%, which would have stayed there his whole life.
Until Wang Sheng took over everything and the Golden Finger appeared.
When Wang Sheng tried planting the chrysanthemum seeds in a pot and turned over the soil.
His skill broke through!
It became “Breakthrough +1”.
Breakthrough, exceed limits, surpassing the ultimate boundary.
It was this plus sign that permitted Wang Sheng to grow chrysanthemums that usually took three to six months in just three days.
And all Wang Sheng did was to pretend to turn over the soil daily, watching the progress bar of the chrysanthemums grow.
This morning, Wang Sheng truly breathed a sigh of relief as he watched the chrysanthemums mature. With this ability, he could supply 500 kilograms of dry chrysanthemums within a month.
However, before he could fully relax, Wang Sheng realized another problem.
The Great Zhou Dynasty had endured for over five hundred years and reached its decline; the government’s credibility in local areas could almost be said to have hit rock bottom.
Even if he supplied the chrysanthemums, as a local tyrant with Martial Artists, would the Sun Family really let him go?
Perhaps they would, perhaps not.
But this uncertainty was the biggest threat to Wang Sheng, who simply wanted to live his life peacefully.
He pondered over a solution all afternoon, extracting much from his memories, and ultimately he made a decision.
“I must practice martial arts!”
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