A Mortal’s Immortal Gourd
Chapter 2: Want to Be a Landlord

“Woo... woo... woo...”

The rooster crowed for the second time, and as dawn barely broke, Ergouzi was already up from bed.

He glanced at the three new pairs of straw shoes hanging on the wall and reluctantly took one down to put on.

Straw shoes weren’t expensive to make, but they took a lot of time. These three pairs were woven during late nights, and he planned to sell them in town when he had the chance.

He was already thirteen this year. Living off others couldn’t go on forever—he lived worse than a dog, worked harder than an ox, and ate worse than a pig.

His biggest dream had always been to save up some money, rent a few acres of farmland, and start his own life.

But even renting land required capital. He’d need tools, seeds—all of it cost a lot.

Not to mention, he'd need to butter up the landlords. With so many poor folks around, there was no guarantee anyone would rent land to him.

After putting on his shoes, he grabbed a handful of straw from the bed and stuffed it inside his clothes—when your coat wasn’t warm enough, straw would have to do.

Just then, he noticed a patch of green in the straw.

In the faint light, he saw a shriveled seed nestled among the straw that had actually sprouted, with two to three inches of tender shoot growing out of it.

What the h**l?

It was the middle of winter—every green leaf had frozen to death, let alone a seed sprouting.

When he touched the straw, it felt a bit damp.

Ergouzi thought hard for a moment. Last night, while drinking from the little gourd, some water had spilled, but he didn’t pay it much mind.

Could it be that once the creek water went into the gourd, it gained some sort of magical property?

He quickly hid the sprouted seed behind the bed in an inconspicuous spot and poured a bit more water from the gourd over it.

Then he dug through the straw again, hoping to find more seeds to test.

But whatever seeds there had been, he’d long since eaten. In the end, he found only three dried-out grains of rice.

He planted them behind the bed too and gave them a splash from the gourd.

“Ergouzi! The sun's already up your *ss and you're still lying around like a corpse!”

While he was still in his room fussing, his aunt’s screech had already started outside.

He had to stuff the yellow gourd back into his coat and rush out. Truth be told, it was still barely light outside.

Every morning, Ergouzi had to get up early to cook pig feed and boil water for his younger cousin to wash his face.

His uncle’s family had five people: two adults and three kids.

His older cousin, Zhang Youliang, was bigger than him and had been learning martial arts at Zhengwu Hall in town for years. He could down ten pounds of meat in one sitting, punch a cow to death, and leap five or six feet into the air.

His younger cousin, Zhang Youxin, was a bit younger than him and studied at a private school.

He couldn’t even recognize a full basket of Chinese characters but had already picked up every annoying scholar’s habit. Even in the freezing cold, he insisted on washing his face every morning—what was the point?

The sun could be halfway across the sky and he’d still be in bed, and every day Ergouzi had to prep hot water for his face-washing ritual.

These two had taken joy in bullying him since they were kids.

Zhang Youxin’s favorite game was making Ergouzi crawl on the floor while he rode on his back, barking orders like he was some grand general.

There was also a younger cousin sister, just seven years old—the only one in the whole family who still had a shred of humanity. Every day, the half bowl of cold porridge left on the table was what she saved for him.

But being a girl in this household didn’t earn her any favor. She was often scolded by Auntie as a worthless money sink.

Ergouzi sat by the clay stove, starting the fire to cook pig feed and boil water.

He took the chance to warm his chilblain-ridden hands and feet by the fire. Once they were warm, they itched like a thousand bugs crawling under his skin.

He kept rubbing his hands over them, scratching at the bone-deep itch—it hurt, but it also felt so damn good.

“Quit dawdling! Go feed the pigs already. You’re wasting all my firewood!”

Auntie was prepping breakfast and kicked him out, swearing up a storm.

“You eat my food, drink my water, and waste my firewood...”

Under her yelling, Ergouzi grabbed the pig slop and headed to the pen.

To prevent him from stealing food, Auntie always cooked both meals herself and never let him get near the pot.

So the only way he could sneak a bite was through the pig feed. As he reached the pen and saw no one around, he grabbed a hot lump and shoved it into his mouth—burning himself until his eyes bulged.

He picked out another lump with more rice and stuffed it into his coat.

The feed was mostly sun-dried pig grass, soaked and boiled before feeding.

The big black pig in the pen had been raised for two years, weighing at least seventy or eighty pounds—fatter than Ergouzi.

Uncle had plans to slaughter the pig for the New Year, so lately, he’d added some rice and rice bran to its diet.

But most of that good stuff ended up in Ergouzi’s stomach.

That pig would die without ever knowing that after eating grass for two years, even its last meal had been stolen.

No matter how careful you are, you can’t guard against someone in your own house.

After feeding the pig and nibbling some leftovers, it was time to head back to the mountains for firewood.

Ever since the autumn harvest, he’d been up there every day. There was never a shortage of work.

The harder he worked, the more meat his older cousin got to eat, and the more pens and books his younger cousin received.

But ever since he got the yellow gourd and made that discovery this morning, he’d started imagining new possibilities for his future.

His old dream had been to save enough to rent some land and become a tenant farmer. If he could marry a big-hipped, sturdy wife, life would be complete.

But now... being a tenant wasn’t enough anymore. He figured he might just have what it took to be a landlord.

Like Huang Laocai, the richest man in the village—owned hundreds of acres of land, had five wives, ten sons, and ate meat every other day.

Lost in these wild dreams, Ergouzi’s steps quickened. The wind didn’t seem so cold anymore.

In the following days, four rice seedlings sprouted in his little room.

This was a crop that should’ve only grown in sunny, flooded fields during spring.

But here they were, thriving in the dead of winter, in the dark. And growing well too.

In just a few days, they had shot up over a foot tall.

He roughly estimated their growth rate was at least ten times that of regular rice seedlings.

To keep Auntie’s family from discovering them, Ergouzi worked even harder outside these days, picking up dog poop until the rich man Huang’s dogs almost had nothing left to dump.

Inevitably, he got some on himself, and now both his body and room stank to high heaven.

Auntie started scolding him from a distance and wouldn’t go near his room.

Seeing how well the seedlings were doing, he thought about expanding a little.

If he could plant more now, then by spring, he might have enough savings to get started.

Yesterday, when Auntie asked him to husk rice, he managed to steal a handful of unhulled grains when she wasn’t looking.

Too many seeds to plant in his room. Since the gourd could help seedlings grow in dark, freezing rooms, why not test it on the mountain?

It was ice and snow outside, and few people ventured out.

Ergouzi scouted around the mountain for a while before clearing a small patch of land in a remote spot.

The place was full of rocks, barely any soil beneath the snow.

No idea if anything would grow, but he planted the grains anyway and watered them with the gourd, hoping for a miracle.

The next morning, he went to check.

Sure enough, the rice had sprouted—right there in the icy, rocky ground.

Over the next few days, he watered them daily with the gourd’s water.

In just a few days, they were over a foot tall.

Amid the frozen wasteland, a patch of thriving green rice stood strong—the gourd really was a miracle.

Meanwhile, the four seedlings in his room were starting to put out thick grain heads.

At this rate, they’d be ready to harvest in just two more days.

Everything was looking up.

After New Year’s, he was determined to find a way to rent some farmland.

Looking at the healthy seedlings, Ergouzi made a silent vow.

At the same time, he kept trying to fill the yellow gourd with water every chance he got—but it never filled up. He had no idea how much it could hold.

No matter how much he poured in, the gourd never got heavier.

He also discovered that not only could he shrink the gourd with a thought, he could make it bigger too.

At its smallest, he could shrink it to the size of a hair. As for how big it could grow—he hadn’t reached the limit yet.

But every transformation drained him. After changing the size three times in a row, he’d need to rest for a day or two.

Shrinking it was fine. Making it too big, though, became a problem—he wouldn’t be able to hide it.