The sugar ci baba Grandma Lu made wasn’t the kind where glutinous rice had to be pounded over and over into sticky rice dough.
Instead, she used a stone mill to grind glutinous rice together with some coarse rice into rice batter. Then she strained out the excess water, steamed it in a pot until it set, let it cool, and cut it into small bite-sized pieces before pan-frying them.
Then she soaked brown sugar crumbs into syrup, poured it in, and fried it together a little longer until it developed a slight caramelized flavor.
Then it was ready to eat.
After helping Grandma Lu hang up the laundry, Grandma Lu quickly ground a bowl of rice batter and soon finished making the sugar ci baba. Using bamboo chopsticks, she picked up a piece and fed it to Lu Yuning.
That perfectly balanced sweetness instantly filled Lu Yuning with happiness!
The slight caramelized sweetness made the soft, chewy ci baba even more flavorful and gave it an even better texture!
Delicious!
Way too delicious!
Grandma Lu looked at Lu Yuning with a smiling face.
“Well? Is it good?”
Lu Yuning nodded repeatedly.
“Mhm, mhm, mhm! It’s so delicious!”
Grandma Lu smiled and said, “Even if it’s delicious, you still can’t eat too much. This one bowl is just enough for everyone in the family to have two pieces each. You’ve already eaten one piece, so there’s one left. Do you want to save it for after dinner tonight, or eat it now?”
Without even thinking, Lu Yuning replied, “I’ll save it for tonight.”
She had already satisfied her craving.
In this era, having someone like Grandma Lu, so skillful and thoughtful, making tasty little treats for the younger generation from time to time was already something very precious.
Lu Yuning was very content and didn’t feel that she was living worse than Lu Yuxin.
The original host had simply thought too much, always comparing herself to Lu Yuxin, and that was why she constantly felt miserable.
But why was there any need to compare yourself to someone else?
Seeing the happiness you already had and cherishing the happiness in front of you, that was what mattered most!
Grandma Lu looked at Lu Yuning in surprise.
“You little girl have finally gotten smart for once. Alright, Grandma will save it for you to eat tonight.”
“Thank you, Grandma!”
As soon as Lu Yuning said that, she happily trotted off to the storage room to find a basket and a small sickle.
“Grandma, I’m going to cut pig grass now.”
“Mhm, alright. First cut for the brigade, then cut for home.”
“Okay.”
Lu Yuning responded and left the courtyard with the basket on her back.
Just then, Lu Yuping from the house diagonally across the way was also heading out with a bamboo basket on her back.
She was extremely thin and frail. Her hair had been cut as short as a boy’s, and the clothes she wore were patched over with patch after patch, washed so many times they had faded white, to the point that you could hardly tell what they originally looked like.
Lu Yuping’s family was considered the poorest in this Sixth Alley of Group Six.
Her family was similar to Lu Yuning’s and Lu Yuxin’s—both grandparents were still alive, and there were also three branches of the family.
But Lu Yuping’s family had far more daughters and fewer sons.
The eldest branch had five daughters before finally having one son.
The second branch also had three daughters before finally having one son.
The third branch was a little better. Above Lu Yuping, there was one older sister and two older brothers, and she was the youngest.
But the problem was, Lu Yuping’s grandmother, Sixteenth Grandma, was the type who only loved grandsons and had no affection for granddaughters.
Their whole family followed that example from top to bottom, so one could easily imagine Lu Yuping’s life at home.
She ate the least, yet her workload wasn’t any lighter at all.
If she weren’t still so young, she’d probably already be out in the fields doing the double harvest with the adults.
Because of that, Lu Yuping had the best relationship with the original host.
Like the original host, she also envied Lu Yuxin’s life very much.
In her eyes, there wasn’t much difference between herself and the original host.
Even though the original host had so many older brothers, cousins, and sisters at home, didn’t she still have to come cut pig grass with her?
Only Lu Yuxin was different.
She was fair and tender-skinned, plump and round, just like one of those lucky baby dolls from New Year pictures.
Her life was sweet too, she only needed to happily play every day.
When Lu Yuping saw Lu Yuning coming out, she smiled and said,
“Yuning, let’s go together.”
Lu Yuning nodded.
“Sure.”
Lu Yuping looked Lu Yuning up and down.
Seeing that she was also wearing dull gray long pants and a long-sleeved top, both patched and faded from washing, Lu Yuping felt much better inside.
Sure enough, in the brigade, only Yuning and she were the same.
No, not just them. Most girls were like them.
Only Fubao was different.
As Lu Yuping walked with Lu Yuning toward the mountain by the brigade, she said,
“Just now Fubao went out to play. Did you see?”
Lu Yuning nodded.
“Mhm, I saw. What about it?”
Lu Yuping sighed.
“I really envy her. So many people love her.”
Lu Yuning: …
Well, yes. Sixteenth Grandma did favor boys more and didn’t care much for girls. She really didn’t give the girls much good food.
During the difficult years two years ago, she had even often let the girls go hungry.
But Lu Yuping’s biological father, Lu Dahai, didn’t truly treat daughters like they weren’t human.
At the very least, he would share some of his own grain ration with his two daughters.
Because Lu Yuping was the youngest, Aunt Dahai would also secretly give the children little things to eat from time to time.
Even if, when dividing eggs, the sons got the yolk while the daughters only got the egg white, there was still some genuine care there.
Right now, Lu Yuping only saw Lu Yuxin’s life and completely failed to see any of this.
Honestly…
Compared to the daughters of Uncle Dashan from Sixteenth Grandma’s family, Lu Yuning felt that Lu Yuping had already been born to relatively better parents.
If she had been born into Uncle Dashan’s family, that would have been the true little cabbage life, nothing but bitterness.
Still, everyone longed for a better life.
So Lu Yuping thinking this way wasn’t exactly wrong.
But living every day by comparing yourself to others, wasn’t that just making life harder for yourself?
After thinking for a moment, Lu Yuning said to Lu Yuping,
“Pingping, I actually think that no matter how good Fubao’s life is, we should still live our own lives well. Only then can life gradually become better.”
Lu Yuping froze for a moment, then nodded.
“Mhm, you’re right. But I still really envy Fubao. In our whole brigade, she’s the only one who’s truly different.”
Lu Yuning: …
Well then.
That was all said for nothing.
But it didn’t matter.
They were both still little and didn’t need to think so much anyway.
“Just now I heard Fubao say she was going with Yuchun to pick wild plums. Later, let’s go take a look. If there are any, we can pick some too and bring them back to eat.”
Lu Yuping’s eyes lit up.
“Okay!”
Lu Yuning smiled.
The two girls chatted and laughed, sometimes teasing each other, sometimes running around, and before long, they arrived at the foot of the mountain where they cut pig grass.
The spots for cutting pig grass had all been assigned by the adults in the brigade, just to prevent children from fighting every day over whose turn it was.
When the two of them arrived, the other girls from the brigade were already there.
Oh, and quite a few boys too.
Anyway, all the younger children worked in this area.
The group of children greeted each other, then everyone immediately got to work!
After cutting a few times, Lu Yuning gradually got used to it again, and her speed slowly returned to the level of the original host.
Once she had filled one basket, Lu Yuning called out to Lu Yuping, then headed first to the brigade’s livestock farm to hand in the pig grass.
Each full basket earned one work point.
If she cut three baskets, she could earn four work points.
Each basket of pig grass weighed around ten jin or so. For children in the countryside, carrying that much wasn’t considered too heavy.
Lu Yuning quickly finished cutting three baskets. After that, she cut one final basket and left it at the foot of the mountain. Then she went with Lu Yuping, who had also finished cutting pig grass, to look for wild plums nearby.
This was exactly the season when wild plums were growing well. It didn’t take much time at all before they found a large patch that no one had picked yet.
The two children happily ran over and started picking.
After picking them, they wrapped them in the large leaves they had gathered at the foot of the mountain. Very quickly, they had picked a huge bundle!
After wrapping it securely in leaves, they were just about to go back and carry their pig grass home.
At that moment, a burst of children’s shouting came from the nearby woods.
“Hit him! Hit him!”
Lu Yuning and Lu Yuping exchanged a glance and immediately hugged their bundle of wild plums as they ran toward the sound.
They hadn’t run far before they saw several children tangled together in a fight in the woods just a little way up from the foot of the mountain.
Nearby, Lu Shisan was standing protectively beside Lu Yuxin, watching.
Lu Yuxin’s eyes were red, clearly showing she had just been crying.
What happened?
Lu Yuning was surprised.
Were there actually people in the brigade who dared to provoke the female lead?
She looked at the children rolling around on the ground and recognized one of them as Lu Shier. Two of the others were boys who usually played well with him.
As for the other three, she remembered them too—they were also children from the Lu clan, though they seemed to have never gotten along with Lu Shier.
Oh ho!
Interesting.
Could this be that classic scene every era novel needed—the female lead being bullied by boys her age from the same village?
Tsk tsk.
Good thing she hadn’t gone with the female lead.
Otherwise, wouldn’t she be the one suffering right now?
Thinking of that, Lu Yuning turned to look for Lu Yuchun.
Earlier, Lu Yuxin had said she was coming out with Lu Yuchun.
Very quickly, Lu Yuning spotted a little girl with messy loose hair, dirt all over her body, crying her eyes out.
Yet no one around her seemed to care.
Everyone was gathered around the female lead, Lu Yuxin.
Lu Yuning: …
Lu Yuping had clearly noticed Lu Yuchun too.
“Yuning, look—isn’t that Yuchun? What happened to her? Did she get beaten up?”
Lu Yuning shook her head.
“I don’t know…”
Just as she said that, a few more boys came running over from not far away.
Among them was her own Third Brother, Lu Yuting.
He quickly swept his eyes over the crowd, and when he saw Lu Yuning standing at the outer edge, he immediately ran over.
“Little Sister, are you okay?”
Lu Yuning looked confused.
“Huh? What would happen to me? I’m fine.”
Lu Yuting let out a sigh of relief and frowned.
“Just now Yukun ran to the fields all panicked saying you and Fubao were together and got beaten up, so I rushed over right away.”
Lu Yuning: …
“I wasn’t with Fubao at all. Why is Brother Yukun talking nonsense?”
Lu Yuting nodded in agreement.
“Exactly. Also, stay away from Fubao in the future, so you don’t get beaten up for nothing.”
As he spoke, he looked toward Lu Yuchun, who stood near Lu Yuxin in the crowd, completely ignored, until finally her own older brother, Lu Yufeng, arrived and someone at last asked what had happened.
Thank goodness Little Sister hadn’t been with that Fubao today.
Otherwise, she would’ve ended up suffering again.
Lu Yuting really didn’t want his little sister playing with that Fubao.
That girl might look cute, but no matter how cute she was, she wasn’t more important than his own little sister!
In the past, his younger sister had always liked playing with her, and every now and then she’d get dragged into trouble because of it. Lu Yuting had long been unhappy about that.
No—it should be said that everyone in the family disliked their little sister playing with Fubao.
Because anyone who played with Fubao always ended up unlucky.
She herself always came out completely unharmed, but everyone else had it miserable.
Just like today.
Look at Sister Yuchun—she had really been beaten badly!
The more Lu Yuting thought about it, the more frightened he felt afterward.
His little sister hated pain the most.
There was no way he could bear to see her get beaten or hurt.
“Since you’re fine, let’s go home.”
As he said this, Lu Yuting was about to take Lu Yuning and Lu Yuping home—
when Lu Yujun arrived!
He headed straight for Lu Yuping, grabbed her by the arm, and turned her around to inspect her all over. Only after confirming she was fine did he angrily knock her on the head.
“Are you stupid? When you see people fighting, why don’t you hurry and run? Why are you standing there watching the excitement? What if they hit you? Do you think Grandma would let you see a doctor?”
Lu Yuping was startled at first, then looked confused.
But after hearing what her second brother said, she suddenly felt wronged, and tears welled up again.
“I wasn’t watching for fun. I just didn’t know what happened, so I came to take a look.”
“Take a look at what? Hurry up and go home.”
As he said that, he grabbed her arm and started dragging her home.
But Lu Yujun was a year older than Lu Yuting, and like his father, he was tall and powerfully built. With one hard yank—
the bundle of wild plums in Lu Yuping’s arms was pulled loose and fell.
Worse, it landed right under Lu Yujun’s foot.
He stepped on it.
That huge bundle of wild plums was instantly crushed into wild plum juice!
The moment Lu Yuping saw it, her eyes turned red.
Choking with tears, she struggled and cried,
“Let go of me! My wild plums…”
Lu Yujun froze for a moment.
Then he lowered his head to look, and his face stiffened immediately.
His grip loosened slightly, and Lu Yuping broke free, tears falling as she crouched down to pick them up.
Lu Yujun frowned and said impatiently,
“Alright, enough. Go home first. I’ll pick you another whole bundle later, okay?”
Lu Yuping sobbed.
“No! I picked these myself! Do you know how long it took me?”
Lu Yujun: …
Lu Yuning and Lu Yuting exchanged a glance.
Lu Yuting quickly took the bundle of wild plums from his little sister’s arms.
“Big Brother will hold these. I’ll give them back to you when we get home.”
Lu Yuning: …
Wait, did she even say anything?