"You were the auntie on the bus that day with a child and a cage of hens." I recognized her and smiled, "Hey, where's your son? I haven't seen him."
The auntie whipped out a calculator to tally up the price of three boxes of soy sauce and looked up at me with a smile, "Yeah, it's been a long time since I've seen you, you're just as beautiful. As for my son, my husband has gone to pick him up. Let me calculate the price for three boxes. I'll shut the store soon and ride the tricycle to deliver them to you."
"That's very kind of you, auntie. How has your son been feeling recently?" I remembered the lovely child's face marked by a trace of black air from Evil Disease Palace.
The auntie calculated the price and lifted the calculator for me to see, "He's in good health, eating really well, three hundred and fifty."
"That's great to hear, I'll transfer the payment directly through Alipay." I took out my phone, scanned the code, and transferred the money to the auntie.
Since the child didn't experience any issues, he must have been carrying my Peace Pouch.
I've found that although the Peace Pouch isn't as effective as the Disease-Expelling Robe, it can suppress the aura of latent diseases and imperceptibly remove some hidden risks.
The auntie received a phone call, and her smiling face suddenly froze, "How could this happen? Okay, okay, I'll come right away. Which hospital?"
"Is something wrong, auntie?" I asked proactively.
After hanging up, the whole aura of the auntie became extremely grim, "My son had an accident at school, and now he's been taken to the hospital. I might not be able to deliver the soy sauce for you."
"No worries, whenever you can deliver them is fine. I'll just take three bottles to tide me over." I told the auntie and then left the mini-mart. ᴛhis chapter is ᴜpdated by novel~fire~net
The auntie quickly packed up and also came out, pulling down the rolling shutter.
As she crouched down to lock the shutter, I asked, "Hey, what exactly happened to your son at school?"
"Food poisoning. Blasted kindergarten, giving children unclean food," the auntie accused furiously.
I breathed a sigh of relief, relieved it wasn't a serious illness flare-up, "That must have been a collective poisoning incident, right?"
"Indeed it was. Over twenty children were poisoned and sent to the hospital," the auntie said, straightening up to leave.
I caught her arm, "About that Peace Pouch I gave you, has he been wearing it continuously?"
The auntie gave me a surprised and slightly embarrassed look, "Kids, you know, are fickle, quickly losing interest after a while. He was initially inseparable from it, but now I don't know where it's ended up. I'll look for it at home when I get a chance and have him continue wearing it."
After saying this, the auntie quickly walked away.
I was left speechless.
At that moment, I felt utterly helpless.
Deep inside, I felt uneasy, but I didn't know what the right thing to do was.
Three days later, I visited the mini-market again.
The doors of the mini-market were tightly shut, adorned with several black flowers.
It turns out the child of the owners of the mini-market had died after falling ill with food poisoning at the hospital.
The hospital diagnosed him with an inherent familial diabetes.
This illness is a genetic condition that is hard to detect unless it flares up.
And once it does flare, it can be life-threatening.
Despite the hospital's full efforts to save him, they couldn't preserve his life.
Now, the auntie's family is embroiled in a legal battle with the school, seeking compensation.
The school, being no easy adversary, is unwilling to pay for a genetic disorder, but the family believes the food poisoning triggered the disorder.
Now the child remains uncremated pending the conclusion of the lawsuit.
No wonder the black line in the child's Evil Disease Palace was so ominous, flashing briefly before my eyes.
It can stay dormant for a lifetime or suddenly claim a life.
Everything depends on a single moment of fate.
I looked at the black silken flowers swaying in the wind, symbols of mourning, and my heart numbed.
My eyes reddened as I thought of that day on the bus.
I didn't know he had diabetes and had given him candy.
Luckily, he was fine then, or else it would have been hard for me to escape blame.'
The child's lovely face is still vividly replaying in my mind.
Yet such a gentle and adorable child had to die so young.
"The Buddha saves those who have fate, moreover, Wanwan, you are just a regular person. It's merely that they had no fate with you."
Yu Longting's deep voice echoed in my ear.