Chapter 11: Fake Couple Meeting
Chen Yao and his group set out before dawn with their loads on their shoulders, heading straight for Wanhe Township.
Because they still had to go to the eastern suburbs, which was a long journey, Huang Xing knew that the children might have to return home later than usual today, so she couldn't help but worry.
Before leaving, he held Chen Yao's hand and repeatedly reminded her to be careful.
"Don't worry, aunt. Nothing will happen with me here." Huang Dongsheng hid the sickle under the tofu plate and looked at the two plates of tofu and ten dried bean curd sticks in the basket on the left, and the food for his father and others on the right.
A full can of sweet soy milk and roasted and ground soybean powder were placed together, which made him carry the load more carefully than usual, for fear of spilling the food inside.
Because my cousin said that my father and cousin-in-law were quarrying in the eastern suburbs and they would definitely not have enough to eat. Although there was no decent food at home, roasted soybean powder could not only fill the stomach but was also convenient to carry.
When you are hungry, you can take it out and eat a few bites at any time without worrying about others snatching the food away.
The narrow path was filled with thick fog. Yang Wenying watched Huang Dongsheng, who was carrying a load and walking in front of her, gradually disappear. She fell behind and became very anxious. She hurriedly called out, "Ayao!"
Chen Yao, who was leading the way, stood still, waiting for the two people behind to catch up, "What's wrong?"
The fog was so thick, they should be able to see the embracing tree that Dad mentioned if they hadn’t taken the wrong path!
Chen Yao felt that it was not that she was unwilling to see Yang Jizong, but that it was really not appropriate to travel far today.
Yang Wenying listened to the cuckooing birds around her and shrank her neck in fear: "Why don't we wait until the fog clears and the sun comes out before we go? What if we take the wrong road?"
Huang Dongsheng, carrying his load, immediately retorted, "Impossible! How could my cousin have taken the wrong road? Didn't we take the right road when we went to Shahe Township before? Just follow my cousin."
Even without a GPS and surrounded by wild mountains, Huang Dongsheng was still so firmly convinced that she had not led everyone astray.
Chen Yao: Cousin, thank you!
Huang Dongsheng looked at his cousin, scratched his hair, raised his head and looked around, and asked, "Cousin, what are you looking for?"
"There's a cucurbita tree nearby. Can you help me take a look? Can you see it?"
"What is a cucurbita arborvitae and what does it look like?" Huang Dongsheng put down his burden, pulled out the sickle from inside, and chopped at the bushes around him that were as tall as a person. He was about to open a small path on the slope next to him.
Yang Wenying suddenly pointed to the old tree at the intersection in front of her right and said, "Look, is that the one?"
The three of them walked over quickly and saw the embracing tree clearly.
The century-old tree, which should have been lush and leafy, seemed to have been struck by lightning. Its thick trunk was hollowed out, and its entire body was black and covered with moss. The strong trunk was entangled and deformed by vines, and it looked like an old tree.
Just when everyone was feeling sorry, they saw a small tree as tall as a person growing on the other side of the hollowed-out ancient tree. Under the protection of the ancient tree, the tree absorbed enough nutrients and became full of vitality.
At first glance, the old tree uses its remains to support the young trees, just like an elder supporting them.
Chen Yao stared at the tree in a trance until a ray of sunlight penetrated the clouds and parted the thick fog. Then she said to the two of them, "Let's go. We haven't taken the wrong path."
Huang Dongsheng followed her with his load on his shoulder, pouting at Yang Wenying: "See, I told you it was right to follow your cousin, and you didn't believe me!"
"I don't disbelieve it, don't talk nonsense!" Yang Wenying followed Huang Dongsheng beside his shoulder pole and argued with him. The two of them didn't notice that Chen Yao secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
My cousin is also very carefree. Ever since I gave him a chance, he seems to have some mindless worship of me. He obeys any decision I make unconditionally.
But sometimes it is also thanks to having him by my side.
Chen Yao remembered that her father said that they would see the embracing tree if they walked towards it, but she led the two of them with their backs to the ancient tree, which meant they had taken the wrong path. Fortunately, they changed direction in time.
After the sun came out, Chen Yao regained confidence in his sense of direction. Following the "signposts" provided by his father, the three of them finally arrived at Wanhe Township.
"Cousin, let me carry the load for a while, you take a break." He had been carrying the load for the entire morning without even putting it down to take a break. It was really hard for him.
Just as Chen Yao was about to take over the burden from Huang Dongsheng, Yang Wenying snatched it away: "I'll do it."
Yang Wenying squatted down and grabbed the ropes at both ends of the carrying pole with both hands. When she stood up again, she didn't expect the load to be so heavy. She gritted her teeth, picked up the load and walked forward. The carrying pole pressed against the coarse linen clothes, causing her shoulders to ache.
Huang Dongsheng watched her swaying with the load on her shoulder, and was extremely anxious from behind: "Slow down, don't spill the soy milk!"
If it spills, what will dad drink?
Chen Yao simply followed the two of them and started selling things.
Wanhe Township is surrounded by mountains and the village is low-lying. Even though the sun is high in the sky, the village looks extremely desolate. The fields are overgrown with weeds and no one takes care of them. There don't seem to be many people in the village.
"Cousin, why do I feel that this place is even poorer than our village?" We passed by several thatched huts in a row. They were all abandoned for a long time and half-collapsed with no one living in them. The ones who lived there were all elderly people in their seventies who were guarding the empty houses alone.
When he heard that they were selling tofu, he waved his hands and said no.
I told the old people that they could exchange things at home for tofu, but they said that not even a mouse would come to their house, so how could they have anything useful to exchange.
When asked what they usually eat, the elders pointed at the mountains with their sticks and said, "If you can't survive, go into the mountains."
Yang Wenying whispered, "We can live off the land and fill our stomachs by digging some mushrooms and wild vegetables in the mountains."
The old man smiled sadly at her words. "All my children and grandchildren have been drafted into military service. We, old bones, can't even till the land. If we can't pay the rent next year, we'll be dead. What's the point of continuing to live?"
Yang Wenying suddenly understood what the old man meant.
The sun was shining brightly, but after hearing what the old man said, the three of them felt as if they were in a cold ice cellar.
The hardships of tenant farmers cannot be understood unless one sees them with one's own eyes and experiences them firsthand, or relies solely on a few words to describe them.
For tenant farmers, farming is their livelihood, but if God is unwilling to give them food, the rent collected will really cost the lives of the tenant farmers and their entire family.
Huang Dongsheng tugged at his cousin's sleeve, motioning her to look into the distance.
Everywhere you look, there seems to be an old man standing in front of every thatched house in the village, waiting for death.
Chen Yao's eyes were red, and she said to the old man with a slightly nasal tone: "Are all the young and middle-aged men in our village serving in the eastern suburbs?"
"Ah, yes, my son left after last year's autumn harvest. If he were still alive, he would be back around this time next year. Unfortunately, I won't be around until then." The old man looked at the overgrown weeds in front of and behind his house and muttered to himself, "It's better not to come back. There's no way he can survive if he does."
It’s better to die, because when you die, everything will be clear!
"You have to stay alive. Only by surviving can you see hope. We are going to the East Suburb Quarry. What's your son's name? I will go see him and tell him that you are waiting for him to come back home." Chen Yao squatted down and held the old man's hand.
The old woman shuddered and clutched the hand tightly, as if grasping a life-saving straw, but her eyes, blinded by tears, could no longer see the people in front of her: "My son's name is Youfu, and my eldest grandson's name is Goudan. If you see them, please tell them a message for me."
"What?"
"Don't go back to the village. There is no home for them here anymore."
Chen Yao distributed tofu and long-lasting bean curd sheets to the elderly people who stayed behind in the village, one portion per person, from the beginning to the end of the village, and she didn't even finish giving out a whole plate of tofu.
Yang Wenying held the sand table in her hands and burst into tears as she looked at the many names on it.
They went to the eastern suburbs with the expectations of these old people to bring messages to Youfu, Goudan, Tiedan, Maizi, Dahe... and them.
"If they come back alive, their families are waiting for them in the village."
Huang Dongsheng wiped away his tears while carrying his load: "Cousin, I will never say that soybeans are worthless again. I will work hard and come to bring them food no matter how far away I am."
Chen Yao turned her face away and hummed.
Before leaving, the three children made an agreement with the elderly in the village that they would visit them every two days and asked them to persevere, even for the children.
Chen Yao told the elders that if the children came back and found that you were gone, wouldn’t they really become rootless duckweed? Children without parents are like weeds!
The old people in the village burst into tears after hearing this, crying about the miserable lives of the children, and cursing the wealthy families who didn't care about their lives or deaths and only cared about collecting rent.
The closer they got to the East Suburb Quarry, the heavier their hearts became. They no longer had the joy they had when they set out at home.
Yang Wenying actually began to get scared. If anyone among the names on the sand table died, how would they tell the elderly people in Wanhe Township when they returned?
But when they appeared near the quarry, they were all stunned when they saw the group of people who were in tattered clothes, covered in dirt, and could not be distinguished from each other.
Chen Yao's ears were filled with the clanging of stones, the cursing of the officers, and even the sound of the whips in their hands hitting human flesh. She could clearly hear it.
In the past, she thought that redeeming Yang Jizong would be even with him, and they would no longer owe each other anything.
But looking at this group of people today, Chen Yao felt dizzy and dazed. She pulled Yang Wenying and Huang Dongsheng and said, "Let's go find an officer to find out who is your uncle and your brother!"
Huang Dongsheng immediately called a servant.
Chen Yao handed the three of them a pass to the officer and reported their purpose truthfully, saying that they were just carrying tofu to sell in various villages and were passing by the eastern suburbs to visit their relatives.
After saying this, he offered all the remaining pieces of tofu in the basket.
The officer glanced at the three of them, his eyes falling on the faces of Shen Yao and Yang Wenying.
Huang Dongsheng immediately stepped forward to stand in the middle. The officer then asked his men to collect the tofu and go to the quarry to call the relatives they were looking for.
The three of them waited outside the quarry for a whole incense stick of time before they saw the officers leading two skinny men over.
Huang Dongsheng looked at his father in front of him and didn't dare to recognize him for a moment. Is this really the tall father in his memory?
"father?"
"Dongsheng, Ayao, why are you here?" As soon as Huang Songbai opened his mouth, he saw his son about to pounce on him.
The officer drew his sword and stopped the man, "What do you want to do?"
"I...he is my father, I want to talk to my father." Huang Dongsheng looked at the blade flashing with white light and stopped in fear.
"Sir, we will just chat here and give them some food before we leave." Chen Yao handed the soybean powder to him for inspection. "This is soybean powder ground by ourselves. If you don't mind, you can try it."
The officer saw that there was nothing unusual about them and that the cloth bag was indeed filled with soybean powder, so he let the two men go.
"Don't play tricks, otherwise you will be executed on the spot!" The officer whispered a threat to Yang Jizong.
Chen Yao was close by and could hear it too. When the officer stood farther away, she looked up and saw Yang Jizong's face.
How should I put it? Yang Jizong now is a little different from what I remember.
Chen Yao lowered her head guiltily and thought, the old saying is true, a phoenix without feathers is no better than a chicken, no matter how successful a person is, once he enters the quarry, he will be worse off than a beggar!
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