Lu Huai pointed at the pot still bubbling on the stove. “Sister-in-law, it’s sweet potato porridge.”
Huang Qiuying leaned over for a look. “It really is sweet potato porridge! But why does it smell so sweet?”
“These sweet potatoes were brought back from Shanghai. They seem to be a different variety—better tasting and higher yielding too. I managed to get hold of some seeds, and they’re already being shipped over. When the time comes, if you want, you can plant some in your own vegetable patch too.
“I’ve already submitted a report to the higher-ups. They’re willing to open a few experimental plots to test the new seeds.”
Huang Qiuying listened in a daze. In the end, she looked at Lu Huai with admiration in her eyes.
“I’d only heard before that you were good at training soldiers and fighting battles. I never expected you to know all this too!”
“You’re praising the wrong person, Sister-in-law. Zhenzhu helped find them. I’m unfamiliar with Shanghai, so there’s no way I could’ve found them myself. But because of her background, she doesn’t want to draw too much attention, so she let me take the credit. I did report the truth to the leadership though—we’re just not publicizing it.”
Huang Qiuying nodded approvingly. “That’s exactly how it should be. If these crops really succeed, it’ll be a huge achievement!”
As she spoke, she glanced toward the inner room, shame appearing on her face.
“Zhenzhu really is a good girl. She’s beautiful, kind, and capable too. Before, my prejudice against her was just too deep.”
“Sister-in-law, that was only because you didn’t know her before. Things will be fine from now on. You didn’t have many chances to interact with her before anyway—it’s normal you didn’t understand her.”
“You’re right!”
Huang Qiuying nodded in agreement. “Alright, hurry up and finish cooking. Pregnant women get hungry quickly—don’t keep her waiting. I’ll head back now!”
After seeing Huang Qiuying off, Lu Huai quickly returned to the bedroom.
At some point, a large soft cushion had appeared on the kang bed. It was shaped like a bear’s head and looked incredibly cute.
Qiao Zhenzhu was leaning comfortably against it, eating fruit from the small kang table beside her.
When she saw Lu Huai come in, she smiled brightly and called out to him.
“Come eat some mango! It’s so delicious!”
Though she wasn’t picky with food, there were still things she especially loved, and mangoes were one of them.
Lu Huai’s brows were still slightly furrowed, worry lingering in his eyes.
“Zhenzhu, are you really alright?”
“Of course I’m alright!” Qiao Zhenzhu looked at him in confusion. “Didn’t you already realize I was pretending? I hadn’t even said anything yet, but you cooperated perfectly! You scared Old Madam Wei so badly she dragged her grandson away immediately. I bet no one will dare come looking for trouble before I give birth.”
Lu Huai sighed softly. “Even though I knew you were pretending, I still worried… If something like this happens again, don’t pretend to feel unwell anymore.”
Qiao Zhenzhu blinked curiously at him. “Then what should I do?”
“I’ll pretend instead.” Lu Huai spoke with complete seriousness. “Next time I’ll just shut my eyes and collapse straight onto the ground.”
“…”
Qiao Zhenzhu tried to hold it in, but in the end she burst out laughing.
How was he not intentionally trying to make her laugh?
That was just too funny!
Hearing her clear, cheerful laughter, Lu Huai smiled too.
“Rest for a bit. I’ll go stir-fry the dishes. Dinner will be ready soon.”
“Wait!”
Qiao Zhenzhu stopped him. “Come here.”
Though confused, Lu Huai still walked over.
Qiao Zhenzhu skewered a piece of mango with a bamboo pick and held it up to his mouth.
“Try a bite. It’s really good!”
Lu Huai looked at the mango by his lips, then at Qiao Zhenzhu’s stubbornly earnest expression. In the end, he opened his mouth.
“Is it good?”
“Very good.”
The tips of Lu Huai’s ears instantly turned red. He quickly turned and walked out, casually shutting the door behind him.
No matter how you looked at it, he seemed to be fleeing in embarrassment.
No wonder people said those from this era were so innocent and pure-hearted.
She’d only fed him a piece of mango, yet he’d blushed this hard!
Lu Huai shut the door to keep the cooking smoke from drifting into the room.
Still, both the front and back windows were open, and the breeze flowing through made the room feel cool and comfortable instead of stuffy.
But it was summer after all, and by evening, the mosquitoes had started swarming.
After using her spatial ability to catch yet another mosquito, Qiao Zhenzhu finally got annoyed.
There were simply too many mosquitoes. She couldn’t keep catching them forever, could she?
Screens!
They absolutely needed window screens!
…
More than ten minutes later, Lu Huai finished cooking.
Green peppers stir-fried with pork, steamed eggplant, chili scrambled eggs, and stir-fried shredded vegetables.
Each of them had a bowl of sweet potato porridge, paired with steamed buns brought back from Shanghai. It was an incredibly lavish meal.
The shredded vegetables were cut extremely fine—one look was enough to tell how excellent his knife skills were.
Qiao Zhenzhu sampled every dish, then gave Lu Huai a thumbs-up.
“Delicious! Seriously delicious! Your cooking’s good enough for you to be a professional chef!”
The original owner of this body knew how to cook.
But Qiao Zhenzhu clearly hadn’t inherited that skill.
She couldn’t cook.
And she didn’t want to learn.
If she didn’t want to keep buying meals every day in the future, then she’d have to rely on Lu Huai to cook.
Thinking of this, Qiao Zhenzhu smiled at him.
“Later, prepare more containers. Whenever you cook, make extra portions too. We can store the leftovers in my space. That way, when you’re away on missions, I’ll still have food to eat.”
Lu Huai had no objections at all.
“Alright. When we go to the market in a couple of days, we’ll buy more.”
He didn’t think cooking was troublesome in the slightest.
On the contrary, knowing Qiao Zhenzhu liked the food he made only made him happy.
Today, he’d cooked an especially large pot of porridge. Qiao Zhenzhu still had some stainless steel pots and clay pots she’d collected during the apocalypse, and they were perfect for storing it.
Summer nights came late, so even after they finished dinner, the sky outside still wasn’t completely dark.
But the mosquitoes had already become even more aggressive.
If they didn’t want to be attacked by mosquitoes while sleeping, they’d have to close the windows.
But closing the windows would make the room unbearably stuffy.
Qiao Zhenzhu pulled out a roll of mesh screen from her space and looked at Lu Huai expectantly.
“Do you know how to do carpentry? Just simple work is fine.”
As she spoke, she described the type of window screen she wanted.
Lu Huai listened carefully, then nodded.
“It’s not difficult. The only problem is that there aren’t any properly prepared wooden strips. If we have to make them from scratch, it might be too late.”
“I have them!”
Qiao Zhenzhu immediately took out a pile of wooden strips from her space, thick and thin alike.
Along with them came nails, a hammer, measuring tape, a saw…
“I collected all these during the apocalypse. Even though I didn’t know if they’d ever be useful, my space was huge, so I just stored everything inside. Looks like I was right after all! As long as you prepare in advance, there’ll always come a day when you need it. Better safe than sorry!”
Lu Huai nodded in deep agreement.
“Then I’ll start right away.”
With ready-made materials and tools, making simple window screens was quite easy.
Lu Huai crafted the screens according to the exact size of the windows so they could fit directly into the window frames.
There were practically no gaps, and they wouldn’t interfere with closing the windows from outside.
Once summer passed and the mosquitoes disappeared, they could simply remove the entire screens.
Since it was already late, Lu Huai only managed to make two screens, one large and one small, for the bedroom windows.
By the time he finished, it was fully dark outside.
Lu Huai looked apologetically at Qiao Zhenzhu.
“There’s no bathroom in this courtyard. But tomorrow, I’ll figure out a way to build one. For tonight, you’ll have to make do and just wipe yourself down for now.”
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