Chapter 3: Nine Sons Embracing the Lotus, the Method of Inner Strength
Xu Ji's Wood Carving Shop was among the top-ranked wood carving shops in the Outer City, often receiving orders from the Inner City, which had a tremendous demand for various types of wood carvings.
Whether carving landscapes or statues of Bodhisattvas and Buddhas, or even images of gods that Li Che had never heard of before.
For a laborer, transporting both the wood and the finished statues meant receiving a fixed piece rate pay, which wasn't much to begin with, and it was backbreaking work.
However, if one could become an official wood carving master, carving a finished product could earn at least ten silver coins!
Even more, Li Che had heard that Master Chen once carved a "Thousand-Armed Guanyin Woodcarving Statue" that took almost a month to complete and earned him a Gold Leaf, which was equivalent to one hundred taels!
Such craftsmanship could make ordinary people extremely wealthy!
Li Che was tempted. In the past, he wouldn't have dared to dream so far.
Wood carving skills needed to be nurtured from a young age, and they tested talent as well as artistry. Many apprentices in the wood carving shop were sent there by their families at the age of five or six in exchange for silver.
When Li Che started working in the wood carving shop, he was already thirteen and had missed the appropriate age.