[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent":3,"chapter-the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-chapter-154":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","The Fox Has No Malicious Intent",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2340607,4575,"Chapter 154: The Overworked Lao Chen","the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-chapter-154",154,"\u003Cp>“Our children in Zhangxizhen will finally have a proper future.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Though Lao Chen didn’t understand An Sheng’s words, he could read his expression and smiled.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“It may hurt the child’s pride, but it’s great for the parents’ wallets.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Hmm. The dual-flower red stick of the West Coast gang.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Being hung in front of the ancestral hall and beaten by both his own parents—it sounds kinda thrilling to imagine.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lao Chen rode his electric scooter around back, arrived at the newly built cluster behind the ancestral hall, and unlocked the gate.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After opening the ancestral hall’s gate, Lao Chen sneaked back and shut it tightly.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>On the floor inside were two bags of freshly picked tea leaves, casually dumped on the ground.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Mmmmm—”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>High catechin levels make tea bitter and astringent.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Low catechin levels, however, drastically weaken the tea’s aromatic freshness.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>If you dig deep into tea processing, it’s fundamentally chemistry, botany, and geography.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Factors like catechin compounds, caffeine, and soil mineral content all affect tea quality.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.’\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But times have changed now.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In the past, ‘holding back one trick’ hindered scaling and industrialization; manual tea-making simply couldn’t match the speed of mechanized production.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Ten old men exhausting themselves roasting tea can’t match the profit margin of a machine running for a month.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Most tea-processing techniques are now publicly available on official agricultural bureau websites and tea university portals.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He swore—he was only tired and had stepped out to smoke a cigarette.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He never imagined Master Fuli would be holding his phone, browsing CNKI, seemingly researching something.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“What’s so surprising? I haven’t roasted this stuff myself in years—how could I remember anything?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Do I have to get a master’s in chemistry just to drink tea?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lao Chen didn’t understand fox babble.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Just then.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Master Fuli, I need to handle something—I’ll be back in ten minutes.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Mmm?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>An Sheng tilted his head and faintly heard someone on the phone talking about a fight.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The little fox shrugged, stood upright, and began turning the tea leaves in the pile to continue sun-drying.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>About fifteen minutes later, Lao Chen returned.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Mmm?” An Sheng, holding a rake, looked at Lao Chen and mumbled.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lao Chen’s face was dark with exasperation: “Nothing—just another mother-in-law and daughter-in-law fighting. It’s become routine.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“I just need to show up and say a word, and they’ll be quiet for three or five days.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Mmm.” An Sheng’s face darkened: “I suggest you kick them both out of the Chen clan—they’ll settle down then.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Your Zhangxizhen Chen clan doesn’t distribute dividends based on male heirs—does gender even matter?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Some villages with abundant natural or land resources have dividend systems.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Villagers enjoy dividend rights from the profits generated by these lands, though the amounts vary.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In Zhangxizhen, besides land leasing, the biggest dividend comes from tea plantation land leased to local villagers.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Guided by the village committee and the agricultural bureau, villagers laboriously plant tea trees—ten-year cycles.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Most of Zhangxizhen’s wealthy residents originally accumulated their startup capital by planting tea trees.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Zhangxizhen villagers’ dividend rights don’t distinguish between sons and daughters—any registered villager is entitled to dividends and land profit shares.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Of course, some villages restrict dividends to male heirs or only to permanent residents.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>So An Sheng genuinely couldn’t understand why the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law were fighting.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>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.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Vrrrr—”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Lao Chen had barely returned to help when his phone rang again.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He answered, cursed, said “Wait a sec,” then dashed off again.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“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.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Ah Hong is also stuck on the road.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>An Sheng’s eyelid twitched slightly: “...”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Are you just messing with me? Why don’t you have this many problems on normal days?\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>You just happen to pick tea-making season to cause chaos.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>You probably set an alarm to sneak off and slack off on schedule.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>(End of Chapter)\u003C\u002Fp>",1204,"2026-06-20T23:19:16.017Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","f6f886ed3d6f0be34384d43fb454ebccba7edf5fe47ba74f8c0cd93dcefbc8ec","the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-chapter-155","the-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-chapter-153",354,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fthe-fox-has-no-malicious-intent-cover.jpg"]