Chapter 91 - 90: What Does the Gosling Eat?

Chapter 91: Chapter 90: What Does the Gosling Eat?

Putting the geese aside for a moment, Huai Yu had already been delayed for a while. She needed to hurry up and buy meat.

Before leaving, she paused and asked Boss Tang, "Is that meat seller on the street reliable?"

Boss Tang let out a confused grunt before finally remembering. "You mean the one selling coarse grains, meat, and eggs? They’re reliable enough, but the Mutant Value of their goods is just average. If you want the good stuff, I can contact someone for you on my end?"

"No need, no need," Huai Yu waved her hands repeatedly. "I was just curious."

The low-quality rice she bought last time had an average texture after purification, but it still tasted quite fragrant and perfectly suited her current status. She figured that since the vendor was reliable, she would buy a bit more this time!

And so, half an hour later, Huai Yu returned with five pounds of pork suet and two pounds of pork.

There was no helping it; without a refrigerator, she couldn’t buy too much pork. Plus, it was incredibly expensive! Just this alone cost her almost 800 points! She let out a long sigh.

She was very curious about the situation. "How do ordinary families in our city manage if they want to eat meat?"

"Oh, that... According to the national plan, it will be at least three years before meat becomes relatively accessible. If people want meat this year, they just have to tough it out. There are meat-flavored nutrient solutions and seasonings, though...

"Did you want to try some?"

Huai Yu shook her head decisively.

As for nutrient solutions, she numbly drank her original brand now, entirely unable to handle the stimulation of new flavors.

Speaking of food, she still needed to buy some scallions, ginger, and garlic. It wasn’t just for eating, but also to plant back home. However, she didn’t plan to buy them at the market. Instead, she would go check out Golden Yuan District tomorrow when she had time.

She sighed internally. She had thought her home wasn’t lacking anything, but now it seemed she was missing quite a lot. If only she had known earlier, she would have made Wu Yue pay a larger compensation fee! At the very least, she could have gotten a generator out of it. After all, a person with his status looked very rich.

***

The meat and other supplies were placed at the very bottom of her basket so they wouldn’t be pilfered. The barnyard grass, which looked exactly like rice, was also placed at the bottom because it was too heavy and would easily crush the box if placed on top. In the middle went the cardboard box stuffed full of the two chubby little geese, and on the very top, she placed three books.

The hardest part to manage wasn’t the geese. Having downed an entire cabbage, they seemed sleepy from eating their fill and were currently squatting in the box, fast asleep. The hardest part was those three books.

Huai Yu thought long and hard before picking the most normal-looking one, "Toads Raising Swans"... ptui, no! It was "Unattainable Lover" that she placed on top.

She then covered the bamboo basket slightly, hugged it to her chest, and squeezed onto the bus once more.

The bus gradually filled with people. Everyone’s clothes had changed from heavy cotton-padded jackets and down coats to increasingly light, thin long-sleeved shirts. After that massive downpour, the sky had never been overcast again. Now, the temperature was rising by the day. At this rate, storing fresh food would become more and more difficult, especially meat.

Although there wasn’t any meat that needed storing right now, hoarding was probably human nature, so Huai Yu started worrying again. She wondered how people ever managed in the past without refrigerators.

***

Carrying the basket back home once again, Huai Yu reflexively started walking toward the treehouse. Halfway there, she remembered and turned back toward the new house.

The wind blew past with a steady WHOOSH. As the sun neared the horizon, a distinct chill gradually set in. Huai Yu watched the Rose Corridor swaying its flower walls side to side. It was clearly in a very good mood, so she happily returned to the house as well.

However, after putting the basket down, she suddenly felt that something was amiss.

The Rose Corridor’s flower walls were swaying back and forth, so why wasn’t the bamboo forest in the back moving at all? It looked as if it had rooted itself into a horse stance in the dirt.

Remembering Kuang Biao’s rather unreliable personality, she specifically walked around to the back of the house, only to see that the layer of soil at the edge of the bamboo forest was bulging upward, as if it had been earnestly plowed by someone.

She was very familiar with these kinds of traces. During the day she had dragged Kuang Biao down the mountain, those large trees had fought using their roots exactly like this.

"What happened here?" she asked.

The bamboo forest remained perfectly still, not making a single sound, playing dead.

Huai Yu was completely speechless. Great! She had only been out for a little while and something had happened at home again!

She turned on her heel and walked toward the Rose Corridor, loudly announcing that she was going to ask the Rose Corridor what happened.

The next moment, the bamboo leaves began to loudly RUSTLE, and the birds resting on the branches gave a startled cry before taking off with a frantic FLUTTER.

Kuang Biao’s voice was full of dejection. "Nothing much happened. My roots were just a little itchy and I wanted to expose them to stretch out... but Rose wouldn’t let me."

Huai Yu didn’t believe him for a second. "If you just wanted to grow bamboo shoots normally, how could she not let you? The Rose Corridor has the best temper. Where did you want to grow? Into my house? You should have said so earlier! When building the house, I wouldn’t have had them set up roof beams; you could have just sprouted a bamboo shoot straight across!"

After her treehouse was destroyed last time, she was now highly sensitive about the safety of her new house. Seeing that her home had nearly been infiltrated again, she unleashed a barrage of sarcasm and mockery, making Kuang Biao’s branches and leaves QUIVER in fear. He didn’t dare to reply at all.

After quite a while, Kuang Biao finally gathered his courage.

"How could you say that? I didn’t want to go toward your house either. I was just stretching my limbs, wanting to expand my borders a bit...

"We agreed at the beginning that I could just grow casually... I only took up an acre or two this time... You have over 600 acres here, what’s wrong with letting me grow a bit?"

The audacity! Huai Yu was utterly speechless.

"I do have 600 acres of land, yes, but even Little Tian has to submit a report to share it with me. What gives you the right to just keep expanding on your own?"

Besides, she thought, an acre or two today, an acre or two tomorrow... wouldn’t she end up begging Kuang Biao to make room for her down the line? The roles of master and guest were being completely reversed!

Huai Yu angrily planted her hands on her hips.

"I got it, I got it..." Kuang Biao’s voice was filled with helplessness and dejection.

After stammering for a long time and seeing Huai Yu still standing there with her cheeks puffed out, he shook his bamboo leaves ingratiatingly. "Um... I know the rules now... Anyway, quite a few bamboo poles snapped during the fight and are lying in the back. If you want them, feel free to drag them away."

Huai Yu paused. Suddenly, she became happy again. Because if they really fought every now and then and provided her with materials exactly when she needed them, that would actually be pretty great.

***

By the time she dragged two bamboo poles to the empty clearing in front of her with practiced familiarity, the sky had gradually darkened.

Huai Yu hurried to tidy up, wanting to settle the two little geese down.

Having slept all afternoon, the dusty, chubby little goslings seemed to have grown a bit of fluff. Currently squeezed in the box, they were already getting impatient. When Huai Yu looked over, their tiny beaks were wide open.

"HONK HONK HONK HONK..."

She realized with a start that there didn’t seem to be any fresh vegetables at home!

Huai Yu looked left and right around the room. Could they eat rice grains? Would they eat pickled vegetables? Would they eat dried wild scallions and dried shepherd’s purse if she soaked them in water?

After thinking about it, she set a pot to boil water, then took a knife and sliced open a bamboo shoot. Tender diced bamboo shoots blanched in water... they should be able to eat that, right?

She sighed. This pot was really big, and the water was boiling just right! If only there was a chubby, full-grown goose to toss into the pot right now...

Huai Yu swallowed hard. She was hungry.