"If only we could find out who Du Lizheng's backer is." Gui Chongyang sighed.

No matter how the Gui family develops, this Mujia Village is the foundation place, and it is really difficult to feel at ease with a person like Du Lizheng, who is full of malice towards the Gui family.

"If you can hide it for 30 years, it's so easy to find it anywhere. But after 30 years, who knows if there has been any change. Gui Wu said thoughtfully: "If we can't find it, it doesn't mean that others can't find it." Over the years, I have been paying attention to the Du family, and the people in the village think that the Du family is rich, and they had 500 acres of land before, and a few years ago, they bought 300 acres sporadically through the relationship between the Yamen, for a total of 800 acres of land. But in fact, the Du family's land is not only 800 acres, and another ten hectares of Zhuangzi are registered under Du Lizheng's pseudonym! ”

What is most sought-after in Tongzhou now, of course, is land. With the imperial court entering Beijing, there were many powerful people in Nanjing, and they were all vying to buy land. The land in the hands of the Du family has reached 1,800 mu, which is not a small number. If it spreads, someone will check the details of the Du family to see if the Du family can touch it.

"The Du family has 1,800 acres of land!" Gui Chongyang gritted his teeth and became angry.

In that case, Du Li colluded with "Dong Gui" to prevent the Gui family from selling land, and bought the Gui family's land at a low price, either greedy for money and property, or aimed at making the Gui family unable to make up the money, so as to make Gui Li Zheng lose the hearts of the people and take the opportunity to seize the position of Li Zheng.

A small ambition cost nine lives.

Even a household like Gui Lizheng who has no background can inquire about the danger of that draw, how could the Du family, who can find a relationship in the yamen and take over the position of Li Zheng, not find out? But in order to hit Gui Lizheng's prestige, the Du family still secretly intervened.

After the death of nine people, the Du family did not feel guilty at all, and quickly married the Mei family and the Li family, and finally succeeded in discrediting Gui Lizheng and the Gui family being marginalized.

For other people, Gui Chongyang absolutely agrees with this method, but the Du family is different: "The sky has eyes!" ”

Gui Wu shook his head and said, "Let's see, except for the expulsion of two families over the years, Du Li Zheng is still good." He acts with scruples, and if he is replaced by other powerful people, it is difficult to ensure that the situation is even more uncontrollable. ”

Gui Chongyang frowned, understanding the unfinished meaning of Gui's five words.

In front of the real magnates, Duri, who is the tyrant of Mujia Village, is vulnerable, but the same is true for other villagers. Now all the surnames in Mujia Village live together, except for the tragedy thirteen years ago, the rest of the days are peaceful. If it is really to attack Du Lizheng and attract the attention of the powerful and rich slaves, it is impossible to say that the pattern of self-government in the village will change, and if you encounter such greedy and shameless people, the whole village will lose its land and become vassals and tenants.

Even if you hold the handle of Du Lizheng, you can't use it lightly, and if you use it, it will be a situation of "hurting the enemy by a thousand and losing yourself by 800". Unless it is time for the jade to be burned, this handle can only verbally threaten the Du family for two sentences.

Although he sent out the usual money reward, he didn't need to worry about it anymore, but Gui still went to Xiji Timber Store the next day. In addition to finding someone to inquire about the amount of timber sold by Li Facai, Gui Wu also had to order wood with the timber shop.

The house on the side of Gui's second grandfather's house needs to be repaired, and the doors and windows must be replaced, and the tiles should be replaced.

Gui Chongyang didn't follow him to Xiji Town, it costs money to build a house, if he wants the Gui family to live up, he has to find a way to make money.

However, no matter what means are used to make money, in the eyes of the world, land is fundamental. Whether it is a dignitary, or a small people.

Gui Chongyang's silver is useful, and he didn't plan to press on the land, but yesterday's theft of poplars in the woodland made Gui Chongyang begin to pay attention to his family's land.

In addition to the four acres of woodland that I saw on the mountain yesterday, there are also two acres of fields under the mountain.

The so-called "Shimoda", as the name suggests, is a land with low yield. Some "lower fields" are good for a few years, and when the land is fertilized, it becomes "middle field", but in some places, there are various drawbacks, so it has always been a lower field.

According to the current land price, Shangtian is ten taels of silver per acre, and Zhongtian is also seven or eight taels, all of which have doubled faster than the previous two years.

The three brothers of the Gui family are after the parents of the older generation, Gui Changhai made his own decisions to divide the family of the two younger brothers, except for the four acres of ancestral cemetery, which is jointly managed, the other 60 acres of middle field, 18 acres of lower field, and 12 acres of mountain forest are all equally divided by the three families, and a family of 20 acres of middle field, 6 acres of lower field, and 4 acres of forest land.

After Gui Yuan stole the silver and ran away, Gui Changhai sold the land to patch the silver, and the second and third grandfathers of Gui also took out their own twenty acres of Zhongtian to accompany their brother to tide over the difficulties.

At that time, the Gui family sold land to make up silver, and after being depressed, they made up seven and eight, and there was a shortfall of forty-five taels of silver, and it stands to reason that the Gui family still has more than ten acres of land and twelve acres of woodland, and how much can be made up, but who made Du Li Zheng hateful, not only united with "Donggui" to drive away the real buyer first, and then arranged for someone to hang Gui Changhai, and the real price transfer was already the last time, and there was no opportunity for the Gui family to continue to make up money.

As soon as the "Difficulty of Nine Dings" came out, in addition to the pensions that each family should receive, the Mei family deducted twenty-four taels of silver and four acres of ancestral cemetery from the Gui family; The Li family occupied the new house of Gui Changhai's family, eight taels of silver; Only Yang Jinzhu of the Yang family was kind and understood that the Gui family also had an accident, not only did he not come to the door to make trouble, but he also stopped his younger brother Yang Yinzhu, who was going to make trouble.

was dragged down by the Gui family three families, all of them are in-laws, the Yang family died, the father and son are Yang Changhai's brother-in-law and nephew, and they are not worse than the other two families on weekdays, there is no reason to compensate the Mei family and the Li family, and the Yang family who has died two people is bullied and kind.

Gui Changhai, who was bedridden, gave his family's six acres of land and four acres of woodland as compensation to the Yang family.

Yang Jinzhu said that he would not accept anything, but it was Grandma Gui, the old aunt and grandmother of the Yang family, who spoke, that Yang Jinzhu agreed to accept half of it. Gui Changhai gave Yang Jinzhu four acres of land, but Yang Jinzhu didn't keep it himself, and gave it to his younger brother Yang Yinzhu. Therefore, there are only two acres of land and four acres of woodland left in the Guijia family's house.

The six acres of land and four acres of woodland in the second room of the Gui family are all there, because the family has a large population, and they have relied on the odd jobs of their mother-in-law and daughter-in-law to make up for it over the years, so they can barely make ends meet, and there is no surplus to buy new land.

The six acres of land and four acres of woodland in the third room of the Gui family were sold by Gui San's grandmother.

According to the rules commonly known as the agreement, land trading "first ask the clan relatives, then ask the neighbors", if the Gui family sells the geography, the long house and the second room should be sold first, and the two houses are not bought and then the villagers who are adjacent to the land around the land.

If the Gui family's house and the second room are no longer heirs under the pretext that there is no male in the third room, they can still hold on to the land of the third room and not let it be sold, and take back the land without paying a penny.

When Mrs. Li was young and widowed, she had the land of this house that Li Jiatang was worried about, and she almost occupied it on the grounds of "escrow".

Although Gui San's grandmother remarried at the beginning, she was celebrating her husband's first anniversary, and it was not easy for a widow to take her young daughter, so she took that step.

At that time, there were only Grandma Gui, Mei and the young Mei in the Gui family's room, and the second room was also a room full of old, young, sick and disabled, and they didn't have the energy to help Gui San's grandmother and daughter.

Before Gui San's grandmother's family came to pick up people, Gui's second grandfather came forward and helped Gui San's grandmother sell the six acres of Xia Tian and four acres of forest land to the Lin family, which happened to border the land of Sanfang.

Because of the fact that the Gui family's house and the second room sat back and watched the third room buy land, "Donggui" also came out and jumped for a while at that time, saying that "Xigui" was the ancestral property of the descendants of the unscrupulous descendants. Even "Donggui" wanted to repeat his old tricks, and wanted to sabotage the matter by virtue of his clan status, but he did not stop the Lin family.

The Lin family was kind-hearted and did not take the opportunity to lower the price, and bought a three-room land according to the market price of two taels of silver per mu of land and one tael of silver per mu of forest land.

Grandma Gui San was only willing to ask for half at that time, and wanted to give the remaining eight taels to the long room and the second room, but she refused to accept either room, and gave the sixteen taels of silver to Grandma Gui San, so that she could take away the funds for raising her young daughter.

Because of these antecedents, the remaining eight acres of the Gui family's house and the second room are bordered by Yang Yinzhu's land on one side and the Lin family's land on the other, which is an independent land reclaimed at the foot of the mountain.

Today, Gui Chongyang has to follow Gui Chun to see, it is this piece of Xiatian.

Because they wanted to avoid the heat at noon, the two brothers came early, the dew in the forest was still there, and the sky was bright, so they arrived at the ground.

Looking at the sorghum field in front of him, Gui Chongyang only felt that his throat was tight, and the taste of scraping his throat seemed to be still there. This grain does not pick the ground and is drought tolerant, so it can be used as rations when it is used in the field.

Gui Chongyang didn't want to eat this anymore.

Gui Chun took a hoe and went into the sorghum field, and today he came to shovel grass.

In the summer rain, the weeds in the crops are rising wildly, and they must be shoveled once in a few days, otherwise the weeds will steal the ground, and the output in the field will be even less.

The eighteen acres of land are planted with sorghum, but they look very different. The slightly smaller land on the left, the sorghum grows sparsely, and the field is overgrown with weeds, which is the land of Yang Yinzhu's family; The eight acres of land in the middle, the sorghum is arranged neatly, and the weeds in the field are all newly grown, and the number can be counted, which is the land of the Gui family's house and the second room; The sorghum on the right six acres of land grows taller and stronger, and the ears are fatter, which is the land of the Lin family.

Even a person like Gui Chongyang, who doesn't know about farming, can tell that the Lin family's sorghum cultivation is good.

"Is this a good grain?" Gui Chongyang stood in front of the Lin family and watched, and asked Gui Chun in a loud voice.

Gui Chun's subordinates didn't stop, and said: "Yes, I just started planting this year, the first year was an experiment, it looks like it's no problem to increase the yield by two percent, and we can also plant it next year, the Lin family is kind." ”

The cousin was working, and Gui Chongyang was embarrassed to be idle, so he went into the sorghum field. Gui's house also has farm tools, but Gui Chongyang didn't think about going to the ground before he came out, so he was a little embarrassed with his empty hands.

Seeing this, Gui Chun hurriedly stopped and said, "What are you doing here?" Get out quickly, carefully cut the face of the leaves. ”

"I pull weeds." Gui Chongyang said, already squatting down.

Gui Chun said: "You can't do this, you should be confused when you squat down." ”

"I'll try it first." Gui Chongyang still insisted.

Gui Chun knew that his cousin had a good idea, so he didn't stop him anymore, but he was still not at ease, so he slowed down his work and paid attention to Gui Chongyang's side.

Although it was early in the morning, it was the middle of summer, and it was hot in the morning and evening, Gui Chongyang got up and squatted down with effort, and he began to feel dizzy before pulling out half of the ridge, and his forehead was sweaty, so he got up and closed his eyes to recuperate.

At this time, he heard a "swish" sound not far away, and Gui Chongyang opened his eyes.