The Cultivator's Reborn to 1970s
Chapter 42

Chapter 42: 42

"Coming back is good, coming back is good."

The villagers all came to comfort Grandma Sun, it’s good that the child was found, some children get abducted and are never found in their entire life. In the village next to the next, a 4 or 5-year-old boy was abducted, the old couple acted like madmen, accosting everyone to ask if they had seen their child, almost ten years have passed and they still haven’t found the kid, later it was heard that the wife went mad.

When Lan Tian went missing, the village helped to look for him, Grandma Sun was very grateful, as her husband had died in defense of the villagers, his death was worthwhile. Firmly holding Lan Tian’s hand, afraid to let go lest he disappear again, she said to the villagers, "It troubled everyone this time for Lan Tian, come over for a meal sometime!" Pulling Lan Tian, she went back home.

Back home, the family sat together. Grandma Sun held Lan Tian’s hand the whole time, looking at him over and over, touching him again and again, not daring to believe that he is really back. Lan Tian held Grandma Sun’s hand to his face, gently wiping her tears, "Grandma, I’m back, for real, if you don’t believe me, pinch me and see if it hurts."

"Always talking nonsense," Grandma Sun laughed through her tears, gently pinching Lan Tian’s face, finally believing that he had returned.

Lan Tian was still immersed in Grandma Sun’s doting when, suddenly, the tone changed. She poked his head and scolded, "What did I tell you? Didn’t grandma tell you to stay close to your auntie, not to run around? There are so many bad people these days, human traffickers are everywhere. There you go, got abducted, didn’t you? The disobedient child gets sold to the deep mountains to become a child bride, how would you have come back then? Are you going to run off again?"

Grandma Sun scolded a torrent of words, Lan Tian was like a roly-poly toy, toppled by Grandma Sun’s pokes only to spring right back up, the scene quite comical, Mo Yuanle’s mouth couldn’t help but curl upwards.

Zhao Li wiped her tears, blaming herself, "It’s my fault for not watching her properly. If I hadn’t gone to buy cloth, Tiantian wouldn’t have been abducted by the trafficker."

"Auntie, it really isn’t your fault," said Lan Tian, seeing her aunt who seemed to have aged years in just a moment, her heart aching, gently wiping away the tears left by Zhao Li.

Mo Yuanle looked at Zhao Li with concern, the child is Zhao Li’s Achilles heel. He worried that this incident with Lan Tian’s disappearance would lead her to blame herself and trigger her condition.

Lan Tian held Zhao Li’s hand, comforting her fragile heart, "Auntie, I was waiting obediently, but the traffickers had sedatives. They covered my nose with it, and I passed out and was put into a sack and carried away. Even as they walked right past you, you wouldn’t have known. In the end, the traffickers are too cunning, one blocking the way, the other using sedatives. Auntie, I haven’t eaten for days, I’m so hungry. Can you cook me a bowl of noodles?"

Lan Tian had realized in her previous life that Zhao Li was particularly sensitive when it came to matters involving children. Despite her normally fiery temper, anything to do with children turned her heart into a glass one, fragile. Lan Tian had to find something for her to do, so she wouldn’t sit around thinking up all sorts of nonsense and torturing herself.

"Okay, auntie, I’ll cook the noodles!" Zhao Li got up and went to the kitchen.

Lan Tian unabashedly made her requests from behind, "Auntie, add some baby bok choy! I saw the other day, the ones growing in our backyard are doing well, and add two eggs too. Uncle hasn’t eaten either, so make a bit more."

Mo Yuanle looked admiringly at Lan Tian, and Grandma Sun, who couldn’t bear to see her so pleased with herself, tapped her on the head, and Lan Tian bowed her head acting obediently, quietly taking the lecture.

"Look how scared you’ve gotten your auntie, weeping at home every day. You’ve got to be nicer to her from now on, got it? Or else, grandma will beat you to death with her walking stick, you little ungrateful wretch." Grandma Sun had spent the last few days anxious and worried, she also knew about Zhao Li’s condition, terrified that if anything happened to this member of the family, it would be the end of her.

"Grandma, I’m sorry for making you and Uncle and Auntie worry." Lan Tian hugged Grandma Sun, truly scared this time. Without any fighting ability, a single trafficker could capture her. What if she really ended up sold into the mountains as grandma had said, by the time she escaped, the grass on grandma’s grave would be taller than a person, with nowhere left to cry.

"Tell grandma, wasn’t it that a trafficker lured you away with candy? Or did they tell you they’d take you to find your parents and you followed them?"

Lan Tian pouted, quite displeased, "Grandma, am I worth just a piece of candy? That’s really underestimating me!"

Grandma Sun looked her up and down, fiddling with Lan Tian’s hair that looked as though it had been chewed by a dog, "Indeed, a piece of candy is too little, at the very least it should be a pig’s head!"

Lan Tian rolled her eyes, her own worth equated to a pig’s head. She wondered if her master would be so angry he’d descend from the heavens after finding out.

"This haircut, did the trafficker do it?" Lan Tian nodded.

"And the clothes, did the trafficker change those too?" She left the house wearing a newly made set of red clothes, but returned in patched-up boy’s clothes, hardly recognizable to anyone on the road.

"I changed into these clothes myself, my outfit was too conspicuous, people would spot me right away." Now that everything was over, Lan Tian didn’t want her grandma to worry, "Grandma, I need a bath, I reek. Can you find me a change of clothes?"

After sending Grandma Sun away, Lan Tian scooted over to Mo Yuanle with a sweet smile, "Uncle, there’s no need to tell grandma about what happened, no need to make her worry. And the stuff in that room, you’ve got to keep it a secret for me, it’s between the two of us!"

"Okay!"

Lan Tian planted a quick kiss on Mo Yuanle’s face, "You’re the best, uncle."

A glint of amusement flashed in Mo Yuanle’s eyes, as he reached out to touch Lan Tian’s head. Lan Tian batted his hand away, "Stop touching, it looks awful. Shitou and the others will definitely laugh at me, I’ll be too embarrassed to show my face."

"I’ll trim it for you." Mo Yuanle, eager and brimming with confidence, took out a pair of scissors from the cupboard and led Lan Tian to the yard. Sitting on a small stool with an old piece of cloth draped around her neck, she listened to the ’snip snip snip’ above her head, her little face full of anxiety. With her hair this short, if he messed up and gave her a look like it’d been gnawed on by a dog, there’d be no fixing it.

Grandma Sun came out with clothes just to find the hall empty. Looking out into the yard, she saw Mo Yuanle cutting Lan Tian’s hair and hurried back inside after a glance.

"Auntie, what are you doing?" Zhao Li came out with a bowl of noodles, noticing Grandma Sun laughing inside until tears came.

"Nothing, Lao Wu’s giving Lan Tian a haircut. Don’t laugh when you see it," warned Grandma Sun in advance. Zhao Li glanced outside, just a haircut, what was there to laugh about. While setting down the bowls she called out, "Come and eat noodles."

After Mo Yuanle finished cutting and washed Lan Tian’s hair, she felt around and had a nagging feeling that in some places she could feel her scalp. She hoped it wasn’t as bad as she thought. Zhao Li turned around, saw Lan Tian’s hairstyle, and burst out laughing. Grandma Sun gave her a stern look, and Zhao Li finally understood the meaning behind grandma’s "don’t laugh," turning her head away with her shoulders shaking, clearly trying to hold back laughter.