"It's under the east window..."
Sweetie hid behind Fang Qiao in fear.
Fang Qiao was also a little scared, but she was the only adult in the house, so she had to step up even if she was scared.
After all, Sweetie was already scared and crying, so the mother and daughter couldn't just hug each other and cry together.
Fang Qiao took out a fire poker from the kitchen. It was a long thing and quite good for self-defense.
Following Tian Tian's suggestion, Fang Qiao cautiously approached the east window. From a distance, she saw a green snake with an oval head and a green body, and immediately breathed a sigh of relief.
Green tree snakes are non-venomous, have a very docile temperament, and are even somewhat timid. They do not attack people. Fang Qiao has seen and eaten many of them during his years working in the countryside.
At first, she didn't dare to eat it. She was a cook, that's true, but this thing was too scary. She had been afraid of it since she was a child.
The same applies to other female educated youth.
But the countryside was too poor, and they couldn't smell meat all year round. Later, as long as it was edible meat, these girls didn't care anymore, because it would taste pretty good when stewed.
"Don't be afraid, Sweetie. This snake isn't poisonous and won't bite."
After calming the child down, Fang Qiao used a fire poker to poke at the snake on the ground.
The snake remained motionless even when disturbed, its body stiff, clearly frozen solid.
Fang Qiao thought about it and realized that snakes are cold-blooded animals, and their body temperature changes with the external temperature. Therefore, they must hibernate in winter to adapt to the low temperature, otherwise they will freeze to death.
This snake is currently hibernating, and it's unlikely that it would have come out of its hibernation nest on its own. Therefore, it's highly probable that this was the work of a wicked person.
"Sweetie, tell Auntie, where did this snake come from?"
Fang Qiao gently stroked Tian Tian's hair, using her tenderness to dispel her inner fear.
Sweetie hugged Fang Qiao's legs tightly with both hands, bit her lower lip, and mustered up her courage to whisper, "Auntie, Auntie, she didn't run away. Someone threw her in from outside. She almost got thrown into my washbasin."
Fang Qiao looked outside in the direction Tian Tian was pointing. On the wall, a withered blade of grass swayed in the cold wind.
Outside the wall, Cheng Hongmei and Huang Yan stood side by side at the base of the wall, heads tucked in.
The silence was eerily quiet. The two women looked at each other, feeling uneasy. Cheng Hongmei asked, "Mom, why did the child only cry out once in the yard and then go silent? Aren't Fang Qiao scared if a snake gets into the house? Why didn't she cry out?"
"It probably wasn't scared enough." Huang Yan complained subconsciously, "Hongmei, I just said that it wouldn't work if you used a small green snake. It's not poisonous and won't scare people. If you're going to use one, you should have used a poisonous one."
Cheng Hongmei: "I wouldn't dare touch anything poisonous. What if someone gets bitten? They could die."
"In the dead of winter, even snakes are frozen stiff and can't move. You're such a coward."
Cheng Hongmei grumbled discontentedly, "You say I'm a coward, but you don't even go out into the fields to catch snakes yourselves. Do you think snake dens are easy to find? You'd be lucky to catch even a small green snake..."
Before she could even utter the word "δΊ†", Cheng Hongmei suddenly felt a chill on her head, followed by a cold sensation that slid down her neck, instantly raising goosebumps on her skin.
"What's this? It's so cold. Is it snowing?"
She subconsciously reached up and touched her neck. The scales felt slippery and cool to the touch. She scratched them in confusion, then belatedly realized what was happening and her body suddenly stiffened.
She writhed in terror, trying to shake the snake off, her face contorted, her voice trembling as she pleaded for help: "Ahhh, snake! Snake! Mom! Mom... help me get it off, get it off."
Huang Yan ignored Cheng Hongmei's pleas for help, her tone full of disdain: "It's a frozen dead snake, and you caught it yourself. What are you afraid of?"
Trying to scare people by catching snakes backfired; he's got no guts at all.
Cheng Hongmei finally managed to shake the snake off her body after a lot of effort. Hearing her own mother say this, she felt extremely wronged: "I, I was just afraid it would crawl into my clothes."
"So what if we go inside? There's no poison in there."
Huang Yan was too lazy to look at Cheng Hongmei's cowardly and fearful appearance, and rolled her eyes speechlessly.
Looking up again, they saw Fang Qiao staring coldly at them from over the wall, which made them even angrier.
That brat, why hasn't she miscarried yet?!
What a waste of that layer of ice I spent most of last night working on yesterday.
Cheng Hongmei also saw Fang Qiao, her eyes widened immediately, and she said angrily, "Fang Qiao! I knew it was you!"
Fang Qiao glanced at her indifferently: "What's wrong with me?"
"You're so vicious! You deliberately threw a snake down my neck to scare me!" Cheng Hongmei gritted her teeth.
Fang Qiao: "You caught the snake yourself. I'm just giving you a taste of your own medicine. You deserve to suffer the consequences of your actions."
"What are you comparing or talking about? Just because you're from the city doesn't mean you're so great. Even if you're capable, you still end up in the countryside farming. Stop spouting nonsense that we don't understand."
Cheng Hongmei was most annoyed by Fang Qiao's calm and collected demeanor, which made her seem like a brainless shrew from the village. She was so angry that her eyes turned red, and she kicked the snake several times as if to vent her anger.
Fang Qiao was too lazy to listen to Cheng Hongmei's scolding, so she turned around, left the courtyard wall, and took Tian Tian's hand to go back to the kitchen.
Outside the wall, Huang Yan grabbed Cheng Hongmei's arm.
"Alright, stop stepping on it, everyone's gone." Huang Yan bent down and picked up the frozen snake: "What a waste. At least it's some meat; we can take it home and have a meal."
On the way home, Cheng Hongmei said with dissatisfaction, "Mom, why didn't you help me scold her just now! She bullied me to death."
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