Eternity Starts From His Seed

Chapter 7: Harvest

Placing a sack of spirit rice on the scale on the wooden table, Bubai took a step back as he silently waited for Manager Qin to do the calculations.

In silence, Manager Qin watched the scale sink with a satisfied smile. Then, Bubai faintly sensed some Qi flowing into Manager Qin's eyes as Manager Qin's attention shifted to Bubai and scanned his body up and down.

Naturally, he wasn't taking a fancy to Bubai's body. Instead, Manager Qin was doing his due diligence as a field manager, scanning his body with his Qi-sensing eyes to search for any hidden sources of Qi.

The Qi-sensing eyes was a basic technique mastered by many cultivators, used to vaguely perceive sources where Qi gathered, usually immobile or stationary sources with non-hidden Qi fluctuations.

This technique was almost an established requirement for spirit rice farm field managers, who used it to check if their farmers hid any grains of spirit rice.

Birds dies in pursuit of food, humans die in pursuit of wealth.

Stealing grains of spirit rice was a common practice for farmers. It's fine if one doesn't get caught, but if caught, being kicked out and beaten would be considered lucky.

In serious cases, one might be banned from all fields and may even have their hand chopped off. The unlucky ones might just obtain a free ride into reincarnation.

Confirming nothing wrong, Manager Qin nodded in approval as he began his calculations. Manager Qin then poured out a bit more than half of the sack into a bigger sack, "Half to the landlord..."

Then, he took out another good portion into another larger sack, "This is my share." Tossing the now light sack onto the scale once more, Manager Qin meticulously measured out half, "This is the city tax."

Manager Qin poured the rest of the remaining grain on the table, waving his hand over them, "And this is your final share."
Bubai nodded, and his hand reached out.

Slap! Just before his hand could grab the grain, Manager Qin slapped it away, his palm deftly sweeping the rest of the grain into his own sack, "And this is what you pay me for your meal during this season."

Bubai cursed inwardly. Although he 'ate' many buns, the sales from the remaining spirit rice would definitely cover the cost and even have excess!

However, Bubai held back his anger, his expression not even changing a bit, a silly smile etched on his face as he scratched the back of his head, "As Manager Qin says. I'm happy as long as I can eat well."

"Hahaha!" Manager Qin chuckled happily as he waved his hand, "Good! Chen Bubai, right? I'm optimistic about you! My field will always welcome honest workers like you. As a reward, let's skip the formalities and renew the contract..."

Walking out of Manager Qin's house with empty hands, Bubai received the sneers and jests from the others waiting outside. He walked past them, heading towards his hut.

On the way, he passed by Old Liu leaning against the wall of his hut with his arms crossed. "What did I say? Being too honest will get you nothing. Do you regret rejecting me, Xiao Chen?"

Bubai understood Old Liu's implications. The reason why this sly old man attempted to close the distance with him was not to help him but to pull him into his spirit rice-stealing group.

But did he have good intentions?

What use would an honest man be in a group of thieves? A scapegoat, of course.

So, Bubai rejected him because he knew better. This poked a hole in their relationship, and Bubai became isolated in the group, especially with the special overtime he was assigned with.