The special fever-reducing medication was remarkably effective. Less than an hour after taking it, Meng Pan'er's fever had mostly subsided, though she was still fast asleep.
Cheng Nuo did not disturb her. Rummaging through the kitchen, she found half a bag of cornmeal and headed to the chicken coop to look for eggs. It was too cold; the hens had gone on strike, and after a long search, she managed to fish out only one from beneath a hen's tail feathers, no larger than a table tennis ball.
She scalded the cornmeal with hot water, stirred it into a batter, and added an egg, white sugar, and pure milk that Cheng Nuo had just ordered from the system mall. After letting the dough ferment, she brushed it with clarified butter and pan-fried it over low heat until both sides turned golden brown.
By the time she finished eating, dusk was approaching. She tossed a few more pieces of charcoal beneath the *kang* bed to ensure it would stay warm all through the night, and only then lay down beside Meng Pan'er.
As she closed her eyes, the verses from the scroll earlier in the day and the plots of novels she had read in the past rushed into her mind like a tidal wave.
She hadn't realized she had transmigrated into a book at first, because the people Cheng Nuo came into contact with were merely marginal characters in *The Real Daughter is a Medical Grandmaster*. She herself lived only within the memories of the secondary male lead, Meng Nanzhou, with the entire book recording her in just a few sparse sentences:
The top scholar Meng had once married a wife in the countryside. That woman was fickle and unchaste, and later, unable to withstand the gossip and slander, she hanged herself by the neck, leaving behind a feeble-minded daughter who died before reaching the age of six—a fitting retribution!
That's right. In the book, the ungrateful wretch Meng Nanzhou not only escaped retribution but instead placed first in the imperial examinations as the top scholar, going on to enjoy a smooth official career and attaining the rank of a second-tier grand official.
Everyone knew that the top scholar's heart was tethered to one person alone. Unable to form a lifelong alliance with her, he preferred to remain chaste and unmarried for the rest of his life, drawing the admiration of countless women across Dasheng.
And this beloved woman held in the very core of Meng Nanzhou's heart was Feng Zhiyi, the female protagonist of the book, a true daughter of a marquis's estate who had been switched at birth.
Tales of swapped true and fake daughters were commonplace. Coupled with the author's severe padding of the plot, Cheng Nuo had practically only glanced at the headings in the latter half of the novel, skipping directly to the grand finale.
In the end, Feng Zhiyi recognized her ancestors and returned to her family clan, married into the East Palace, shared a deep and harmonious bond with the crown prince, and gave birth to a son and a daughter, becoming a romance whispered about in every street and alley.
In short, as the number one lickspittle of Feng Zhiyi in the early stages of the story, Meng Nanzhou ultimately failed to win the beauty's hand, carrying that lifelong regret to his grave.
When she was reading the book, Cheng Nuo had even thought he was quite a pitiful fellow. Now that she had transmigrated into Meng Nanzhou's "early-deceased first wife," she only wanted to grab him by the collar and slap him twice across the face.
You used my good reputation to fulfill your own deep-rooted infatuation, didn't you?
What a piece of trash whose mouth grows out of his ass!
The countryside had no nightlife. Cheng Nuo slept early and woke early.
When she rolled over, the bedding beside her, which had still retained some warmth, was completely empty.
She dressed and stepped out into the courtyard. Whether it was her imagination or not, today's temperature was a few degrees colder than yesterday's, and she couldn't help shrinking her neck.
The padded jacket she wore was too thin; the cotton inside offered zero protection against the cold. She needed to buy a down jacket from the mall—since she couldn't wear it on the outside, she could swap it for a down vest to wear underneath where no one would notice.
Meng Pan'er, who was not even as tall as a water vat, stood on a low stool and was using a stone hammer to smash the ice.
Being small with little strength, she had only managed to chip off a thin layer from the thick block of ice, which was harder than a brick.
Instead, her little hands were frozen bright red, the blood vessels looking as though they might burst right through the thin layer of skin.
That was a special medicine costing 500 cash a pill.
If she caught another chill, she wouldn't have any money left to treat her.
Cheng Nuo snatched the stone hammer right out of Meng Pan'er's hand. "Have you lost your mind, running out to catch the cold in the dead of winter!"
The little fellow's back shrank back, and she slowly turned her head. Cheng Nuo froze in place.
On that pale, thin little face, a pair of long eyelashes were frosted with ice, as if they were about to freeze together. Most striking of all were her parched lips, the dead skin peeling and covered in wrinkles.
Cheng Nuo suppressed the urge to slap her own forehead. How could she have forgotten? People recovering from a high fever needed hydration. Combined with the fact that the little one hadn't swallowed a single drop of water yesterday, she was probably dying of thirst, which was why she had come to smash the ice to boil water.
It was her fault. Last night, she had eaten two extra corn pancakes, which had choked her, and she had drunk every last drop of the hot water from the kettle.
Cheng Nuo picked up her daughter and carried her back inside, covering her entirely with the quilt just like yesterday. "Lie down. You are not allowed to go anywhere."
Her tone was blunt and sounded rather frightening. Meng Pan'er shrank under the quilt, licked her parched lips, and did not dare to utter a single word of dissent.
Entering the kitchen, Cheng Nuo opened the mall, spent ten yuan to buy five liters of mountain spring mineral water, and poured it into the pot to heat up.
It was too cold, and she was too lazy to knead dough and cook. Instead, she simply bought two meat buns and two vegetable buns, steaming them on a bamboo rack over boiling water.
The stove fire burned fiercely, and before long, the aroma of meat buns drifted out. Meng Pan'er's stomach began to rumble like a beating drum, and even the big yellow dog next door let out a couple of yips.
After Cheng Nuo wolfed down two buns, she shoved the remaining two at Meng Pan'er.
The little one didn't dare to eat them at first, but under the threatening gaze of "if you don't eat, I'll hit you," she took a tiny bite, and after that, there was no stopping her.
Once fully fed and watered, before the Meng family returned, Cheng Nuo wanted to take a look up in the back mountain.
Winter was the best time for wild nuts and wild mushrooms.
She had just checked, and aside from half a bag of millet, there was no other food in the kitchen, and the oil and salt were also running near the bottom.
The Meng family did not engage in production and never worked the fields; for six years, they had relied entirely on Cheng Siniang going to her maiden home on the fifteenth of every month to "borrow" rice and oil to get by.
No wonder Mrs. Zhao glared daggers at her; any family that ran into such a sister-in-law would curse up a storm.
Though her maiden family wasn't quite at the point where they couldn't even put food on the table, they were pretty close to it. How could Cheng Nuo add frost to the snow?
Though rice and flour were cheap in the mall, vegetables were quite expensive, and nuts started at three figures. It was better to try her luck on the mountain and forage for ready-made ones.
She couldn't rely too much on the system either. Living in this world, one still had to depend on oneself. Only by standing firmly on her own two feet would others not dare to look down upon her. As for everything else, it was just icing on the cake.
Before leaving, Cheng Nuo hardened her heart and used her remaining money to buy two down vests—one large and one small.
As she buttoned up her daughter's coat, she instructed, "I'm going to the back mountain. There is warm water kept hot in the stove; pour some yourself if you're thirsty. Don't go chipping the ice when you finish it, wait for me to come back."
With that, regardless of the little one's reaction, she ruffled the messy hair on her head, picked up her wicker basket, and walked out.
As she passed the doorway, she couldn't help sniffing the smell on her hands.
Oh my...
Goodness gracious, she definitely had to give her a hair wash when she came back.
It was just early winter now. According to previous years, it shouldn't have been this cold; for some reason, this year, right after the onset of winter, it was almost catching up to the bitter depths of January.
Cheng Nuo walked along the path. Because of the cold, every household was cooped up indoors, and she hadn't seen a single person along the way. This serene environment made her feel happy for the first time since her transmigration.
She didn't need to worry about infected creatures suddenly leaping out from everywhere, nor did she need to guard against others snatching the food and medicine on her person. The sky was a bright blue, the air was fresh, and even breathing felt free—how wonderful.
With no weapon in hand, Cheng Nuo didn't go too deep into the mountain, fearing she might run into wild beasts. Although at this temperature most ferocious beasts had already hibernated, for safety's sake, it was better not to act rashly.
After wandering around the mountainside for a bit, she indeed discovered quite a few good things.
Wild mushrooms hiding on damp tree trunks and dead wood, termite mushrooms that loved to grow in woodland soil, and protein-rich, sweet-tasting wild pine nuts and chestnuts.
Perhaps due to growing unhindered, the wild mushrooms were quite large, usually with a ring of slightly smaller ones surrounding a large one, like a mother leading a brood of children.
Whether this patch had gone undiscovered by the villagers or the people of Yunxi Village simply didn't like wild mushrooms, plenty of them grew around the tree stumps.
Cheng Nuo harvested them one by one, picking only the large ones and leaving the small ones to grow so she could come back and harvest them a few more times.
The quantity of pine nuts and chestnuts wasn't as great as the mushrooms, but if you were lucky, you could scavenge some. Fortunately, Cheng Nuo was willing to circle around a few extra times, and adding them up two or three at a time, she had collected five or six pounds.
The basket was quickly filled. Seeing that she had picked just about enough, Cheng Nuo found a dead tree trunk to sit on and summoned the system mall for checkout.
[Natural, pollution-free wild mushrooms detected: five jin. Recovery price: 50 cash/jin. Does the customer wish to sell?]
[Natural, pollution-free termite mushrooms detected: three jin. Recovery price: 20 cash/jin. Does the customer wish to sell?]
[Wild pine nuts and wild chestnuts detected: three jin each. Recovery price: 80 cash/jin. Does the customer wish to sell?]
Cheng Nuo, who had originally wanted to keep some mushrooms to take back and boil in soup, hesitated. The prices were so wonderful that she simply couldn't bear not to sell!
"Sell! Sell them all!"
The clinking sound of gold coins settling in the system rang out once more.
790 cash deposited.
Account balance: 800 cash.