Chapter 6 (Catching Bugs)
Yunmian trembled and spread out her dirty little hands covered with chicken feathers and mud, trying to awaken her mother's love that was dispersed by her anger: "Mom, look~ Mianmian fell down, and her hand was pierced by a stone. It hurts so much!"
"And this chicken is so bad. After it finished eating its own leaves, it went to steal those of other chickens. It also tripped me and made me fall. Mom, how about we stew it and eat it to avenge the other chickens?!" The little girl chattered while spreading out her palms, trying to open her eyes wide to show how miserable she was.
In fact, his eyes were fixed on the thin and scary stick in his mother's hand, for fear that it would be raised high and fall on him in the next second.
At this moment, Yunmian was like a rabbit with its ears pricked up, extremely alert.
Yun Jin was so angry at her daughter's behavior that she laughed. She didn't even take the stick. She just walked over and grabbed the little girl's ear and pulled it up: "You still think you're right, don't you? Did you know that this chicken only started laying eggs the day before yesterday? From now on, your eggs will be crushed to death every morning. You won't have any to eat next time!"
My ears were pulled and it hurt, but no matter how painful it was, it was nothing compared to the huge damage caused by my mother's words.
When Yun Jin let go of her hand and tried to calm down her anger, Yun Mian immediately rushed over and hugged the chicken on the ground. The next second, she cried at the top of her lungs even louder than when she was beaten after rolling in the mud yesterday.
While sobbing, he laid the chicken flat on the ground, half-knelt there with great experience, pressed the chicken's breast with both hands, and performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the chicken.
The series of rescue actions afterwards stunned Yun Jin who was standing beside him, and also dumbfounded the system on the wall.
"...What are you doing?" Yun Jin's voice sounded a little dazed.
The system's tone was also floating: "Mianmian, are you rescuing this chicken?"
After half an hour of rescue... the soul of this chicken should be queuing near the King of Hell waiting to be reincarnated, right?
"Mom..." Little Yun Mianmian stopped and announced sadly: "The rescue is ineffective. This little chicken that can only lay eggs will never survive."
After saying this, she sighed deeply and closed her eyes in silence for the chicken.
Yun Jin stood in the yard with her eyelids twitching. The anger in her heart was completely replaced by absurdity. For a moment, she didn't know whether she should continue to be angry and teach Yun Mian a lesson or take a deep breath and comfort herself not to care about the child.
In the end, she chose to kick her daughter out of the house, closed the gate, and boiled water to pluck the chickens.
Since they are dead, it is better to sell these chickens alive. People will also suspect that they were killed by poison, and you won’t make much money.
So despite being angry, Yun Jin finally decided to process the chicken. She hung half of it to air-dry and stewed the other half on the same day.
However, little Yun Mianmian, who had been kicked out of the house with an egg in her hand early on, had no idea of her mother's plans. She wandered around the village dejectedly, thinking about the wild persimmons that her mother had put in a dark place to ripen yesterday, and the chicken that died despite cardiopulmonary resuscitation. She let out a long sigh, drooping her whole body and looking very listless.
As she strolled along, she finally arrived at the gate of the village primary school.
The self in Yunmian's memory has not yet gone to school. Her mother is saving money to send her here to study next spring. In her previous life, Yunmian had to seek medical treatment everywhere because of illness. Not to mention going to school, she had never even seen a teacher.
Yunmian wandered at the empty gate of the village primary school for a long time. Finally, with the boiled eggs in her pocket and full of yearning and curiosity about the school, she tiptoed in.
The system flew slowly behind her, and also looked around the primary school in this poor little village.
It was only around seven in the morning, and the school was almost empty. Only the iron gate at the school entrance was opened early to welcome students, so Yunmian could move freely in.
Entering the school, Yunmian looked around curiously, his eyes sliding over the narrow playground and the weeds growing wildly around it, and then falling on several classrooms and the iron bell hanging on the second floor of the teaching building.
As I recall, this school was the only two-story building in the village, and the iron bell hanging under the eaves was where the school bell rang to signal the end of classes.
Yunmian stood on the earthen playground downstairs, looking up at the iron bell that was gently blown by the wind. There was a hint of bright light in her dark and clear eyes.
"Uncle, I can also come here to take classes next spring." She turned around and happily shared the news with the system.
By spring, she can become an elementary school student, sitting in the classroom like all the other children, listening to the teacher's lectures, and having her own books and pens.
The system flew over and landed on her shoulder, and replied: "Time passes quickly. Autumn is over, winter is here, and spring won't be far away."
Yun Mian narrowed her eyes and nodded heavily: "Yes!"
"... Yunmian?" A familiar voice suddenly sounded behind him. There was a hint of doubt and hostility hidden in the hesitation, and the tone was also very aggressive: "Why did you sneak into our school? Are you trying to steal something?!"
"It's Zhao Xiaoli's second brother, Zhao Yuntao." The system reminded Yunmian of the other party's identity before she turned around.
Yun Mian's panic about being discovered disappeared, and she turned around and looked at Zhao Yuntao who was running towards her with great momentum.
"Did you come to our school to steal something? I'm going to tell the teacher and the principal! Yunmian, you're finished!" Zhao Yuntao said as he reached out to grab Yunmian's collar to prevent her from escaping.
Yun Mian took two steps back to avoid his grabbing hand and frowned as well: "I'm not a thief, I just passed by and came in to take a look, don't talk nonsense!"
"When the teacher comes, we will know whether you are here to steal! Just wait there and don't run. I will go find the teacher now. If you run away, we will go to your house to find your mother!" Zhao Yuntao didn't listen to Yunmian's explanation at all. He stubbornly believed that Yunmian must have come to school to do something bad, and ran out after throwing down the cloth bag in his hand.
After running outside, he did not forget to close the school's iron gate to prevent Yunmian from escaping.
Yunmian wanted to catch up, but Zhao Yuntao was already 7 years old this year and much taller than Yunmian. Yunmian could not outrun him at all. She could only watch him close the school door and run away.
Yunmian stood on the playground, staring at Zhao Yuntao's running back and pursed her lips.
"I'm not a thief!" She raised her hand and rubbed her eyes fiercely. She didn't even think about running away. She squatted on the edge of the playground and took out the still warm boiled egg from her pocket. She found a stone to break it and peeled it. She held it up and asked obediently, "Uncle System, do you eat eggs?"
She is the first host who thinks of sharing anything she eats with the system first.
From yesterday's bowl of porridge, to last night's wild persimmons, to today's boiled egg, she would carefully separate the portion that belonged to the system every time, and would only eat it herself after being rejected by the system.
More than three thousand hosts, more than three thousand reincarnations, this is the first time that the system has been treated equally as "people".
Even though it had been rejected several times yesterday, the little girl's serious look today as she squatted by the playground, holding a peeled egg and asking questions still made the system silent for several seconds.
After coming to its senses, it flew away from Yunmian's shoulder and replied, "I don't need to eat human food, Mianmian, you can eat it yourself."
This is the most important nutritional intake of Yunmian’s three meals a day, just an egg.
After getting the system's answer, Yun Mian carefully bit through the white egg white.
In fact, it wasn’t particularly delicious and had no flavor, but Yunmian still ate it in small bites and was very satisfied.
Because this is something that her mother is reluctant to eat, it is a "delicious" dish that her mother specially cooked for her.
After Yunmian quietly finished eating a whole egg in the village primary school, several children from the village came to the school gate one after another. Yunmian knew all of them.
"Yunmian, why are you here in our school?"
"Yunmian, are you coming to school with us too?"
"Is your mother sending you to school? Did she sneak in?"
"Yunmian, if you don't pay the tuition, you can't go to school..."
They gathered around Yunmian and discussed the matter in a flurry. However, before they could get any answer from Yunmian, Zhao Yuntao outside the school gate was already shouting at the teacher to come and catch the thief Yunmian.
"It's Yunmian! I saw her sneaking around our school alone! Teacher, search her, she must have stolen something!!"
Zhao Yuntao domineeringly pushed aside the other students, grabbed the teacher's clothes and dragged him to Yunmian, glared at her condescendingly and proudly, and said that she was a thief.
Teacher He Kaijin is a not-so-young man, probably in his thirties or forties. He wears glasses and looks very elegant and easy-going.
"Yun Tao, we haven't figured out the truth of the matter yet, so don't define the matter arbitrarily, and don't just say Yun Mian is a thief." He Kaijin disapproved and stopped Zhao Yuntao from saying anything more extreme. His usually gentle expression became a little stern because of his frown.
Zhao Yuntao wanted to refute, but Teacher He stared at him with such disapproving and even serious eyes that he was a little scared. He shut up unwillingly out of fear.
But even so, he still glared at Yun Mian fiercely, not feeling that he was wronging her at all.
After all, in his heart, Yunmian is a child who bullies his sister every day, does bad things everywhere and has no family discipline. This kind of child is the most annoying. Even if it is for the sake of protecting his younger sisters and brothers, he will teach him a lesson every time he sees it!
But Yunmian, who was always arrogant and domineering, was very reserved in front of the teacher. She nervously put her hands behind her back, raised her head and whispered in defense: "Teacher, I didn't steal anything, I just wanted to come in and take a look. My mother said she would send me to school next spring..."
The little girl's face turned slightly pale with nervousness. While explaining in a trembling voice, she tilted her head and stared at the teacher, fearing that he would sentence her to "death" as soon as he opened his mouth.
Her hands were twisted tightly together behind her back, with the knuckles bulging from excessive force. Anyone could see her panic and fear at the moment.
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