Chapter 2 Wild Chicken Egg_1

Everyone's having a tough time nowadays, and even those families with men at home are scrambling to dig up wild vegetables, not to mention Gougou and his mother, alone without any male support.

Old Lady Liu's face looked terrible. She was only a few steps away from Nanzhi and the Li family. She knew better than anyone how sensible Gougou was on ordinary days, so she glared at Shi Tou and demanded, "Tell me the truth, Shi Tou, did you steal Gougou's brother's pheasant eggs? Did you hit him too?"

In these hard times, let alone pheasant eggs, even the few sparrow eggs the size of a little finger that Shi Tou brought back yesterday afternoon were considered exceedingly rare.

"I, I didn't! The eggs were ones I found! Gougou tried to take them!" Shi Tou stubbornly denied the accusation, remembering his mother's words that denying wrongdoings meant no trouble.

Watching Shi Tou's obstinate attitude, Nanzhi felt a surge of anger. Wasn't this just the kind of mischievous child she used to hate?

As for whether Gougou was lying, Nanzhi wasn't worried at all. The original owner of her body, due to always looking after her sick in-laws, might have been somewhat negligent towards Gougou, but the little fellow seemed to understand everything. He would even ask for permission before accepting food from others when they were too poor to have meals at home.

"Then let me ask you both, if you both say you found the pheasant eggs, where is the pheasant's nest?"

The women standing by all turned their gaze toward Shi Tou, whose face was turning red, waiting for his explanation.

"I, I..."

Shi Tou hung his head and stammered, unable to justify himself.

Gougou, however, stopped crying and tugged at Nanzhi's sleeve, his voice wavering with sobs, "Mom, I know where the pheasant's nest is. I found those pheasant eggs, I wanted to save them for you to eat. Brother Shi Tou saw them and tried to take them. I refused to give them to him, so he hit me."

With the situation as it was, how could anyone not understand what really happened?

The women all spoke up, telling Shi Tou to return the eggs to Gougou, but he, furious and embarrassed, threw the pheasant eggs on the ground and ran away.

Seeing the broken eggs with their contents leaking out, Old Lady Liu's heart ached. Those could have been sold for five wen coins each in town. That wretched child truly deserved a beating.

Nanzhi glanced at the pheasant eggs, each about the size of a table tennis ball. There were five in total; two had their shells cracked, leaking some of their contents, but the remaining three were fine, intact upon the dry leaves.

She quickly picked them up and, with Gougou on her back, hurried down the mountain.

Children are delicate, not to mention Gougou who was chronically malnourished. She feared he might have sustained internal injuries from being hit.

"Gougou, tell Mom, where did Shi Tou hit you? Do you hurt anywhere else?"

Gougou lay on his mother's back, silent for a while before he finally said, "He hit my nose, but it doesn't hurt now."

Once Nanzhi confirmed that Gougou had only been hit on the nose by Shi Tou, her worrying heart dropped by half.

Children are still undeveloped, and considering Shi Tou's height and strength, there was a legitimate fear of other injuries, but given her current impoverished state, she couldn't even afford the village doctor.

When they got home, Nanzhi let Gougou lie down on the bed and went to the kitchen with the eggs.

She remembered Gougou had gone the whole day without food, having only eaten a sweet potato in the past two days. On their way home, she heard his little stomach growling fiercely.

Besides a small box of salt and a nearly empty bottle of soybean oil, there was nothing else in the kitchen.

After looking around the backyard and seeing neither wild vegetables nor even a few blades of grass, Nanzhi eventually decided to take the three intact pheasant eggs and leave the house.

She recalled that a few days before, the village head's daughter-in-law had given birth. Nanzhi thought to exchange the three pheasant eggs for two sweet potatoes.

About fifteen minutes later, Nanzhi arrived at Li Zheng's door. After hesitating for a moment, she knocked.

"Who is it?"

A woman's voice rang out, followed by the gate being swung open.

Looking at the person before her, Nanzhi quickly searched her memory and greeted with a smile, "Ms. Qin, I have some matters to discuss with you."

The woman appeared to be in her early forties, the village chief's daughter-in-law. Everyone in the village addressed her affectionately as "Ms. Qin."

"Ah, it's Lin's girl." The woman glanced at Nanzhi, then left and right, before pulling her into the house and carefully closing the door behind them.

"You must have run out of grain at home, haven't you?" Ms. Qin said as she led her toward the kitchen. "I've always said, just speak up if you need help. We're all from the same village. Don't cling to your pride. These days, how much is face worth anyway?"

While speaking, she rummaged through the kitchen's rattan basket, pulled out a few sweet potatoes, and tried to stuff them into Nanzhi's embrace.

"Take these, and later sneak them into your sleeve to take out, so nobody sees."

Nanzhi's eyes reddened at the sweet potatoes being pushed into her arms. "Ms. Qin, I can't take these for nothing. I've just come to exchange some things. Today, Gougou found some wild chicken eggs in the mountains. We still have three good ones left; I heard your family was blessed with a lovely grandson a few days ago, and I thought of exchanging them for a couple of your sweet potatoes."

Hearing this, Ms. Qin's eyes lit up—her daughter-in-law had given birth recently, and they currently had nothing suitable for her nourishment. Even the two old hens at home hadn't laid any eggs in half a month.

"Alright, alright."

With that assurance, Nanzhi felt relieved. Ms. Qin laughed as she took the wild chicken eggs, and Nanzhi received four sweet potatoes the size of a palm.

Ms. Qin wanted to give more, but Nanzhi stuffed the sweet potatoes into her sleeve and hurriedly left.

Gougou was still at home, and she didn't feel comfortable leaving him alone for too long.

However, as soon as she reached the gate, she saw someone standing in her courtyard cursing loudly.

The woman had sharp eyes, and upon seeing Nanzhi, she blocked her at the entrance: "You little vixen! Your little bastard dared to steal my Shi Tou's wild chicken eggs!"

Upon hearing this, Nanzhi's face darkened immediately. The visitor was none other than Shi Tou's mother, Ms. Wu, who had beaten Gougou earlier that day.

"Ms. Wu, please watch your words. I have three 'people' in my house who saw everything," Nanzhi taunted, pointing upwards towards her home.

Back when tragedy struck the Shen Family, the elders passed away one after another. Ms. Wu had been saying all day that Nanzhi was a disaster that brought grief upon her husband and had even claimed her courtyard was haunted by resentful spirits. Yet now, for a few wild chicken eggs, she dared to come here.

Ms. Wu was thirteen years older than Nanzhi, now thirty-four years old. It took her twelve years of marriage into the Li Family to have Shi Tou, becoming a laughingstock in the village. After the whole family doted on Shi Tou, she finally had her moment of triumph.

Now being addressed as "Auntie" by her contemporary, Nanzhi, Ms. Wu burst into fury.

"You little hussy!" she said, raising her hand to strike, but was stopped by the other women who had gathered to watch the commotion.

"Who are you calling names? Your Shi Tou took advantage of being four years older than my Gougou, stealing and hitting others, even causing my Gougou's nose to bleed. I haven't even come to you for an explanation yet, and here you are, cursing at my place?" Nanzhi, too, was enraged and began to scold, pointing at Ms. Wu's nose.

She hadn't read those novels for nothing; she felt somewhat confident in arguing with Ms. Wu.

"Perfect, since you're here, we might as well get the village head, Li Zheng, to be the judge and see whether your Shi Tou is indeed in the wrong!"

Ms. Wu was taken aback by Nanzhi's demeanor. She had always known Lin's girl to be meek, which is why she had targeted her for a fuss.

Meat and savory foods weren't easy to come by these days. Yesterday, Shi Tou had brought home a few bird eggs, all of which his grandmother had broken up to make egg drop soup for Shi Tou, leaving Ms. Wu without even a taste. Hearing that her son said Gougou had found five wild chicken eggs, she imagined that if she could get them back, she might at least get a bite for herself.

Who would have thought that the previously dough-like Lin's girl would now be as prickly as a hedgehog?

If they really called for Li Zheng, the situation might blow up even more.

"I don't care about any of that. Who knows if your Gougou broke his own nose to frame my Shi Tou."