In 1992, a small village owner became the richest man in the village by owning a car.

Chapter 46 Repairing the House and Building a Doghouse
These days are the busy farming season; every household is in the fields, making ridges, sowing seeds, and planting.

The land owned by Yu Dawei's family and the old man's family together currently amounts to sixty mu, of which eighteen mu belong to Yu Dawei's family of three.

Six mu of land were allocated to the eldest son, Yu Muyu. These kinds of things can be done easily nowadays just by going to the village committee.

However, if another child is born later and wants to claim land, it will be completely impossible.

Yu Dawei roughly calculated the remaining balance of his first income. After paying his salary, paying back debts, and buying things, he still had more than six thousand yuan left.

It's busy farming season now, and he wants to find a few people to help him repair his house. The cost will probably be high, but it's not much for Yu Dawei right now.

As for the wood, mud, and a small amount of bricks needed to repair the house, roughly speaking, it would cost around one or two thousand.

The entire house renovation should cost around three or four thousand yuan.

Nowadays, a brick costs eight cents on the market, and a slightly lower-quality one costs five or six cents. It's not realistic to build a brick house with that amount of money.

We can only save up later and make do with a mud-brick house for now.

Building a three-room brick house next year will be more than enough for Dawei.

Just do it.

Yu Dawei called some people from the village to help the old man farm in the morning, and in the afternoon they began to demolish the west wing of the house that was about to collapse.

When the villagers heard that Yu Dawei was going to build a house, they all thought that Yu Laonian had a grandson and were overjoyed, so they planned to help Yu Dawei pay for the house.

After all, Yu Laonian was the richest man in the village. Even though he had kept a low profile all these years, his wealth was still considerable.

The bricks we bought were used to build the foundation. We then covered the outside with mud, and on top of that, we used square mud bricks made from square wooden molds. After the mud bricks were removed from the molds, we placed them in the sun in the yard. Once they were dry, we could build the foundation.

The house was raised to the same height as the kitchen and the outer room, and then the main beam was installed.

Yu Dawei also tore down the old kang (heated brick bed) inside the house and had someone build a new one with an S-shaped fire hole. It burned well except for the firewood.

Then he bought a brand new kang mat, which he and his wife picked out at the supply and marketing cooperative; it was a purple patterned kang mat.

If my wife says it looks good, then it looks good. Anyway, Yu Dawei didn't feel anything about it.

When I returned from the supply and marketing cooperative, I also bought a large mirror, intending to hang it on the wall next to the east edge of the kang (heated brick bed).

The heated kang (a traditional brick bed) that we used to live on in the north side of the kitchen was also demolished by Yu Dawei. There was no need to keep it, since we wouldn't be living there anymore anyway.

The windows in the west room were also replaced with double-opening windows, and there were two small hooks in the corners. In the summer, when the windows were opened, they could be hooked up directly, and the windows could not be closed when the wind blew.

During this time, Han Jingfan's elder brother, Han Guoqiang, came once and brought some duck eggs and chicken eggs.

They said they came to help, but after learning that the house was built by Old Yu for his eldest son, they left after a few polite words and a meal.

When they left, they took the lamp sticks that Yu Dawei had just bought. Luckily, Yu Dawei had bought two.

Yu Dawei was utterly speechless about his brother-in-law.

He also knew that his mother-in-law must have sent the chicken and duck eggs.

Yu Dawei watched as Han Guoqiang drove away in the repaired four-wheeled vehicle. After thinking about it, he felt relieved. After all, this four-wheeled vehicle had tormented his brother-in-law for several years, and he was a pitiful person.

The renovation of the entire west wing took more than half a month.

During this time, Yu Dawei helped the old man finish planting the land. He also took care of watering and fertilizing, and there was a lot of work to do. Sowing seeds and getting them to sprout was just the first step.

Yu Dawei took good care of the villagers who came to help, providing them with good food and drink every day. His mother and wife, as well as Dafeng, were busy cooking for everyone every day, while Eryan took care of her nephew.

With some broken bricks left over, Yu Dawei kept his promise to the dogs, demolishing the original dog kennel in the southeast corner of the yard and using the broken bricks and adobe bricks to build a very spacious dog kennel, which he then filled with fresh hay.

The dogs happily circled around Yu Dawei, but only Gou Shengzi stood atop his brand-new doghouse like a knight-errant, looking down on everyone with arrogance.

Yu Dawei got angry just looking at him, so he gave him another good beating before leaving.

The repairs to the west wing, the hiring of farmhands, lunch, and other miscellaneous expenses totaled over 2,800 yuan, much less than Yu Dawei had anticipated.

He still had a little over four thousand yuan left in his pocket, and then he gave Han Jingfan another two thousand yuan. He had finally paid back the money he'd taken from her for her future wife. Now he could finally hold his head high at home.

After receiving the money, Han Jingfan started making arrangements to buy more eggs to treat the chicks, and even told Zhang Yunqin that she would give some to her mother after the chicks hatched.

Yu Dawei saw that his mother was all smiles all day long.

Now everyone in the village knows that Zhang Yunqin and his daughter-in-law have an exceptionally good relationship.

Han Jingfan loves to eat fish. Every time she comes back from the market, she will buy Xiaofan a carp or a few crucian carp.

Knowing that Han Jingfan never eats cilantro, this mother-in-law never puts cilantro in her fish dishes.

Once, Yu Dawei couldn't stand the favoritism anymore, so he chopped some cilantro and put it in the dish, which earned him a severe beating from his mother.

Yu Dawei was dumbfounded, he really didn't know what kind of bewitching potion his wife had given her mother-in-law.

When he first transmigrated before the New Year, things weren't like this at all!

Later, Yu Dawei learned from Er Yan that when he was away from home, Han Jingfan had asked Yu Yan to collect books from the village, especially books like "Cai Gen Tan," the more the better, as she really enjoyed reading them.

There were also books on military strategy and open tactics, and Han Jingfan didn't overlook any of the miscellaneous books as well.

Even the old man has picked up his interest in reading again. Sometimes, the father and daughter, one sitting at the head of the kang (a heated brick bed) and the other at the foot, will exchange their thoughts after finishing a book.

They really are from the same family; like attracts like.

Actually, Yu Feng loved reading the most, but her head would ache when she read—it really hurt—so she could only watch the two of them reading with envy.

Da Feng left just a few days after the house was built.

Yu Feng's trip to Hohhot was full of twists and turns. At first, they agreed that she would leave after the New Year, but her second brother went back to school and she didn't hear from him. Later, they said it would be around mid-May, around the time Yu Dawei gets paid, but the result was the same.

She didn't actually leave until the end of May.

She knew that she was ill, and no matter what job her aunt found, no one would agree to it once they heard that she was mentally ill. Even if they were willing to do it for the sake of face at first, they would eventually change their minds.

Yu Dawei was aware of his younger sister Yu Feng's situation, but he didn't have any good solutions.

Before she left, he, as her older brother, secretly slipped her five hundred yuan, thinking that if she suffered while away from home, she could rent a place and make a living.

The current attitude of my aunt and uncle is not unrelated to the trouble I caused back then.

This can be considered compensation.

Dawei and Yu Laonian dropped Dafeng off at the city's train station and then returned.

The father and son remained silent the whole way. How could the father not know about his eldest daughter's situation? He just didn't say anything.

The older brother was worried about his younger sister, and knowing the future outcome, how could he not feel emotional?

She hoped that with this money, she would have more options.

At this point, Yu Dawei only had a little over a thousand yuan left in his pocket.

Sure enough, I'm still poor...

"Dad? You've come all this way to Sui City, how about we have a drink?" Yu Dawei noticed his father looking gloomy on the way.

"It's not impossible. Let's go, it's on me."

"so good?!"

"You pay."

Yu Dawei: "..."

(End of this chapter)