“En, if you two can do as you say then Uncle Chaun will definitely rest easy in the heavens.” Su Yongqiang felt very comforted seeing this scene. At the same time, he looked over at Madam Zhou and said, “I seem to remember that when Uncle Chuan exchanged his house back then he didn’t exchange the surrounding land together with it.”
Madam Zhou nodded and said slowly, “That’s right, isn’t it? Back then, Uncle Chuan said that his family would make more money in the future and be able to build a new house on that land. But who would have thought that before even two years had gone by…”
Madam Zhou trailed off in a sad tone and Su Yongqiang also let out a sigh. Of course, as the old couple spoke Su Tang and her brother had very confused expressions, so they quickly spoke to explain.
As it turned out, back in those days Su Laochuan had also owned a house in the central part of Sujia Village. It had been a large four-room house, and their family could be considered to be living a pretty good life when compared to the other families in Sujia Village.
Back then they had been able to rely on Su Laochuan’s fishing skills to earn a good living from the river, and they had even bought an extra two mu of farmland. In those days it had seemed that their family was only getting better and better, but who would have expected that they would suddenly have a devastating accident? One day while Su Laochuan was fishing he ended up getting severely injured and crippling his leg.
In order to save Su Laochuan, the family could only sell off their extra land and even exchange their house with another family’s house. In the end, they traded their large house in the center of town for the old house at the edge of town where Su Tang and her brother had been living before.
And that house that they moved into was at the very edge of Sujia Village and was a bit too close to the Qing River for safety. After all, although the Qing River had been relatively stable in recent years there had definitely been floods and accidents there in the past.
Basically, with the position of that old house it was bound to be flooded if the river ever ran out of control. Because of the latent danger associated with its location, the price of the house was naturally cheap.
The house had originally belonged to a family of hunters but later on that family made a bit of money and naturally didn’t want to live there anymore. And as it happened, it was right at that time when Su Laochuan’s family needed silver to pay to treat his injuries, so the two families discussed things and ended up exchanging their homes. The hunter’s family paid Su Laochuan’s family some silver and got their good house in the center of the village in exchange for their old house near the river.
From this deal, Su Laochuan’s family managed to raise enough money to save Su Laochuan’s life, but in the end, his leg was still crippled. After that, his daughter who had already married out of the family contacted his son, Su Yonghe, with news that she might have a channel for him to do business. Su Yonghe had leaped at the chance, eager to work hard to earn money and build a new house on the empty land they still owned.
But who knew that he would go out to do business for only a year before he ran into mountain bandits. In the end, both of Su Laochuan’s children’s families met with disaster and all eight people died on the road. When Su Laochuan got the news he immediately fell ill from the grief and didn’t last long before directly passing away.
At around the same time, Su Tang and her brother were being offered up by Su Yonggui’s family as sacrifices to the River God, but in the end, they didn’t die. After that, Su Yongqiang had taken charge of the matter and directly allowed the brother and sister pair to be adopted into Su Laochuan’s household in order to carry on his family line.
So, in fact, Su Laochuan and his family had only lived in that old house near the river for less than two years. Moreover, Su Yongqiang had presided over these matters pretty much every step of the way, since even that family of hunters had been a part of the Su family. After all, as the Su Patriarch it had been up to him to settle the exchange of houses.
Su Laochuan’s old house had been well built, sturdy, and large, so it had been worth a fair amount of money. Additionally, Su Laochuan’s family had also owned a large portion of the land immediately surrounding the house which wasn’t included in the exchange with the family of hunters, and it was for this reason Su Laochuan’s family hadn’t hesitated to make the exchange. At that time, the family was still optimistic. Their thinking was that if they could save enough money to build a large house in the center of the village once, then they could definitely do it again in the future.
But, unfortunately, their struggles came to nothing in the end.
So when Su Tang mentioned that she wanted to build a house in the village, Su Yongqiang and Madam Zhou couldn’t help but remember this old story from back then.
“Back then when Uncle Chuan exchanged his house with that family of hunters, he only exchanged the house itself, but the land around it still belongs to your family. If you want to build a large house in the village, you can use that land with no problems.”
When Su Tang heard Su Yongqiang’s explanation she was overjoyed. This was really like being sent a pillow just when she was feeling sleepy. After all, she truly did want to build a large courtyard.
“That’s excellent news, I truly did want to build a large courtyard.” Su Tang replied.
“Well, I don’t know much about how to build such a courtyard, but Brother Shun has built a house for someone before, so he should be able to help.” Hearing that Su Tang wanted to build a large house, Su Yongqiang mentioned thoughtfully.
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