Chapter 26 Chapter 26 Sour Taro
Fortunately, the rain came and went quickly. By the time they had dinner, although the dark clouds in the sky had not yet dispersed, the rain had finally stopped.
Since there were no rain boots at home, Gong Zhili simply took out a pair of reed slippers, put them on barefoot, and walked out.
Xia Yujie leaned against the door and said, "You are the type who can never sit still."
Gong Zhili walked along the gravel path towards the orchard. Rainwater seeped through the soles of her shoes, and a slight chill made her hunch her shoulders. Upon hearing this, she said, "After all, I'm the pillar of the family!"
Geto Xia Yu: If you only look at the surface situation, she is a young girl living with her two younger sisters in an old house in a village with nothing. This statement can still make people feel sympathy.
But actually...
Gong Zhili walked into the orchard and took a walk around. The soles of her reed shoes were covered in mud, making them heavy and difficult to walk in. She simply took off her shoes, held them in one hand, and stepped into the mud barefoot.
She came out of the orchard and continued to check the vegetable seeds she had planted a few days ago. Fortunately, she had not removed all the straw covering them in the past few days, so the heavy rain did not wash the soil into a mess.
Geto Suguru followed her with his eyes. Although it was dark, he could still see her bare feet with the help of the light under the porch... and the muddy shoes in her hand.
He wanted to call her in quickly, but he saw her standing motionless at the junction of several terraces.
"What's wrong?" Xia Yujie stood up straight, thinking that she had stepped on something. "Do you need help?"
Gong Zhili carried him on his back and waved his hands in the air: "It's okay, I was just thinking..."
Geto: "What?"
Gong Zhi stared into the darkness before him. "It's going to cost a lot of money to install streetlights in this area, right?"
The 50 million may be spent quickly.
Geto Suguru: "You want to work under street lights at night?" What a workaholic.
Gong Zhili said: "There will always be a time when streetlights are needed."
But this is really not what she should worry about now.
She went to the well to rinse her shoes and feet, then climbed directly from the edge of the well shed onto the porch, where her shoes were hung on the wall at the end of the porch.
--
It didn't rain the next morning, but the sky was still very gloomy, so Gong Zhili decided to go out and buy some things.
"Mr. Xia Yu, please put all the taro on the second floor of the warehouse into buckets, sprinkle some wood ash on them, and then move them to the kitchen. Then take some feed to feed the chickens and ducks." She told Xia Yujie this before going out, then put on the backpack and walked towards the village through the mud.
Today she went to Kato's house, which is a fishing tackle store that also sells various rain gear.
The fishing rod that the village chief gave her was the one offered by the Kato family.
When she went there, there were several children gathered around the counter in Kato Masakazu's store, and they looked like they were sent out by their parents to run errands.
As soon as she arrived, the children pushed each other to greet her and ran out of the house with their raincoats and rain boots.
Kato Masakazu smiled and asked her, "Does Gong-sama want to buy some rain gear?"
He looked at Gong Zhili's shoes and immediately recommended them to her: "This rain will continue for a few more days, Lady Gong, why don't you buy a few pairs of wellies? I also sell waterproof leggings here."
Gong Zhili took off the backpack and looked at the various items in the store. The store was not big and square, so you could see it all at a glance. On the left wall, straw raincoats and bamboo hats were hung next to plastic raincoats, oil umbrellas were inserted upside down in the fish baskets, and folding umbrellas were lying in the glass counter. There were even wooden clogs at the bottom of the counter. The leggings and rain boots mentioned earlier were on the shelf on the right, along with split rain pants, waterproof aprons, and sleeves. The counter was also filled with small containers with "fish hook" labels on the outside. The labels were yellowed and old, with curled edges. On the wall behind the boss were many fishing rods hanging closely together, including simple bamboo fishing rods and new carbon fishing rods sent by the village chief. There were so many fishing rods that they almost blocked the small door on the lower left side of the wall.
Gong Zhili simply followed her boss's recommendation and bought all the rain gear for her family at once. She even bought a few extra sets for future students. The boss had heard that her place would entertain students and recommended a new fishing rod to her: "The last time I went to buy stock, the supplier said that young people in big cities like to use carbon fishing rods. Lady Gong, why don't you pick up a few too?"
Gong Zhili shook his head: "You don't need to buy a lot of fishing rods. I'm more interested in straw raincoats and bamboo hats."
The boss, working on his computer, said, "A bamboo hat is more convenient than an umbrella when working, but a straw raincoat takes several days to dry out in the sun after each use. It's only good on typhoon days so it won't be blown away."
Gong Zhili bought the same number of straw raincoats and bamboo hats as raincoats and asked, "Are there any straw raincoats or bamboo hats for children?"
Kato Masaru paused and said, "There are clothes for children, but I haven't made them for a long time." The main reason is that parents will not let their children go out wearing such clothes during typhoons.
Gong Zhili: "I'll pay the deposit, and you can make me two sets of straw raincoats and bamboo hats for children. Well, make them according to the size of a ten-year-old child."
Children cannot go out in the rain when they are young, but when they grow up, they will want to go out and play on rainy days. By then, everyone has a raincoat to wear, but they don’t, which is so bad.
Hearing her say this, Kato bent down and took out a few pairs of clogs from the bottom of the cabinet: "Shoes like these come in different sizes. I thought you might be interested, Lord Gong."
Gong Zhili picked up the clogs and was about to say that they might not be used to wearing them, but when she saw the soles, she became uncertain: "Is this... rubber?"
Who would put anti-slip rubber pads under clogs?
The boss said nonchalantly: "It makes you walk more steadily when you wear this."
Gong Zhili: What a weird thing.
Bought it.
Her backpack was full of things, and she was holding several straw raincoats in her hands. She refused the boss's offer to help deliver the goods and returned with the things.
The weight was nothing to her now, but it was difficult to carry. When crossing the wooden pier, she raised her arms to prevent the raincoat from getting wet.
Geto Suguru on the other side of the lake: What is that—ah, it’s Miss Miya.
That's okay.
At first glance, it looks like a large ball of brown fur moving.
Mimiko didn't hesitate at all. When she saw her, she wanted to run down, but Geto grabbed her collar and said, "Wait, wait, your shoes aren't that waterproof."
Nanako quickly put the pebbles in her hand into the small basin - Geto Suguru had just finished teaching them and took them out to get some fresh air. She ran home with the basin in her hand. She wanted to give the beautiful pebbles to Lord Gong!
"Nanako, you are so cunning!" Mimiko, the twin, immediately understood her intention and quickly followed her.
Xia Yujie stood there, waiting for Gong Zhili to slowly move up, then reached out to take the raincoat and asked, "You bought so many...?"
Gong Zhili smiled proudly: "Straw raincoat and bamboo hat, how great, right?" He didn't expect that there would be such good things in the village.
Xia Yujie looked into her backpack and saw a normal raincoat and rain boots. He wondered, "What's so great about it?"
Gong Zhili: "It doesn't make sense to people like you who have no sense of artistic conception."
On a rainy day, wearing a straw raincoat and a bamboo hat, fishing by the lake, what an atmosphere!
Xia Yujie probably understood her thoughts a little bit and said in surprise: "Do you like this kind of traditional things?"
Gong Zhili took off the backpack on the porch and said, "Not all of them, I just happened to see them."
She packed the rain gear into the living room—well, this room was really used to store miscellaneous items—and she planned to put the finished cabinet into this utility room, which could hold a lot of things.
Then she shouldered her backpack, picked up her machete, put on her new rain boots, and asked Xia Yujie, "Do you want to go with me to cut taro stalks?"
Xia Yujie had the same idea, so he took his tools and went out with her.
The sky was still gloomy, and the dark clouds seemed lower than in the morning.
Gong Zhili dared to run in his rain boots: "It will rain heavily today, so let's cut the taro stalks first."
There is no shortage of food at home now, but the food is rather monotonous. She can't stand eating the same kind of food all the time, so she needs to expand her diet.
The mud on the lakeshore was half-soaked, making it slippery. Gong Zhili, with a machete in hand, pushed aside the reeds, revealing clusters of taro stalks lying sideways in the mud.
She warned Xia Yujie, "Pick straight ones, avoid those with black spots." She poked the base of the pole with the tip of her knife and pulled it diagonally, the blade wedging into the gap between the mud and the pole. With a flick of her wrist, the entire pole snapped free, mud-clumped in it. White specks oozed from the broken root. Xia Yujie imitated her, chopping down with the blade diagonally, slicing away the green skin with a snap, revealing a white core that oozed water.
"Don't rub your face with your hands, it's itchy." Gong Zhili picked up the sharpened pole and rinsed it in the lake. The white pulp spread in the water and quickly disappeared. The rinsed poles were placed on the rocks. The two of them worked quickly, and soon the rocks were full.
"It's coming." Xia Yujie looked at the sky while working and reminded Gong Zhili.
"Okay, okay." Gong Zhili pulled off some reed stalks and quickly twisted them into ropes, tying up the taro stalks neatly. Xia Yujie took the initiative to carry the large bundle, and Gong Zhili packed up their tools and rushed home.
Xia Yujie carried the things to the kitchen, and Gong Zhili used a bucket to fetch water, filling the large vats, urns and buckets in the kitchen with water.
Today's rain was more sensible than yesterday's. Not only did it wait until they finished all these things before falling, there wasn't even any wind.
Gong Zhili put all the taro stalks under the porch and said, "Pour the water you used to wash the taro stalks down there later."
When she and Geto Xia Yu went to deal with the taro, she belatedly asked, "Why didn't you use the curse spirit today?"
Xia Yujie's hand holding the taro paused for a moment, and he lowered his eyes: "This is training after all."
He felt that the appearance of the cursed spirit in this place was really abrupt.
Gong Zhili: "Does it consume a lot of mana?"
Geto Suguru uttered a vague "hmm".
Gong Zhili did not ask any more questions. She spread 3-5 cm thick dry wood ash on the bottom of the prepared wooden box, and stacked the taro in a layer to avoid contact with each other. She covered the surface of each layer of taro with wood ash of similar thickness, and repeated the stacking until the container was full. Finally, the ash completely covered the top layer. After doing this, she put the box and then the container in the utility room, and put a few pieces of wood underneath to isolate the moisture from the ground. After that, she checked it once a month, removed the taro that was rotten or sprouted due to improper storage, and replaced it with the damp wood ash. This could delay the sprouting and mildew of the taro, and she could take out some to eat on the way. When the weather cooled down completely, there would be no big problem. At least it could be preserved until January next year when taro was planted.
After processing the taro, she carried a low stool to the porch to wash the taro stalks. Xia Yujie admired her: "Do you really have to finish so much work in one day?"
Gong Zhili: "But we didn't do much work just now."
Geto Suguru choked.
Gong Zhili showed a clear expression: "I understand, but we farmers are like this, we always have life in our eyes."
Geto: "You're talking nonsense again."
How could she be a farmer?
--
Gong Zhili pressed down the base of the taro stalk, used a narrower long knife to split the green skin diagonally, cut off the leaves, and used the tip of the knife to dig out the brown hard core. He put the peeled stalk into a basin of water next to it, piled up the peeled taro cores, and Gong Zhili scooped up water and poured it in, scrubbing it quickly. He took out the soaked taro cores and spread them on a reed mat to drain some water.
The two children kept the stone stove burning very brightly. Gong Zhili put some taro stalks into the big pot and boiled them. When the time was right, he took them out and rinsed them with cold water. The taro stalks were boiled until they were translucent and could be fried or eaten cold.
She cut the remaining taro stalks that hadn't been put into the pot into suitable sections, put them into the basin, and instructed Xia Yujie to sprinkle coarse salt on them and then rub them. Xia Yujie supported his hands, which had been soaked in white wine, and was not sure: "Will this really work?"
Gong Zhili gave him a thumbs up in affirmation.
The taro stalks need to be salted to remove moisture first. Xia Yujie rubbed the taro stalks and looked down to see the twins standing around the basin watching his movements.
Geto: "You guys want to learn this?"
Mimiko shook her head and said, "This is very simple. We can do it, but Lord Gong said there are no gloves that fit our size, so he won't let us do it."
Xia Yujie turned to look at Gong Zhili and gritted his teeth slightly: "So there are special gloves?"
Gong Zhili exclaimed, "Oh!" "We do have food-grade gloves, but they're all my size." She stretched out her hand and placed it next to Xia Yujie's to compare—it was a whole circle smaller than his. "You can't use them."
Xia Yujie said nothing and just kept on killing the water.
The taro stalks over there had released a lot of water, so she put the basin on the stove to dry them. It was raining and she couldn't dry them in the sun, so she could only do this to remove some of the moisture.
During the baking process, she cut the taro stalks that she had taken out earlier into small pieces, poured oil into a hot pan, and sautéed the minced garlic. After hesitating for a while, she still did not add the chili pepper. The aroma and heat steamed together. She poured in the taro stalks, pressed the stems with a spatula, and then seasoned them with salt, soy sauce, and a little sugar. She stir-fried them for a short time. She liked the crispy taste.
When the dish was out of the pot, she weighed the appetite of the high school boy and scooped out some more flour.
She poured the flour into a bowl, added some salt, and added water in batches, stirring as she poured. Then she pushed the bowl to Geto Suguru and asked him to beat it into a flowing batter without any particles.
She took out the eggs that the store owner had given her when she went to buy chickens and ducks the day before yesterday, and felt that she should buy more to stock up before the chickens and ducks at home laid eggs.
She cracked a few eggs, stirred them well, sprinkled some chopped green onions in, brushed the frying pan on the small stove with oil, scooped a spoonful of batter into the pan, quickly turned the pan to spread it into thin round pancakes, fried them over medium-low heat until the edges curled up and the surface solidified, then turned them over. When both sides were slightly yellow, she picked them up with chopsticks and took them out of the pan. She made more than ten pancakes in one go.
Then she made some fried tofu. The edges of the tofu were slightly curled up on the brown surface, and the surface was covered with an attractive sauce with a rich aroma. The chili powder was oily red, and sprinkled with chopped green onions, the colors were complete.
At this time, the basin placed on the stove mouth had been manually rotated several times by Nanako, and the taro stalks were slightly wilted due to being baked. Gong Zhili felt that it was almost done, so he started to chop chili peppers. He chopped a lot and poured them into the basin. This time, Xia Yujie refused to rub it with his hands no matter what. He picked up a wooden spoon and spread it slowly. Gong Zhili let him do it, then smashed the garlic, cut the ginger into shreds, and spread the garlic and ginger shreds on the bottom of the ceramic pot that had been rolled in hot water.
Xia Yujie neatly arranged the evenly coated taro stalk cores, and then Gong Zhili pressed on a large stone that had been carefully washed, rinsed with hot water, and rolled in white wine, and finally covered the pottery jar with the lid and filled the edge with water to seal it tightly.
This can can be eaten for a long time. By the way, the sour taro can also be made sweet, but I don’t know if anyone will like it. I’ll try the new flavor after the rain stops.
It was raining heavily. On sunny days, the large living room felt very airy and cool, but on rainy days, it felt too empty, so they simply sat in the kitchen and had lunch.
Xia Yujie watched the twins go to take a nap without fail. He stared at the rain outside in a daze. Gong Zhili pulled a stool and sat next to him: "Xia Yu-kun."
Xia Yujie came back to his senses and said with a bit of amusement: "What?"
Gong Zhili was curious: "Do sorcerers really make money like this? Gojo-kun easily makes 50 million."
Only then did Geto Suguru realize that the box that Satoru brought in the morning contained 50 million.
Is this probably the price of the deal? He also needs to work hard to make money.
"He comes from the Gojo family, 50 million is not a lot for him."
Miya Chiri: "There are also such large families in the world of curses... Have they existed for a long time?"
Geto: "About a few hundred years?"
He had only been in school for a few days and had not yet been exposed to information in this area. What he knew was what Wu told him all at once after they had a fight.
Gong Zhili propped up his chin, resting his elbows on his knees, and asked, "How many students are there at Jujutsu High School? Are the teachers easy to get along with?"
Geto is stuck.
He remembered that when he was invited to study at the Jujutsu High School, the adults in his family had doubted the legitimacy of the school.
He tried his best to beautify the school environment: "The teachers in the school are very responsible. The school is very spacious, with single dormitories. You can take on tasks while you are in school, and the rewards for the tasks are generous."
Gong Zhili was silent for a moment after hearing this, not knowing whether to complain that his rhetoric sounded like a real estate salesman's. The "natural oxygen bar" he mentioned was just a forest and a pond outside the complex, and the "quiet place amidst the hustle and bustle" he mentioned was actually just the suburbs and the station...
"Is there a lot of people in school?" she asked. Since everyone can live in a single dormitory, there must not be many students.
Geto Summer Oil slowly shook his head.
Gong Zhili had a bad feeling in his heart: "Not many...how many people? Dozens of people?"
Geto Xia Yu lowered his head and held his forehead.
Gong Zhili's heart skipped a beat: "Then... a dozen people?"
Geto Xia Yu now covered half of his face with his hands.
Gong Zhili's heart sank. "Why are there only two specialized schools in the country, and your students are so poor?"
Geto Suguru remained silent, he couldn't explain the reason.
Gong Zhili murmured: "I need to think about it carefully."
Xia Yujie thought of her twins at home and was able to put himself in her shoes: "If you want to live an ordinary life, there are ways."
Gong Zhili shook his head: "They can't live a normal life - and it's better not to."
Xia Yujie was stunned for a moment, then immediately understood what she meant and said, "Then how do you want to train them?"
Miya Chiri sighed, "It's still a mystery. How about Geto-kun? Why do you want to be a sorcerer? You went to a regular school for junior high, right?"
Geto Suguru is not the type of person who would analyze his inner character with others, but at this moment, he was looking at the rain outside through the glass door of the balcony. The whole world was isolated from the pain and irritability, and he could actually say some words.
"No matter what, sorcerers are the 'oddballs' among the crowd," said Geto Suguru, "people always subconsciously seek out those of their own kind."
Gong Zhili could understand this point very well.
Race, appearance, origin, class, accent, living habits... these things are dividing human beings all the time.
She originally wanted to say that it was good that Geto Suguru finally found someone of his kind who accepted him, but then she thought of the cursed jades he swallowed and the unknown terrible taste.
She reached out and patted Geto's shoulder: "Next time I will try to make the Curse Jade more delicious."
Geto Xia Yu was bewildered: "Why did the topic suddenly jump here... But thank you in advance."
The author has something to say:
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I feel that the resentment at work can really give birth to a lot of cursed spirits...Hahahaha, I feel like my spirit is hovering on a certain edge every day.
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