The first thing I did was to find out

Chapter 225: Licking the Calf (IV) (Thanks to K, Xiaoyao, Yuan for the reward!)

The news that the dumb little fool in Qu Liehu's family was not dumb or stupid either, spread like the wind throughout the village as the day dawned, shocking the village chief and his entire family to come to the house to watch.

The village chief pointed at himself and asked, "Jingjing, do you know who I am?"

"Village chief." Qu Jing said.

"What about me? Who am I?" asked the village chief's wife anxiously.

"Grandma Ma Dalan." Qu Jing said.

Ma Dalan was so excited that she almost cried. Ever since she married the village chief, people first called her the Guo family's daughter-in-law, and later the village chief's daughter-in-law. No one had called her by her real name for a long time.

"Where's he? Where's Goudan?"

Qu Jing: "...Guo Goudan."

"Amazing!" Ma Dalan clapped her hands excitedly. "Now she can talk, so she's not stupid anymore. Old Qu, what magic medicine did you give your granddaughter? It's so effective. I'll ask for one for the idiot in the village next to my mother's. His family is rich and has three big fat pigs! If this really works, he'll definitely give you a whole fat pig to thank you!"

Hunter Qu smiled so hard that the wrinkles on his face almost opened up. "There is no such thing as a magic pill. Our Jingjing is not stupid to begin with. She can talk. She was just shy a few days ago and got scared in the mountains. Now she's fine and is normal."

The village chief and his family were still watching. The village chief thought about it and felt something was wrong, so he pulled Qu the hunter outside and whispered to him.

"If your daughter Jingjing is not stupid or dumb, then why did you abandon this healthy, good-looking girl in the mountains after she grew up?" The village chief frowned. "Could it be that she has some indiscernible disease?"

"Just like your first wife, she looked fine, but suddenly one day she became sick and vomited blood and died."

Qu Liehu was startled and a little nervous: "What should I do then?"

The village chief thought for a moment and asked, "Are you willing to spend money?"

Qu Liehu: "Speak of things."

"Didn't the higher-ups call us to the county for a meeting last time? They talked about a lot of policies, like how we in the countryside will also have doctors and schools in the future. When I was at the meeting, I heard Wang Dana from Dahe Village say that the doctors at the provincial hospital are very good."

"His brother-in-law's leg was broken by a piece of wood while he was working in the provincial capital. He was bleeding all over the ground and was about to die. He was sent to the hospital but was saved."

"If you are willing to spend money, I will ask Wang Dana how to get to the provincial capital and the hospital, and you can take your family Jingjing to see it."

"Yuan is fine too. Yuan can be exchanged for money."

Qu Liehu hesitated a little: "I only have 6 dollars, is that enough?"

"I know this hospital. It's run by foreigners. You can't get in without a few dollars."

"It's not owned by foreigners anymore." The village chief said that Qu Liehu had been hiding in the mountains for many years and the information was still a little backward. He touched his chin and said, "I don't know if 6 yuan is enough. Wang Dana didn't tell me how much the treatment cost. His in-laws only have one child, so they must spend all their money to treat him."

"Maybe the fields have been sold."

Qu the Hunter became even more nervous and whispered, "I still have two small yellow croakers, is that enough?"

village head:?!

The village chief's face was full of an expression that said, "We've been living in the countryside together as poor people all these years, and you've secretly become rich behind my back."

"Where are you from?" the village chief was surprised.

"I knocked the battalion commander unconscious when I was deserting, and I stole the money from him."

The village chief began to regret that he had run away when the men were being conscripted, thus missing out on a path to wealth.

But on second thought, many able-bodied men were captured in the surrounding area back then, but few of them escaped alive like Qu the Hunter. Most of them were lost, and their families could only have empty graves. The village chief felt a little more balanced.

"It's enough, it's definitely enough. What disease needs two small yellow croakers? Jingjing is lucky to be picked up by you. Even the most serious disease can be cured." The village chief turned his head to look at Qu Jing in the house and lowered his voice. "But, is it worth spending so much money on a girl you picked up?"

"It's worth it." Qu Liehu said happily, "Jingjing just opened her mouth last night and told me that she would take care of me in my old age and see me to the end of my life."

The village chief shook his head helplessly.

What neither of them noticed was that Qu Jing, who was being asked questions by everyone in the room, raised her head slightly and glanced outside the door when Qu Liehu said the last sentence.

In the next few days, Qu Jing and Qu Liehu lived a dull life.

After knowing that Qu Jing was neither stupid nor dumb, Qu the hunter felt more at ease letting Qu Jing stay at home and let Qu Jing go to the village to play with other children during the day.

Qu Jing was not a real child, and had no interest in playing with other children. She only liked to stay at home and play with wood carving. However, the children in the village were very interested in Qu Jing because she was rich and always had sweet potatoes and corn in her pocket.

The children who were a little smarter would carry their baskets to find Qu Jing to exchange for sweet potatoes after digging wild vegetables every day. The bolder ones would even steal vegetables from their own vegetable gardens to exchange.

Qin Huai watched Qu Jing change her dishes for two days and felt that Qu Jing just passed the tribulation too early. If it was thirty years later, it would definitely be a story of getting rich in the past.

Finally, on the fifth day after Qu Jing exchanged the vegetables, Qin Huai saw from afar the vegetables in the basket of a child on his back and knew that the vegetables were worth a few sweet potatoes. At that time, the village chief came with the good news he had heard.

The village chief has already found out the way to the provincial capital. The village is very poor and there are no ox carts, but people can take a donkey cart to the county. The county is very poor and there are no cars, but people can take an ox cart to the provincial capital.

We slept in the open air and brought our own food along the way. Qu Liehu was born a hunter, and he had guns, knives, and bows and arrows, so there was no need to worry about encountering robbers on the road. The village chief had already arranged everything, and Qu Liehu and Qu Jing did not have to pay for the trip. Everyone who was traveling with them felt very safe with the hunters around, and they did not have to pay for the round trip, which was very cost-effective.

We will set out tomorrow morning. The journey is long and may take ten days. The village chief knew that Qu the Hunter was not good at cooking, so he prepared pancakes and boiled eggs for him in advance and only charged 20% of the processing fee, allowing him to pick up the payment at his door.

The hunter Qu said it didn't matter, and gave the village chief two more rabbit skins. The village chief was delighted and immediately said that he would cook three more eggs when he got home, so that Qu Jing could eat more on the way, because the child was thin and needed more nutrition.

In this way, Qu Jing and Qu Liehu set off in a dusty manner.

Hunter Qu adhered to the concept of being poor at home but rich on the road. He carried with him all the dollars, legal tender, copper coins, and small yellow croakers. Two large bags of dry food were prepared by the village chief's wife, with more than twenty eggs, as well as a leather water bag and several pieces of patchwork leather.

Qu the Hunter originally wanted to take the tiger skin with him, but the tiger skin was too conspicuous. He could fight off two or three robbers, but not ten. This trip to the provincial capital would take him nearly a month, so Qu the Hunter packed up all the valuables in his house and hid them in the cellar.

The food was kept at the village chief's house, and the several hunting dogs were also entrusted to the village chief's care.

The journey was boring.

Whether it is a donkey cart or an ox cart, the speed is not very fast, and the animals need to rest, so they stop and go. In comparison, this mode of travel is only slightly faster than Chen Huihong's escape from famine by walking on two feet.

If he couldn't fast forward during breaks, Qin Huai felt that he would be bored to death by this journey.

Fast forward is Qin Huai's adjective to describe the passage of time.

Qin Huai had this experience when he was watching Luo Jun's last memory. During the years when Luo Jun was guarding Liu Tao's tomb, Qin Huai was like a bystander watching a movie, watching the sun rise and set, and time passed quickly. A few years seemed to pass in a blink of an eye, and an hour passed in less than a few dozen minutes.

The same was true when they were on the road. Qu Jing didn't speak most of the time, and only responded when Qu Liehu asked him if he was thirsty or hungry, or if he wanted to eat. In addition, Qu Liehu was going to the provincial hospital, and several passengers who didn't know what was going on thought that Qu Jing was seriously ill and was about to die, so they quickly gave Qu Jing the best seat on the ox cart, so that the child could lie half-lying instead of sitting.

It was not until the ox cart drove into the provincial capital that Qin Huai felt a bit of modern atmosphere.

The coachman took Qu Liehu and Qu Jing all the way to the hospital entrance, told Qu Liehu where he was staying and when he would return, and asked him to let him know if he could not make it back in time.

When Qu the hunter entered the provincial capital, he was obviously a little nervous. He wrapped his hunting rifle in cloth and carried it on his back, and he led Qu Jing around the hospital entrance like a headless fly.

This cannot be blamed on Qu Liehu, as he is illiterate.

Fortunately, the hunting rifle wrapped in cloth on the back of Qu the Hunter was very eye-catching, and the security officer at the hospital entrance recognized it at a glance.

Everyone was very accepting of a hunter from the countryside carrying a hunting rifle into the city. Now was a period of chaos, and many farmers who were isolated from information in the countryside didn't even know whether the war was over, whether the county magistrate had run away, died, or was replaced, and whether there were still bandits in the mountains that had not been eliminated. It was normal for them to carry some self-defense items on the road.

Upon learning that Qu the Hunter was taking his granddaughter to the city for medical treatment, the security officer told Qu the Hunter that guns could not be brought into the hospital and had to be kept outside. He took him to exchange money first and then took him to register.

Seeing that the other party's gun was better than his, Qu the Hunter obeyed obediently.

After Qu the Hunter exchanged all the French francs, copper coins and dollars he had with him into the current currency, he nervously took Qu Jing by the hand to register and see a doctor.

The result was naturally fruitless, nothing was found.

There are limited ways to check these days. Qu Jing was not a human being without disease. During the checkup, Qin Huai was a little worried that he might find out that Qu Jing was not even a human being. It turned out that he was overthinking. The doctor was very touched that a hunter in the countryside would take his granddaughter to the provincial capital for a checkup because of suspicion. He helped Qu to cancel the number so that he could save some money. He prescribed two taels of free soybeans as a nutritional supplement for Qu Jing, and told her to go home and eat some soybeans to supplement her nutrition. He also told Qu not to be suspicious and to give her something good if he was really worried about her child's illness.

Hunter Qu took the doctor's advice to heart, took two taels of soybeans, and went around the street looking for good ones.

In Qu Liehu’s simple value system, eating good food = white flour + sugar.

He first went to the grain store and spent a huge amount of money to buy a bag of flour, and then Qu the Hunter looked for a candy seller. In the end, he didn't find any candy seller, but found a pastry shop.

The shop is small and looks old, but the pastries on display look good. From Qin Huai's perspective, the pastries that can be seen are all B-grade pastries, combined with the raw materials available in this era.

The pastry chef's craftsmanship is absolutely outstanding.

As expected, the masters are among the people.

Qin Huai sighed inwardly, took a few steps back, and looked up at the shop sign.

Qinji Bobo Shop.

?

? ?
???

The shop of Qin Wan’s brother?

Decades later, Qinji's pastry shop, which couldn't continue operating in Peking, has grown into a national chain?

Qin Huai quickly took another look at the snacks displayed in the store.

There are steamed buns, but not many.

If black flour steamed buns are the signature dish of Qinji Steamed Bun Shop, then Qin Huai didn't say anything.

Judging from the small square cakes, Dingsheng cakes, and glutinous rice cakes, this store should be a pastry shop selling Suzhou-style pastries.

The small and exquisite pastries were so delicious that Qu Liehu couldn't take his eyes off them.

"Jingjing, do you want to eat?" asked Qu Liehu.

Qu Jing looked at the pastries. She was not stupid. These days, having enough sweet potatoes and corn was enough to make the children in the village envious. The legendary white flour buns only appeared in gossip about the legend of the landlord's stupid son who died of overeating.

Among the pastries in front of her, except for the black flour buns that looked very bad, none of them looked more exquisite than the white flour steamed buns. Qu Jing shook her head decisively.

"I do not want to eat."

Qu Liehu knew that she wanted to eat.

There was no one in the shop, but he could see that there were compartments inside. Qu Liehu gritted his teeth and shouted loudly, "Is anyone there?"

"Yes." A young man in a long gown walked out of the compartment.

Seeing that the guests turned out to be a pair of grandparents and grandchildren, the young man was a little surprised. He looked at Qu Jing a few more times, but did not look down on the two of them because of their slovenly appearance after traveling for ten days. He asked, "Excuse me, what can the guests do for you?"

The young man was so polite that Qu the Hunter became even more timid. He stared at the exquisite snacks on display and asked, "Boss, are these for the child's health?"

"What...to eat?"

"To nourish your body?" The young man looked at Qu Jing again and said with a smile, "This is my pastry shop. To nourish your body, you have to go to the hospital or the pharmacy. It's useless to buy from me."

"but."

"I have some cheap glutinous rice cakes here, are you interested?"

Qu Liehu was instantly attracted by the word "cheap" and asked stutteringly: "Cheap?"

"Yes, I came from the south to open a shop. I didn't know that the glutinous rice here is not suitable for making rice cakes. I made a batch of rice cakes, but the customers didn't like them. Look at what is on display. They don't want to be returned."

"If you are willing to buy it, I can sell it to you at cost price and give you these cakes as extra gifts. What do you think?"

When Qu the Hunter heard about this good thing, his first reaction was that this young man was setting a trap to rob them. He subconsciously looked back to see if there were any robbers with knives, axes, or guns who could catch them on the spot. He felt a little safer after touching the cloth-wrapped hunting rifle and swallowed his saliva.

"How much?"

"How much money do you have?"

Hunter Qu subconsciously revealed all his assets except for the small yellow croaker.

"Then let's take this price. I have some extra glutinous rice here and I can give it to you. By the way, can you read?"

Qu Liehu shook his head.

"Then I will tell you orally. You can take these bags of glutinous rice back to make rice cakes. I will tell you how to make rice cakes."

"Didn't you say that the glutinous rice here is not suitable for making rice cakes?" Qu Jing suddenly asked.

"That's right, but I only know how to make rice cakes with glutinous rice. I don't know how to make other snacks. I'm afraid of waste. It's a small business, so I'll try to save as much as I can." The young man explained to Qu Jing with a smile.

Qu Jing said to Qu Liehu without any hesitation: "Grandpa, let's help him."

Qu the Hunter was still in the initial stage of adapting to the fact that he would be dizzy with joy whenever Qu Jing called him Grandpa. He was first dazzled by the cakes and then by the Grandpa. Without thinking, he nodded and agreed, and took out money to buy glutinous rice cakes.

"Is this rice cake coated with sugar?" Qu Jing asked.

"Yes, I have some white sugar for wrapping rice cakes, which I'll give you as well. How's your memory? Now I'll tell you the recipe for making rice cakes and the recipe for the red bean filling. Let me write it down for you with a pen and paper, and you can go back and find someone who can read to you." The young man took out another bag of white sugar that weighed at least 10 pounds.

Twenty minutes later, Qu the Hunter left Qin's Pastry Shop in a daze, carrying cakes, glutinous rice, sugar and two precious recipes in his arms.

"Jingjing, the way people in this city do business is really strange. They gave me all these precious things at such a low price." Qu Liehu sighed.

"Grandpa, he was clearing out his stock. We were lucky enough to catch him." Qu Jing said.

"Yes, yes, yes, what luck! Jingjing is so lucky to have such a good thing as soon as she entered the city. Here, what is this rice cake? Jingjing, you eat it first. I can see the white sugar grains on it. It will definitely nourish the body!"

"Grandpa, you eat too." Qu Jing stuffed a small piece of glutinous rice cake into Qu Liehu's mouth.

Qu Jing looked back at the young man in the shop. The young man smiled and waved at her, and mouthed to her to come back next time when he had time, quju.

quju?

To be inferior?

Quju?

District Bureau?

What do you mean?
Qin Huai looked at the young man's lip movements with some confusion, and regretted that he didn't have a copy of Shan Hai Jing to read on the spot.

He could see that this young man was most likely a spirit. Since the spirits in the first and last lives were very easy to recognize, the young man must have recognized Qu Jing at first sight, and even recognized her true form.

Seeing that his fellow man was in such a miserable situation, I helped him out and sold him some snacks at a low price.

Qu Jing did not respond and looked at Qu Liehu.

"Grandpa, is it delicious?"

"It's delicious. This rice cake is really delicious. It's sweet and soft. When I get home, I will learn how to make it so that Jingjing can eat it at home too."

(End of this chapter)