Educated Youth in the Countryside: She is the Village's Embroidery Queen!-Chapter 102: The Embroidery Is Missing

She returned the shoes, but Liu Lan wouldn’t accept them and insisted that she must keep them.

Because they were made to her size, and if she didn’t take them, no one else would wear them.

Yi Chichi... had no choice but to accept them even if she didn’t want to.

She hesitated for two seconds, "How about I pay..."

"Stop right there!"

Liu Lan, knowing immediately what Yi was about to say upon hearing "pay," quickly interrupted her, "If you really feel bad, just draw some more patterns for me."

The previous pattern got boring.

Besides, constantly embroidering the same pattern is no help in developing color sensitivity.

"Alright."

Exchanging patterns for a pair of shoes didn’t feel like taking advantage, and Yi Chichi’s guilt vanished instantly.

"Like always, don’t let anyone see."

"I won’t!"

Liu Lan and the others were well aware; they learned embroidery from their elders, always doing insoles, never flowers or grass on clothing — just patches upon patches.

So, Yi Chichi drew three patterns for her.

When she finished, Liu Lan and the others started to comment.

"Looks harder than before."

"Take your time to learn."

Yi Chichi was calm, "Anyway, you won’t master it overnight, plus many manual embroidery factories are merging with machine embroidery ones now, no rush."

Once you master it, you won’t worry about not earning money.

"Makes sense."

Then, the group sat together, chatting and doing needlework.

In the midst of the chat, Aunt Ma shared a little scoop.

"There will be new arrivals at the Youth Corps Courtyard this year."

"???"

"Seems like three this time."

Liu Xiaocao blurted out, "Hope this time there’s someone who can actually work."

Yi Chichi embarrassingly lowered her head, feeling like Xiaocao was alluding to her.

Since she’s only decent at picking corn, but truly helpless with other crops.

"Chichi, I wasn’t talking about you, don’t take it to heart."

Yi Chichi felt even more embarrassed, feeling more rejected with the comment.

But she had to maintain a smile, nodded, and began to change the subject.

"Auntie, do you know when the new arrivals are coming?"

Having new arrivals at the Youth Corps Courtyard wasn’t good news for Yi Chichi, she wasn’t worried about anything except the newcomers being troublesome.

Just thinking about that scenario gave her a headache.

"Around mid to late April!"

Yi Chichi calculated the time, realizing there was over a month left.

She could chill for a while.

You only know what people are like when they arrive; no need to worry excessively for now.

Still, the timing was good, just around the spring planting season.

Speaking of spring planting, "What’s being planted in spring?"

"Wheat and corn, later on rice and such."

She responded with an "Oh," so spring planting would be busy till around May or June.

Luckily, she didn’t need to work in the fields this year, just followed Uncle Yaozi to plant herbs.

Yi Chichi thought the work was simple.

However, unexpectedly, one day in late March, Uncle Yaozi caught her on her way back to the Youth Corps Courtyard after work, "Miss Yi, come with me to the mountains to collect herbs tomorrow."

"What?"

She was utterly confused, "Uncle, are you asking me to go into the mountains to collect herbs?"

"Yes, we’re going to gather herbs to plant."

Yi Chichi didn’t want to go; as the saying goes, getting up the mountain is easy, coming down is hard.

In the Northeast, forest resources are abundant and many mountains are still pristine forests; forget coming down, going up already exhausts her.

Neither was she a chosen one, dreaming of finding ginseng or other valuable herbs.

She just wasn’t destined for it.

Rather than dreaming about finding ginseng in the mountains, she was more worried about encountering bears or wolves.

"Uncle, do I have to go?"

"You don’t have to."

"Really?"

"You can work the fields instead."

Great, if she didn’t plant herbs, she’d have to farm; even a fool knows which to choose.

Though going up the mountain was hard, with potential dangers, it was short-term.

Spring planting though...

Just thinking about two months of spring planting gave her chills.

"I’ll go with you to the mountains to collect herbs."

Uncle Yaozi nodded in satisfaction, "Go get ready, we’ll head up the mountain tomorrow."

Yi Chichi’s mouth twitched; this was too fast.

Really not a moment to prepare.

"Uncle, we’re just heading into the mountains like this?"

"How else would you go, with gongs and drums to see you off?"

Uncle Yaozi shot her a glance, Yi Chichi quickly waved her hand, "That’s not what I mean, I meant this season, with everything reviving, even the beasts coming out after winter."

Meaning: it’s better to prep something for protection.

"No need, we’re not going deep into the mountains, just scoping around the edges."

The infirmary’s herbs were all common ones.

Simply because they’re wild enough to thrive with just a bit of sunlight, soil, and water.

As for valuable herbs...

Ha, leaving aside whether they’d encounter them, even if they did, they couldn’t grow them.

"Many herbs depend on environment and soil, it’s not about just planting after finding; I only gather those that are easy, practical, and grow well."

Yi Chichi suddenly understood, roaming the edges was fine.

"Does planting herbs adhere to policy?"

"Nonsense, if it didn’t, where’d we get our herbs? The few Western medicines the commune allocates aren’t enough to do squat."

Yi Chichi’s worried heart finally eased.

"Alright, I’ll go prepare; what time do we head out tomorrow?"

"No need to hurry, come at half-past nine."

"Okay."

Yi Chichi returned to the Youth Corps Courtyard, finding Bai Chen and the others squatting in the yard doing laundry; their clothes were changed and different from what she saw when she left in the morning.

Their hair was also semi-dry.

"Why are you all doing laundry together?"

"Don’t mention it, we were called by the team leader to break compost piles today, got the smell all over us."

No wonder.

"Why were you all called?"

Breaking compost piles takes strength, and the Youth Corps Courtyard members aren’t really good at work.

Even the strongest among them, Bai Chen, only managed to get eight merit points, never a full one.

"Because we had free time."

They couldn’t do the work of drying and selecting seeds. In the first year, the team leader found them inefficient, so he gave them relatively easier tasks, like sorting seeds with the grandmothers of the team.

No need to mention how that went.

Ever since, they’ve never done seed sorting again.

Nor could they sharpen farm tools.

After laboriously sharpening for a long time, they barely got a glimpse of sharpness; two scythes or hoes later, they were blunt.

Needed to be sharpened again.

"Just hate that we’re so useless, among so many chores, only breaking compost suits us."

Wu Yongfei looked bitter and indignant, and Yi Chichi could relate.

"I’m not much better, tomorrow I’m going with Uncle Yaozi to collect herbs in the mountains."

The group exchanged glances for a while, then all let out a collective sigh.

Oh, the hardship; why does living mean working?

Don’t want to work.

Later in the evening, Wang Nan dropped by her room again to repay money, this time two bucks.

Yi Chichi accepted without hesitation, just about to ask if her sister was out of the hospital, when Wang Nan’s eyes were drawn to the almost completed embroidery on the kang bed.

"Finished embroidering?"

She looked in awe at the clothing’s pattern, almost like hidden lines, wanting to touch but afraid her calloused hands might snag the threads.

"Almost done."

Yi Chichi lifted the clothes, and Wang Nan exclaimed, "Why did the embroidered pattern disappear?"