Her Cultivation Diary
Chapter 880 - 862. I will keep it warm.

Chapter 880: 862. I will keep it warm.

However, Song Tan didn’t directly tell Qiaoqiao about these harsh realities. Instead, she found a documentary online for him to watch.

She only patted his head at the end, which was fluffy and well-behaved: "Everyone who is alive will eventually die, death is very fair."

Qiaoqiao stared at the few-minute documentary that summed up the life of a Bear Bee, and tears fell: "But... Daxiong has it so hard, working so diligently all day and still not getting enough to eat..."

Ah, if you say that, I won’t feel sad anymore!

Song Tan blinked: "You can’t be biased, the worker bees are clearly the most tired. They have to maintain the queen, make honey, and take care of Bear, all while having such a short lifespan."

But soft-hearted Qiaoqiao was particularly lucid at this moment: "It’s impossible not to be partial as a human. I like you much more than I do Brother Yanping. I also like Bear a lot more than the other worker bees; it can’t be helped."

"Moreover, Bear knows what I’m saying—it’s very smart and obedient—it was my first close friend, and I really can’t bear the thought of Bear dying wah wah wah..."

He began to sob, shrinking in the empty living room, appearing even more lonely and pitiable.

It was only now that Song Tan remembered; after she returned to her hometown, the very first companion she brought to Qiaoqiao was indeed Bear.

It was Bear that Qiaoqiao had found himself, and even though it had stung him upon their first meeting, Qiaoqiao had followed its entire egg-laying and hatching process...

Song Tan sighed.

"All right," she touched Qiaoqiao’s head again: "What’s said online isn’t always accurate—like the people in our village, some pass away at sixty, and some live to over ninety. Maybe Bear is different too?"

She implied: "After all, it’s been really lucky."

But Qiaoqiao was no longer the easily consoled child he once was, wiping his tears, he said: "I need to go and tell Bear: if it’s going to die, not to leave secretly, and not to be afraid of being driven away by the swarm. It should come to my palm; I will keep it warm."

After he finished speaking, he rushed out of the yard in a hurry.

Xin Jun frowned: "What’s wrong with Qiaoqiao?"

He seemed to have cried just a moment ago.

Song Tan sighed: "I told him that the bee colony will have a new queen. He’s upset."

Xin Jun was silent for a while: "It’s good that you told him; he’s too tender-hearted. The countryside doesn’t have that many places to spread love."

Pigs will be slaughtered for meat, and so will cows, sheep, chickens, and ducks...

Yet Song Tan smiled—because being tender is all the more precious precisely for that reason.

Suddenly, Zhang Yanping sighed deeply:

"Bear was a hero in attracting fans when our live broadcast first started!"

After all, there are so many farming live streams, and none of them use Bear’s butt to draw in viewers at the start! Round, plump, fluffy, and the classic black and yellow color scheme—who wouldn’t get mesmerized by that?

That’s how the first wave of followers came about.

Now that this founding figure was about to age, Zhang Yanping felt rather sentimental: "Once Bear is gone, let’s hold a live broadcast meeting and tell everyone about it."

However, Song Tan shook her head: "No, most of the live streaming fans don’t know the true lifespan of a Bear Bee, so we shouldn’t talk about such unhappy things. Once Bear dies and a new queen emerges, they won’t recognize it."

Huh? Zhang Yanping was puzzled: This kind of evasive character doesn’t seem like Tantan!

But this was ultimately a trifle, and he quickly agreed too: "You’re right, let’s not mention it. Just pretend it’s that one—hopefully the next one won’t be so round and heavy, making it hard to hold the flowers."

Song Tan: ...Ah, that, maybe probably...the weight won’t decrease.

...

Qiaoqiao went up the mountain, while Guo Dong prepared to boil beeswax with the others.

Just as he took a brand-new stainless-steel barrel out of the warehouse to place on a low stove in the kitchen corner, he saw Seventh Uncle stop everyone:

"Don’t waste it! Come on, let’s wash it first."

"Do we really need to wash it?" Guo Dong stared at the clean beeswax in the box: "Aren’t you guys experienced in storing this? It’s both frozen and sealed, not dirty."

Who cares if it’s dirty or not, it’s not like we’re going to eat it.

Seventh Uncle pointed at the remaining honey in the honeycomb: "Won’t it be a waste if we cook it together later? Let’s wash it first and keep the honeywater for feed pigs."

Zhang Yanping got excited: "Oh, there’s honeywater too? Can humans drink it?"

Seventh Uncle didn’t stop him: "You could, but these honeycombs still have bee larvae and a few remaining bees."

"But don’t worry, according to my experience, it won’t kill you."

If it weren’t for these residuals, why bother freezing them in the refrigerator? It’s to prevent them from hatching and worm infestation.

Zhang Yanping: ...

No need, actually.

He has honey at home; he was just used to repurposing waste and asked out of curiosity, not really intending to drink it.

But...

"Just for a bit of honeywater to feed pigs, wouldn’t washing be a waste?"

"Not at all." This time, Xin Jun replied: "They’re beeswax and honeycombs, insoluble in water. After washing, they’ll still be the same."

Guo Dong agreed: "We still need to boil them in water later; washing them now won’t affect anything."

She’s the definition of a doer, rolling up her sleeves ready to get started, but was stopped by Zhang Yanping:

"Don’t touch anything!"

He looked quite serious: "Switching from food to skincare products is quite a leap; we need to give the fans some time to prepare."

"Let’s wait for Qiaoqiao to come down the mountain and do a livestream first, do some pre-promotion."

He called to everyone: "Let’s calculate the costs first, decide on the containers, and set a price before anything else."

Do we even need to calculate the costs?

Song Tan spouted cold numbers: "188 yuan for 50g."

Hiss—

Guo Dong gasped: "You’re really ambitious! The special-offer hand cream I bought before, 30ml for only 88 yuan!"

"Only?!" Zhang Yanping and Xin Jun simultaneously made exclamations: "Just for applying on hands! The urea cream I used for chilblain when I was young was only 5 yuan a tube!"

Guo Dong blinked coldly: "Oh, it seems to be 15 now—but that’s not the point. Song Tan, isn’t your price of 188 a bit steep?"

"88 and 188 are both pricey just for hand cream!" Zhang Yanping shouted loudly!

Yet Song Tan remained calm: "Our family’s tea oil, our family’s beeswax. For the tea oil, we need to pick the seeds first, then dry them, crush and then press them. Our tea plants don’t yield much oil, a top yield from a pound of seeds is just a couple ounces of oil."

"The same for the beeswax, we’ve only accumulated so much this year, at most 70 pounds. For a 50g hand cream, the beeswax would have to be at least six or seven grams, right?"

She looked at Zhang Yanping: "Now do you still think 188 yuan is expensive?"

Zhang Yanping thought for a moment: "If it was someone else’s product, I would definitely still think it’s expensive. But if it’s our own products..."

He made up his mind instantly: "I’ll listen to you!"