WS - Chapter 157
Chapter 157
Yu Nianbing, who had kindly come to help, was stopped by Song Shiyue in a fluster outside the fence. For a moment, she couldn't even return to the main camp, which left her feeling both amused and bemused.
However...
Compared to the person who could only lie in the tent a few days ago, showing no response except breathing, the Song Shiyue right now—so anxious that sweat beaded on her nose, talking and gesturing emphatically to block people—was much more alive.
Never mind not letting her help with cooking; even if she were told not to eat tonight, it wouldn't matter.
If Song Shiyue wanted to cook, then let her cook; whatever she wanted to do was fine. Without a trace of displeasure, Yu Nianbing withdrew the foot that had stepped into the fence, then watched with amusement as Song Shiyue inside heaved an undisguised sigh of relief.
However, from Yu Nianbing's perspective, Song Shiyue was acting like this only because she had been cared for by everyone during her consecutive comas and wanted to do something for everyone upon waking, unaware of the hidden tenderness Song Shiyue held for her. Admittedly, it was somewhat regrettable.
But it didn't matter. Some tenderness is like enduring affection, like flowing water—if one drop slips away, another handful will always come along.
A destined fate did not pass by; when you look back, everything becomes clear, carrying a different flavor.
There wasn't much in the way of seasoning; even the rabbit could only be marinated roughly with salt. Fortunately, Song Shiyue had been used to roughing it in the apocalypse and didn't find this coarse cooking inappropriate.
Besides, ordinary rabbit meat was far better than the tough, coarse, and strange-tasting mutated beast meat of the apocalypse.
Two rabbits were chopped into small pieces, blanched, rinsed clean again, and then put into the pot to stew.
Using the remaining hot water, she also blanched the five rabbit heads and a basin of cleaned and chopped innards, temporarily setting them aside in a basin for later.
In the other basin used earlier to catch the rabbit blood, a little salt had been sprinkled inside beforehand. Now that the blood had cooled, there was a shallow layer of blood curd in the basin.
Changing to a new pot of hot water, she cut the blood curd into larger pieces, boiled them once, then scooped them out: that was firm, elastic rabbit blood tofu.
Then it was time to start roasting the rabbits.
Before she started cooking the rabbits, Song Shiyue had already taken firewood and split one fire into three.
Ning Chuyang, who had been responsible for gathering firewood these days, felt her heart tremble at the sight, and had long since gone into the nearby woods again to replenish the supply. Naturally, Yu Nianbing, who had been "chased" out of the camp by Song Shiyue, went along.
Fortunately, although the camp was only a small area enclosed by a fence, there was still some open space between the three tents. The three fires, squeezed together, were still at a safe distance from the surrounding combustibles.
The rabbit soup stewing on one fire had been bubbling for a while. Now the blanching pot on the second fire was taken off, and it was time for the three rabbits—which had been scored with fine slits and rubbed twice with salt water—to make their appearance.
The three rabbits were not skewered directly; instead, they were clamped between two long, thin sticks, turned repeatedly over the fire until heated and slightly golden, then placed in turn on a slightly flatter-bottomed iron pot set over the third small fire. Once a low flame had rendered some fat from the rabbits, they were finally skewered with sharpened clean wooden sticks and officially placed over the fire to roast.
One could only be grateful for this treehouse. Likely because the large iron pots used for stewing beef at the first camp were not easy to haul up and stuff into the treehouse, there were three or four pots of various shapes here. One ceramic one had shattered to pieces on the day of the Yaoxing Storm, but there were still three metal ones that could be used.
Although Yu Nianbing still had a thumb-sized bottle of oil in her backpack, it was best to save where one could.
Wild rabbits didn't have much fat, but it shouldn't be wasted. Render it out, and stir-fry the rabbit innards: that would be delightful.
The three rabbits, after having their fat rendered, were stuck into the ground, at a distance from the fire that Song Shiyue had determined through experience.
In the flat-bottomed iron pot, with a shallow layer of hot oil, the fresh rabbit innards and rabbit heads—blanched simply to remove any off-flavors—were dumped in with a sizzle. Instantly, the rich aroma of stir-frying meat overwhelmed the scent of the rabbit soup that had been simmering for a while in the stew pot.
Stir-frying always produces an instant, intense aroma. But once the soup is fully cooked, the long, lingering fragrance versus the intensity of stir-frying: it's hard to say which wins out.
But at this moment, the oil-blasted rabbit innards in the camp were the most fragrant.
After stir-frying, the rabbit innards shrank slightly again. A few bowls of water were added, and they were stewed a bit more. Once the innards and heads were about done, the rabbit blood tofu was added, along with salt and pepper, and that made a simple yet delicious rabbit innard hotpot.
Time is never stingy in bestowing rich and wonderful flavors upon ingredients. In cooking, effort and dedication always yield more unexpected rewards than in other pursuits.
The two pots, one of rabbit meat and one of innards, bubbled and rolled, their aromas interweaving and growing richer. By the fireside, the three rabbits dripped fat with a crackle, already roasted to the most beautiful golden-brown...
Thus, it was once again time for StarNet viewers to pray that technology would develop enough to share taste buds through livestreaming.
"Roast meat, roast meat again—how come every time I watch Sister Song roast meat, I get so hungry!"
"I think Sister Song should just live alone on Wilderness Planet. Every day, wake up and hunt, get a few dozen rabbits or a wild boar, go back to roast and cook, then eat and sleep, and then another day begins!"
"That sounds pretty nice, but wait, I'm speaking up on behalf of the Little Mooncakes—how can it be alone! Little Ice Block must have a name!"
"Really drooling, daily envy of Song Shiyue's teammates!"
"Hahaha, right, so envious! I start drooling from the moment she cuts the meat, even when it's still raw!"
"Cutting meat and breaking bones as graceful and smooth as writing poetry or painting—who wouldn't get hungry watching that? If some butcher shop hired Song Shiyue, wouldn't they sell a thousand pigs a day!"
"??? Hahaha, what did my Sister Song do wrong to have to chop up a thousand pigs a day!"
"I've never eaten rabbit before, just want to ask everyone, any good rabbit restaurant recommendations? The kind with rabbit soup, rabbit innard hotpot, and a full roast rabbit combo!"
"Ding, the little ad ocean you requested will arrive on scene in ten seconds!"
"Hahaha, I'm afraid by today one in ten watching this live stream will want to eat rabbit."
"No no no, I think once they start eating, it'll be at least one in five!"
"Why are you all so conservative? If you've got guts, come vote! Friends who don't want to eat rabbit, please press Q1!"
"2!"
"22222!"
"Hahaha, 2 to the Nth power!"
The fragrance of food, the scent of meat—the wandering and displacement seemed to pause for a moment, leaving only the comfort and beauty of the present.
Feng Qianqian leaned against the tent, watching the person by the fire managing three stations by herself, and let out a long sigh.
What she sighed out was the pent-up, stale energy of the past few days.
And what she breathed in was the fragrance brought by that person, the vitality...
Truly wonderful.
The fifty-two rabbits Song Shiyue brought back swept through the entire camp's atmosphere, and also made Feng Qianqian start to feel that her failure to starve herself to death a few days ago was actually quite good.
Who doesn't want to live, if they can?
But in her heart, Feng Qianqian was still apologetic. She was always a burden, and it was impossible for her to receive a miracle like Song Shiyue's.
Still, failing to starve herself was quite good, and good things are always yet to come.
Feng Qianqian was leaning at the tent entrance, but she was actually some distance from the fire, where there were pots and roasting meat and a bit of noise.
It was clearly just a soft sigh, yet Song Shiyue over there seemed to have heard it, raising her eyes to look straight over, leaving Feng Qianqian a bit flustered and stunned.
Flustered indeed.
Feng Qianqian felt that her existence in the camp was... rather awkward. She always felt that the three had stayed for Song Shiyue's sake, whether out of friendship or gratitude, and honestly had nothing to do with her. Being cared for was merely a humanitarian byproduct... Although Ning Chuyang had been striving to reassure Feng Qianqian, but... it wasn't about fear of being abandoned; it really was that she didn't know how to repay their kindness.
Now that Song Shiyue was better, she didn't know what they would do next... nor what Song Shiyue's attitude would be... Feng Qianqian felt that they didn't seem like they would give up on her, which made her even more clueless about how to repay them... The earlier mention about the rabbit skins... was also her wanting to do something...
In short, Feng Qianqian's mind was very messy, full of conjecture.
People, when there are fewer things they can do, think about more things.
Feng Qianqian was particularly mindful of Song Shiyue now, and being looked at like that gave her an inexplicable feeling of being called out.
"Oh right, rabbit skins..." Song Shiyue smacked her forehead, turned to rummage through the basins she had carried out earlier from the washroom. "Ah, here they are. The little wooden curls, right? I'll shave them now, it'll only take a little while."
"No..." Feng Qianqian wanted to say she wasn't rushing Song Shiyue, and since Song Shiyue was so busy, she could do it later. But Song Shiyue's hands were simply too fast. As soon as she spoke, the little wooden pieces were being shaved away with a swish, and on a large leaf pulled over, little wooden curls quickly began to pile up.
Feng Qianqian, sitting some distance away, couldn't see clearly, but the StarNet viewers got a close-up. Those little wooden curls, each one uniform—thin, tiny, and curled—were clearly whittled by hand with a stone knife, yet they were more regular and pretty than planed ones, looking truly endearing and pleasing. At the thought that these little wooden curls would soon be used to scrape rabbit hides, more than a few viewers couldn't help but feel a pang of regret.
But as Song Shiyue shaved the wood, when she looked up to check the roasting rabbits' fire, she inadvertently glanced at Feng Qianqian not far away, and saw the girl still staring blankly at her. Her hand, which had not stopped shaving even while checking the roast, paused.
Such a look...
Song Shiyue lowered her eyes.
Song Shiyue had seen such a look many times in the apocalypse.
Behind the forced "I'm fine" lay such deep helplessness and confusion. If one just paid a little attention, one wouldn't miss it.
The environment of the apocalypse was truly too harsh. Zombies, mutated plants and animals, deadly things everywhere... As a mere Strength-Type Ability User who couldn't keep up with those five-element ability users in the later stages, it had been hard enough just to keep herself alive. When she encountered such looks, what she could do was quite limited.
But now, after all, things were different.
This was something within her power, and that was truly... wonderful.
"Oh, by the way, I saw the wheelchair model you made before. Very impressive. But we have quite a lot of stuff now, only two rabbit cages, and I still want to bring some of the tents. Let's first make a cart to use, so we can load up both the supplies and you. After this meal, we'll get started building it." Song Shiyue lifted her eyes, speaking in a light tone but looking at Feng Qianqian very seriously.
Building a cart was one of the things Song Shiyue had planned to do before. However, making it would require more strength than hunting rabbits, and it would be more convenient to have a meal first before getting started. Sharpening the knife doesn't delay the woodcutting, after all...
This was just mentioning it a bit early, but when Song Shiyue saw Feng Qianqian's eyes brighten instantly, her mood still improved a little more.
Everything will be alright.
Song Shiyue did not say this sentence clearly.
But in some things, everything is understood without words.
Feng Qianqian felt it. Yu Nianbing and Ning Chuyang, who were just then carrying new firewood to stack by the fence and happened to hear Song Shiyue's words, also felt something.
Ning Chuyang, who kept an eye on Feng Qianqian's emotional state every day to prevent her from overthinking, was naturally even happier for Feng Qianqian's current joy.
But Yu Nianbing's mood was a bit complicated.
That Song Shiyue—say she's not perceptive, yet she's clearly good at reading people's conditions and cheering them up. But say she is perceptive, then why did she never seem to catch on to all those hints Yu Nianbing gave her in the past, telling her to tone it down, or those looks reminding her of this or that?
Hmph, so annoying!
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