We ate a good meal yesterday and had a decent breakfast this morning, so the group walked with a surprisingly energetic stride.
Yesterday, Fatty ate meat and millet rice. With food in her stomach, she felt stronger than usual and insisted on putting Little A-Nan in the stroller, sitting next to her mother, Wu.
Qin San Niang was worried that she would get tired, so she kept an eye on Pang Ya's complexion on the way. She didn't expect that even when she was panting heavily, Pang Ya still had a smile on her face and didn't even pant heavily!
Well, she really hit the jackpot!
The number of refugees on the road gradually increased, and they saw a family with children who looked very similar to them. Qin Sanniang quickly stepped forward and asked, "Sister-in-law, do you know how far Luzhou City is from here? My mother's leg is injured, and we urgently need to find a doctor to treat it."
The woman, dressed in gray clothes and with a sallow face and sunken cheeks, looked in the direction pointed out by Qin San Niang. There was indeed an old woman sitting on a cart with two children following behind. She realized that this family was even worse off than her own. At least her family still had men. Although they had gotten separated from the group, they would eventually catch up.
People are always like this; they tend to feel some sympathy for the weak.
"Luzhou City is very close to here, only about two days' journey. If we walk fast, we should arrive by noon tomorrow." She has a distant relative in Luzhou, and she had taken her child to visit this relative a few years ago, so she knows this road. However, they don't plan to go into Luzhou this time. The head of the household said they should continue south. They've only been out of the village for seven or eight days, and they still have food, so there's no need to go to Luzhou to buy anything.
"Thank you so much, sister-in-law!" Qin San Niang said sincerely.
The Liu family also heard the good news and decided to hurry to Luzhou.
The sallow-faced woman, seeing the family's radiant appearance, assumed they were refugees fleeing from war. Otherwise, how could they show no signs of sorrow? Moreover, their steps were steady, seemingly carrying a hint of...excitement?
The thought that this family, without even an adult male, could still be so resilient made the sallow-faced woman put aside the sorrow of fleeing home and the bewilderment of being separated from the group. She still had a man, three sons, and two daughters-in-law; it seemed there was nothing to fear.
Around noon, Qin San Niang and her group avoided the crowds and rested by a secluded roadside, where they cooked their meal.
"Mother, Sister Chunhua, let's make extra steamed buns for lunch today, and also make the porridge thicker. There are more and more refugees on the road!"
As she spoke, Qin San Niang took out the brown sugar from her basket and handed it to Wu Shi, asking her to boil some more brown sugar water after she finished cooking and put it in the gourd so that if anyone got thirsty or hungry on the road, they could drink some sugar water to replenish their energy.
The cooking is now mainly done by Wu Chunhua and Liu Shi. During her break, Qin San Niang plans to look for medicinal herbs in the surrounding area. She has enough to eat, but she lacks money and medicine. These herbs are all useful and of good quality.
Wu Chunhua was somewhat bewildered by Qin San Niang's casual gesture of handing over a large piece of brown sugar. She thought to herself that San Niang was really generous. Brown sugar was not a cheap food, and ordinary farmers could not afford to eat it so easily.
When was the last time she ate brown sugar? She thought it was probably when her daughter was just born. Back then, her husband still had some affection for her, so she shamelessly asked his mother for a bowl of brown sugar water...
Mrs. Liu was used to her daughter's behavior. Although she felt a little sad, she couldn't teach her daughter in front of outsiders. She thought she would talk to her properly when no one was around.
Forgive Qin San Niang for truly forgetting how precious oil, salt, sugar, and iron were in this era. But even if she had known, she would still have done it this way, otherwise they would have starved to death on the way to Luzhou, and then there would be no future!
Both Liu and Wu Chunhua were capable women. In fact, there were very few lazy rural women in this era. As long as they had enough to eat, most of them were good at both housework and cooking.
The two women worked together, one kneading the dough and the other making the pancakes, quickly producing two batches. However, the daughter said that wasn't enough, so Liu and Wu continued making two more batches until all the dark flour in the flour sack was used up. Even so, they only made four batches of steamed pancakes, and no more.
Qin San Niang really wasn't used to eating this dark, steamed cake. It was hard, coarse, and made her throat sore. She had to soak it in porridge for a while before she could eat it. However, she didn't have a better reason to take out the flour. She could only take out the flour and rice openly under the pretext of going to Luzhou to buy things. It really broke her heart!
Fatty and her friends, however, were quite different. Eating the steamed buns, fragrant with wheat, they felt completely satisfied, both physically and mentally. Although the buns were made with dark flour, they weren't mixed with rice bran or anything like that. Normally, their food consisted mostly of bran with very little flour, which was unimaginably unpalatable. As for white flour steamed buns? For Fatty, that was something she wouldn't even dare to dream of; she might not even get to eat them during the New Year.
Lunch consisted of steamed flatbread with pickled wild vegetables. Time was a bit tight, so no porridge was made. After a short rest, everyone continued their journey along the official road to Luzhou.
As Qin San Niang had predicted, they encountered even more refugees along the way, including one or two very long groups. However, none of them were from Wangjia Village or Fatty's father's group, which inexplicably relieved Wu Chunhua.
She's living a comfortable life now and really doesn't want to have anything to do with those scoundrels. Besides, if they see her, it might cause trouble for Third Sister and the others, and that would be really unfair to them.
Qin San Niang wasn't afraid of these things, but she figured it was better to avoid trouble.
The next afternoon, the group arrived outside Luzhou City. From a distance, they could see that there were quite a few refugees gathered outside the city.
"Mother, you two rest here for a bit. Da Wa, get some water for your younger brother and sister. I'll go see what's going on up ahead." Seeing the long queue ahead, Qin San Niang felt that entering Luzhou City might not be so easy.
Sure enough, the further you went, the more different voices you could hear, with many old women sighing and complaining.
Qin San Niang was not going to give up. No matter what, she had to get into Luzhou City, otherwise how would she buy carts and grain? Also, she needed to find a proper doctor to examine Liu's leg before she could feel at ease.
It was midday, the sun was high in the sky, and many refugees began to seek shade along the roadside to rest. Qin Sanniang was also very hot, but she couldn't care less; she planned to go to the city gate and ask the guards on duty.
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