The early summer air in Chen Valley carried the promise of rain, but the skies remained stubbornly clear, filled with the gentle scent of ripening loquats. The village's rhythm had begun to subtly shift—what used to be idle gossip over mahjong now leaned toward discussions of "logistics apps," "cooperatives," and "e-commerce."
And behind all this quiet transformation stood Lin Feng.
Not as a ruler.
As a gardener.
One who knew that true permanence didn't come from power—it came from people.
---
"I'm starting a training camp," Lin Feng said one morning, standing in the middle of a newly renovated classroom at the edge of the valley.
Xu Yuhan looked up from her clipboard, brow arched. "A what?"
"A Rural Innovation Training Program," Lin Feng said with a grin. "Three weeks. Small batch. Pilot only. I want to start grooming the next generation—local youth who can handle digital tools, logistics, negotiations, media, even branding."
Xu Yuhan stared at him, then smiled.
"Lin Feng… you're building a rural MBA."
He nodded. "Except they'll graduate by building things, not just reading about them."
"And where are you going to find these students?"
Lin Feng pulled out a file. "Twenty applicants. All from nearby villages. Most are under 30, high school grads or dropouts. A few returned from cities after failed jobs. They're skeptical. Some are cynical."
"Perfect," Xu Yuhan muttered. "Cynics ask hard questions."
"Exactly. I want them to challenge everything."
She tapped her pen against her palm. "I'll bring in a few volunteers from my side—one marketing pro, one journalist, and one logistics analyst. But you'll have to convince them this isn't charity."
Lin Feng smiled faintly. "They'll see the profit model soon enough."
---
The first day of the Rural Innovation Program was, to put it kindly, chaotic.
Out of the twenty confirmed participants, only fourteen showed up.
Eight arrived late.
Three didn't bring notebooks.
One asked if lunch was free before even signing in.
Lin Feng, standing at the front of the modest classroom dressed in a simple grey T-shirt and jeans, took it all in stride.
"Good," he said, not even flinching. "If this were perfect, I'd know you were lying."
Laughter rippled, cautious but real.
Then he gestured at the board behind him, where he'd written a single sentence:
"What is the value of a cabbage?"
No one answered.
He pointed to a young man with bleached yellow hair in the second row.
"You."
"Uh… like… five yuan?"
"Wrong."
He pointed to a girl in the front row with chipped nail polish and a skeptical face.
"You."
"Depends. Supermarket cabbage? Maybe seven."
"Wrong."
Lin Feng turned to the board and underlined the sentence again.
"The value of a cabbage is not in its price. It's in its story."
He let that hang for a moment.
Then he walked over to a table and pulled out a box.
Inside were three cabbages.
One was fresh, green, and wrapped in eco-friendly paper with a clean design.
One was dirty and unwashed, bundled with old string.
One was shredded into neat pieces and placed in a mason jar with garlic and chili—homemade kimchi.
He placed them side by side.
"This one," he pointed to the first, "sells online for 12 yuan."
"This one," he pointed to the second, "sells for 3 yuan in the village market."
"And this one," he tapped the kimchi, "sells for 45 yuan per jar to city cafes."
Silence.
"Same cabbage. Different stories. Different value."
Now they were listening.
---
Over the next few days, the training evolved into something more than anyone expected.
Morning sessions included storytelling, price modeling, packaging theory, and logistics math.
Afternoons were practical: filming short product videos, designing simple flyers, testing packaging durability with crude drop tests.
Evenings were for group discussions—what made a village product stand out? Why did people trust some brands and not others? How could they compete against big chains?
It was here that Lin Feng's quiet genius began to shine—not through charisma, but through structure.
He never lectured.
He asked questions.
He let others fail—then asked why.
And slowly, the trainees began to shift.
Even the bleached-haired boy, whose real name turned out to be Zhao Ming, became a standout. He had a sharp instinct for what urban youth found "authentic" in marketing. By the end of the week, he was designing TikTok ads that could go viral with the right boost.
Xu Yuhan, observing from the sidelines, turned to Lin Feng one night and said:
"This… is bigger than what we talked about."
"I know."
"This is a movement."
Lin Feng said nothing.
But his eyes were alive.
---
On the tenth day, a storm rolled in from the east.
Rain lashed the rooftops of Chen Valley, flooding the lower fields and turning dirt paths into rivers of mud.
Normally, training would be canceled.
But that day, Lin Feng stood outside in the courtyard, soaked to the skin, setting up an open tent with solar lamps and emergency tables.
When the trainees arrived, confused and wet, he simply said:
"Business doesn't stop for weather. If your brand can't survive a storm, it's not real."
That day, they repackaged 60kg of soaked produce into "storm-harvest emergency packs," filmed the process live, and sold out the stock by evening—online, to urban consumers fascinated by the narrative.
The story?
"Real farmers. Real floods. Real food."
By nightfall, the rain had eased, and the group sat around drinking ginger soup, exhausted but giddy.
Zhao Ming, holding a mug, asked, "So… what are we, exactly?"
Lin Feng smiled. "You're the future management team of Chen Valley Agricultural Group."
Everyone stared.
"You mean… you're hiring us?"
"I'm offering partnership," Lin Feng corrected. "Small equity shares. Real pay. Continued training. But I expect loyalty, silence, and grit."
One girl raised her hand. "Do we have to stay in the village forever?"
"No," Lin Feng said. "You just have to remember where you started—and who trusted you before the world did."
No one said no.
---
Behind the scenes, things were moving fast.
With the pilot training showing success, Xu Yuhan used the footage and stats to craft a compelling grant proposal to a national NGO focused on "Rural Youth Entrepreneurship."
By week's end, she received notice: a 1 million yuan grant was approved to expand the program into a full year-long initiative.
They would be allowed to train 100 youths across five provinces—starting with Chen Valley as the flagship.
Lin Feng read the approval letter, then quietly filed it away.
He wasn't excited about the money.
He was excited about the symbol.
This wasn't just a grant.
It was validation.
It was the first time someone from the outside had officially recognized what he was building.
And from here, things would only grow.
---
At night, in the Inner Realm, Lin Feng walked alone through the tea groves.
The moonlight glinted off the emerald leaves, and frogs croaked in the pond beyond.
He stopped by the training pavilion he had built here—identical to the classroom outside.
A space for simulation.
A space for practice.
Here, he could teach without limits.
He sat at the central table and reviewed a new idea forming in his mind.
Not just training…
A full Rural Incubation System.
He would build:
Training centers (real and virtual)
Mentorship matching platforms
Rural-focused e-commerce gateways
Blockchain-based produce tracking
Anonymous IP masking for brand owners
Each trainee would be given tools not just to earn—but to build legacies.
He called it Project RootNet.
And it would span the nation.
---
As dawn broke, Lin Feng returned to the real world with clarity in his heart.
He made one phone call.
To an old college professor, one of the few who had ever encouraged him.
"Professor Liu," he said, "do you still know people in Beijing who care about education reform?"
A pause, then a chuckle on the line.
"I do. And they'll want to meet you."
"Good," Lin Feng said. "Because I want to talk about a national rural talent pipeline."
Silence.
Then: "Are you finally ready to step into the spotlight, Lin Feng?"
Lin Feng looked out over the valley, where a hundred dreams had begun to bloom.
"No," he said softly. "I'm just giving the soil better seeds."
---
End of Chapter 20