Song Tantan wanted to say something, but when she saw the gold ingot lying in her palm, her eyes lit up immediately. She waved her chubby arm generously and said, "I'll let it go this time because you're young. Remember to speak properly next time."
"I'm nine years old." Ye Moxun pursed his lips, emphasizing each word, the subtext being that she was at most six years old, three years younger than him.
“I have food, water, and medicine. Who do you think is the boss?” Song Tantan said confidently.
“You’re my sister.” Ye Moxun immediately cooperated without any principles.
"You have to know your own limitations, or you'll starve to death." Song Tantan stood on a low stool, slightly taller than Ye Moxun, and patted the latter on the shoulder.
Ten days later, it still didn't rain. This time, Song Tantan went to the crack in the rock to release the water in the middle of the night. Song Zhuiyan helped her keep watch. After finishing her business, she quietly returned to the village. The next day, everyone knelt and prayed to the heavens again, hoping that they could continue to receive water to drink.
After resting for about twenty days, Zhong Qingyi was able to walk, but he still had to stay in bed most of the time. He couldn't stand or sit for long periods of time, and he still needed to take his medicine. It would take him three or four months to fully recover from his injury.
He was quite curious about how Song Zhuiyan and his group were able to find food and meat to eat. The Great Jin Dynasty had been devastated in recent years, with more than half of the people starving to death and the trees on the mountain withered. Where did they get those chickens, ducks, and vegetables?
Zhong Qingyi had many questions in his mind. He asked Ye Moxun what was going on, and the latter replied with a serious expression, "This matter is rather fantastical. The other refugees can regularly obtain water from a crevice in the rocks on the mountain. The food was left behind by the villagers of this village before, and there wasn't much; it's almost gone."
Song Tantan and her aunt were lucky; they always managed to find pheasants, wild ducks, and other small animals in the mountains. Everyone said it was a miracle, a sign from heaven that they were given a chance to survive.
Zhong Qingyi stared blankly. What had he just heard?
Did Heaven intervene? If Heaven has eyes, how could it allow the Great Jin Dynasty to suffer from a drought for three long years, during which some prefectures even experienced earthquakes and locust plagues, causing widespread suffering and misery among the people?
But if it weren't for God's mercy, how would this group of refugees, mostly children, have found food and water, been able to get water again after drinking it once, and how would the Song family girl have been able to find wild animals? If it weren't for the fact that it happened right before his eyes, he would have really thought it was a rumor.
Despite his complicated feelings and inner turmoil, Zhong Qingyi still chose to believe, after all, he had consumed a lot of meat broth and medicine.
"By the way, where did you find those medicines? Can you still buy medicine outside? This area seems to be all wilderness." Zhong Qingyi led Ye Moxun on their escape, and along the way they had conflicts with many people, including refugees who wanted to rob them, as well as Hu people and bandits composed of some of the refugees.
Although he had been fighting all the way, he still clearly remembered that in the days before he was seriously injured and collapsed, he was on a deserted road or in a deserted mountain. The group of Hu people were very troublesome and chased him for several days. He was forced to come to this area. There were probably no people around here for miles.
"It was found by the Hu people. Sister Song and the others also had some medicine on them and found some dried herbs on the mountain. Oh, Sister Song knows some herbs. She and Tantan are not ordinary people." Ye Moxun gave an ambiguous explanation.
However, Zhong Qingyi trusted her nephew and didn't suspect anything. She just said, "I guess they used to be daughters of wealthy families. It's all because of this world. Have you asked their families if they got separated or what?"
If they got separated, he can help her find her family after he recovers from his injuries, as a way of repaying her kindness. He can never repay the life-saving grace, so he can only try his best to help them.
Ye Moxun lowered his eyes and said softly, "They have no other family members."
"It seems they all perished during their escape, leaving only these two frail women," Zhong Qingyi sighed.
"They know martial arts." There's also a space, and the space contains a lot of food.
"Luckily, they were skilled in martial arts, otherwise how could they have survived until now and even saved us and everyone else?"
Okay, Ye Moxun didn't want to say anything more. His uncle could make up his own ideas, which saved him the trouble of making excuses. However, the above ideas were purely his uncle's own opinions and had nothing to do with him.
Having lived in the abandoned village for nearly a month, Song Tantan has already put water into the cracks in the rocks three times. Now, the water that everyone has been given is almost gone. By tomorrow night at the latest, she will have to find a chance to put water in the cracks again, otherwise everyone will not be able to hold on, because the food she initially gave them will also be gone.
This was all because everyone was eating porridge twice a day, and later only once a day. Song Tantan hadn't yet found a reasonable excuse to take out the food.
"I think we should just leave it near the water source. We've already pushed the matter to the Bodhisattva, so since we've already given water, giving some food along with it won't hurt." Ye Moxun thought this matter was easy to resolve. Since it was already a fantasy, it was reasonable to play around with some supernatural elements.
That seemed to make sense. Song Tantan and Song Zhuiyan exchanged a glance and decided that this was the only way to do it, since they couldn't find a better solution.
"Then let's move tomorrow night and just pack up more food so I don't have to figure out what to do later." Song Tantan scratched the little bun on her head. Her hair was a bit short now, like a watermelon head, and she felt a little ugly without the bun.
The next day, the scorching sun baked the earth all day, and by evening, a wave of heat surged up from the ground, making the air so stuffy that it was almost suffocating. In the blink of an eye, dark clouds suddenly loomed overhead, making it seem as if the sky was about to collapse.
A bolt of lightning, as thick as an adult's arm, streaked across the clouds and struck straight down. At that moment, Song Tantan and the other children were returning from gathering firewood on the mountain. Who could have predicted that the weather would change so suddenly? The children had just run back to the village entrance when the lightning struck, and it looked like it was about to hit one of the houses.
"Crack, boom..." The lightning exploded in mid-air right above their heads, and everyone experienced firsthand what it meant to be deafened.
At first, everyone turned pale with shock, but they quickly screamed excitedly, forgetting their fear and apprehension, "It's raining! It's finally raining! We have water to drink! We have water to drink!"
Everyone inside the house ran out, laughing and crying as they stretched out their arms and looked up to eagerly welcome the first rain after three years.
Song Tantan's face was serious, and she was in a bad mood. She cursed inwardly, "Damn it!" If God wanted to rain, He should at least give some warning beforehand. It just started raining without any warning. How was she supposed to let the villagers find their food?
At this moment, the rain poured down, and everyone shouted as they were bathed in the rain, no longer caring about anything else.
"Don't worry, we'll go prepare now, there's still time." Song Zhuiyan carried Song Tantan into the mountains. Their destination was near the rock crevice where the water used to be released, but halfway there, a bolt of lightning struck down a towering, withered tree.
The dead trees caught fire, blocking the way up the mountain, and the rain was pouring down harder and harder. The two had no choice but to leave their food nearby.
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