CH 24.1

“Alright.” It was his big-spending tomato buyer, after all, and it was just breakfast, it wasn’t a big deal. Lu Qingjiu didn’t think twice before agreeing and inviting Chao Qianyu into his home. 

Upon entering, Chao Qianyu saw Xiao Hei and Xiao Hua lying on the ground. His eyes lit up slightly, but then his gaze fell on the flock of chickens next to them. He raised his head and gave Lu Qingjiu a look, opened his mouth, planning on saying something, but Bai Yuehu walked out from the house.

Seeing Chao Qianyu, Bai Yuehu didn’t say anything either, just giving him an indifferent look. Chao Qianyu looked as if he was being stared at by some predator. Not only did he stop dead in his tracks, a few beads of cold sweat formed on his forehead.

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

“Mister…… Mister Bai.” Chao Qianyu forced out a greeting to Bai Yuehu.

Bai Yuehu shot him a look, saying, “What did you come here for?”

“Oh, I heard Mister Chao hasn’t had breakfast, so I thought I’d have him join us for breakfast,” Lu Qingjiu, off to the side, answered for him. Today’s breakfast was porridge and bing. The bing had a minced meat filling, which were minced by Yin Xun in advance last night. Today, Lu Qingjiu woke up early in the morning, wrapped them in the dough, placed them into the fryer and deep-fried them so that they could still be piping hot on the table right now.

“Oh,” Bai Yuehu responded.

Lu Qingjiu originally thought Bai Yuehu would refuse to let Chao Qianyu to have breakfast together with him, he never thought that he would agree so easily. This made Lu Qingjiu a little surprised. Usually, Bai Yuehu was always protective of his food unless it was someone familiar to him. Or else, wanting to eat a mouthful of his food wasn’t an easy task. The aunties in the village had coveted Bai Yuehu’s tomatoes for a very long time, but he never gave out even one.

But soon enough, Lu Qingjiu understood why Bai Yuehu had let Chao Qianyu in so easily. It was because he wasn’t at all preparing to let Chao Qianyu touch a single one of his meat bing. 

The meat bing were filled to burst, covered with just a thin layer of crust. With a bite, rich meat juices filled his mouth. In the minced meat filling, there was even some lotus root mixed in. This way, the greasiness of the meat would be cut down and there was an extra depth of flavour added. These meat bing were very well-received, as could be seen by how Bai Yuehu grasped them tightly, utterly unwilling to let go. 

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Every time Chao Qianyu even so much as tried to move his chopsticks in the direction of the meat bing, Bai Yuehu would give him a look. What exactly that look implied, Lu Qingjiu didn’t know, but the moment Chao Qianyu was given such a look, he would retract the chopsticks in his hand. There was no need to mention the two subordinates he’d brought along.

Yin Xun sat next to Lu Qingjiu. He came a little later and didn’t know what had happened, so he gave Lu Qingjiu a questioning glance, asking what exactly had happened. Lu Qingjiu signaled at Bai Yuehu with his eyes. Seeing the situation, Yin Xun didn’t quite know whether to laugh or cry. However, he was smart and didn’t say anything, continuing to quietly eat his meat bing.

Because of Bai Yuehu’s looks, the only thing Chao Qianyu ate during breakfast was Lu Qingjiu’s porridge. As for the meat bing and other things, he didn’t get even a single bite. Other than him, everyone else ate their fill. Yin Xun, that jerk, even let out a rather impolite, satisfied burp after filling his stomach, making the hidden bitterness in Chao Qianyu’s eyes intensify. 

As Lu Qingjiu watched, he wanted to laugh, but he didn’t want to get involved. He knew from what had happened that night that Chao Qianyu probably wasn’t human either. Since they both weren’t humans, he should just leave their internal affairs to be solved internally.

This meal was probably the most resentful meal that Chao Qianyu had ever had in his life. Given his status, how could there be anyone who would refuse to give him food? But as it happened, before him sat a big BOSS. He really couldn’t not give in. The meat bing, which let out an inviting fragrance, were right before him, just within arms’ reach. However, the fierce god with the malicious gaze across from him made it so he could only lower his head and drink the porridge within his bowl. He didn’t even dare take an extra chopstick full of pickles — he was afraid that even if this event spread, nobody would believe it.

Up until the very last bing was grasped in Bai Yuehu’s hands, Chao Qianyu wasn’t able to satisfy his desire of having a mouthful of meat bing. Lu Qingjiu, who had been stared at by his resentful eyes from beginning to end couldn’t help but break out in goosebumps…

After the meal, Bai Yuehu very naturally picked up the bowls and headed to the kitchen, leaving Lu Qingjiu and Yin Xun in the room to sit back and digest. 

“Yi, what did Mister Bai go to the kitchen for?” Chao Qianyu asked as he watched Bai Yuehu’s figure disappear into the kitchen. He thought the kitchen might still have a few meat bing.

Lu Qingjiu answered honestly, “To wash the dishes.”

Chao Qianyu’s expression twisted, “Wash dishes?!”

Lu Qingjiu asked, “Or else?” Almost all the dish-washing in the house was done by Bai Yuehu. Yin Xun and he were used to it. 

Chao Qianyu, “…” He fell silent for a while, as if digesting Lu Qingjiu’s words.

Lu Qingjiu had eaten his fill so he was feeling very lively. He stood up and called Chao Qianyu to come with him to the fields to pick tomatoes. Chao Qianyu took in a deep breath, gave a longing look at the empty table, and said, “Alright.”

Seeing his gaze, a hint of laughter couldn’t help but enter Lu Qingjiu’s eyes. Maybe next time he went to town, he could bring a few meat bing over to Chao Qianyu. But today…he supposed they could only drink porridge.

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The Chao Qianyu with a stomach full of porridge was resentful, but he had no choice but to go with Lu Qingjiu to the nearby vegetable plot in preparation to pick tomatoes. 

The tomatoes planted by Bai Yuehu were indeed quite different from the tomatoes next to them, they were almost all round, plump, and ruddy red, not even a single scar or hole made by insects visible on their surface. In order to keep their crops from being damaged by moths or worms, farmers would usually spray a lot of pesticide. Bai Yuehu didn’t use those things but no insects dared to target his tomatoes.

There were a lot of tomatoes in this batch. The few of them spent an entire afternoon picking them. After weighing, there were more than a thousand jin, even more than the first batch.

Lu Qingjiu kept a few tens of jin and the rest were all sold to Chao Qianyu.

Chao Qianyu didn’t waste time, directly settling the bill with Lu Qingjiu. Following that, he casually broke off one of Lu Qingjiu’s cucumbers and took a bite, then asked, “Are you selling your cucumbers?” 

“Cucumber?” Lu Qingjiu said, “No, we’re not selling them, we didn’t grow a lot, there isn’t even enough for our home.”

Chao Qianyu revealed a regretful expression, “Then what about other vegetables? I’ll buy them all.” 

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Lu Qingjiu looked over at the vegetable plot. He didn’t relent, “Wait until they ripen before we decide on anything. I’ll call you if I have any extra.”

“Alright.” Chao Qianyu nodded and prepared to leave with the tomatoes. But before he left, he thought of something and gave Lu Qingjiu a word of warning, “Don’t go to town too often, it hasn’t been very peaceful lately.” 

“What happened?” Lu Qingjiu seldom watched the local news and knew very little about what was going on.

“Someone died,” Chao Qianyu said, “It’s estimated that there will be several more deaths.” After he said this, he looked over at the area Lu Qingjiu lived, “It’s safer to stay in the village.”

Lu Qingjiu said, “Okay, I understand. Thanks.”

Chao Qianyu nodded, and drove away with his two men. 

When Lu Qingjiu returned home, he saw Bai Yuehu lying on his chair, looking up at the sky again. Recently, he seemed to be particularly interested in the sky. He hadn’t even been sleeping.

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

“Are you looking at something?” Lu Qingjiu asked casually.

Bai Yuehu replied, “I’m looking at the things in the sky.”

Lu Qingjiu looked up, following Bai Yuehu’s gaze, but only saw the white clouds hanging in the blue sky. He watched for a while, confirming that he hadn’t seen anything, “Where is it?” 

Bai Yuehu pointed upwards.

Knowing that he couldn’t see it, Lu Qingjiu simply gave up. Shrugging his shoulders, he went to the kitchen to prepare lunch.

Since exposing their ability to speak, Xiao Hei and Xiao Hua didn’t like staying in the pigsty and began to wander around the courtyard. Lu Qingjiu was originally worried that they’d conflict with the chickens, but both sides stayed safe and without problems so he dropped the subject and let them do what they wanted.

Today’s main course for lunch was sliced beef in chili oil. The beef was bought beforehand and had been taken out of the freezer that morning to thaw. Lu Qingjiu also prepared to fry a few meatballs and use the tomatoes he picked today to make tomato soup with fried meatballs. 

Bai Yuehu and Yin Xun both had a really high tolerance for spice, so when Lu Qingjiu was making the sliced beef in chili oil, he added a bit more chili peppers. However, after adding the chili peppers into the pot, the smoke entered his eyes, making Lu Qingjiu’s eyes turn red. Just as he was planning on finding a damp towel to wipe at his eyes, the cell phone in his pocket rang.

Lu Qingjiu scrambled for the phone and saw two words displayed on the screen: Hu Shu. What was this police officer calling him for? Could it be that something else happened? Lu Qingjiu’s eyebrows furrowed, but he still picked up the call, answering, “Hello?”

“Hello, is this Mister Lu?” Hu Shu’s voice sounded from the receiver.

“Yes,” Lu Qingjiu said, “Is there something wrong?” 

“It’s like this,” Hu Shu said, “I wanted to ask you about that well in your courtyard…”

Lu Qingjiu asked doubtfully, “The well? Hasn’t this case been closed already? What’s the matter now?”

Hu Shu said, “It’s a long story. Are you free tonight? I’ll come over. Can we have a face-to-face talk?”

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

Lu Qingjiu said, “Alright.” He agreed. 

In the end, Hu Shu was a police officer. If a police officer had something to ask of him, then as a citizen, Lu Qingjiu naturally had the duty to cooperate. It was just that he didn’t know if Hu Shu would be eating dinner at his house tonight, or else he’s afraid that Bai Yuehu wouldn’t be happy again.