Jiang Qiao smiled slightly and said, "Grandpa Qiao, I'm giving this to you. You can use it however you like."
The old man looked at Jiang Qiao in surprise. "Give it to me? Girl, do you know that this kind of thing is rare and hard to come by? You really want to give it to your grandfather?"
Jiang Qiao shrugged. "Of course, I have no use for this stuff. Grandpa Qiao, take a look and see if there's anything wrong with the mushrooms and herbs I picked. If there's nothing wrong, then I'll continue."
After seeing all that Jiang Qiao had made, Qiao Jie couldn't help but sigh, "Talent is something else entirely. Girl, you should learn more from your grandpa in the future. You're much better than I was back then."
Jiang Qiao was very curious about why the old man studied medicine back then. Qiao Jie sighed, "I didn't want to either, but it's a family tradition. My brothers and the others had accidents one after another. If I don't learn it, who will? We can't let this knowledge be lost, can we?"
But now I'm quite grateful to my dad. He forced me to learn it back then, and now it's become my livelihood.
The old man became somewhat depressed when talking about his family. After all, his entire family had been killed by the Japanese, leaving him all alone. It was always a sad thing to talk about.
Jiang Qiao didn't want to see the old man looking downcast, so she rolled her eyes and pointed to a pheasant flashing by in the distance. "Grandpa Qiao, look, there's a pheasant. I'll hunt one for you to eat with your drinks tonight."
Qiao Jie tried to stop Jiang Qiao, but the little girl was agile and had already run away before she could even speak.
"Hey girl, slow down! Wild pheasants aren't that easy to catch. If they were, they would have been wiped out long ago. Be careful not to fall!"
Jiang Qiao's idea wasn't impulsive; she had been thinking about it all along. If she didn't show off her skills, she would have to be careful and timid at home in the future, and she would have to find a good excuse to eat meat. So she decided to let the old man broaden his horizons today, at least to lay the foundation for him to be able to eat meat in the future.
When Qiao Jie saw the rabbits and pheasants Jiang Qiao was carrying, he was dumbfounded. "You...you picked all of these up?"
The only thing he could think of was that someone in the mountains might have dug traps or set snares, but he didn't believe Jiang Qiao had that ability.
Jiang Qiao grinned, showing his little teeth. "Grandpa Qiao, someone else would have snatched up this good thing long ago. How could it possibly be our turn? To tell you the truth, I did all of this, really, I'm not lying to you..."
Jiang Qiao used the tricks she learned from her uncle as a shield again, and even said that she had never given up practicing them.
"So, I just wanted to give it a try, and I didn't expect it to actually work. From now on, whenever you're craving meat, I'll come and hunt pheasants for you."
Qiao Jie felt like he had struck gold, but at the same time he felt sorry for Jiang Qiao. He sighed inwardly at how stupid Wang Dahua and the Jiang family had been. She was clearly a talented child, but the Jiang family had ruined her to such an extent.
The old man shook his head with a smile on his face. "You little rascal, you've really hidden it well. If the Jiang family had known you could hunt, they definitely wouldn't have let you go so easily. But it's good this way, it's actually a good thing for your grandpa Qiao. I'll have a treat in the future."
Seeing the old man like this, Jiang Qiao couldn't help but grin. "That's right, they all made a fool of themselves. If they had treated me well, would I have come out like this?"
"That's good, though. It'll give us both some peace and quiet. Grandpa Qiao, how about we make some roast chicken now? I brought the seasonings with me."
The old man also became interested. It was already noon, and he was hungry. Besides, he was craving roast chicken.
"Okay, come on, Grandpa will take you to the water to do it—"
Jiang Qiao was immediately overjoyed. "Really? There's water in these mountains?"
The old man proudly raised his chin and said, "That's right, there are still fish in there, but they're not easy to catch. Come on, let's go eat."
Master Qiao spent many years collecting herbs in the mountains, so he was very familiar with the terrain. The water was located in the inner part of the mountains, where spring water from the mountains converged.
The river water was crystal clear, and you could see fish and shrimp swimming in it. Jiang Qiao immediately became interested, rolled up his trousers, and went into the river to catch fish. The old man just chuckled as he processed pheasants and rabbits by the stream. It wasn't that he didn't want to eat the fish, but he didn't have the skill. He just thought that Jiang Qiao was letting the child play in the river.
Just as the old man said, those fish were very cunning. As soon as you approached, they would dodge away. Jiang Qiao struggled for a long time but didn't catch a single fish.
"So cunning! I refuse to believe I can't catch you—"
Qiao Jie let Jiang Qiao frolic in the water while he cooked, watching with a smile as the little girl showed a rare display of childlike innocence.
Believe it or not, after summarizing her experience and lessons learned, Jiang Qiao changed her approach and started hitting the fish with a stick. Whether it was because she was strong or what, after her bombardment, several large fish actually surfaced.
"Haha, Grandpa Qiao, look, I caught a big fish."
Seeing Jiang Qiao excitedly waving the fish in her hand at him, Qiao Jie smiled and shook his head. "It's good to be young. If it were me, I would probably be exhausted by now. Alright, girl, stop. Take this fish home and we'll stew it for dinner. With fish and meat, and a little wine, even the gods wouldn't trade this life."
The grandfather and grandson ate and drank on the mountain for a while, and had gathered almost everything they needed. They hurried down the mountain to walk back, which would take quite a while. Although the old man had been traveling around for many years, he was already seventy years old, and even so, his energy was not as good as when he came.
When passing through a village, Jiang Qiao noticed about a dozen boys chasing and beating a boy who looked older than her.
Although she looked down on those who bullied the weak, these people were not really her concern. She originally wanted to turn her head away and ignore them so as not to get upset.
But after turning her head away, she felt a strange mix of emotions, a dull ache, and a suffocating feeling that made it hard to breathe.
She didn't know what was going on. Could it be that even God couldn't stand her indifferent behavior and was giving her a warning?
Jiang Qiao's uncomfortable expression caught the old man's attention. "Girl, what's wrong? Are you feeling unwell?"
Qiao Jie assumed Jiang Qiao was exhausted from being on the mountain. This kid usually doesn't go out, and if he suddenly went out, most people couldn't handle it.
Jiang Qiao clutched her chest, looking puzzled, and said, "Grandpa Qiao, I feel terrible, and I don't know why. I guess it's because seeing someone get beaten reminded me of what happened to me back then."
This is probably the only explanation Jiang Qiao can give; in fact, she herself doesn't know why.
Seeing his granddaughter's distress, the old man felt sorry for her and turned to yell at the boys.
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