Xavier was a mess inside. He lay on the bed but couldn't sleep. He had finally found a girl he liked, but she already had a fiancé.
That was just terrible. He didn't really want to be the secondary husband. Here, the secondary husband had a low status and was always controlled by the main husband at home.
On Yaelle's side, things were different. She happily fell asleep, ready to go transplant chili seedlings tomorrow. There weren't many watermelons, and the back garden still had some empty space.
The seedlings had been growing for a month and were over ten centimeters tall, so it was time to transplant them. If they waited any longer, it would be too late. It was the eighth day of the fourth lunar month.
According to the modern calendar, it was early May. She had arrived at the beginning of April, so she had been in the ancient world for one month and a few days. Time passed so quickly when she was busy.
Early the next morning, Yaelle was woken up by Michael's urging voice. Her brother had heard that they were going to transplant the new crops today and was more excited than she was. He barely slept all night, afraid she would miss the time and affect the harvest.
He couldn't help it, since he ran a grain store and knew how important food was to the common people. He didn't dare to take it lightly at all. Yaelle had no choice but to get up with sleepy eyes.
She quickly washed up and went to the back garden with her brother. The watermelons had been prepared using the method from their hometown. They made small nutrition pots and arranged them neatly.
Each pot had a small hole where they pressed in a watermelon seed, then covered it with a layer of fine soil. Normally, they would cover it with plastic film, but since they didn't have any here, they skipped that step. They didn't have a pot-making tool either, so the pots were handmade from mud.
It wasn't a lot of work since there were only about three hundred seeds. The process was similar, just not as neat-looking, but it was very convenient for transplanting. Yaelle and the others loaded the nutrition pots into baskets one by one and carried them to the field.
The ridges in the watermelon field were already made. One person dug holes in front, another carried manure to put in the holes, and someone else placed the nutrition pots inside. Then they covered the seedlings with soil around the stems and watered them.
That finished the transplanting. They worked quickly together and finished in no time. Once the watermelons were done, everyone went to the chili field to dig up the seedlings.
First, they watered the soil thoroughly, then dug up the seedlings. They left some soil around the roots and carefully placed the seedlings upright into baskets. They packed dozens of baskets tightly.
The seedlings looked healthy. There were probably about twenty thousand of them. Yaelle had the baskets loaded onto a horse cart.
They could transport everything in one trip to the manor. The manor was in the suburbs, not far from the city center. The ride took a little over half an hour.
Michael had already arranged things in advance. They went directly to the field left prepared from last time. The land was already plowed and ridged.
Planting chili peppers was simpler, just like planting regular vegetables. They just needed to dig a hole, put the seedling in, and cover it with soil. Anyone could do it.
A few people were each given several baskets. Once the spacing was decided, they got to work. Chili peppers were usually planted at a rate of 3,500 to 5,000 plants per acre.
Normally, there were two rows per ridge, with rows 33 to 45 centimeters apart and plants 30 to 45 centimeters apart. With more people, planting went faster. They planted about six acres with all twenty thousand seedlings.
After one round of watering, the rest would be treated like normal vegetables. As long as fertilizer was applied regularly, they would grow well. By the time they finished, the sky was getting dark.
A few of them decided to stay the night at the manor. Uncle Huang, who had watched them grow up, warmly arranged for rooms to be cleaned. They already had fixed rooms there, so it only needed a little tidying.
He also treated them to a hearty dinner, with vegetables grown on the manor and wild game from the mountains.
After dinner, Yaelle said she wanted to take a walk to help digest and asked Michael to go with her. They walked around the estate and observed the general layout. The estate was large and planted entirely with dry crops.
There were no rice paddies, but what made Yaelle happy was the small mountain stream running through the eastern side. Although it was narrow, water flowed slowly and continuously, making irrigation convenient. Still, it felt like the water source hadn't been fully utilized.
"If we dig a deeper pond in the middle of this stream to store water, wouldn't it help during dry seasons or when the stream gets low? It could last a few extra days. And if we dig a canal going east that circles the estate, then they wouldn't need to walk so far just to fetch water."
"Though it takes labor at first, it'll save a lot of effort later on." Michael thought about her words and realized they made sense. "We could even dig a larger pond in the center of the estate and direct water there."
"We can raise fish, grow lotus roots, and make better use of the space." "That sounds like a good idea." After giving a few suggestions, Yaelle discussed things with Michael a bit longer.
When it got too dark, she returned to her room to sleep. She had been busy all day and fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. Michael then found Uncle Fernan and shared their ideas.
He told him to arrange workers early and only returned to sleep afterward. The next morning, the two siblings woke up early and headed back home. Michael had more things to handle.
After getting home, they took a short rest and got busy again. Michael managed the shop affairs, while Yaelle started organizing the crop data from the past few days. She decided to write a detailed report.
She recorded the planting process and results in full. She also recalled some modern wheat and rice farming techniques from memory. She hoped they might help future agricultural development.
While Yaelle focused on her agricultural research, an unexpected visitor arrived. On the sixteenth day of the fourth lunar month, a man wearing flashy clothing came to the house. One glance made it clear what kind of job he had.
He was a matchmaker and said that at the recent flower viewing event, a young master surnamed Wang had taken a great liking to her and wished to marry her. The groom's side offered several shops, a house, and a dowry of twenty thousand taels of silver. It sounded like a good match.
But Yaelle didn't remember this Young Master Wang and didn't want to marry. She didn't want to offend the matchmaker either, so she politely declined. "I'm really sorry," she said.
"My father had already arranged my marriage before he passed. We plan to marry once the mourning period ends. I already have a primary husband picked out."
"I would hate to wrong Young Master Wang." "Even if he agrees to be a secondary husband, that decision needs the approval of the main husband." "If I agree to it on my own, it would embarrass him."
She thought for a moment and added, "My brother isn't engaged yet. If you know any suitable young women, please keep an eye out. We don't care about family background, just good personality and character."