As if to express herself, Youjuan rushed to the stove first, stood on tiptoes, reached out and opened the small wooden cover, and smiled playfully at her brother.

From where the cover was lifted, a curl of hot steam came out.

Oh, the soup pot is right there!

Chen Tianhua strode forward, reached down with a copper ladle, scooped out a few ladles of hot water and poured it into the footbath. After finishing, he smiled at his younger sister Youjuan, took the wooden basin and scooped out another ladle of cold water in the bucket.

He tested the water temperature with his hand before placing it in front of his mother.

Xue Wanzhen took off her black cloth shoes, revealing her special little feet wrapped in white cotton cloth.

My mother's cloth shoes have a very peculiar shape. The uppers are very high and narrow, and the length is only about 13 to 4 centimeters.

She slowly peeled off the layers of white cotton cloth wrapped around her feet. The innermost layer actually had some bloodshot eyes, probably because she had walked too much today.

Xue Wanzhen threw the white cotton footcloth she had just taken off beside the tub to be washed later. She took out a clean white cotton footcloth from her pocket and placed it on her leg.

Chen Tianhua discovered that his mother's naked feet were pale white in front of him.

The instep of the foot is very high, and the five toes are joined together and cannot be separated or distinguished. The foot is very short, no more than 13 centimeters long. The overall appearance is like the "brown seeds" wrapped in rice used by people in Jiangnan during the Dragon Boat Festival.

Is this the 'three-inch golden lotus' mentioned in later generations' books?

Chen Tianhua suddenly remembered what the great writer Lu Xun said in his book: '...the foot-binding cloth is smelly and long...'

This was the first time in his life that he had witnessed this with his own eyes, and he was astonished and a bit unbelievable.

"Didn't you see enough when you were a kid? You brat!" Xue Wanzhen scolded her warmly and angrily when she saw Tu Gen staring at her little feet with a dumbfounded look.

"Oh, no, mama, I see there are bloodshot eyes on your feet. Are you injured? This..." Xu Tianhua quickly reasoned out his wits.

"Oh...it's okay. I was a little anxious walking from your grandma's house this afternoon."

"this……"

Chen Tianhua wanted to say something more, but was interrupted by his mother, "Stop nagging! Go to the west wing quickly and get some red potion. Just rub it on for me!"

"Oh okay... red potion..."

Chen Tianhua muttered, but he actually didn't know where the red potion was, and slowly stood up and deliberately smacked at Youjuan.

"I'll get it!"

Seeing this, Youjuan volunteered to go to the west wing to get it.

This little girl is very clever and will come in handy in the future.

Chen Tianhua thought to himself.

After the mother washed her feet, she asked Chen Tianhua to use cotton wool dipped in red liquid to lightly apply it on the broken skin on the toes.

He knew that this red potion, like iodine tincture, had basic functions of sterilizing, disinfecting, antiseptic, and healing wounds. These functions had long been eliminated in later generations and would not be seen anymore. Nowadays, antibiotics are used.

Mother said while wrapping clean white cotton cloth around her feet:

"Gen'er, my mother has always wanted to ask you. You promised that the Fan family will repay the debt before the end of the year. What are you going to use to repay it? Don't brag about it."

She finally spoke out the worries she had been holding in her heart, and when she spoke, she had a frown on her face, as if she was blaming the roots of the earth, and she looked dull.

"Well, mama, don't worry about this anymore. I'll start fishing for shrimps and fish right away. I can also go to the lake to touch river clams and sweep snails. These can be sold at the township market. More than three months will be enough to pay off the debt.

, it’s important for you to take care of yourself first.”

"Fishing for shrimps and fish...and river clams...can we do it when the weather gets cooler?"

Xue Wanzhen still doubted Tu Gen's ability. She had never seen him catch any shrimps or fish at home before. He had touched snails and river mussels, but the quantity was not large, and her family could barely eat them.

However, these few times he touched a lot of mussels and snails, and even took a lot to his grandmother's house.

But how much can these sell for?

"Don't worry. From now on, with me as your son in this family, grandma won't have to worry about anything anymore."

"My roots have really grown up, and I will open up to my mother's heart! Okay, from now on our family will depend entirely on you. You are the male of the family, so you have to give your mother credit..."

Xue Wanzhen suddenly realized that the Tu Gen in front of her was very different from before. He spoke and acted like an adult. Maybe after returning from a trip to the Lord of Hell, this person would become more sensible, right?

God, Bodhisattva bless me!

She muttered silently in her heart, gently caressing her son's forehead with her hands, tears in her eyes.

Let a child under twenty years old be the head of the family, this is life!

"Well, ma'am... don't worry, I will definitely fight for you!" Chen Tianhua gritted his teeth and comforted his mother.

"Okay, okay... don't worry about mother... go to bed early, I have to get up early tomorrow morning."

"Um…"

When they went to bed at night, the beds and bed boards of sisters Chen Tianhua and Tingjuan were dismantled to make coffins, as well as door panels.

Now, only my mother's big bed remains untouched.

The eldest sisters Tingjuan and Youjuan had no beds, so they went to sleep with their mother in the main room in the west wing. Chen Tianhua was the only one in the east wing.

He used two long benches as supports, bundled thick bamboo poles as temporary mattresses, and put a layer of straw mats and straw mats on top to make a small bed.

There is a toilet in the west wing room, which is used by the female relatives in the family. When Chen Tianhua goes out for convenience, he urinates in a broken pot next to the pig pen, and he has to go to the toilet outside to defecate.

In the few days after traveling through time, Chen Tianhua's biological clock was still adjusting.

In the countryside, people wake up at Mao hour and go to bed at the same time. They all rely on the pattern of getting up when the rooster crows, then working at sunrise and resting at sunset, depending on the weather.

Unless there are special circumstances, most families are reluctant to light candles, let alone oil lamps.

Chen Tianhua estimated that in summer, it gets completely dark around 7:30 to 8 o'clock, and in winter it should be around 6 to 7 o'clock.

When the family gets up, they listen to the crow of the rooster in the chicken coop.

At this time, it should be Xu Shi, which is what people often call the "late watch" time. If it is the first watch, it is the first watch.

But in the past few days, he had never heard the sound of "bang bang bang", or the cry of "it's all right" in the movie.

Chen Tianhua originally wanted to ask his mother about this issue, but thought it would be inappropriate, so he kept silent and did not dare to ask.

Only later did he understand that nowadays there is still a need for an hourglass to time the watch, and a professional watchman is required.

This kind of situation only exists in towns and villages where government offices are set up. In Xibutou Village in the countryside, people just act according to the weather.

It is said that wealthy families in big cities, such as Hangzhou and Shanghai, have Western clocks that they can strike when the time comes. Folks call it a 'self-ringing clock'.

I heard that the Fan family, the richest man in the village, owned a hanging self-winding pendulum clock. It seems that the village chief also had one.

Western clocks such as the so-called chime clock were still a luxury item for wealthy people in the late Qing Dynasty.

When the rooster crows at home, Chen Tianhua estimates that it will be like this at five o'clock in the morning. Getting up early is not a big problem. He has the habit of getting up early for training.

But when it comes to sleeping at night, around eight or nine o'clock here, everyone goes to bed and falls asleep, but Chen Tianhua just tosses and turns and can't fall asleep.

This is not the case in later generations, where we have televisions and smartphones, where we can play games, chat and watch smart videos.

Apart from mosquitoes and flies, there are only a few living people left here.
Chapter completed!