Rebirth of the Legend of the Red Age

Chapter 32, The third bargain, gold

Time flies. Wang Li's father and Lai San have been learning to build houses for half a year. Although it is not a good time to build houses because of the cold weather, there are still a few families who build and repair houses when the weather is not too cold.

The two of them have accumulated some experience. When they are not working on building houses, they often go to Mr. Jin's home to learn basic knowledge.

By the first half of 1950, the weather had begun to warm up, the land had thawed, and the construction of the third courtyard of the Wang family had begun.

Generally, the first step in building a house is to lay the foundation, but their house was built by digging a hole, because they needed to build a two-story basement and an underground warehouse in the front yard of the main house, so the project was quite large.

This manual labor was mainly undertaken by Wang Li. As Wang Li's father was getting older, Wang Li persuaded him to stop working and asked him and Lai San to assist together.

The preliminary project was to dig a deep pit 10 meters deep, 17 meters long and 9 meters wide under the main house, and then dig a tunnel along this deep pit in the direction of the corridor, and then dig an underground warehouse 8 meters wide and 16 meters long under the front yard. In fact, the two pits were one before the wall was built.

It was still light after dinner that night. Wang Li suggested to his father: Let's dig a little longer today and try to dig out the foundation of the main house as soon as possible. Then he picked up the excavation tools and walked towards the third courtyard.

When Wang Li dug 3 meters below the ground, he heard a ding sound and the shovel hit a hard object. At first Wang Li thought it was a stone, but after digging a few more times, he found that it was an iron plate.

Wang Li thought, could this be a treasure? He started digging around the iron plate. Wang Li's father also saw Wang Li's actions and came over to help Wang Li dig around. After a while, the father and son dug out an iron box in the ground. The box was about the size of the old kang box. Fortunately, they were both strong men, so they moved the iron box out with great difficulty.

After careful inspection, it was discovered that there should have been a coating of unknown material on the surface of the iron box, and there was a copper lock on the front that had been corroded beyond recognition and fell to the ground with a slight touch.

The father and son stood up and looked around. When they found that there was no one around, they used a shovel to pry open the iron box along the gap. They found that there were black metal blocks three fingers wide and one finger thick inside.

My father said, "Who is this? There is a box of this metal hidden underground."

Wang Li picked up a piece and found it very heavy. His eyes narrowed slightly, and he used his fingers to gently pick at the metal. He said to his father: "Father, this is not iron, this is gold. It must have been placed underground for many years and has rusted."

Then he handed the gold nugget to his father and scraped the rusty surface with his hand to reveal the golden color of the underlying layer.

The father was slightly surprised after hearing this. He immediately reached out to take the gold nugget and observed it carefully. He exclaimed: "Really? How much gold is this? This nugget must weigh two kilograms, right? There are 30 nuggets of this size in one layer of this box, and I don't know how many layers are underneath!"
Wang Li suggested: "Let's bury it first, and then we two will come and carry it to your room at night." Father nodded in agreement. So the two buried the box again, sprinkled a layer of loose soil on it, and after cleaning it up, they got up and returned to the front yard.

The father and son explained what happened to Wang Li's mother. At nine o'clock in the evening, it was completely dark and the people around were asleep. The three Wang family members groped their way to the third courtyard. The mother watched from outside while the father and son went into the pit to take out the gold. With the efforts of the three, the gold was brought to their parents' house.

After the three people distinguished and counted them one by one, they found that there were 20 layers of gold bricks in the box, 30 gold bricks in each layer, a total of 600 gold bricks. The total weight was about 1200 catties. This is a very exaggerated number. If it were put in today's calculation, based on 500 yuan per gram of gold, 1200 catties would be 600 kilograms, 600 kilograms would be 60 grams, and 60 grams multiplied by 500 yuan would be 3 million yuan.

After the three members of the Wang family counted the amount of gold, Wang Li's parents were already stunned. Such a huge amount of wealth was too hot to hold in their hands.

Wang Li's mother asked: "Oh! Could this be passed down from the ancestors of Shopkeeper Sun's family?"

Wang Li replied: Mother, I don’t think so. Look at these gold bricks, they have become so rusty. They must have been placed underground for many years. Moreover, these gold bricks are in the basement of the main house, and there is no passage leading to the location of the gold bricks.

Therefore, the Sun family should not know about this gold. I think this gold must have been buried underground by some nobleman before the Qing Dynasty. After the Qing Dynasty entered the Pass, there must have been a fire or it was destroyed by someone, and the courtyard was rebuilt and these gold bricks were pressed under the main house.

Wang Li's parents thought about it and nodded in agreement with this guess, otherwise there was no way to explain why the gold was buried under the main house.

After hearing Wang Li's explanation, his parents felt relieved, knowing that no one knew the gold was buried here, and they were not afraid of being discovered by others. As long as they were careful and did not tell anyone, they could use it secretly. After solving this problem, the mother began to worry about where so much gold was hidden.

Wang Li's father suggested: We can first hide the gold under the bed in the master bedroom, and dig a hole like the gatehouse and bury the gold in it. After the basement of the third courtyard is repaired, we will transfer the gold to that basement, and it will be safe this way.

After the three of them reached a consensus, they started to work, and it was not until after 11 o'clock in the evening that they finally hid the gold. The three of them went back to the house to sleep with excitement.

Note: Gold can rust, and it turns black. If you don't believe me, you can search on Baidu.

Thank you for your recommendation and support. I wish you good health and a happy mood.

(End of this chapter)