Chapter 93: Purifying Coarse Salt

After dinner, Ning Yaxin sent a carriage to escort Xu Mo and Qin Mutou away.

Just as Ning Yaxin was about to return indoors, one of Master Ning’s servants suddenly came to deliver a message, saying that Master Ning had urgent business and wanted to see her.

Ning Yaxin did not need to ask to know that her father must be summoning her because of Zhang Zhishen.

A short while later, inside Master Ning’s room.

Ning Yaxin pushed open the door and came to the bedside. She first studied her father’s complexion, then said, “Father, you look much better lately. It seems that old ginseng really does work.”

Master Ning said nothing. He merely nodded with a faintly stern expression, then gestured for Ning Yaxin to sit by the bed before waving the servants out of the room.

After the servants had gone, Master Ning asked, “Yaxin, Young Master Zhang specially came all the way from Heyang to find you. It would be one thing if you treated him coldly and shut the door on him every day, but why did you report him to the authorities and have him thrown into jail?”

Ning Yaxin explained, “Father, I had no choice. He blocked me at our gate every single day. I told him many times not to come again, but he simply would not listen!”

“Even so, you should not have had him arrested by the authorities! This... what kind of affair is this? Cough, cough... cough...”

Master Ning grew agitated and immediately began coughing.

Ning Yaxin hurriedly asked, “Father, are you all right?”

Master Ning shook his head at once. After calming himself and stopping the cough, he asked, “That Xu Mo was the one who gave you the idea, wasn’t he?”

Ning Yaxin nodded and immediately told him that Zhang Zhishen would be sent back to Heyang County first thing in the morning.

Ning Yaxin said, “Father, I do not like that Zhang Zhishen. I did this to tell him that I could never marry him, so he should give up on the idea!”

Master Ning looked at his daughter with a stern face and asked, “You do not like him. Then who do you like?”

Ning Yaxin lowered her head and said nothing.

“Do not think I am too old and foolish to see through you. You have taken a liking to that Xu Mo, have you not?” Master Ning pressed.

Ning Yaxin was shocked at once. Her heartbeat quickened in an instant, and she shook her head in panic to deny it. “No! I do not...”

Her denial was feeble and powerless; even her eyes, guilty and evasive, would not meet her father’s.

Master Ning shook his head. “Yaxin, you are my daughter. If you are hiding something in your heart, do you think your father cannot tell?”

“Yaxin, your father is merely bedridden. I am not blind or deaf!”

“Ever since you began working with him, you have spent all your days at that so-called Skin and Scent Shop. Have you forgotten that our Ning family makes a living in the silk trade? During this time, have you once asked after the business of the silk shop?”

Ning Yaxin was instantly at a loss for words.

Indeed, all this time she had poured every ounce of her energy into the soap business, and had scarcely paid any attention to the family silk shop.

His daughter had nothing to say.

“In calling you here today, I mean to remind you that Xu Mo is a married man. I will never agree to let you become his concubine!” Master Ning’s tone was heavy, his resolve absolute.

“Father! What are you saying?” Ning Yaxin immediately grew anxious, her voice rising with her. “When did I ever say I wanted to marry him as a concubine? I... I am only working with him in business. There is no romantic feeling between us at all!”

Master Ning gave a cold laugh. “Perhaps you do not have such thoughts now, but that does not mean you will not in the future.”

“Father called you here today only to tell you to abandon this notion as soon as possible!”

“As long as I am alive, you and he can never be.”

Two days later, on a morning in Gushan Village.

Xu Mo did not go to the soap workshop that day, but was busy in the courtyard behind his house.

At that moment, he was about to pour coarse salt into a large wooden tub filled with water.

Just as he lifted the sack of salt and was about to tip it in, Chen Miaoyi and Xu Hui arrived.

Xu Hui was startled at the sight and hastily asked, “Cousin, what are you doing? Why are you pouring salt into the water?”

Chen Miaoyi was also puzzled, but she knew Xu Mo must have his reasons and would never waste good things for nothing.

Xu Mo did not stop moving. With a rustling sound, he poured half a sack of coarse salt into the tub.

Only after setting down the salt sack did he say, “I am purifying it. Eating too much coarse salt can make you ill. From now on, we should eat fine salt.”

With that, he picked up a wooden stick and began stirring the brine.

“Cousin, they sell fine salt in the market, don’t they? Why don’t we just buy it? Why go to the trouble of making it ourselves?” Xu Hui asked in great curiosity.

As he stirred, Xu Mo said, “The fine salt sold in the market is not the same as the fine salt I am purifying. They only filter out the visible impurities. The impurities you cannot see are still left in the salt.”

“Impurities you cannot see?” Xu Hui did not understand and could not help glancing at Chen Miaoyi.

Chen Miaoyi was also confused. “Husband, what are the visible impurities and the invisible impurities?”

Xu Mo replied, “The visible impurities are usually dirt and sand. They are also called insoluble impurities.”

“As for the invisible impurities, they include magnesium chloride, calcium chloride, and the like. These are all in the salt, and they are called soluble impurities. Eating them over a long period of time is very harmful to the body!”

He told them that because coarse salt contains a relatively high amount of sodium, long-term consumption can easily cause the body to retain water and sodium.

Not only that, it can also lead to swelling. Over time, it may cause blood pressure to remain elevated and kidney function to decline, greatly increasing the risk of kidney disease.

Chen Miaoyi and Xu Hui listened in a daze. Magnesium chloride, calcium chloride, water and sodium retention, and that thing called sodium—all of it was completely beyond them.

“Cousin, what are you even saying? I don’t understand a word of it,” Xu Hui said, scratching her head.

Although Chen Miaoyi did not understand those technical terms either, she could grasp Xu Mo’s meaning.

“Huihui, after saying so much, your husband is simply telling us that eating too much coarse salt is bad for the body,” Chen Miaoyi said with a smile.

Xu Mo immediately nodded. “Exactly! That is what your sister-in-law means. That is exactly what I wanted to say!”

Xu Hui said, “But we have all been eating coarse salt all this time, and I have never seen anyone get sick from it.”

Xu Mo smiled and, unwilling to waste breath explaining further, said, “Then you may keep eating coarse salt in the future. I, for one, am going to eat fine salt.”

At that, Xu Hui was displeased. “That won’t do. I want to eat it too!”

Xu Mo smiled and continued stirring the brine in the tub.

After a while, he stopped stirring and, after carefully examining the brine, finally nodded. “Good. Once it settles, we can filter it.”

During this time, he had Chen Miaoyi fetch a piece of fine linen cloth, which he would soon use to filter the brine in the tub.

After the sediment had settled, Xu Mo, with the help of Chen Miaoyi and Xu Hui, filtered the large tub of brine and removed a great deal of dirt and sand.

Looking at the dirt and sand left behind in the filter, Chen Miaoyi immediately understood. “Husband, I get it now. These are the insoluble impurities!”

“Exactly!” Xu Mo nodded with a smile, then praised her, “My wife is indeed as clever as ice and snow. I was not loving you for nothing!”

Hearing this with Xu Hui standing right there, Chen Miaoyi immediately felt shy, lowered her head, and smiled with embarrassment.

Seeing this, Xu Hui rolled her eyes at once and muttered with obvious disgust, “How revolting.”

Then Xu Mo placed the quicklime powder he had prepared earlier into a new tub.

Before adding water, Xu Mo reminded them, “Miaoyi, Huihui, step farther back. Do not let the lime water scald you!”

After the two of them moved back a little, Xu Mo poured in clean water.

In the next instant, thick steam billowed up from the tub, and the water he had poured in gradually began to boil.

Chen Miaoyi asked, “Husband, what is this for?”

Xu Mo stepped back beside Chen Miaoyi and explained, “When quicklime meets water, it turns into slaked lime. In a moment, I will add both the slaked lime and the alkaline water to the brine. That way, we can filter out the soluble impurities invisible to the naked eye.”