"You shouldn’t have bothered with him," Ruan Zeqiu said to Ruan Chanchan as he stepped out of the cave where Sun Cao lived with his daughter. The medicine was not going to work for another hour or so; there was no point in staying behind and waiting for the girl to wake up.
More importantly, Ruan Zeqiu was still a bit feverish. Even though the mer had taken medicine, Ruan Chanchan was worried that his fever would return if Ruan Zeqiu roamed outside in the wind for too long. Thus, she brought him back with her to the cave and asked him to lie down on the bed made of the animal hide.
"I know," Ruan Chanchan agreed with Ruan Zeqiu. After all, she was there when Sun Cao confessed that he had taken his daughter to the old priestess of the tribe. If she was not skilled enough and the girl died, Ruan Chanchan was certain that with Sun Cao’s fierce paternal instincts, he would have definitely accused her of causing the death of his daughter.
It didn’t matter if she had caused the death of the girl; Sun Cao would have certainly held her accountable after all, people could be quite chaotic when they were grieving.
However, she couldn’t turn a blind eye to the plight of the young girl when she saw her writing and moaning in pain. Having seen too much cruelty in her many lives, Ruan Chanchan had grown a bit sympathetic and soft-hearted. Maybe it was because she was impressed by the good deeds of the woman who took over her body. The new Mo Qiang was fierce, but she was also a really kind woman. A perfect combination of beauty with brains.
A woman who would help those in need but won’t leave those who hurt her loved ones or innocents.
Though Ruan Chanchan was not happy with the way Sun Cao schemed against her, she was not going to leave the little girl who needed her help alone.
"However, the child is innocent," Ruan Chanchan said to Ruan Zeqiu with a smile on her lips. "I couldn’t leave her alone. And neither would you."
Ruan Zeqiu snorted while lying on his bed. However, he didn’t deny what Ruan Chanchan said to him. Instead, he turned his head to one side and looked at Ruan Chanchan, who was piling up a bunch of wooden logs inside the big hole that she had dug in the centre of the cave. He tilted his head to one side and questioned, "What are you doing, sister?"
"You will see." Ruan Chanchan mysteriously smiled at the mer and continued with her work. First, she piled the wooden logs in a neat order. Once she was done, she started pulling the stone slab that she had found lying outside and started washing it. Since she didn’t have permission to access the BBQ area of her supermarket, there was no point in wasting her time with Xiao Xi.
He would only ask her to work hard and collect more points. She might as well look for another option.
After looking around for a long time, Ruan Chanchan finally found this flat stone slab that could be used as a grill. Though it was not as flat as she would have liked, it was better than having nothing.
Ruan Zeqiu watched his sister silently. At first, he was quite curious. He couldn’t understand what Ruan Chanchan was trying to do, but the more he stared, the more he realised that maybe his sister was doing something completely useless.
Hmm, though she has recovered, Priestess Yuan did say that she is still recovering. Maybe this is one of those times when she is acting like a fool. Ruan Zeqiu thought and closed his eyes without paying much attention to Ruan Chanchan and soon fell asleep.
Here, Ruan Zeqiu went to sleep; there, Ruan Chanchan quickly took out the lighter from her space. Though it was quite hard to light a fire without any kerosene oil, a lighter still made things easier. Anyway, the fuel inside the lighter would replenish once she returned it to the space; thus, Ruan Chanchan was not worried about wasting the fuel and continued to light the fire with the help of the dry leaves and logs.
It didn’t take long for a small flame to light up in the pit, and soon it turned quite big.
Ruan Chanchan watched it with a satisfied smile on her lips and started working on smoking the meat. It was a better solution than curing meat; at least with the meat smoked, it would last longer than it did after just being cured. If she smoked the cured meat, then it would last longer than just being cured.
Of course, this was not a long-term plan. But what was she going to do? She had a lot of salt in her space, with every item replenishing without running out. But she couldn’t always take it out and give it to the tribe members. It wouldn’t solve the issue.
Ruan Chanchan tilted her head to one side while watching the meat getting cured. What was she supposed to do?
"How about looking for a territory that is near the ocean and then teaching these beastmen how to make salt?" Xiao Xi innocently suggested, and Ruan Chanchan turned to look at him as if he had lost his mind or, in his case, database.
She rolled her eyes before saying, "Let’s take it easy. We haven’t even made them learn the benefits of washing their hands and taking a bath. What is the point of jumping so high? Do you think that they will be able to make such a leap? Let’s first take baby steps."
Of course, the problem of the salt running out was not a small one. She had to think of a way to procure salt before she could think of getting another territory near the ocean.
"Now that I think about it... the old territory of this tribe—it was near the ocean, wasn’t it?"