Taking advantage of the good daylight, Mai Zi picked up a stone from the riverbank and sharpened one end of the iron piece until it gleamed. After wrapping it with cloth strips, a small iron-bladed knife was ready.
Returning home, Mai Zi closed all the doors and windows tightly before taking out the earthenware pot from the Space. It was still warm, just as it had been when first placed inside.
Overjoyed, Mai Zi quickly lit a fire to boil water. The earthenware pot was lightly rinsed with a thin layer of water—after all, water resources were scarce now, and every drop counted. Then, Mai Zi placed the pot over the fire.
Guiding water from the Space into the pot, Mai Zi kept it boiling. Once boiled, the water was left to cool until lukewarm. By the time all the water was used up, dusk had already fallen.
In late summer, Dajing Village was unbearably hot and stifling. Almost everyone in the village had come out to cool off. Mai Zi’s home was a bit far from the village entrance, but the villagers could still be faintly seen from there.
Mai Zi brought the quilt inside the house and slowly made their way toward the village entrance.
“When will it ever rain? The bean sprouts in my field have already dried up. Sigh, this year is going to be tough,” Old Hunter Lin Hu from the village sighed between puffs of his tobacco pipe, his brows tightly furrowed.
“Don’t even mention it. All the sprouts across our ten acres of land have dried up. I say we should draw water from the well and carry it over. We can’t let the land turn barren,” Old Man Chen from the village urged the surrounding villagers. Old Man Chen’s family was prosperous, making them one of the village’s prominent households. They lived in an earthen house and owned extensive land, but what they valued most were their few acres of fertile fields.
Hearing his uncle once again eyeing the well water, Village Head Chen Dahe couldn’t help but scold him!
“What nonsense are you talking? Other villages don’t even have wells, and the river is almost dried up. Our village still has one well, but how many acres of land can that little water irrigate? I went out to check these past couple of days—grain prices in town have already risen…”
Hearing this, Zhang Shi suddenly interrupted the Village Head, her eyes darting around. “What? Grain prices have risen? Village Head, tell me more.”
At that moment, Mai Zi quietly slipped into the village’s gossip hub, blending in seamlessly without drawing any attention. Zhang Shi paid no mind to this worthless girl who had caused her to be scolded.
She was already thinking about selling the grain now, hoping it might help her third son marry a girl from a family with a few acres of modest land.
“Don’t even think about selling grain, Li family’s wife. People from other villages have already caught wind of this and are hoarding grain. If the heavens don’t send rain, what will we eat? It’s my fault for not catching wind of this when I visited the township head the other day. There’s one more thing.”
Village Head Chen Dahe stared sternly at Zhang Shi, extinguishing the idea in her mind.
“I understand, Village Head. I was just asking,” Zhang Shi, who usually acted tough, dared not utter another word under the Village Head’s gaze.
Mai Zi thought to themselves, after all, in this era, there was still a vast gap between officials and ordinary people. The Village Head of Dajing Village was quite far-sighted—these ancients weren’t foolish either.
“From what the township head said, the court is already preparing to conscript soldiers to fight the Hu people. With the severe drought in the north, the Hu people are bound to invade and plunder the south. According to the higher-ups, every household with male members aged sixteen or older must go, and those who have already served must go again.”
The Village Head waved his hand and staggered back toward his house. Despite being in his prime years, his back was already hunched.
Hearing this, everyone fell silent, their expressions darkening. This year's harvest, coupled with the conscription, weighed heavily on them, leaving them speechless.
Mai Zi suddenly felt someone touch her arm. Looking up, she saw a small, dark child whose gender was indistinguishable—in modern times, they would be a primary school student. Their hair grew wildly like a tangle of weeds, and their dark face was dotted with a few freckles.
This was the child of Lin Hu, the hunter at the village entrance—Xiaocao, who often went out with Mai Zi to gather wild vegetables and collect firewood. She had been Mai Zi's companion since childhood.
"Mai Ya, why didn’t you come out the past few days?" Xiaocao whispered into Mai Zi’s ear.
"I felt dizzy the last couple of days, so I rested a bit." Mai Zi pursed her lips tightly, looking at Xiaocao with a hint of embarrassment—after all, she had fainted from hunger.
Xiaocao took it in stride, as for them, eating enough was nothing short of a fantasy. "That’s good then. You should eat more usually, don’t be reluctant… and try to save up more food." Xiaocao sighed with relief, hesitating as she spoke, her eyes betraying a hint of unease.
Mai Zi agreed, finding Xiaocao a bit strange. In her memory, Lin Xiaocao wasn’t like this—she used to chatter endlessly, telling Mai Zi everything, including Zhang Shi’s little schemes and the Lin family’s favoritism…
Mai Zi opened her mouth, recalling the bond she and Xiaocao had shared while digging up roots, and asked anyway, "Xiaocao, did something happen to you?"
This little dark monkey looked at Mai Zi, her childhood friend who was now twelve years old. Her family was about to marry her off—something quite ordinary—but she had had a dream…
In the dream, she was also betrothed to the Xu family, butchers from the neighboring village. Less than a month later, refugees from the northern border fled to the surrounding villages. The northern city gates had been breached, and the Hu people were about to charge over.
Da Jing Village fled southward with the surrounding villages, escaping for a long time. On the way, Mai Zi died in a sudden uprising of refugees, and not long after, Xiaocao herself was sold to refugees as food. The thought of the scenes from her dream made her heart race with panic.
She dared not tell anyone, knowing that even if she did, no one would believe her.