The poor girl from the 1970s was forced to kiss by the damp educated youth.

When Chen Zhi got home, it was already past midnight. She boiled water, took a shower, and before her hair was even dry, she lay down on the bed and fell asleep.

She slept soundly until late morning the next day, and even the squealing of the three pigs in the house didn't wake her.

After Chen Zhi fed the pig and cooked herself a bowl of noodles, she moved the small table into the sun, intending to eat the noodles while basking in the warm sunshine, when someone came to the door.

"Oh dear, Zhizhi, you're finally awake! Are you alright?" Cai Hongmei asked with a smile.

"Auntie, just push the door open and come in yourself," Chen Zhi said. She sat down and was too lazy to get up. She felt a little sore all over and didn't want to move.

Cai Hongmei didn't stand on ceremony with her. She opened the gate and walked towards her, pulling up a chair to sit down. "Auntie has come several times today, but you haven't opened the door. I was worried something had happened to you. If you hadn't woken up soon, Auntie was afraid she would have gone to find the brigade leader."

Chen Zhi shook her head, "I'm fine, thank you for your concern, Auntie."

Cai Hongmei gazed at her fair and rosy face. Perhaps she had slept enough, as she looked rosy and her languid posture added to her delicate and alluring charm.

Xi Lang has such good taste; he won Chen Zhi over before anyone else even noticed her beauty.

"Has Auntie eaten yet? Shall I go and make her another bowl of noodles?" Chen Zhi put down her chopsticks and pretended to get up.

"I've already eaten. My aunt had lunch before coming over." In those days, food was precious, and there was no custom of eating at someone else's house.

Chen Zhi sat down again; she was truly tired and didn't want to move.

"I'm here to buy chickens from you." Cai Hongmei looked at the plump chickens in Chen Zhi's yard, her eyes reddening with envy. "How do you raise them?"

As far as she knew, Chen Zhi hadn't raised those chickens for even a year.

"They weighed four pounds when we bought them, and we usually feed them rice bran and green vegetables." The only difference is that these hens are fed more meat.

Cai Hongmei: "So that's why they're fed rice bran. No wonder they grow so well."

Their family grinds the rice bran several times, then sifts it through a fine sieve. The finer pieces are kept for human consumption, while the coarser pieces are used to feed the chickens.

"Didn't your aunt say before that she would only buy eggs and not chickens?" Chen Zhi felt that she must have remembered correctly.

Cai Hongmei looked helpless. "I said I was going to buy eggs to help my sister-in-law recover after childbirth. Now I'm buying chickens for my eldest son. He lost a lot of blood and is in great shape, so he needs some nourishment."

Chen Zhi nodded, "It's necessary to replenish it."

"That's right, I'm just afraid that if we don't make up for it, our health will suffer later." Cai Hongmei felt sorry for the money and her son at the same time. "Thanks to you yesterday, otherwise we would all be finished."

Chen Zhi did not feign modesty and tacitly acknowledged her own contribution.

She stood up. "Besides the one incubating the eggs, there are only two hens in the yard. Which one do you want?"

"They all look pretty much the same to me, just grab one for me," Cai Hongmei said.

Chen Zhi grunted in agreement, grabbed one at random, tied its leg, and handed it to Cai Hongmei. "I don't have a scale here. You can weigh it when you get back and pay me according to the village's price."

Cai Hongmei took the chicken; it felt quite heavy in her hands. She touched its belly and was even more satisfied, knowing it must be full of chicken fat. Then she said, "I'd like to take a look at your eggs too."

"Please wait a moment, I'll go get it for you."

Chen Zhi went back to the kitchen and brought out a full basket, which contained about sixty or seventy items.

"Wow, what a big egg!"

Cai Hongmei's eyes widened in disbelief; this egg was half the size of a regular egg.

She asked incredulously, "These eggs are being sold at the usual price?"

Chen Zhi nodded; she wouldn't have sold it if they weren't close.

"I'll take them all." She gave twenty to her younger brother and sister-in-law, and the rest to her eldest son to help him recover. Her eldest son had suffered a lot this time, and one chicken wasn't enough to nourish him, so she would cook him an egg every day from now on.

Chen Zhi disagreed, saying, "I need to keep some for myself."

Cai Hongmei: "Isn't there still a hen?"

Chen Zhi: "It's not enough. Please save fifteen for me."

Even if they kept fifteen, there were still more than forty left. After thinking for a moment, Cai Hongmei could only agree, "Okay."

You can't disagree; these are other people's eggs.

"Next time you have eggs, sell them to me first."

Chen Zhi did not agree, "It won't happen in the short term."

Cai Hongmei said with some regret, "Then next year, there will always be next year. I'll take the eggs and chicken back now and bring you the money later."

Chen Zhi nodded, "Let Chen Da get some sun too."

"Yes, everyone knows we should get more sunshine. My second aunt reminded me of that yesterday too."

Chen Zhi also wanted to sunbathe, so she moved a few chairs into the sunlight, lined them up, and lay down on them.

Her wounds had healed, but she felt weak and listless.

Chen Zhi slept until the afternoon, and only groggily opened her eyes after the sun had set. Zhao Jinbao was standing outside the door carrying buckets of water. Seeing her sit up, he pushed the door open and came in. "I saw you sleeping all afternoon, without moving at all. It was a bit scary."

Chen Zhi rubbed her aching limbs. "If only there were a tatami mat or a rocking chair."

She had seen those low chaise lounges in other people's homes, about a meter wide, and varying in length.

Zhao Jinbao thought for a moment, "Rocking chairs are difficult to make; they require skill. But a low couch shouldn't be too hard. Think about it, if you make the dining table a little longer and narrower, wouldn't that make a low couch?"

Chen Zhi's eyes lit up; how come she hadn't thought of that?

"Anyway, it's just for my own use, so it doesn't need to be very pretty." Zhao Jinbao had seen Chen Zhi and Xi Lang make tables and chairs before. They weren't particularly exquisite, but they were sturdy and easy to use.

Chen Zhi: "You're right."

She's just too lazy to do anything right now, she'll do it later.

To everyone's surprise, Zhao Jinbao added, "If you don't want to do it yourself, you can hire someone to do it. There are carpenters in the village. The furniture in our educated youth settlement was made by a carpenter."

Chen Zhi: "..."

The Chen family makes their own furniture, and Xi Lang also makes her own furniture; she forgot that there were professional carpenters in the village.

Chen Zhi glanced at the sky; it wasn't too late. She got up and walked outside. "I'll go order one now."

The carpenter in Sandong Village is named Liang Dongyao. His carpentry skills are passed down from his family, and he usually makes some wooden furniture to sell at the supply and marketing cooperative. However, because his furniture is old-fashioned and dark in color, people don't like it nowadays, so it doesn't sell very well, and he doesn't earn much money. He still relies on earning work points to make a living.

As Chen Zhi left her house, she met several villagers on the way. They smiled and asked her, "Zhizhi, where are you going?"

This warm tone was a treatment Chen Zhi had never received before.

Chen Zhi nodded to them, "I'm going to order some furniture from Grandpa Liang's house."

The Liang family was cooking when they saw Chen Zhi knocking on the door. They were all taken aback, but after regaining their senses, they immediately welcomed her in warmly.

Liang Dongyao's family, spanning three generations and consisting of more than a dozen people, all came out of the house. They looked at Chen Zhi with curiosity, as if they were seeing her for the first time.

Chen Zhi felt a little uncomfortable under their gazes, so she got straight to the point and said, "I'd like to book a low couch."

Liang Dongyao also went into the mountains yesterday and witnessed Chen Zhi's skills. He didn't treat Chen Zhi as a junior, but his tone was more respectful. "What kind do you want? Here are two ready-made ones. Why don't you take a look first?"

"Okay." Chen Zhi followed Liang Dongyao into his warehouse.

"These days, low couches aren't fashionable anymore. People outside use sofas, saying that's more stylish," Liang Dongyao said with a hint of disappointment.

Chen Zhi: "I know about sofas. I've heard there are leather sofas and wooden sofas. You could try making a wooden sofa."

Liang Dongyao: "But I've never seen what a wooden sofa looks like."

Chen Zhi: "When you and your uncle have the chance, you can go to the county to take a look. They should be selling them there."

"In the county—"

Liang Dongyao drawled, "I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to go in this lifetime."

Chen Zhi didn't respond; she didn't know either.

Chen Zhi immediately took a liking to a low couch on the spot. It was made of thick, sturdy material, with fine workmanship, smooth surface, and not a single burr could be found. It had already been coated with tung oil, so the smell had long since dissipated, and it was ready to use as soon as she took it home.

Chen Zhi imagined herself lying on it basking in the sun tomorrow and couldn't help but feel a little excited. Without even asking the price, she said, "This is it."

Liang Dongyao didn't expect her to be so decisive. He was prepared to be criticized. After all, people who come here to buy things always find fault first, then bargain for the price, and only decide to buy if they feel it's suitable.

Liang Dongyao really liked this straightforward customer.

"This tatami mat costs twenty yuan. It's made from good timber from back then, the kind of timber you can't find anymore." Liang Dongyao couldn't help but feel heartbroken thinking about how the forests were severely destroyed a few years ago.

Chen Zhi nodded, "Okay."

Liang Dongyao: "I'll have my two sons deliver it to your door in a bit. Don't think it's expensive; if it were someone else, I wouldn't sell it for twenty yuan."

Chen Zhi couldn't tell whether he was telling the truth or not. She paid the money, thanked Liang Dongyao, and then went home.

It's not that she can't carry it back herself, but she's just lazy and doesn't want to put in the effort.

When I got home, I found Chen Da standing outside the door.

Chen Da came to deliver money—money for the hens and eggs.

"I feel like I got ripped off last night," Chen said, annoyed.

Chen Zhi agreed, "It's a loss of blood, a loss of health."

Not only did they lose too much blood, but yin energy also entered their bodies, so Chen Da and Chen Peng, along with a dozen other young men, would be weak for a period of time.

"That's not what I meant." Chen Da stared straight at Chen Zhi. "My regret is that I passed out and didn't see you fighting the zombies."

Chen Zhi waved her hand, "I'm too tired, I don't want to do it again."

"I didn't want this either." This regret will probably stay with him for the rest of his life.

Chen Da stood for a while, feeling a little dizzy, and then sat down in a chair. "You saved my life again."

Chen Zhi hummed in agreement, "I would have taken action even without you."

She acted because she was confident; of course, she was also itching to vent her frustration. When this opportunity presented itself, she seized it.

"That's what you say, but it's true that you saved me." Chen Da said very seriously.

Chen Zhi just grunted in response, not taking it to heart.

"My mom even came to buy chickens and eggs from you. You sold us such good chickens and eggs at market price, so we're the ones who got a bargain from you—"

"stop."

Chen Zhi interrupted him, "The chicken and eggs were agreed upon beforehand, and they were at market price; I didn't give you any discounts. It's getting dark; you have to go back. During this period, you shouldn't stay outdoors after dark; in fact, it's best not to leave the house at all. Okay, go back now; I should start cooking."