The Sweetness of the Seventies
Chapter 138 Generous Snake King (740+) _1

Chapter 138: Chapter 138 Generous Snake King (740+) _1

Snake King pondered for a moment, that’s true, if He Tiantian was deceiving it, it would just be for once, and it wouldn’t trust her the next time.

Besides, He Tiantian, the little girl, was timid and a bit clever, but she would never deceive it.

"If that’s the case, then I will agree to go to the back mountain tonight," Snake King consented. It had been a long time since it had been in the water and felt uncomfortable all over.

He Tiantian prepared the tools she could use and placed them in her basket, ready to carry them away at night.

When night fell, He Tiantian suddenly remembered—what if Third Grandma Qi woke up in the middle of the night and went to her room, only to find no one there?

"Why haven’t you left yet?" Snake King asked, "If you don’t leave now, you won’t be able to come back by midnight."

After thinking for a moment, He Tiantian said, "I will sleep in the early part of the night and go in the later part. This way, when Grandma Qi falls into a deep sleep, she won’t discover that I am gone."

"Fine then, you go to sleep, and I’ll call you later," Snake King said eagerly, rubbing its hands together in anticipation.

After midnight struck, Snake King woke He Tiantian up.

Climbing over the wall with her bamboo basket on her back, He Tiantian left.

To avoid encountering anyone from the village, Snake King made He Tiantian invisible.

In haste to reach the back mountain, He Tiantian ran and arrived at the secret base on the back mountain in less than an hour.

Snake King could already feel the enthusiasm emanating from within, leaped off He Tiantian, and slithered into the pond inside the cave.

Following suit, He Tiantian went down and found that the pond inside was somewhat larger than before. The land on the west side of the cave, which was higher up, was not flooded by the spring water.

In the pond, Snake King swam back and forth—sometimes doing backstroke, sometimes an S-shaped swim; sometimes it was entirely underwater, while at times its head was above the surface.

"Snake King, remember, we were supposed to hunt," He Tiantian cautiously reminded as she saw Snake King was having so much fun that it seemed to forget the world, but they still had work to do!

Snake King ignored her until it got tired of playing and lay on a large rock, while He Tiantian, sitting aside, was almost dozing off, lazily saying, "Wake up, wake up, the prey has come to our door."

He Tiantian, groggy from sleep, opened her eyes to see a row of wild rabbits in front of her, at least dozens of them.

"So many?" He Tiantian was stunned, "Snake King, although I want to catch more, I can’t catch all the rabbits on the mountain at once."

Feeling good after its exercise, Snake King replied in a pleasant tone, "The back mountain stretches for hundreds of miles, and there are countless rabbits in it. This is just a small number. Even if you caught fifty a day, that would only amount to a little over ten thousand in a year, which is nothing. Hurry up, or we’ll have to head down the mountain."

Upon hearing this, He Tiantian didn’t hesitate for a moment and began to deal with the rabbits using her tools.

She skinned them, removed the innards, and washed them at the outlet of the pond, where all the filth was washed away.

There was a drying rack inside the cave that He Tiantian had prepared beforehand to air-dry the rabbits. After salting them, she tied a small rope around each rabbit’s neck and hung them on it.

As the sky brightened outside through the open area of the cave, He Tiantian finally stopped to count the wild rabbits on the rack. She unexpectedly had twenty-two of them. She also cleaned up the rabbit skins on the ground, hanging them on the other side, as they could be sold as well.

"Let’s go, if we don’t leave now, the villagers will be waking up." Snake King urged, also tired and wanting to catch some sleep.

The person and the snake made it back home, just sneaking into the house.

Third Grandma Qi got up, and He Tiantian had changed her clothes inside and was up as well.

Now that she was feeling better, she felt embarrassed to let Grandma Qi cook for her every day.

Two days later, Third Grandma Qi finally agreed to let He Tiantian go to the back mountain.

Zuo Li and Xiang Rong, seeing He Tiantian come over, were very happy. They said, "Girl Tian, you’re finally back. We dug a few more traps on the back mountain, and we were just about to check them today. You should come with us. With you, our lucky charm around, we might catch even more game."

"I was just joking when I said I was lucky, Uncle Zuo, Uncle Xiang, you’re taking it too seriously!" He Tiantian joked, not wanting everyone to pin their hopes on her, although she intended to help.

"Don’t dismiss these things; when we fought wars before, we valued people with strong abilities and good luck. Such people can inspire those around them, making them believe that if they follow him, they can win battles and return alive," said Zuo Li. "You are our hope now, let’s go, hurry, it’s too cold today, we desperately need fur to keep warm."

Only then did He Tiantian notice that their clothing was indeed flimsy and could not withstand the cold wind.

"Alright, let’s go now. But if we don’t catch much, you can’t blame me," He Tiantian said, following behind Zuo Li and Xiang Rong to the back mountain.

Although Zuo Li and Xiang Rong were not experienced hunters, they were good at observation and knew where animals passed by. Digging traps in those areas usually led to a catch.

Seeing that they were quite pitiful, He Tiantian felt a pang of sympathy and let Snake King drive many wild rabbits their way.

Now, even if they caught tigers or bears, they couldn’t sell them – but with rabbits and pheasants, not only could they eat the meat, but they could also use their fur for clothing, which was the most economical.

"Xiang Rong, look, there are six rabbits in this trap!" Zuo Li shouted. "My goodness, we can finally have fur coats to wear."

"Not bad, not bad, if we’re careful, we could even have two coats," He Tiantian said. "Uncle Zuo, Uncle Xiang, how many traps did you guys dig?"

In fact, He Tiantian already knew through Snake King that they had a total of seven traps. Putting two or three rabbits and one or two pheasants in each trap was about satisfactory without leaving any empty.

Snake King was quite generous, actually putting six wild rabbits into one trap. She didn’t know how many were in the other traps.

"Seven in total. If every one has this many, we’ll have a good winter," said Xiang Rong. "Digging these traps took a lot of effort. We even broke the shovels from the animal husbandry team. Thankfully Uncle Qi was there to cover for us."

"Hehe, you guys have worked hard too," He Tiantian said with a laugh, thankful they had set the traps; otherwise, she would’ve been troubled about how to help them.

When they reached the second trap, He Tiantian was astonished and exclaimed, "Oh my, there aren’t just rabbits in there, but a goat too!"

He Tiantian had only asked Snake King to herd the rabbits; the goat must have fallen in on its own.

Zuo Li looked in the direction He Tiantian was pointing and was overjoyed.

"Oh boy, look at that nanny goat, she’s got a big belly, and it looks like she’s got a kid in there," Zuo Li said excitedly. If it was alive, they could keep it, and once it gave birth to a lamb, they would have milk as well.