Ding-ling, ding-ling.
The small bell at the entrance chimed as early-rising regular customers walked in one after another.
Looking at the wooden signs hanging with the types of buns listed, they began ordering.
“Whoa! Today’s smell is so fragrant!”
“Are only the meat ones ready? Then boss lady, give me five meat ones first! And a bowl of soup!”
“I want some too! Two bowls of soup, ten buns, to go.”
Song Xu sold the buns while continuing to steam more, busy to the point of her feet barely touching the ground.
The cabbage and tofu soup cooked with toad oil was even more popular than yesterday’s sales; nobody drank the millet porridge in the regular pot anymore.
At 8:30 AM, the first morning rush passed.
The prepared meat filling and dough were nearly exhausted.
Song Xu wiped her sweat, looked at her daughter obediently nibbling on a bun, and smiled.
“Bao Bao, is it delicious?”
Her daughter blinked her big eyes and gritted a smile: “Mm, Mommy, so, so good~”
Song Xu walked over to help wipe the corner of her mouth: “Good girl, eat slowly. Come, have a sip of soup, ah—”
Bao Bao obediently opened her mouth, accurately leaning close to the soup spoon.
Fine lines appeared at the corners of Song Xu’s smiling eyes.
How wonderful; this time her daughter drank two bottles of Gene Repair Fluid.
The effect could be said to be immediate!
Her fingers and facial expressions were more flexible, and she could even straighten her back!
Just a few minutes after feeding her daughter, a dozen people poured into the shop with a rush.
“Boss! Are there any buns left? I want 4! No, make it 6!”
A young man in a suit, out of breath, rushed to the front, followed by seven or eight men and women filing in.
“Yes, yes, yes! This is the exact smell! I smelled it the entire way up the elevator!”
“I want ten too! Just now Old Li from our department ate one, and the look on his face was amazing. I was dying of cravings!”
“Boss, how do you make these buns? They’re way too fragrant!”
“Look at this, you can even see the oil through the bun skin. You can tell it’s delicious at a single glance!”
The chatter nearly lifted the roof off the shop.
Song Xu hurriedly responded: “Yes, yes, yes, please wait a moment, they’re coming out of the pot right away!”
Before long, the savory aroma of pork and Welsh onions gushed out once again.
Those few white-collar workers took a deep breath in unison.
“This is the smell!”
“Quick, quick, quick, boss, pack mine first!”
Song Xu handled the bags expertly and collected the money.
A girl wearing glasses could not wait and took a bite on the spot.
Some juices splattered out, and she shouted indistinctly to her companions: “My goodness, you guys try it quickly! This meat filling is divine! It’s so delicious I want to swallow my tongue!”
Another male colleague sped up his chewing, swallowing it down in two or three bites. Choking to the point of thumping his chest, he still remembered to give a thumbs up: “Delicious! A hundred times better than that century-old shop downstairs from my house!”
“Boss! How come your onions taste like the ones from Shandong? So fragrant!”
“And this meat filling, how did you season it? It’s so tender and smooth!”
Song Xu smiled as she dealt with them while busy: “It’s all home-cooked methods. The onions bought today are indeed quite good.”
The girl wearing glasses took another bite, her face full of bliss. “If I could eat buns like this every morning, working overtime wouldn’t feel like a problem at all!”
“Boss, can we place an advance order for your buns? Our company has a team-building event tomorrow, and we want to order a hundred!”
“Our department wants some too!”
Song Xu smiled and said: “Advance orders might not work. I can’t wrap that many by myself. If everyone wants to eat them, come early tomorrow.”
In less than twenty minutes, the remaining buns and soup were swept clean.
Song Xu counted the earnings, which were more than three times the usual amount.
She washed her hands, picked up her daughter, and kissed her tender little cheek.
“Bao Bao, Mommy earned money today. Let’s go buy toys for Bao Bao today, alright?”
Her daughter giggled, using her little greasy hands to touch her face.
Song Xu did not dodge either, letting her touch her.
Sunlight outside the window shone in, sprinkling over mother and daughter.
Behind a large tree across the road.
A filthy old man wiped his runny nose with his sleeve, sticking his head out to peer around.
Bao Bao lay on Song Xu’s shoulder. Across the glass door, her little mouth parted, blurting out an indistinct: “Pa-pa?”
Song Xu’s heart trembled, and she turned around abruptly.
Traffic intertwined outside, and pedestrians walked in a hurry; no familiar figure was to be seen.
“Bao Bao, are you calling Daddy? You… miss him, right?”
Bao Bao waved her little fingers and pointed at the bear: “Daddy, daddy…”
“Good girl, Daddy will be back very soon.” Song Xu kissed her daughter’s forehead, pressing down the bitterness in her heart.
After cleaning up the shop, she took her daughter to the hospital first.
The attending doctor held the newly issued brain-enhanced CT film, looking at it again and again against the light.
“Ms. Song, you… what special treatment have you undergone recently?”
Song Xu sat on the chair, her expression calm: “Nothing really. Just eating and sleeping on time, and keeping a calmer mindset.”
“A calmer mindset?” The doctor was so excited his speech grew incoherent, saliva even spraying out. “This isn’t something a mindset can explain. This is simply… Where is your husband? Why didn’t he accompany you today?”
Song Xu’s hands resting on her knees tightened slightly. “He’s been busy with work lately. Doctor, regarding my condition, I actually know everything already. Just tell me directly.”
The attending doctor paused, looking at Song Xu with a complex expression.
“Since you already know, then I’ll speak directly.” He pointed at the film. “Your type of tumor… is extremely malignant, highly invasive, and surgery is useless. Based on your previous progression rate and location, our evaluated survival period was indeed very unoptimistic.”
His gaze fell upon the child, his voice softening further: “So last time when your husband came to sign and choose conservative treatment, although as doctors we should encourage active treatment, combining your condition with your family situation… the hospital side expressed understanding as well.”
He changed his tone, picking up the latest film. “However! The results of this examination are very, very unexpected. Look here, the tumor’s mass effect has significantly lightened, and the surrounding edema zone has shrunk in scope. Most critically, the contrast enhancement scan shows that the tumor’s blood supply has weakened!”
The doctor’s eyes sparkled with excitement: “Do you know? Your tumor is shrinking! This is simply a medical miracle! So I’m asking you, did you take some medication? Or go somewhere else for treatment?!”
Looking at the doctor’s excited expression of witnessing a miracle, Song Xu shook her head slowly.
“No, doctor, really no.”
“Uh, then, should I prescribe you some routine supplementary medication again?”
“No need, thank you.”
Stepping out of the hospital building, cold air was inhaled into her lungs.
Song Xu gripped the medical record bag in her hand tightly.
She knew this was no miracle.
Recalling the small pill she had taken before, bearing a faint, sweet fragrance.
Browsing through the system mall, she roughly knew what that was.
Elementary Heart-Clearing Pill.
Priced at 25 points in the mall; taking it could clear one negative status and slightly increase the endurance upper limit.
Clearing a negative status.
So it cured her most fatal cancer in the real world.
25 points a pill.
Liang Yan had exchanged an entire bottle for her.
Thinking of the thousand-fold processing fee required to bring items out.
She did not know how much he had ultimately sacrificed for this.