CHAPTER 51: CHAPTER 51: NOT TO BE TRUSTED TOO DEEPLY

Jiang Hu’s luck was not bad, or rather, Little Lucky Star’s blessing was truly powerful. From going up the mountain to returning home, Jiang Hu only took two hours, yet his harvest was quite substantial.

A wild rabbit, just what he thought of bringing to Shopkeeper Liu; and in addition, two pheasants.

Besides these, there were six wild pheasant eggs!

As soon as he got home, Jiang Hu jogged into the kitchen: "Second Aunt, come quickly and take a look, see if these pheasant eggs are edible. I checked them, and they seem not to have hatched yet."

Wild pheasant eggs are not something you come across all the time, and most of the time, the pheasant eggs you find are already formed into chicks and can’t be eaten.

But when pheasants lay eggs, they usually lay about ten before they start incubating. The one he found had only six eggs, so it’s for sure not started incubating yet!

Second Aunt had finished cooking and was just waiting for Jiang Hu to come back to eat. Seeing the pheasant eggs, she was also pleasantly surprised.

"So many! Da Wa, go and pick some scallions. Let’s fry the pheasant eggs."

Pheasant eggs have a strong odor and are not good boiled, but stir-fried with scallions or garlic sprouts, they don’t have that odor and taste very fragrant.

After Second Aunt took the pheasant eggs that Jiang Hu held in his clothes, he let out a long breath of relief and quickly put away the rabbit and pheasants.

"Second Aunt, tomorrow morning I’m going to see Shopkeeper Liu. I might be back late, so don’t wait for me for breakfast, and don’t take the kids to the field. I’ll leave one pheasant. You can stew it in the morning."

While Second Aunt was cracking the pheasant eggs into a bowl, she heard Jiang Hu mentioning stewing the pheasant for tomorrow and felt a bit reluctant: "Why don’t you take it all to Shopkeeper Liu? It could be worth dozens of copper coins."

They needed to save money for Da Wa’s schooling, which wasn’t cheap.

However, Jiang Hu waved his hand: "No worries, our rabbits are doing so well, and the six we had have grown up. If we continue raising them, they might give birth to little rabbits again, and by then we can sell them for quite a bit of money."

The six little rabbits, four of which are females, and if each female has another six babies, that’s over twenty rabbits.

All six rabbits are doing well and are growing plump. That’s Jiang Hu’s confidence in sending his son to school!

But seeing Second Aunt still a bit hesitant, Jiang Hu thought for a while.

"Second Aunt, we’ve been working hard, let’s just treat ourselves to something nice. Besides, we can catch more later. With our two Little Lucky Stars at home, are we worried about not catching any game, right Xiao Mi?"

The last sentence was directed at Xiao Mi, who chuckled and patted Xiao Mi.

Xiao Mi responded with a soft sound, which Jiang Hu couldn’t understand, but it didn’t prevent him from picking Xiao Mi up: "See, even Xiao Mi thinks Daddy is right."

Alright, Xiao Mi did agree with that.

Hard work must not stop, and life must continue.

Second Aunt smiled helplessly: "Alright, I’ll listen to you."

The three pheasant eggs were fried into a big plate, and the other three were saved for another meal the next day.

After dinner, the sky was completely dark. During washing up, Jiang Hu took over Iron Egg and asked Second Aunt to take care of Xiao Mi, saying that Xiao Mi would always be Second Aunt’s responsibility from now on.

Second Aunt didn’t think much of it, but Xiao Mi secretly breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that although he was indeed Daddy, she wasn’t really the little darling.

However, perhaps Daddy realized that she could already understand speech, so that’s why he did this?

The next day, Jiang Hu indeed left early in the morning, carrying the rabbits they raised at home, the rabbit he caught yesterday, and the pheasant.

After breakfast, Da Wa eagerly went to boil water because today they were going to stew pheasant, which he didn’t forget.

Ever since coming back from town that one time, when Daddy talked to him about protecting his younger brother and sister, or perhaps because he’s grown up, Da Wa isn’t too interested in playing outside anymore.

On the contrary, when he’s at home, he follows Daddy around working, and when he’s free, he holds his younger siblings. Er Ni has grown up and he can’t hold her anymore, but he doesn’t ignore her, talking and chatting with her, feeding chickens and rabbits together.

Occasionally, Liu Hai comes to find him, they don’t go far, just digging for bugs and pulling weeds nearby.

But Liu Hai, like Liu Yang, has a natural familiarity, although Da Wa doesn’t go out with him much, Liu Hai isn’t bothered and often comes to find Da Wa to play.

Xiao Mi guessed that Liu Yang probably taught his son something, because every time this kid comes to her house, he asks for two bowls of water, one when he comes and one before he leaves.

Not only that, Liu Hai, who used to disdain playing with girls, still doesn’t like bringing Er Ni along, but every time he comes to Jiang’s house, he talks to Xiao Mi first!

Moreover, it’s always greeting Xiao Mi with compliments on her being adorable.

To this, Xiao Mi just rolls her eyes with a grumble, chuckles sometimes if in a good mood, and ignores it if not.

From Liu Hai’s perfunctory expression, it’s clear that Liu Yang forced him!

Regarding this Uncle Liu, Xiao Mi had two opinions: thick-skinned! Cunning!

He surely thinks that ’good fortune’ can also be shared, which is why he continually forces Liu Hai to greet her!

For this, Xiao Mi pouted her lips, thinking it was too sly, especially since she’d heard Daddy talk about how Uncle Liu had a big mouth and couldn’t keep anything secret.

But as she saw it, Liu Yang keeping his son visiting her house to drink water wasn’t given away at all!

"Da Wa, are you taking care of your younger siblings? Where are your parents?" Just as Xiao Mi was thinking, Liu Yang came over, cheerfully approaching Xiao Mi with a grasshopper made of straw in hand.

"Xiao Mi, here’s a little toy Uncle Liu made himself, it’s really fun, you can play with it."

There was only one grasshopper, none for Iron Egg.

Xiao Mi didn’t want it, but she couldn’t control her hand, reaching out to take it. Made of green straw, it looked vivid, with a tiny rod extending from its rear, gently shaking, making the grasshopper wobble.

It was quite fun.

"Liu Yang." Jiang Hu came out from the rabbit room on the side and saw a pair of water buckets outside the yard: "Are you here to collect manure?"

Liu Yang replied, "Well, today happens to be my turn."

Jiang Hu motioned: "Then go ahead yourself, I’m busy making a nest for the rabbits, can’t spare any hands."

"Okay then, you carry on, Brother Hu, I’ll handle it myself."

Liu Yang cheerfully went to collect manure, while Jiang Hu continued with the rabbit nests, leaving Xiao Mi with a long sigh, handing the straw grasshopper to Iron Egg beside her.

This Liu Yang is indeed shrewd.

Before, he treated Xiao Mi and Iron Egg all the same until not long ago when he took Iron Egg out to play for a bit.

Presumably, Liu Yang guessed something. Ever since then, Liu Yang’s attitude toward Xiao Mi and Iron Egg was completely different.

Xiao Mi smacked her lips, feeling Liu Yang was not someone to get close to, too profit-driven, and hoped Daddy wouldn’t be caught off guard by this.