Gu Shiyan’s expression didn’t show it, but the corner of his mouth quirked up.
His little sister seemed to be right. Su Wanwan really had changed.
After breakfast, Gu Shiyan washed the bowls and was about to head to work. Before he left, Su Wanwan handed him an army-green canteen, filled to the brim with cooled boiled water.
“Drink more water. Take a break when you’re tired.”
With his reeducation status, Gu Shiyan did far more work than others, yet at the end of the day he earned only half the work points, and the grain ration he received was barely enough to fill his stomach.
Besides field labor, he had to attend ideology classes.
Su Wanwan figured she could start a small business. These days most people looked down on those who peddled goods in public, but money was only easy to make when competition was scarce. As long as you were willing to swallow your pride, it could absolutely work.
The original host’s third brother, Su Feng, was a sharp one.
He made no small amount of money selling popsicles.
After thinking it over, Su Wanwan said to Gu Shiyan, “I want to take a walk in the back hills later. If I’m not back by noon, have little sister bring you lunch.”
Villagers often went up the mountain to gather wild mushrooms and the like. Su Wanwan had gone up every few days before, so Gu Shiyan didn’t think much of it. He only cautioned her, “Be careful. Come back early.”
“Okay.”
As the two talked, Gu Shiwei stood to the side smiling. She smiled and winked at Gu Shiyan, her look seeming to say, See? Sister-in-law treats you well, doesn’t she?
Gu Shiyan felt that goodness even more deeply once he reached the fields.
Su Wanwan hadn’t just brought him water. In the net bag holding the canteen, there was also a boiled egg.
Yesterday she’d said that from now on everyone would get an egg in the morning. That morning she had really boiled them. He hadn’t eaten his egg at the time, and she had brought it along for him. In that moment, Gu Shiyan couldn’t quite name what he felt.
Like a stone dropped into a calm lake.
Meanwhile, Su Wanwan had already gone up the mountain.
If she wanted to do business, she needed startup capital. She couldn’t rely on her family for everything. Besides, the Su family had three sons. Apart from the third, Su Feng, who wasn’t married yet, the eldest, Su Cheng, and the second, Su Zheng, both had wives and children.
The original host might have been shameless enough to keep asking her brothers for money. Su Wanwan wasn’t.
A woman should always rely on herself.
The mountain was rich in resources. If she was lucky enough to come across ginseng or reishi, she could sell them to a medicinal shop in the city and make a tidy little profit. Su Wanwan thought happily.
Unfortunately, reality was harsh.
Together with three aunties, she found only some mushrooms and dug up a few wild greens. As for ginseng or reishi, she didn’t see even a trace.
Well, she was here already. She might as well come back with something.
Su Wanwan wanted to go deeper into the mountain.
“Aunties, I’m going to look around further in. I won’t go the same way as you.”
“Then be careful. Don’t go too deep. It’s not safe in there.”
The aunties cautioned her and headed down the mountain.
Su Wanwan had been a mountain child in her past life too. The mountains provided their living. After her parents died, she’d supported herself by going into the mountains to gather herbs. She knew the deeper you went, the more dangerous it was, but also the more treasures there were.
The precious medicinal herbs mostly grew in places few people went.
She picked up a thick, long branch to hold for protection. It could also serve as a walking stick when she got tired. Every so often she swept it through the grass along the path to keep snakes from hiding there and striking out.
The deeper she went, the denser the trees became. Tall and short, they blotted out the sky.
Su Wanwan found several patches of selfheal. Green leaves with a ring of fine serrations along the edges, and a few small purple flowers blooming in the center. This was purple-flower selfheal, stronger in medicinal potency than the ordinary kind.
When harvesting it, you had to dig up the root.
She took a small trowel from her basket and carefully loosened the soil, placing the selfheal roots and soil together into the basket. The root hairs couldn’t break. If they broke, the medicinal essence would escape.
After digging several patches in a row, she was about to leave when the grass nearby suddenly rustled.
Su Wanwan looked over quickly.
The grass was shaking, and a faint flapping sound came from within.
She thought it was a wild rabbit and even imagined that if she caught it, she could have rabbit meat tonight. But when she parted the grass, she found it wasn’t a rabbit at all. It was a small fox, pure white all over, with a single spot of crimson between its brows. It was as beautiful as a spirit.
There were actually foxes in these mountains!
The white fox saw Su Wanwan too. It arched its back and let out a low threat, but its white body was trembling badly.
Su Wanwan spotted at once the hind leg caught in a trap, blood seeping out, the surrounding fur already stained red.
She didn’t dare rush to rescue it. Instead, she slowly crouched down, softened her voice, and, whether or not the little fox could understand, began talking to it.
“Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you.”
“I’m here to save you. Your leg is hurt.”
She slowly reached out her hand.
The wariness in the white fox’s eyes faded a little, and it let out two low whimpers.
Was that agreement to let her save it?
Su Wanwan hadn’t expected the little creature to be so perceptive. She didn’t delay. First she secured the iron trap to keep it from snapping back and injuring the fox a second time. Then she grabbed the wire on both sides and pried it open with force.
“Whine…”
The trap opened.
The little fox let out a shrill cry, its body going taut with pain. It buried its head in its own fluffy tail and only gradually stopped trembling after a while.
Su Wanwan didn’t waste time either. She quickly searched around for a few herbs to stop bleeding, crushed them, and applied them to the fox’s wound. She tore a strip of cloth from her hem for a bandage. By the time she finished, she felt like she’d worked up a sweat.
Suddenly, the white fox stuck out its tongue.
Su Wanwan felt a light lick on her fingertip.
It was thanking her.
Truly, all living things had a spirit.
“Do you want to come home with me?”
The white fox’s amber eyes regarded Su Wanwan quietly. After a moment, it staggered to its feet and, dragging its injured hind leg, headed deeper into the dense forest. Its white shape vanished in no time.
Foxes were solitary animals.
Naturally, it wouldn’t follow a person.
Su Wanwan curved her lips in a smile and didn’t linger. She picked up her basket and headed down the mountain.
After she got back, she told Gu Shiwei about saving a white fox on the mountain. Gu Shiwei listened, wide-eyed, and couldn’t help imagining a whole tale of the white fox repaying the favor.
“Sister-in-law, do you think it can protect itself with that injury?”
Su Wanwan tossed the trap into the corner and thought for a moment. “It should be able to. These little animals live in the wild year-round. They must have ways to protect themselves. In a couple of days I’ll go up the mountain again and see if I can run into it.”
The two chatted as they cleaned the mushrooms and wild greens they’d brought back.
The selfheal also needed to be dried. The sun had been strong these past couple of days, so two or three days would be enough to dry it.
As they were talking, someone walked in through the door. It was the original host’s mother, Qin Shuanglan.
“Wanwan, busy?”
Qin Shuanglan had given birth to three boys before finally getting a daughter, the original host. She’d doted on her like the apple of her eye since childhood. But ever since her niece came into the household, her care for her daughter had dwindled.
More than half of it had gone to Lin Zhixia.
For a long time, the original host and her own mother had had a strained relationship.
On top of that, Lin Zhixia knew how to play pitiful and sowed discord openly and covertly. Mother and daughter gradually grew less close.
Lin Zhixia and Qin Shuanglan, on the other hand, seemed more like real mother and daughter.