Chapter 154: The Overworked Lao Chen

"Our children in Zhangxizhen will finally have a proper future."

Seeing the thickened, fitted burlap sack hanging at the entrance of the ancestral hall, An Sheng's face filled with astonishment, and he couldn't help but mutter in disbelief.

"It's unavoidable—no one has ever exploded cow dung inside the ancestral hall before; it's our first time, and there were no standards."

"Moreover, Chen Zhi's family's approach isn't suitable for village-wide adoption. After comprehensive consideration by the village committee, we came up with a solution that appeases public anger while giving our ancestors something to laugh at."

Though Lao Chen didn't understand An Sheng's words, he could read his expression and smiled.

"From now on, anyone who misbehaves will be stuffed into the sack and publicly whipped by their parents with bamboo rods, before the ancestors and the entire village."

"It may hurt the child's pride, but it's great for the parents' wallets."

An Sheng thought for a moment and said: "If you put it that way, I'll definitely trick Chen Nian back here when I have time."

Hmm. The dual-flower red stick of the West Coast gang.

Being hung in front of the ancestral hall and beaten by both his own parents—it sounds kinda thrilling to imagine.

Lao Chen rode his electric scooter around back, arrived at the newly built cluster behind the ancestral hall, and unlocked the gate.

The Zhangxizhen Chen Ancestral Hall, spanning centuries and including the new expansion, covers over four thousand square meters; only part of it is normally open for worship.

Most areas with historical patterns remain closed except during major events, due to the difficulty of maintenance, and are fully opened only for villagers and tourists then.

The tea-processing workshop Lao Chen acquired is part of the newly built tourist zone of the Chen Ancestral Hall, containing both old and brand-new tea-making equipment, fully documenting the development of the Zhangxizhen Chen lineage after the founding of the nation.

After opening the ancestral hall's gate, Lao Chen sneaked back and shut it tightly.

On the floor inside were two bags of freshly picked tea leaves, casually dumped on the ground.

"Mmmmm—"

An Sheng approached the tea leaves, briefly inspected their quality, frowned in thought, and waved for Lao Chen to come over and lend a hand.

The tea leaves' quality, as the old tea master had said, had extremely high moisture content, and young tea bushes naturally contain low levels of catechins.

High catechin levels make tea bitter and astringent.

Low catechin levels, however, drastically weaken the tea's aromatic freshness.

If you dig deep into tea processing, it's fundamentally chemistry, botany, and geography.

Factors like catechin compounds, caffeine, and soil mineral content all affect tea quality.

This is a systematic discipline, but in the old days of rampant empiricism, no one bothered to compile the 'why' behind tea-making or answer it with academic papers.

The reason they didn't investigate was not because the old tea masters were stupid—they simply had a habit, once they solved a problem, of 'holding back one trick.'

But times have changed now.

In the past, 'holding back one trick' hindered scaling and industrialization; manual tea-making simply couldn't match the speed of mechanized production.

Ten old men exhausting themselves roasting tea can't match the profit margin of a machine running for a month.

Most tea-processing techniques are now publicly available on official agricultural bureau websites and tea university portals.

"Is Master Fuli checking academic papers!?" Lao Chen, who had been helping with sun-drying the leaves, had just spread the two bags of tea leaves on the cement ground to dry using residual heat.

He swore—he was only tired and had stepped out to smoke a cigarette.

He never imagined Master Fuli would be holding his phone, browsing CNKI, seemingly researching something.

"What's so surprising? I haven't roasted this stuff myself in years—how could I remember anything?"

An Sheng rolled his eyes and scoffed: "If I hadn't had to write PPTs full of fancy buzzwords back at my old job, I'd never remember what catechins, chlorophyll, or caffeine do to tea quality."

"Do I have to get a master's in chemistry just to drink tea?"

Lao Chen didn't understand fox babble.

But seeing Master Fuli, clutching the CNKI forum, standing there with absolute confidence and commanding authority, he instinctively felt diminished, and sheepishly returned to sun-drying the leaves.

Just then.

Lao Chen had barely resumed work when his phone rang. An Sheng handed it back to him; Lao Chen answered, froze, then rushed out in a panic.

"Master Fuli, I need to handle something—I'll be back in ten minutes."

"Mmm?"

An Sheng tilted his head and faintly heard someone on the phone talking about a fight.

The little fox shrugged, stood upright, and began turning the tea leaves in the pile to continue sun-drying.

About fifteen minutes later, Lao Chen returned.

"Mmm?" An Sheng, holding a rake, looked at Lao Chen and mumbled.

Lao Chen's face was dark with exasperation: "Nothing—just another mother-in-law and daughter-in-law fighting. It's become routine."

"The old woman won't give up her tea mountain dividends but wants a third child to try for a grandson; she's pushing her son to divorce and remarry for another chance at a grandson."

"I just need to show up and say a word, and they'll be quiet for three or five days."

"Mmm." An Sheng's face darkened: "I suggest you kick them both out of the Chen clan—they'll settle down then."

"Your Zhangxizhen Chen clan doesn't distribute dividends based on male heirs—does gender even matter?"

Some villages with abundant natural or land resources have dividend systems.

Land belongs to the state, but due to historical and policy reasons, certain villages gained rights to large tracts of reclaimed wasteland, and these land-use rights are held by production teams and village committees.

Villagers enjoy dividend rights from the profits generated by these lands, though the amounts vary.

In Zhangxizhen, besides land leasing, the biggest dividend comes from tea plantation land leased to local villagers.

Guided by the village committee and the agricultural bureau, villagers laboriously plant tea trees—ten-year cycles.

Most of Zhangxizhen's wealthy residents originally accumulated their startup capital by planting tea trees.

Zhangxizhen villagers' dividend rights don't distinguish between sons and daughters—any registered villager is entitled to dividends and land profit shares.

Of course, some villages restrict dividends to male heirs or only to permanent residents.

So An Sheng genuinely couldn't understand why the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law were fighting.

She really isn't worried that her two granddaughters might pull her oxygen tube, unplug her life-support machine, and plug in a phone charger instead.

"Vrrrr—"

Lao Chen had barely returned to help when his phone rang again.

He answered, cursed, said "Wait a sec," then dashed off again.

"Master Fuli! A construction truck overloaded and crushed our village road, fell into the pond, and blocked other incoming vehicles—I need to go handle it."

"Ah Hong is also stuck on the road."

An Sheng's eyelid twitched slightly: "..."

Are you just messing with me? Why don't you have this many problems on normal days?

You just happen to pick tea-making season to cause chaos.

You probably set an alarm to sneak off and slack off on schedule.

(End of Chapter)