Traveling Through Those Years Of Farming (Quick Transmigration) - Chapter 3

“Sister! You’re awesome!” Zhen Baoli lifts his chin and looks at his sister with admiration.

Mama is right—his sister really is strong enough to knock out a cow.

“How did the tree break? We’re done for, the grown-ups are definitely going to scold us!”

The group of children scatter through the wild fruit forest. Some don’t witness the moment Baobao breaks the jujube tree with one slap. When they see the broken tree, their first reaction is fear of being scolded.

The wild fruit forest is public property, and they might even be fined. The children are terrified.

“Brother, I saw it. She broke it.” Zhao Xiaomei quickly snaps back to reality and gloats toward Baobao, who is still a bit confused.

“Nonsense!” Zhao Chenghu, hearing the commotion, rushes over. He looks at his sister as if she’s lost her mind. “Xiaomei, I’m such a smart guy. You can’t treat me like a fool.” Zhao Chenghu puts his hands on his hips, trying to act wise.

Doesn’t everyone know what kind of person Crybao is? The girl who cries non-stop if her feet or arms get scratched by sharp weeds. How could someone like that break a tree? Zhao Chenghu thinks even his father wouldn’t be able to break it with a slap. His sister’s words insult his intelligence.

“It was Crybao who broke it. We all saw it.” A group of nearby children echo Zhao Xiaomei.

“Yeah, it was my sister who broke it! My sister is so strong she could beat a cow!” Zhen Baoli bounces up and down, cheering for his sister.

At that moment, Baobao just wants to find some tape to seal her brother’s mouth. How could there be such a brother, so eager to help his sister admit the crime? She seriously wonders if their mother threw his brain away when he was born.

“No, that’s impossible… right…?” The “right” at the end comes out a little shaky. With so many people insisting, Zhao Chenghu starts to doubt himself too as he struggles to believe what everyone is saying.

She’s only three years old, and the smallest of all the children present. Zhao Chenghu is one of the older boys, and Baobao only comes up to his waist. Even with three layers of clothing—one of which is a thick sweater that makes her look chubbier—she still looks tiny and frail.

Because she hurt her hand when she slapped the tree, Baobao’s eyes still shimmer with tears. Her rims are red, and even her perky little nose is tinged with pink. She looks adorable and pitiful.

How could such a soft, delicate little girl have broken a tree?

Zhao Chenghu figures it’d be impressive if she slapped something without hurting herself, let alone breaking a tree.

He doubles down on his theory. He’s convinced his sister has joined forces with the others to try to humiliate him. But he’s such a smart boy—there’s no way he’ll be misled like that. He trusts his own brain.

“Whoever broke the tree, come out and confess! Trying to pin this on a three-year-old girl—aren’t you ashamed of yourselves?”

“It was the crying baby who broke it! It was her!” Zhao Xiaomei jumps up in frustration. She’s convinced her brother has no brains at all.

“It really was me. I really broke it.” Baobao feels like crying but has no tears left. If she had known how powerful her golden finger in this world was, she wouldn’t have slapped the jujube tree so eagerly. Now, with so many witnesses, she can’t deny it, and fears it will bring trouble to her family again.

As she thinks about it, the original body’s tear glands become uncontrollable again. Baobao quickly rubs her eyes with her hands.

How can a strong woman like her cry in front of others?

Little does she know that her pitiful appearance makes some people doubt even more that she’s the one who broke the tree.

“Crybao, did someone threaten you? Don’t be scared. I’ll let you join our Xiagou Village Third Brigade Railway Guerrilla Team—Junior Division. A guerrilla fighter must never be afraid of evil forces. Go ahead and say who threatened you. The Party and your comrades will protect you.”

Zhao Chenghu pounds his chest with loud thumps, face flushed with excitement.

He feels like he’s no longer just addressing a broken tree, but eradicating the evil forces in the production team. In his mind, he’s one step closer to becoming a real guerrilla fighter.

Baobao stares at him in confusion, unable to follow his train of thought.

How has the topic turned to guerrillas and evil forces?

“Zhao Chenghu! Mom and Dad really gave you the wrong name. You should’ve been called Zhao Chengpig!” Zhao Xiaomei fumes, refusing to acknowledge this clueless, idiotic brother.

“How dare you!” Zhao Chenghu shoots her a glare. Whose hopeless sister is this? Return to sender.

At that moment, a few children spot adults approaching, and the drama of the brother-sister argument comes to a sudden halt.

“The adults are coming!”

“They saw it! What do we do—run?”

A few sharp-eyed children see the adults coming toward them and panic. The feud between the brother and sister is temporarily forgotten.

“What are you kids doing? Hey, why is this tree broken? Who did it? Don’t you know this is state property?”

Unfortunately, the group of children is caught before they can flee.

There are more than 100 households in Xiagou Village’s Production Team, and 37 families live in the third brigade area. Most people know each other well and can easily recognize the children.

Even if they try to run, the adults who see them can identify them one by one.

The children trudge along behind the adults like defeated prisoners, and a few adults who have been collecting firewood bring the broken jujube tree with them.

Destroying public property is a serious matter in this era. The parents of the children working in the fields are summoned by the brigade leader.

“Shankun’s wife, they say your daughter is the one who broke this tree.”

Shankun is Baobao’s father’s name. In this remote place, people are used to calling a woman by her husband’s name. Calling a woman by her own name is something only close female friends or relatives do.

“Bullshit!”

Xu Panhao has been worried the whole way over after hearing that her son and daughter caused trouble. Her daughter isn’t even fully recovered yet—what on earth happened?

As soon as she arrives at the brigade office, she searches through the kids and finds her own two.

Her son is standing there looking foolish, his expression a bit too excited. But Xu Panhao ignores her son, focusing on her daughter instead. The sight makes her heart leap into her throat.

When Baobao left the house that morning, she was fine. But now, her eyes are red and swollen from crying, and the tip of her nose is pink. It’s clear she’s just been crying.

Xu Panhao is about to ask her daughter what happened and if she’s been bullied when the brigade captain’s words stop her. The captain’s words make her blood boil.

“You’re saying my three-year-old could slap a tree like that in half? Did I give birth to a kid or an axe?!”

Xu Panhao is known throughout the commune for being fierce—especially when it comes to defending her daughter. She’s like a madwoman who’d kill gods or demons for her child.

There was once a woman in the village who gossiped, implying that Xu Panhao had wasted too much fine grain on her premature daughter. Upon hearing this, Xu Panhao, along with her mother-in-law, set aside their differences and took turns yelling and cursing outside the woman’s house for half a month. The woman’s family can no longer bear the pressure, so they apologize and even give Xu Panhao two kilograms of millet and twenty eggs as compensation, thus ending the matter.

“You people just think we’re weak—an orphan and a widow—so you pour every bit of dirt and filth on my daughter! Shankun, why did you have to die so early? Your wife and daughter are being humiliated like this. Open your eyes and see! If this goes on, just take us with you. We’d rather be dead than suffer this injustice!” Xu Panhao plops down on the ground, pounding her fists on it. Her shoes fly off as she kicks in frustration.

“Mama!” Baoli and Baobao are both stunned by the sudden outburst and rush to help their mother up.

Baobao feels the most remorseful. Even though it’s not entirely her fault, the trouble is indeed caused by her.

“Aunt Shankun, you’re right! This tree wasn’t broken by Baobao! I’ll testify for you!” Zhao Chenghu steps forward.

Aunt Shankun is just as clever as he is—there’s no way she’ll believe such nonsense meant to fool an idiot.

As he speaks, he glances at a few of the brigade office’s cadres. These people are so dumb—how did they even become cadres?

“Shankun’s wife, stand up and speak properly. No one said for sure that it was your Baobao who broke the tree.”

The few cadres from the brigade office all feel a headache coming on from Xu Panhao’s commotion. Especially Brigade Leader Zhen Shanfeng—he’s technically Zhen Shankun’s distant cousin. The two families are related, so if word gets out that Xu Panhao cried and made a scene at the brigade office, people will talk behind his back and accuse him of bullying his widowed cousin’s wife.

Truthfully, none of the adults believe that Baobao broke the tree. The thought of a frail three-year-old, premature girl breaking a thick tree trunk is simply inconceivable. Even the strongest men in the village wouldn’t dare claim they could do such a thing with a single slap.

They’re more inclined to believe that a group of children shook the tree together, only for the youngest and most innocent to be blamed.

“Who wronged my granddaughter?” Liu Sanmei, having heard the rumors, charges into the brigade office wielding the heavy knife she uses to chop pigweed.

The moment the fierce old lady appears, the heads of the assembled cadres start throbbing painfully.

Great. Now both of the production team’s most infamous shrews are here—no one is safe.

“Grandma, my sister is so strong! She broke the tree with one slap! Mama’s right, she’s strong enough to knock down a cow!” Zhen Baoli hasn’t yet fully grasped the situation, but upon seeing his grandmother arrive, he excitedly speaks up.

“You blockhead.” The old lady smacks the back of his head, and her sharp gaze meets Xu Panhao’s, both women exchanging a brief yet knowing look.

They might not believe others, but they can’t afford not to believe their own son and grandson.

They both know the boy is simple-minded and doesn’t know how to lie. On top of that, Baoli dotes on his little sister as much as they do—there’s no way he’d side with outsiders to harm her.

If he says that, it must be because he actually saw the baby slap the tree—and not long after, the tree fell.

Though the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law often butt heads, years of living together have made them in sync. After that fleeting moment of solemnity, they immediately slip back into their usual combative and shrewish demeanor.

“Such a thick trunk—even two grown men might not be able to break it, let alone a three-year-old. If you ask me, that tree is already hollowed out by bugs. Just look at it—aren’t those wormholes? And oh, the top is all shriveled! It’s brittle for sure. Must be that the trunk rotted out and couldn’t absorb water anymore!” The old lady points at the broken tree, boldly fabricating the story.

The brigade’s leaders examine the fresh crack in the tree. The wood grain is tight, showing no sign of worm holes. As for the shriveled treetops, they’re simply a result of the season—most of the jujube trees have lost their leaves by now, and the fruit has dried up naturally.

“Even if my granddaughter doesn’t break it, this tree is going to die eventually. She’s just a little girl! Even if it’s a hollow tree, her strength is only enough to scratch the bark. To me, it looks like the trunk has already been broken long before my granddaughter touches it.”

This makes sense to the adults, and they begin to reconsider their assumptions.

The wild fruit forest is a popular spot for children, as adults occasionally leave some fruit for them to pick. However, the children are taught not to climb the trees. Many mischievous ones, in their attempts to reach the fruit, often shake the trees or disturb the branches with long sticks. It’s likely the trunk has already been damaged before Baobao hits it.

“Who here has hit that tree?” Zhen Shanfeng, the brigade leader, asks seriously.

“I have!” Zhen Baoli eagerly raises his hand, and no one stops him.

One by one, several other children raise their hands as well. The children have no real knowledge of which tree they’ve shaken, as they often play and pick fruit in the wild forest, shaking various trees without paying attention. Many can’t recall if they’ve hit this specific tree.

Zhen Baoli’s enthusiasm isn’t about admitting fault, but about trying to be a hero. His eagerness seems to encourage others, and soon every child in the vicinity is raising their hands to claim involvement in the incident.

Zhen Shanfeng takes note of this, observing that most of the children admit to hitting the tree in question.

Such a poor, unfortunate tree. Zhen Shanfeng sighs inwardly.

“It’s not our kid’s fault. They only go to the grove today. Who’s to say some other kid didn’t break that tree days ago? That grove is huge—people come and go every day. Who knows who really did it?”

The parents of the children step in to defend their own, claiming their innocence.

By now, it’s clear that Baobao is the least suspicious. All the adults present are convinced the tree is already broken before she touches it.

Only Baobao herself knows—the tree is still perfectly solid when she hits it.

As the parents defend their children, the room fills with noise, and the heads of several of the brigade’s leaders begin to throb.

In reality, breaking the jujube tree isn’t a huge deal, though it isn’t a small one either. The wild fruit forest has been left unattended for a long time and is considered common property. When the collective meal system is established, the land is claimed by the brigade.

For rural folk, fields and crops matter most. That fruit grove has always gone unmanaged. Its yield each year depends entirely on luck.

Whether the tree is broken by Baobao or someone else seems irrelevant now, and assigning blame to a three-year-old is clearly out of the question.

The Zhen family is in a unique position: Grandpa Zhen is a martyr, and Zhen Shankun dies heroically in the line of duty. The village has deep respect for them.

For the elderly, weak, and vulnerable members of the Zhen family, the villagers can’t possibly persecute them, even if they want to.

“The team will investigate this matter. In the future, children should be careful when picking fruit from the wild fruit forest. Use long sticks to poke the fruit, but don’t shake the trees,” Zhen Shanfeng concludes, sensing that the situation is now resolved. He doesn’t intend to pursue the issue further.

Everyone relaxes when they realize the team won’t take any further action.

“Look how scared my baby is after all this fuss,” Xu Panhao says, wiping her tears away and quickly getting up from the ground. Her face changes so quickly it’s almost comical.

Without waiting for the brigade’s leaders to respond, the two women—mother-in-law and daughter-in-law—march straight to the tree’s crown. They pluck a few jujubes and stuff them into their pockets before leaving with the two stunned children in tow.

The village cadres feel another wave of throbbing in their skulls. With two shrews like that in the Zhen family, it’s probably impossible for anyone to bully them, even if they try.

Author’s Note: 

Jujube Tree: The most pitiful thing here.

Zhen Baoli: The dumbest.