Jiang Heng remained calm.
Song Ming was already anxiously helping.
She hadn’t had to actively promote in a while, but today started again—besides promoting her own sauce, she would mention the mushrooms at Jiang Heng’s stall and how good the ingredients were to make her sushi taste so good.
Unfortunately, by now, everyone already knew where the mushrooms in her sushi came from. If they didn’t buy, there must be their reasons. So only a few customers came through her introduction.
At 7:30, the small dragon shrimp sold out.
Only one large grass carp was left.
Jiang Heng handed Song Ming the leftover shrimp and caught her worried look, smiling: “Relax, it’s fine. I’ve expected this day for a while.”
With the province’s capital city developing well, the government had gradually put effort into improving their town—for example, the roads in her village were government-funded and repaired.
Overall, the town was much wealthier than before, so once the market opened, competition was inevitable.
Jiang Heng clearly understood this and wasn’t trying to capture every customer.
She was alone and needed time to cultivate, so selling this much was already enough.
Song Ming cupped her hands: “Your mindset is really good!”
She deeply admired her.
Jiang Heng whispered, “Because my main job isn’t actually selling wild mushrooms.”
Song Ming looked puzzled.
Jiang Heng teased mysteriously, “You’ll know the day after tomorrow.”
Song Ming’s eyes widened: “You’re still teasing me?!”
Jiang Heng chuckled and quickly ran off.
Heading home!
The first thing Jiang Heng did upon arriving was to cuddle her two little darlings, Caramel and Pudding.
She comforted their little hearts that hadn’t seen their owner for three or four hours.
The little ones were extremely clingy—such a happy trouble.
Afterwards, she put the fish back into the basin, cleaned the remaining mulberries, juiced them, and put the juice in the freezer to warm with water tomorrow for those who helped her.
She then laid out the remaining mushrooms on a drying bamboo sieve.
Her Da Boiniang helped collect the mushrooms.
The first-floor room used to belong to her parents and was now empty, perfect for storage. After a day of sun drying, the mushrooms shrank a bit, freeing up a sieve just big enough for the extra batch.
The batch for Song Ming’s colleagues was already set, just waiting to be completely dried and packaged for shipment.
Tomorrow, she planned to skip mushroom picking and rest after so much work.
After finishing these tasks, Jiang Heng began calculating the day’s income.
There were quite a few items today. Mulberries totaled over thirty jin; a few jin remained unsold, which was normal since some were supplied to the fruit shop and some to customers.
That earned over nine hundred yuan.
The fish weighed around forty jin, making about two thousand yuan.
Fewer mushrooms sold today, but the remaining ones were pricier varieties like Termitomyces, so that earned two thousand five hundred yuan.
Then there were the big small dragon shrimp—over forty jin of the black-red shell type, earning over sixteen hundred yuan; and fifteen jin of the green-red shell shrimp, earning 750 yuan.
All combined, the stall’s income today totaled 7,880 yuan.
“Huh??”
Jiang Heng was stunned by the result, having thought that fewer mushroom sales would reduce income.
But this was nearly eight thousand!
Add the more than ten thousand yuan from delivery orders, and her daily income was almost twenty thousand yuan!
Satisfied, Jiang Heng happily brewed herself a cup of honey water to soothe her throat.
She’d talked a lot at the stall today and needed to take care of her voice.
While sipping honey water, she stroked the dogs.
She first used the Dust Removal Technique on Caramel and Pudding, then cuddled them onto the sofa.
It was already past eight, the sky darkened, and only insects chirping and occasional dog barks filled the air.
“Awwoo!” Caramel was noticeably feistier. The dog barks outside sounded harsh, and he would occasionally gather energy to respond.
But soon, he succumbed to Jiang Heng’s expert stroking, lying flat to show his belly and wagging his tail to ask for more.
Pudding was lazy and didn’t get up, lying quietly in Jiang Heng’s arms.
After finishing her honey water, Jiang Heng reluctantly got up.
There was still work to be done.
She took out a small portion of frozen fish entrails from the fridge, blocking the two following dogs, and started the tricycle to retrieve the fish traps left out all day.
The water pond was a bit far, with uneven, bumpy farmland in between.
The tricycle couldn’t get all the way there, but she could park nearby and walk with two large buckets.
Upon reaching the pond, Jiang Heng noticed fresh footprints.
And they were men’s footprints.
She followed the prints to a spot where the grass was thick. The aquatic plants had also been trampled, and there was a fishing trap line hanging there.
This spot was one where she hadn’t set traps, so someone else must have come.
The last few times she came here, she never saw footprints. Why today?
Especially since the whole village knew she had leased this pond?
She hadn’t stocked fish or shrimp seedlings nor applied Spiritual Rain yet, so she didn’t feel she’d lost anything.
The pond’s contents weren’t really hers anyway—just a bonus after leasing the fish pond.
If she made a fuss, others would call her petty. She just needed to wait a few days to surround this area with nets to block intruders.
After confirming, Jiang Heng left the spot and handled her own traps.
Before leaving, she placed some Restriction spells around each of the four traps, afraid someone would steal her catch.
She hauled in the first trap.
It felt heavy.
Dragged ashore, she saw it was full to the brim.
Joy shone in her eyes.
The pond had far more creatures than she expected.
She had already fished once yesterday, yet today still had this much!
Usually, a trap with two big fish was considered a lot, but hers nearly filled half the space.
Jiang Heng sorted them into piles, shaking all fish and shrimp into a heap below, then deftly untied the rope.
The full clatter of fish falling into the bucket.
One bucket wasn’t enough; she transferred some to another bucket before finishing.
Two small dragon shrimp still clung to the trap. Jiang Heng shook it hard, and the reluctant shrimp fell with a plop.
She then sorted out the smaller ones.
She didn’t need to use her hands here; those little shrimp weren’t gentle.
She shook the nearly empty bucket, and a stream of water flowed from her fingertips like a ribbon, carrying out the tiny shrimp and tossing them back into the pond in a string.
Next, she moved the larger shrimp from the fuller bucket into this bucket.
There was a big fat cyprinid. How did something so large fit inside?
Jiang Heng rolled up the cyprinid and put it aside, then caught a mandarin fish with many wounds. A large shrimp claw firmly clamped its tail—ingredients battling each other.
She tossed both back, along with several large shrimp.
Yesterday, she hadn’t caught any yellow eels, but today she found several. She would raise them for a couple of days to heal before selling. Yellow eels were quite pricey.
The smaller yellow eels she threw back—they were babies. Let them grow and multiply.
After sorting, Jiang Heng saw… well, actually it was a snake!
A water snake.
It looked like a mandarin fish, but with visible scales and a snake’s head, confirming it.
If this were pre-transmigration Jiang Heng, she’d probably be breakdancing right now.
Luckily, after some cultivation experience, she calmly transferred the water snake to another bucket. She wouldn’t eat it, but could give it to her Masters for an extra meal.
After finishing sorting, she had more than half a bucket full.
Most were small dragon shrimp, some fish and eels. The big fish were large and hard to enter the traps, and she didn’t want the small fish.
Next, she pulled up the second trap.
It was lighter but still heavy, just enough to fill one bucket.
Jiang Heng finished sorting, then carried the two heavy buckets back to the tricycle. Luckily, she had brought four buckets.
She collected from all four traps, used fish entrails as bait in each, then threw the traps back into the water with a flick.
The traps opened mid-air and splashed into the water.
Soon, activity stirred around the traps.
The fish entrails infused with Spiritual Rain doubled their attraction!
After placing everything, Jiang Heng left a trace of Spiritual Rain on each trap.
No time for formations, but she could sense the situation here.
If anyone tried to move her traps, she would come immediately!
Nightfall
Jiang Heng was about to sleep as usual.
At most, she would briefly fend off small animals, but could respond quickly if needed.
Suddenly, she felt her trap moving and woke from her dream, quickly changing clothes.
The two dogs sleeping softly in their beds by the side of the bed were startled awake and hurried over with their short legs, tilting their heads to look at her.
Jiang Heng took a moment to stroke their heads: “It’s okay, you two go back to sleep.”
Her voice was especially gentle.
The two dogs were confused but obedient as Jiang Heng slipped outside and closed the door behind her.
She immediately felt spiritual energy surge at her feet, then used Shrinking Earth to appear a hundred meters away in an instant.
After a few jumps, she reached the pond area.
Jiang Heng no longer used Spiritual Rain but ran directly there.
Once in sight, she turned on her flashlight and shone it directly ahead.
The bright light seemed to illuminate the sky, clearly revealing the person moving her trap.
The man, clearly startled by the sudden appearance, cursed, then shouted, “Who’s there?! Suddenly popping out like this…”
Jiang Heng swung the flashlight, highlighting the fishing net he had just loosened from surprise: “The owner of the fishing net in your hand.”
The man froze, then relaxed, smiling in a familiar tone: “Oh, it’s you, little Heng. You’re not monitoring me, are you?”
This man was Jiang Cheng.
A thirty-something idle guy from the village.
Supported by his family, he married, with his wife working elsewhere. He went out to work for about half a month, then rested for a month, often unable to find work.
He spent most days at home calling friends for card games and drinking.
Their two families had little contact. Jiang Heng knew this because as a kid, he often mocked her as a bookworm. Every New Year, his home was the loudest and liveliest.
People from surrounding villages came to gamble at his house.
Not with hundreds of thousands, but sometimes they lost a few thousand yuan a night.
His name often came up in village conversations.