Chapter 586 Full Moon at Mid-Autumn Festival, Still Sharing the View with Old Friends
Upon hearing Li Erxiong's words, Li's mother rolled her eyes at him and turned to Li Erlang and Li Sanlang, saying, "Grandma loves you both the same way. It's just that your eldest brother is away from home this year, so Grandma misses him a little more."
Then the conversation naturally turned to which restaurant or eatery in the neighborhood to have dinner.
"As you're saying you're going out to eat, I almost forgot that you two didn't know someone was sending us holiday gifts this morning since the boss wasn't home."
After Li's mother finished speaking, she stood up to get the Mid-Autumn Festival gifts that others had sent to the Li family to show to Li San Niang and Li Er Xiong. Wu Qiaolan was quick-witted and stood up directly, saying, "I'll go get them. Bao Ya will come with me."
Mother Li nodded, but not only Wu Qiaolan and Bao Ya went, but Li Ersao and Li Sanlang also went to the side room to get the gift boxes.
After a while, Li San Niang and Li Er Xiong saw that there were seven or eight gift boxes on the table, which filled the table completely. The two walked to Li's mother's side and listened to her explain one by one which family sent them.
"These two were sent by the Xing family. They said they were new designs and were called mooncakes, specially for the Mid-Autumn Festival."
Pointing to the four palm-sized mooncakes in the square gift box covered with brocade, Li's mother said to Li San Niang, "After all, the Li family's relationship with the Xing family started because Li San Niang saved the young master of the Xing family."
"Judging from this, it must have been filled, placed in a mold, tapped out, and then baked in an oven. It smells of oil."
Mother Li then pointed to the others and said, "Listen, there are also gifts from members of the exchange hall, from Wang Ye's family and Bi Yuanjia's family. However, Mother Li didn't specifically mention the holiday gifts from Tang Mingyue and Chen Yanfu."
Li's mother simply listed all the families who had sent Mid-Autumn Festival gifts to the Li family for the first time. After all, she had already prepared return gifts for those families she had previously interacted with.
After finishing talking about Li San Niang's social interactions, Li's mother pointed to another gift box on the table and said to Li Er Xiong, "Look, this one was sent by the Wang family's herbal medicine shop in Chongye Fang. And this one, they said it was from Doctor Zhou's family. The person who came to deliver the gift was a young man I don't know."
Li Erxiong explained to Li's mother: "Wang's youngest son was separated and took over part of the medicinal herb business from his father. I helped him contact some herb farmers to go to his family's pharmacy. I guess this is a thank-you gift."
As for this week's doctor, he was someone I met when I accompanied Third Sister to the military camp in the outskirts of Beijing to give a lecture to the doctors in the Department of Ulcer Medicine at the Imperial Medical Academy.
He approached me privately twice, and I gave him individual pointers on the suturing techniques; we became quite familiar with each other.
Li's mother nodded, "Alright, you two know what to do."
Since we know each other, I'll just return the gift as is customary in reciprocal exchanges.
"Oh, thank you for your hard work, Mother."
Meanwhile, Li Dalang, who was on the border town of Shule and was being remembered by the Li family, was doing quite well today.
Because it was the Mid-Autumn Festival, the army stationed on the outskirts of Shule did not give everyone a holiday. However, apart from some soldiers on duty, the other soldiers only trained for half a morning. At noon, the commander-in-chief had a flock of sheep brought over. A messenger shouted, "Today is the Mid-Autumn Festival. The general has specially spent money to buy a flock of sheep so that everyone can have a good meal and have some fun together."
So, Li Dalang was currently rubbing salt on the cleaned half of the sheep, which had been skewered on branches and roasted over the fire.
The injuries he sustained earlier have long since healed after so much time to recuperate. Apart from the scars scattered all over his body, Li Dalang now looks more like a man than before he joined the army.
How so?
It's like fine wine that has been aged and refined over time, shedding its immaturity and becoming mellow and resilient.
Looking at Li Dalang, if he weren't still young, he would be even more manly than Brother Li.
If the Li family were to see Li Dalang now, they probably wouldn't recognize him.
As night fell, Li Dalang held a bowl of roasted mutton and leaned close to the fire. Although it was summer, it was still quite chilly on the grassland at night if you didn't wear enough clothes.
Looking at the round moon in the sky, Li Dalang wondered what the members of the Li family were doing.
The time spent lost in thought was short when someone called his nickname "Tiger Head." Li Dalang, who was still feeling a bit sad and missing his family, turned around and saw that it was Nineteen, and immediately smiled.
That touch of melancholy was completely shattered by the talkative Nineteen.
"Where did you get this wine? The general may be able to relax a bit today, but there was no mention of drinking."
Nineteen came over carrying two small wine jugs, each weighing eight ounces, and then took out two small wine cups from his pocket.
"The general didn't say we couldn't drink."
The junior officers in the main tent are all drinking. It's alright, this is just a small eight-ounce wine jug, very low in alcohol, it only has a taste of wine.
"I don't want to drink..."
Nineteen stopped Li Dalang from finishing his sentence: "I know, I know. I've been with Third Sister in the Li family for so long, how could I not know that you don't drink?"
So, haha, just kidding. Both bottles contain chilled rice wine, which is sweet and won't make you drunk.
I got this through connections, from someone else.
"If I didn't know you and Physician Sun in this huge military camp, and if Physician Sun hadn't been summoned to the city, I wouldn't have come to you with this."
Li Dalang smiled. He knew that Shijiu said that on purpose, probably because he was afraid that Shijiu would miss home while he was alone here. He came to see him and comfort him.
Li Dalang took the small wine cup, uncorked it, and smelled it under his nose. It was indeed the smell of rice wine.
After pouring the wine into the wine cups, the two clinked them together and drank it. Li Dalang did indeed feel a slight coolness in his mouth.
"It really is chilled. Wow, you guys even have this kind of connections."
"Hey, even in a border town, there are still rich people. If the rich people in this town want to eat something good, they naturally have ways to do it. We're just taking advantage of their situation."
The two chatted leisurely, eating roasted mutton with rice wine, while listening to soldiers singing nearby.
Although Li Dalang couldn't understand the dialect, the tune sounded nice. He thought to himself, "Next year, next year I can go home and see my grandparents, my parents, my second uncle, and my aunt. I wonder how Erlang is doing as an official."
Did Sanlang and Xiao Si not get bullied at the academy?
Has the dewdrop grown taller?
Has Kogoro become more fluent in his speech?
..."
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