The Country Maiden: Fields and Leisure
Chapter 756 - 755

Chapter 756: 755

Jinhoo, with fruits tucked in his arms, had also brought the remaining food and other things from home. Therefore, he simply sat down under the big tree at the entrance to the village and called out, "Come and look, come and see—time-honored sugar lumps, and all kinds of sewing threads. The supply today is limited; once they’re all traded, I’ll be gone—"

While speaking, he set up a makeshift stand for his goods and arranged them neatly.

The children saw that there indeed weren’t many items, especially the sugar scraps, of which there were only two or three packets. They immediately became anxious.

If they were left behind, who knew when they would be able to trade for some again.

Therefore, they dispersed in a flurry, rushing back home with a thudding of feet to fetch the things they had gathered from the mountains and hurried off to the village entrance.

This commotion soon attracted quite a few people’s attention.

The grown men and women all smiled. Nowadays, they weren’t too busy, and the children went up the mountains to pick some wild products, getting something to snack on for their sweet tooth. As long as the household was getting by, nobody would say anything.

Who didn’t cherish their children? Besides, those bits and bobs from the mountains, if really sold, wouldn’t fetch a good price.

So, the ones who were anxious were those children, along with a few older girls and young wives who had snuck off to gather wild products in hopes of exchanging them for some bright silk thread or needles.

Before long, Jinhoo was surrounded by a crowd of children.

Jinhoo examined the wild products at a leisurely pace and weighed them. Then, he would give out a small handful of sugar scraps according to the children’s wishes.

The kids were so thrilled that they screamed with excitement, each carefully holding the sugar and licking it at the edge of their lips.

In the end, having licked the sugar off their fingertips and palms clean, they still couldn’t bear to stop sucking on it.

Jinhoo appeared calm, continuing to trade for wild products while his eyes swept over the group of children, searching for a particular child. Not finding the child made him feel a bit anxious.

While exchanging the sugar for the children, he nonchalantly asked, "Why haven’t I seen that chubby one from last time today?"

The kids nearby began talking over each other to answer, "He doesn’t go up the mountain, so how would he have any wild products? Last time it was his third sister who brought them back."

"Who says? I saw his fourth sister go up the mountain today. Maybe he will snatch what his fourth sister collected!"

"Exactly, if those two sisters left at home don’t listen to him, they’ll be sold off to be someone else’s wife again!"

...

Sure enough, when most of the children had nearly finished their exchanges, from afar, a chubby boy almost rolled his way over.

A skinny little girl followed him, carrying a basket on her back, struggling to keep up with the boy and sweating profusely, her hair drenched.

Finally arriving in front of Jinhoo, the boy stopped, turned around, and commanded, "Hurry up and bring the basket over—"

The timid girl handed over the basket to Jinhoo, bowing her head, too scared to speak or make eye contact.

Jinhoo took the basket and looked inside. There wasn’t much of value in it, just some mushrooms and wild vegetables; the only items of any worth were two bamboo shoots.

At this time of year, bamboo shoots were still underground. It was a mystery how the little girl had managed to dig them up.

Jinhoo pretended to disdain the meager offerings, "Just these few things, they won’t fetch much, will they? Only these two bamboo shoots are somewhat pleasing to the eye—"

The boy immediately turned his head and cursed, "You useless little wench, you’ve been up in the mountains for half a day and that’s all you’ve got? Have you been to that slut Zhaodi’s place again? Let me tell you, Zhaodi is no longer a member of our family, she’s now the wife of some mountain man!"

"Those mountain folks are poor and nasty, last time she came back to her parents’ house, she only brought a bag of worthless tree leaves, and she had the audacity to do so? If you run off to Yingzi Gully again, I’ll tell Mom to break your legs!"

Before Jinhoo had a chance to probe further, the boy had already blurted out everything.

The little girl defended herself in a soft voice, "I didn’t go to my elder sister’s place, I just spent some time digging up these two bamboo shoots—"

"Bullshit! You still dare to talk back! I say you’re slacking off, and that means you are! Dare to talk back again? In this house, what I say goes. You lot of money-losing goods, if you don’t behave, you won’t get any dinner tonight and might end up being sold to some old man in the mountains—" Although the boy was not old, he was indeed cruel.

While he spoke, he kicked the little girl with his foot.

The girl was frail and after a couple of kicks, she fell to the ground, propping herself up with her hands on a rock and scraping a large patch of skin, blood seeping out. It hurt just to watch, yet the girl seemed as if nothing had happened, just lowering her head in silence.

Jinhoo, unable to bear the sight and feeling somewhat guilty, quickly tried to diffuse the situation, "Let it go, for the sake of these two bamboo shoots. There’s no more sugar sludge, but here’s a packet of deep-fried sweets, I’ll share some with you!"

As he spoke, he took out the sweets from his pocket, grabbed a handful without looking, and before he could hand them over, the boy snatched them away, clutching them in his hand. These weren’t sugar sludge, these were sugar-coated deep-fried pastries, fragrant even from afar.

Fearing it might be snatched away by others if he delayed, the boy hastily stuffed all of them into his mouth, filling his cheeks to the point of not being able to close his mouth.

With the deep-fried sweets at hand, the boy no longer bothered with the girl on the ground and walked straight away.

Seeing the boy leave, the girl slowly got up, dusted off her clothes, and was about to follow.

Jinhoo, unable to watch and keep his peace, said in a low voice, "Don’t go! Take this—" As he spoke, he handed over the rest of the sweets along with the wrapping cloth.

"Take it and eat. Go back after you finish!" Jinhoo advised in a whisper.

The girl was stunned for a moment, then finally reached out her hand to take the cloth and the deep-fried sweets, and at last raised her eyes to glance at Jinhoo.

It was only then that Jinhoo realized that the girl was dark and thin, with dry and yellowish hair, but her eyes, when they calmly looked at him, made his heart flutter with unease.

After looking at Jinhoo, the girl moved her lips and whispered a thank you.

Then she tucked the cloth-wrapped sweets into her bosom and chased after the boy.

Jinhoo’s feelings were mixed as he packed up his stall and slowly left the village, then quickened his pace.

He hurried home, not bothering to tidy up, carrying the stall on his back straight to the backyard.

Wang Yongzhu and Old Granny Zhang, seeing Jinhoo return in such a state, one hurried to fetch water for him to wash up, and the other brought him warm water.

Jinhoo washed his hands briefly and saw the cup of water Wang Yongzhu brought him wasn’t even enough to wet his lips.

He went straight to the well in the yard, drew a bucket of water, and gulped it down with a ladle before he felt revived.

He recounted everything that had happened in Yang Family Village from start to finish before finally saying, "I heard that elder sister was married off to Yingzi Gully. I’ve heard of this Yingzi Gully before; although it’s not as remote as Chongzi Gou, there are said to be only about ten or so households, all living in a cave."

Wang Yongzhu had never heard of Yingzi Gully and was now intrigued.