Chapter 1 - Lin Mu
"Lin Mu, stop lazing around we still have a lot of trees left to harvest in today’s quota, we barely filled our quota yesterday and I don’t want to anger the supervisor again, he will definitely cut our wages this time."
Hearing the voice calling him, a youthful-looking boy of about 16 years of age and having short hair turned around towards the man that had just called him. Seeing the man’s tense look, the boy gulped and answered;The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.
"I’m not lazing around uncle Yuan Tu, I’m just trying to be careful not to damage the spirit apples while plucking them from the trees."
The man named Yuan Tu, upon hearing the boy’s reply, had a tint of annoyance in his eyes as he thought that the boy was merely giving excuses for his slow pace in harvesting the spirit apples from the trees. Remembering yesterday’s scolding that he got from the supervisor for being the group leader of the slowest harvesting group out of a hundred this week, he knew that if his group did not exceed their quota that day they will definitely never be able to receive their bonus wages of that week.
"Hasten your pace and stop giving excuses or you will be the one to bear the penalty that we’ll receive for incomplete work"
Not giving the boy another chance to reply, the man walked away to another tree to work. The boy heard Yuan Tu’s threat and quickened his pace of plucking the spirit apples from the tree. After that he placed them in his basket and then when the basket was full, he carefully transferred them to the wheelbarrow, which would then be sent to the main collection cart.
Spirit apples were the main produce of the Northern town, which was rather lucrative and were sent to Wu Lim city, which was the main city. Wu Lim city had four satellite towns, each named according to their locations and each having their own specialty. Spirit apples were very expensive for common peasants, with each apple costing a gold coin, which only the people from the city could afford to buy. While the peasants that harvested them only received four silver coins every day, it would take them nearly a whole month’s wages to buy just one, thus they had to be careful not to damage, bruise or scratch the apples as this resulted in the spirit apples slowly losing their spirit qi making them lose value.
Two hours later, Lin Mu had done four trips to the cart, emptying his basket along with the others. The wheelbarrow was nearly full when Yuan Tu walked towards the cart and emptied his basket that ended up completely filling the wheelbarrow.
Looking at the filled wheelbarrow, Yuan Tu took a breath of relief as the day’s quota was finally completed two hours before sundown, which gave them plenty of time to harvest more spirit apples that day. He thought that they may at last get their bonus wages this week. Thinking of this made a slight smile appear on Yuan Tu’s face and he looked towards Lin Mu...
"Looks like you finally picked up the pace, now that we have finished today’s quota you can go and send the wheelbarrow to the main collecting cart, the rest of us will continue harvesting."
Upon hearing the supervisors shout about compensation, Yuan Tu became even more frightened, and his ears were already ringing from the shouting which made it even more difficult for him to talk.
"I... I... I my lord not all apples are damaged. We can still sell the rest of them, please spare us just this once, we’ll never make such a mistake ever again."
Li Peng, now calmed down a little bit and glanced at the spirit apples. He saw that some were indeed still redeemable, but the rest were still damaged apples that were worth at least 700 gold coins.
With a stern expression he spoke, "Even if you exclude the apples that are undamaged the loss is still more than 700 gold coins, when the mayor hears about this he will not be happy, you cannot be spared."
Li Peng thought about how to compensate for the over 700 gold coins’ worth of damage. He knew that he’ll probably have to dock a whole month’s wages from every peasant working here, but it still wouldn’t be enough. At this point, he looked at Lin Mu.
"Every peasant working here will lose one months’ worth of wages in compensation for the loss and for the rest of it, as the boy caused this mistake, all his property will be seized and sold off to pay for it."
Hearing the supervisor’s order each and every person turned pale with despair and then started to feel angry against Lin Mu as it was his mistake which had just caused them to lose everything they worked for that entire month. Lin Mu now having heard the order had tears in his eyes as he knew he would be losing everything he had, even the house that his parents had left him when they died last year.
"Guards, seize this boy and his group leader, go to the boy’s property and seize all valuables and the house, then throw the boy out of the town, then bring the group leader to the square for 10 lashes."
One of the guards seized Lin Mu and others restrained Yuan Tu and then took them away for their punishments. Yuan Tu had a hateful look on his face as he looked at Lin Mu and gritted his teeth, swearing to have revenge on the kid. The other peasants also looked at Lin Mu with hateful gazes. Lin Mu tried to struggle but there was no way he would be able to overpower a guard having the strength of sixth stage of body tempering, he himself was only at the second stage of body tempering as he had never actually trained properly before with a tempering technique.
The guards dragged Lin Mu to his house and ransacked the house, taking everything of value in there. Though there was not much there to begin with as most of the valuables had been sold off in exchange for medicine when Lin Mu’s mother fell sick during the last years’ plague. The only thing worth something was the house itself and the land that it was built on.
Lin Mu watched as his whole world was ripped apart and started tearing up and sniffling. After checking that all valuables have been taken, the guard sealed the courtyard entrance of the house and went back to report to the supervisor, while one guard brought Lin Mu to the edge of the town and threw him away and then turned back to head to his post.
Lin Mu lied there on the ground for hours before he got up, no longer crying. He had a dull look in his eyes and walked aimlessly out of the town towards the forest. After walking for an hour, he found himself in front of the apple tree he used to play at when he was a child. There was a small stream nearby where he would catch fish and play in the water with his friends. Now tired and exhausted, he sat below the tree with his back to the tree and fell asleep under the night sky and the moon hiding in the clouds.