ATPnovel Chapter 11 Ecological Farming
Chapter 11 Ecological Farming
Wang Zhi glanced at her. This girl has sharp eyes.
Most people would only stare at the earthworms when they see a wormhole, but she noticed the soil first.
"It's earthworm castings."
"Earthworm castings?"
"It's from earthworms eating straw and rotten leaves." He picked up a small handful of soil from the edge of the pit, spread it in his palm, and handed it to her to see. "Squeeze it."
Chang Le hesitated for a moment. It wasn't that she was afraid of dirt—there were many rules in the palace, and princesses couldn't just touch the soil.
But this was a farm, and the person standing in front of her had just dug up earthworms from the ground.
She reached out, picked up a small pinch of soil from his palm, and kneaded it between her fingertips.
It's loose and soft, like fine sand, completely different from the hard, yellow mud on the roadside.
"So loose?"
"It's best used for planting. It provides stable fertility and won't burn the roots."
Wang Zhi gently tossed the handful of soil back into the pit, gazing thoughtfully at the dark brown soil. "This stuff is interesting..."
It may look unremarkable, but if you have a piece of land and apply this every year, the soil will never become compacted and will always remain fertile, just like—
He paused, his voice carrying an indescribable sense of remoteness: "As the saying goes—a half-acre pond, a mirror opened, reflects the sky and clouds. How can it be so clear?"
He paused here, as if remembering something, and then continued naturally: "Because there is a source of living water."
He turned to Chang Le and explained in a calm tone, "These earthworm castings are the 'source of living water' of the land."
If you cultivate a piece of land for two consecutive years, the soil will harden and lose its fertility.
If you sprinkle this on the soil every year, it will always be loose and vibrant.
Ultimately, chickens eat earthworms to grow fat, and earthworms eat rotten vegetable leaves and straw, their droppings fertilizing the land.
From beginning to end, nothing is wasted. This cycle itself is "living water."
Chang Le was stunned.
She looked at the young man with mud-covered hands and listened to him connect a poem with a serene and profound meaning with the most basic agricultural work in such a calm tone.
The "square pond" in the poem reflects the sky and clouds, its clarity stemming from a living water source.
The earthworm castings in his hands keep the soil soft and fertile, which is also the source of the "clear water" that makes the fields "so clear".
This association, this insight that perfectly blends poetic imagery with the reality of farming, stirred up waves in her heart once again.
"Young Master Wang..." she spoke softly, a slight tremor in her voice, "This poem... was it written by you again, Young Master Wang?"
Wang Zhi seemed to just realize what he had said, and waved his hand: "These few lines I came up with before don't count as poetry. Seeing this soil, I don't know why, but these lines just came to mind."
"And it's that same understated way again," Chang Le thought to herself.
He always spoke so casually, as if those verses that made her ponder repeatedly were nothing more than clods of dirt picked up from the fields.
But she knew it wasn't true.
She was silent for a moment, then her gaze shifted from the soil to his face, a look of amazement, inquiry, and a complex emotion that was hard to describe.
"Young Master Wang," she finally spoke, her voice softer than usual, yet more earnest, "yesterday's 'How I wish I had a thousand mansions,' and today's 'For there is a source of living water'—both are works of profound meaning and exquisite beauty."
Although I am not well-read, I know that such verses are not the work of ordinary talent.
The young man speaks casually, yet he always hits the nail on the head, illuminating the underlying principles of ordinary things. Such talent…”
She paused, as if carefully choosing her words, before slowly saying, "Such talent cannot be simply described as 'blindly pondering'."
Wang Zhi was still looking at her.
She stood by the fence, the morning light filtering through the gaps in the jujube tree branches and leaves onto her moon-white dress, making her appear calm and focused.
She said this without exaggerated praise or deliberate flattery, but simply stated a fact calmly—she could tell that these poems were not written casually.
He suddenly realized that the girl's eyes were too bright and her mind too meticulous.
"Lady Li, you flatter me." He dusted off his hands, his tone remaining calm. "Actually, poetry and literature are sometimes just like that—"
What you see, what thoughts arise in your mind, they will naturally emerge. You can't force them.
He paused, his gaze fixed on the lush green rice paddies in the distance, his voice carrying an indescribable sense of remoteness:
"As the saying goes, a good article is born of nature, and a masterpiece is achieved by chance. Enough of this empty talk."
Chang Le's breath hitched.
These ten words, like a pebble thrown into a calm lake, rippled outwards in her heart.
"A good article is born of nature, and a skillful hand may come by chance..." she repeated softly, savoring each word very slowly.
A stroke of genius. A serendipitous discovery.
It wasn't the result of deep thought or deliberate crafting.
It is a principle that exists inherently in the world, a beauty that is inherently contained within it, which was accidentally captured by a pair of "skillful hands".
Those "miraculous hands" belong to him.
But he described this "miraculous skill" so casually, as if he had just happened to pass by and picked up a treasure that had been left behind in the world.
"So," Wang Zhihuan looked away, glanced at her, and smiled, "it's nothing serious."
Just like earthworm castings—they're meant to make the soil loose and fertile; I simply discovered this principle and then used it for farming.
Chang Le remained silent for a long time.
She looked at the young man with mud-covered hands, his calm smile, and listened to his seemingly humble yet profoundly wise words.
"A good article is born of nature, and a skillful hand may occasionally bring it to fruition."
These ten short words were more impactful to her than any poem praising talent she had ever heard.
Because it not only explains the origin of poetry, but also reveals a way of looking at the world—it is not that humans create beauty, but that humans discover beauty that already exists.
Those who can discover this kind of beauty are already extraordinary.
"I understand," she finally said softly, her eyes now clearer. "Thank you for your guidance, Young Master Wang."
"It's not really guidance," Wang Zhihuan waved his hand. "It was just something I said offhand."
If the gardeners in your palace knew this, the peonies could bloom for another half month.
Chang Le looked down at the earthworms wriggling silently in the pit and remained silent for a while.
She had heard the phrase "increase revenue and reduce expenditure" countless times in the palace.
Whenever the Ministry of Revenue and the Ministry of Works argued over money, these four words would come out of the mouth of a certain old minister, and then everyone would nod, and the argument would continue.
But the person in front of me doesn't say those four words.
He squatted on the ground, raising insects with straw and rotten vegetable leaves. The insects fed the chickens, and the chicken manure fertilized the land. He saved every penny in places where no one could see him.
This is actually a different manifestation of the same thought as the "living water source" wisdom in his poems—one in poetry, the other in the soil.
"From which old farmer did Young Master Wang learn this method?"
"I tried it myself."
"Try it yourself?"