Cultivation: Start with Inviting Gods

To be honest, it was actually quite difficult to live in the county town during this dynasty.

There were also lands outside the county town, and some landlords and farmers cultivated the land, but they had to pay taxes.

These lands belonged to the county town, and if you wanted to cultivate them, you had to pay taxes.

In addition to land taxes, daily use of water, livestock, farm tools, etc. were all taxed.

This was just the more expensive tax, and there were other taxes of all sizes to be collected.

For example, if you lived in the county town and didn't have a house, you had to pay a housing tax to the county town, and you also had to pay taxes for renting a house.

Moreover, when the emperor celebrated his birthday, the empress celebrated her birthday, the concubines celebrated their birthdays, the high officials celebrated their birthdays, and the princes and princesses celebrated their birthdays, they also had to pay taxes.

It was fine to pay taxes on birthdays, but they also had to pay taxes when they died, when they had any accidents, when they were sick, and when they lived in the county town, they had to pay taxes for sanitation and cleaning.

These miscellaneous taxes sounded a lot, but some could be put together, and it would be enough to pay a few dozen copper coins every year, but that was not the end, and many new taxes would be added every year, or they had to pay money for big and small reasons.

This was simply unreasonable, but it was very normal in this dynasty. What was it called? This was called exorbitant taxes.

They were all useless taxes, and it was also a way for the emperor to oppress the people.

When Jiang Nanhe first knew about it, he didn't know what to say, and he was just silently thankful that fortunately he had lived in the mountains before, and basically all kinds of taxes would not be collected from him.

This tax is said to be collected by everyone, but in fact, only some larger cities and counties will collect it.

Ordinary towns or villages will collect much less tax because they are the main producers of grain, but if other taxes are reduced, grain will have to pay more. It's the same, just a different means of squeezing.

Walking into Anping County, the voices around suddenly increased.

People came and went on the roads and paths, some business people and some children were strolling here.

Of course, there are also some beggars in the county, but it is also difficult for beggars to survive. If they are discovered by the government, they may be beaten to death, or demoted to a lowly person and sold directly. Therefore, if beggars want to live in this county, they must be very discerning or have some connections.

For example, now, Jiang Nanhe walked in alone with a big sheep and a dog. He didn't look very old, and someone had his eyes on him.

Without the general's reminder, Jiang Nanhe could sense that some of the people around him who were looking at him contained some malice.

He identified the direction without caring, and walked towards the county town with the lamb.

Some people around looked at the huge lamb curiously, and made way for him, which made Jiang Nanhe move much more smoothly.

Some children looked at the lamb and wanted to play around him for a while.

Although Jiang Nanhe and the lamb didn't seem to walk fast, the children couldn't keep up, so they had to give up and go to other places to play.

The place where Jiang Nanhe went was a street at the westernmost end of the county town.

The people living on that street were generally middle-class families in the county town. There were all kinds of shops there, which was a good living area.

And there were two medical clinics there. Jiang Nanhe could go there to ask if they would accept apprentices, and he could learn something at his own expense.

As for whether those people would teach? Jiang Nanhe thought they would, after all, the price he offered was very high.

In addition to asking them if they would accept apprentices, Jiang Nanhe also planned to take the lamb and the dog there to eat something.

The lamb had been eating grass all these years, and occasionally the general would give him some snacks. As for human food, he had not tasted it, and Jiang Nanhe had not eaten much either.

He usually ate what the general cooked for him, and some of the food he improved himself, or he dictated recipes to the general and asked the general to cook it, and the taste was basically good.

So he had not come out to eat much. He would have to live in human society in the future, and he had to adapt first. Now it was not convenient for the general to show up, and they had no plans to buy a yard to live in, so the general had not been convenient to cook for the past few months.

Of course, the general could also finish cooking in Futian, and then put it in the lunch box and take it out for Jiang Nanhe, anyway.

After walking for a while, Jiang Nanhe and the lamb got rid of the guys with bad intentions following him, and came to a stall selling sesame cakes.

The sesame cakes were very sweet, especially those that had just come out of the oven. The taste was very delicious.

The food was really good. The baked pancakes were very soft and sprinkled with sesame seeds. The aroma was simply amazing.

If there was a bowl of wontons next to it, it would definitely make people's stomachs gluttonous.

But unfortunately, there was not much good meat in this era. After all, no one had discovered the method of sterilizing piglets. Other mutton and beef were not eaten much, and Jiang Nanhe did not eat mutton.

Jiang Nanhe and the lamb stopped at the pancake stall. The lamb looked at Jiang Nanhe eagerly. Jiang Nanhe knew that he wanted to eat it. It happened that he also wanted to eat something hot, so he asked the boss about the price.

"Uncle, how much is the pancake?"

Hearing Jiang Nanhe's question, the middle-aged man who had been making pancakes with his head down looked up at them. He was startled as soon as he looked up, after all, the lamb was very big, but he soon recovered. He clapped his hands and wiped the sweat on his head.

"Oh my, this sheep is really big and looks really majestic. Young master, you have to keep an eye on this sheep and don't let it be stolen."

After saying this, the middle-aged uncle selling sesame cakes seemed to react and waved his hand embarrassedly.

"The sesame cakes are two cents each. They are large sesame cakes from Xuanhu. They are sprinkled with sesame seeds. They are freshly baked and very fragrant.

Although it is more expensive, it contains my own oil pastry. It is really delicious. Do you want to buy one?"

Listening to what the uncle said in front of him, Jiang Nanhe was surprised. The sesame cakes sold by this uncle were indeed a bit expensive.

After all, meat buns are only one cent each, but it is not too expensive. He took out a small bag from his arms, took out two cents from it, thought about it, and took out two copper coins.

"Give me two freshly baked sesame cakes. The uncle's cooking skills are very good. Just standing here and smelling the fragrance makes me feel that the sesame cakes are delicious."

Hearing Jiang Nanhe's praise, the uncle selling sesame cakes in front of him smiled, and then quickly wrapped two for Jiang Nanhe.

The freshly baked sesame cakes were wrapped in oil paper. Jiang Nanhe opened one, broke off the sesame layer, and put it in his mouth. Tasted it, it was indeed as the uncle said, it was especially delicious.

Jiang Nanhe nodded with satisfaction, praised the uncle's cooking skills again, and left with the lamb. The uncle watched Jiang Nanhe walk away, and then started making sesame cakes. He was obviously very happy with Jiang Nanhe's praise.

But what made him feel strange was that Jiang Nanhe only ate one bite of the two sesame cakes, one was placed on the wooden rack on the lamb's back, and the other was held by him and fed to the lamb and the dog following him.

His behavior was particularly strange. After all, a sesame cake that cost two cents was really expensive, but the uncle felt that what he made was worth the price, and the people around him also recognized it.

But Jiang Nanhe's action of feeding his sesame cakes to the lamb and the dog still made him feel a little strange. After all, who would feed the lamb and the dog with freshly baked sesame cakes?

And the other one was also placed in the wooden box on the lamb's back. I wonder what's in there?

When Jiang Nanhe came in, he covered the stable box behind the lamb where the shrine was placed, and added a layer of cloth on it, so that people couldn't easily see the temple inside. After all, the lamb was carrying a small temple, which was quite conspicuous, so Jiang Nanhe did that.

The general returned to his statue, looked at the hot sesame cakes placed by Jiang Nanhe in front of him, and shook his head.

Some of the heat from the sesame seed cake dissipated, and a sesame seed cake wrapped in oil paper appeared in the hand of the general's illusory figure. The mask on his face opened and closed, revealing his mouth. He took a bite of the illusory sesame seed cake and really tasted its flavor. Just like Jiang Nanhe said, the sesame seed cake tasted really good.