Chapter 7 The Daughter of the Landlord's Family

After waiting for a little while, Olivia walked over carrying a basket.

Seeing Leo standing among the children, she showed a bit of surprise but ignored him. Instead, she took out a key, unlocked the locked freight car compartment, and took out a bundle of baguettes from it.

These baguettes were also pitch-black, with ingredients that were hard to tell, but at least they were well-fermented and soft enough.

Olivia tore the baguette into two pieces and distributed them half to each person.

After distributing the bread, Olivia opened the basket again and gently announced, "Everyone gets an extra egg today."

Amidst a chorus of cheers, Olivia distributed eggs that were even smaller than ping-pong balls while earnestly admonishing, "The adults will be very busy during this period. You must be obedient, help your families with more work, don't run around outside the settlement camp, and don't go fishing in the river. If you're not obedient and I catch you, you'll be prepared to go hungry!"

The chickens raised by the convoy hardly laid eggs in winter, and only a dozen eggs had been saved along the way. Originally, they were intended to be exchanged for coarse grains in the market towns on the way.

But after missing the last market town, Olivia simply used them as a reward for the children's successful arrival at the destination.

The cold and hunger along the way had made many children so thin that they looked emaciated. If they didn't eat something good soon, they would hardly be able to stand up.

Little Mouse was the last one to receive food. She held the soft black bread in her hand and looked at the egg in Olivia's hand, but hesitated for a moment and didn't dare to take it.

The little girl keenly sensed that the people in the settlement camp didn't like her, not even the kindest big sister Olivia.

In fact, in the cold Northern Region, no one liked street orphans. When people couldn't even take care of their own families, every extra bite of food given to a street orphan meant an increased chance of their family members starving to death.

"Does she also get one? She's not one of us!"

"Yeah, she's a street orphan. She doesn't have a father to work. She's not allowed to eat!"

Several children looked at Little Mouse and shouted indignantly with righteous indignation.

"Do you want to die?" Leo lifted his arm, clenched his fist, and the muscles on his arm wriggled like intertwined steel cables, scaring the group of children into silence.

Leo snatched the egg from Olivia's hand with one hand and pinched Little Mouse's cheek with the other, easily forcing her to open her mouth, and slapped the egg into her mouth.

"Done!"

But Little Mouse, with the egg in her mouth, gently pushed Leo, pushing him in front of Olivia.

During this period, she had survived by receiving this half of the black bread every day. Of course, she wanted to share this life-saving opportunity with Leo.

The big sister was so kind that she would surely give Leo a share of food too.

Olivia and Leo stared at each other. She warily protected the compartment behind her and angrily said, "Are you even going to snatch food from children?"

Leo hadn't intended to eat it. Hearing this, his argumentative nature flared up, and he stared back and said, "Aren't I also a child? How old do you think I am?"

Olivia gave him a speechless eye roll, turned around, took out a piece of wild beef jerky the size of a pinky finger, stuffed it into his hand and said, "Here's something delicious for you."

Leo took the wild beef jerky, stuffed it into his mouth and chewed. It felt like he was chewing tree roots.

As he chewed, he watched Olivia bending down to rummage through the freight car in front of her.

Olivia was dressed in a light yellow corseted tunic and a homespun dress, and there were several patches on the dress.

This outfit was similar to that of other village women. The only difference was that she also had a black warm fur shawl on her shoulders.

However, her well-proportioned figure set off this attire extremely well. Every gesture and every smile of hers were like those of the female lead in some game or anime.

Compared to the other villagers who eked out a living from the soil, Olivia, who had an imperial sergeant father, was simply the daughter of the landlord's family.

Her educated mother had taken good care of her and raised her before passing away. Olivia had hardly ever worked in the fields, so her figure was completely different from that of her peers, who were usually burly.

She also had a gentle and kind personality and wouldn't blurt out vulgar words that would even make a man blush.

Being able to write and do arithmetic, she naturally became the right-hand assistant to her father, Ulyan, and was in charge of managing the property and supplies of the exploration team.

During the time when Leo was injured, it was Olivia who took care of him closely.

She scrubbed him, changed his dressings, and fed him. It was only because of the bowls of hot porridge she fed him spoonful by spoonful that Leo had enough nutrition to repair his body and survive.

It was impossible to say that he wasn't grateful in his heart. But in the memory of the original owner, he was really too familiar with her. The way the two communicated was to quarrel. There was no way he would say thanks.

In the deep memory fragments of Leo's mind, there were many scenes of him bullying her when they were kids, making her cry and run home to find her mom. Then her mom would invite him to dinner and lecture him while they ate.

What? You get fed for bullying someone. That's awesome!

After rummaging for a long time, Olivia finally found all the supplies she needed. Only then did she turn around and catch Leo staring at her butt for a long time. Blushing with anger, she said, "Why are you still here?"

"This is it?" Leo was stunned and only then realized that the so-called delicious food was the small strip of wild beef jerky he had just swallowed.

"Humph! This is beef jerky! I'm not even willing to eat it myself." Olivia was furious, feeling that her kindness had been in vain.

This is not even as good as a spicy strip!

Leo was also very angry. Having waited in vain for so long, he turned around and left. Seeing Little Mouse following closely beside him, holding a piece of black bread, he reached out and tore off a large chunk and stuffed it into his mouth.

Little Mouse looked at the black bread with a chunk missing with distress, then spat out the egg that she had held in her mouth for a long time and reached out to offer it to Leo obsequiously.

Looking at the egg dripping with saliva, Leo shouted, "Get out!"

After having a meal of the adult food in the settlement camp, Leo felt the hardship of his situation more keenly.

Previously, having lain on the freight car and drunk wheat porridge for several consecutive days, Leo's mouth had become so tasteless that he thought he could finally have a good meal after he recovered.

But after taking a bite of the tooth-breaking hard bread, he realized that what he had enjoyed before was actually top-notch treatment.

He forcefully occupied a large pot and scooped around in it with a spoon for a long time, but in the end, he couldn't fish out any decent soup base.

At night, Leo lay in the tent, staring blankly at the tent roof.

Fragmented knowledge from his previous life and survival experience from this life kept flashing through his mind, trying to combine into a way to easily solve the current dilemma.

"If only I had a golden finger like an encyclopedia search."

Baidu, Baidu. How can I feed a group of the old and weak in the first episode of Surviving in the Wilderness?

Little Mouse carefully got in and lay down in the pile of tattered furs beside Leo's feet, imperceptibly getting a little closer to Leo's calf.

A few minutes later, she got a little closer.

A few more minutes went by, and it got closer once more.

Feeling the chill rising from his feet, Leo let out a soft sigh inwardly. He lifted his foot and placed the entire foot on Little Mouse.

Little Mouse hugged Leo's calf happily and stopped moving.

Although he was wearing pajamas suspected to be made of magical fabric, the warmth they provided was obviously insufficient to ward off the bitter cold at the end of winter and the start of spring.

And Little Mouse's weak constitution and meager nutrients, just enough to sustain life, couldn't generate enough heat at all.

Leo's leg was held in Little Mouse's arms, as if it had been left outside the tent. It took a full ten minutes before it was warmed up again by the heat emanating from Leo's strong body.

"Leo, can I call you dad?"

In the darkness came Little Mouse's voice, barely audible.

"What for?"

"They said that only kids with a dad can get food."

"Alright then."

"Dad?"

"Yeah."