This time, because they were pulling a cart loaded with luggage, the uphill journey was not easy.
A path that would normally take just over an hour to walk now took over two hours.
Some sections were so rough that they had to go around them. Eventually, Liu Liu pulled from the front while everyone else pushed from behind.
Jiayin’s great strength finally came in handy—even Fang Youwei had to admit defeat.
When they finally reached the small valley, Old Madam Yang and Li Shi were dazzled by the sight.
Li Shi couldn’t help but exclaim, “This place is so beautiful!”
A clear creek, green meadows on both sides dotted with unknown wildflowers, and further away, lush forests, rock formations, and a cliff face where water bubbled out. It looked just like a painting.
Jiayin asked Fang Youwei, “Uncle, should we build one of those branch huts here too?”
Fang Youwei shook his head. “We don’t know how long we’ll be staying here. Now that the Yue people have come, we definitely won’t be able to return to the village anytime soon.”
“It would be better to find a cave—it’s safer. This deep in the mountains is nothing like the forest’s edge, where there weren’t even any small animals.”
“If we sleep in a temporary shelter again, let alone wild beasts, we’ll have to deal with snakes, insects, rats, and ants all night.”
Fang Zhiyuan looked around and said to his father, “But this place doesn’t look like it has any caves!”
Fang Youwei replied, “We can search later. Places with lots of rocks like this usually have caves—otherwise, where would the wild animals live?”
Jiayin asked Liu Liu telepathically, “Liu Liu, do you know where there’s a cave?”
Liu Liu shook his donkey head. “We donkeys don’t live in caves. I wouldn’t know.”
Jiayin raised an eyebrow. “Then what do you do when it rains? Just stand in the rain?”
Liu Liu replied, “We can shelter under a tree or beneath a cliff.”
Jiayin: “…”
Well then. Their lives were really tough.
…
Although they had come here for several days to fetch water, they had never really explored the entire valley.
Fang Youwei had only taken a cursory look, confirming there were no animal tracks or droppings—meaning no large predators came here.
He did see wild donkey droppings in a few places. Liu Liu must have stumbled upon this place by chance before, which was why he could lead them straight here for water.
Since they couldn’t find a cave right away, Fang Youwei first built a temporary shelter for resting and cooking.
This time, instead of building it among the trees, he cut down a few trees as thick as a bowl’s mouth and set up an A-frame shelter on slightly higher ground not far from the creek.
The walls were still woven from thin branches and thatched with grass. It would be fine as long as it didn’t rain heavily.
Li Shi used a knife to cut a lot of grass by the creek and spread it on the ground to dry. Later, she would weave it into straw mats.
Seeing her working with the grass, Jiayin came over to help. She pulled up the grass by hand, gathered small piles, and spread them on the ground just like Li Shi.
With Jiayin’s great strength, the work went much faster. Soon, the ground was covered with spread-out grass.
Liu Liu had already been unharnessed from the cart. He wandered over, watched them spreading grass, and asked Jiayin, “Is this for me to eat? I can’t eat this much.”
Jiayin answered, “No, this is for drying so we can weave it into straw mats.”
Liu Liu flicked his head, not understanding what a straw mat was. But he understood that it wasn’t for him to eat, so he wandered off to find fresh grass for himself.
Fang Zhiyuan was in front of the shelter, helping his grandmother build an earthen stove for cooking.
This time, they weren’t digging a pit. There were many stones in the creek. They gathered some large ones and stacked them together with mud and grass, forming a small round earthen stove.
Li Shi said they had enough grass and told Jiayin to stop pulling. So Jiayin came over to watch Fang Zhiyuan build the stove.
As the stove slowly took shape, Jiayin said admiringly, “Brother Dazhuang, you’re so amazing. You know how to do this.”
Fang Zhiyuan puffed out his chest proudly. “I’ve seen Dad build this kind of stove several times. When we cooked in the yard back in the village, we had to rebuild the stove every year.”
Back in the village, they cooked in the kitchen during winter, which also heated the kang bed.
In summer, they moved the stove outside. But after half a year of wind, sun, and rain, the outdoor stove would always be somewhat damaged, so it had to be rebuilt every year.