Chiang Songhai hesitated for a moment, then said subconsciously, "Your great-grandpa loves rabbit meat, so maybe..."
If they really were a family that loved and cherished each other, or at least, managed to get along on the surface, Chiang Xiao wouldn’t hesitate to spare a wild rabbit and would definitely agree to give one to Chiang Songtao.
But to her, the Old Chiang Family was not family at all, even worse than common neighbors, so why would she be willing to give away a rabbit?
So before Chiang Songhai could finish speaking, she interrupted him.
"Grandpa, all three of these need to be sold, I want to eat pork, and grandma needs to eat some meat to get stronger, our house doesn’t even have any oil, we need to buy some lard," she said.
After she spoke, she just looked at him steadily.
With the household in such a state, was it really necessary to show such filial piety to the Old Chiang Family every time?
In her shiny black eyes, Chiang Songhai remembered the words Ho Laidi had hurled at her that morning and recalled his visit to Old Chiang Family the previous noon, where he saw the oil basin on the stove still half full with white pork fat.
His face heated up, and he hastily said, "Alright, sell them, sell them all."
Only then did Chiang Xiao smile again.
Sparing her own feelings, if the Old Chiang Family had even a trace of affection for Chiang Songhai, she wouldn’t have stopped her grandpa from showing respect to Chiang Songtao.
But her experiences from her previous life told her that the people of the Old Chiang Family never truly considered him one of their own.
In her previous life, when Ding Daqiang’s family pressured for compensation, the Old Chiang Family not only didn’t help but even kicked them while they were down; they called in a "Fairy" to say she was possessed by ghosts, claimed she must be following her mother’s fatal footsteps due to her youth, and even spoke in favor of Niu Guiying, agreeing that they indeed had to compensate others.
Later, when Chiang Songhai fell into a ditch, her grandma pleaded with the Old Chiang Family to look for him, but they didn’t lift a finger. Chiang Songtao even said, "Second isn’t a child; he will come back when it’s time. There is no need to panic over every little thing."
When Chiang Songhai was finally found, he blamed him for being careless and said it was because he spoiled Chiang Xiao too much, that he brought this upon himself, and the Old Chiang Family couldn’t possibly be as foolish as him.
What was the point of such relatives?
Therefore, Chiang Xiao felt no guilt about the idea of driving a wedge between the brothers.
Chiang Songtao shouldn’t expect even a bite of her rabbit meat.
However, she would have to hide the three rabbits well when she got back home, or their discovery would definitely cause a commotion.
With these three wild rabbits, Chiang Songhai felt considerably relieved as well.
The herbs he could find on the outskirts of Bai Gu Mountain were actually not rare and naturally couldn’t sell for much, but those three wild rabbits would probably fetch a good amount.
This way, there was slightly less pressure.
"Grandpa, let’s leave these three rabbits here for now, and we’ll take them with us when we come back down," Chiang Xiao suggested.
A single wild rabbit weighed at least four or five pounds; all three together must be over a dozen pounds. They still had to climb higher up the mountain, and carrying over a dozen pounds of rabbits was a significant burden.
"That works," Chiang Songhai thought about it and agreed. No one else besides him was likely to come to Bai Gu Mountain, and since the wild rabbits were securely tied up, leaving them here for now shouldn’t be a problem.
So, three wild rabbits tied with straw ropes and those Purple Ginseng roots were hidden among the bushes, and Chiang Xiao continued to climb upwards with her small basket on her back, following Chiang Songhai.
Along the way, Chiang Songhai dug up quite a few herbs, and Chiang Xiao learned some knowledge about medicinal plants as well.
However, as they went further up, Chiang Songhai wouldn’t let her out of his sight anymore, and Chiang Xiao could no longer do anything she wanted. She did manage to secretly slide a few types of herbs into Space, which was not a small gain.
By noon, they had arrived at a stream.
The babbling stream flowed by, with oddly shaped stones along the water’s edge and some purple flowers quivering delicately in the stone crevices, lighting up Chiang Xiao’s eyes. Was there a bit of the supposed malevolence of Bai Gu Mountain?