Hope for a Bountiful Harvest
It started snowing in Charleston, and the little ones who had just learned to walk were absolutely fascinated by the snow!
The four little ones have brought endless laughter and joy to the Palace of Qin, and Lily Evans has been smiling much more than before.
Even the common folk of Charleston have more smiles on their faces these days.
Thanks to the court building new schools, a whole wave of industries has been set in motion.
Brick makers, furniture refurbishers, laborers building houses, cooks feeding the workers, tailors making clothes for them...
All these jobs needed people, and people got paid for their work. Many have benefited from the school-building project, and their pockets are fuller than ever.
Now, just walking down the streets of Charleston, you can already see the results of the literacy classes.
People are now able to write their own Spring Festival couplets and shop signs—using simplified characters, which are easier to learn and write. (Note: Simplified characters are a modern, more accessible version of Chinese script, introduced here as part of the literacy reform.)
Some of the handwriting is a bit crooked, but every word is clear and easy to read.
Even the signs for shops and taverns have been changed to the simplified characters taught in the literacy classes. Hardly anyone could read the old traditional script, but now the easy-to-learn simplified characters have taken over.
So now, as you stroll down the street, every sign is written in modern simplified script. For a moment, you might feel as if you’ve stepped into a present-day historical district!
And with everyone learning to read, the book printing business is booming.
Now that everyone can read, the hunger for stories is unstoppable. The clever ones have started writing novels, comics, and supernatural tales in simplified characters—and they’re flying off the shelves!
Even bookstores in Charleston have multiplied compared to before!
But that’s not even the most exciting part.
Right now, what the soldiers and civilians of Charleston are most looking forward to is the new seedlings sprouting in the fields!
After the autumn harvest, many farmers planted seeds they bought on credit from the court and even used chemical fertilizers. No one knows how next year’s harvest will turn out!
Everyone’s got their hopes up, wishing that the seeds and fertilizer from the government will bring a bumper crop!
With all these expectations, the New Year arrived just like that.
It’s the first New Year since the King of Qin came here—and it’s a New Year filled with hope for everyone.
The days of muddling through under the rule of the Big Four Clans are finally over. Now, with a wise new ruler, everyone’s hoping for a brighter future.
Spring arrived amid the hopes of the people. The snow melted, seeds sprouted in the fields, bright green and full of life, promising a bountiful harvest.
Those who used chemical fertilizers and pesticides were delighted to find that the court’s seeds sprouted better and produced more than the old ones!
And the fields treated with chemical fertilizer were clearly more fertile than those using traditional manure!
Weeds and bugs in the fields? After using herbicides and insecticides, the results were dramatic!
No more worrying about pests eating the crops, and the endless weeds are almost gone!
The common folk are grinning from ear to ear—the government’s gifts are truly magical!
This spring, literacy classes spread across the entire Kingdom of Qin—even tiny coastal villages weren’t left out.
The second phase of the new-style schools’ national rollout was planned by the Ministry of Works, and the money confiscated from the Qian family finally found its purpose.
And during these days, Xiao Yun brought back some fantastic news from the secret factory in the mountains!
After half a year of research, the craftsmen in the factory can now fully replicate the textile machines—their quality matches the imported ones exactly!