As for Gu Panpan, because of the wedding drama, she did not return to the Educated Youth Point. After getting the two of them settled to rest, Hou Yong grabbed a flashlight and headed up the Back Mountain alone.
Though he spoke lightly of it, the concrete predicament right before his eyes left him no room to idle. He had to hustle to make money; otherwise, the meager bride-price savings his family had scraped together wouldn't even cover half a month's worth of medicine.
There weren't many wild beasts on the Back Mountain at night, but the mosquitoes were relentless. Right before leaving, Hou Yong casually pulled a couple of dried mugwort stalks from the door and tossed them into his back basket, which would at least offer some meager defense against the bugs.
Rounding the Back Mountain, the first thing that came into view was patch after patch of stone flower seeds.
These plants had purple-black roots and stems, heart-shaped leaves, and bore many lantern-like fruits.
Having forgotten to bring a sickle, Hou Yong had to pull them up by the roots. After struggling for over three hours, his undershirt was soaked with sweat and plastered to his skin. He weighed the back basket behind him—it felt to be around ten pounds or so—and felt as though his arms were so sore they were ready to detach themselves and run away.
When he climbed down the mountain and arrived home, it was already past four in the morning, and the chickens in the neighboring yard were already crowing.
People in the countryside generally woke up early, so Hou Yong simply decided not to sleep. He fetched the large wooden basin normally used for washing clothes, used some freshly pumped well water to give his body a quick wipe down, and sat down on the ground to rub the stone flower seeds.
He put a little less than half a basin of stone flower seeds into a cloth bag and vigorously rubbed them inside the basin, pounding them as he rubbed. After about twenty minutes, he had worked all the sticky coating off the surface of the seeds, and a basin of crystal-clear well water visibly shifted from clear to cloudy and viscous.
A little over half a jin of stone flower seeds had turned into a thick, shapeless mass of ice jelly.
The sun hadn't risen yet, and the well water was cold enough. Hou Yong found another large basin, filled it to the brim with well water, and set the wooden basin containing the ice jelly inside the larger one to chill for a bit.
Hou Yong didn't idle while waiting. He rummaged through the kitchen twice and recalled from his past life's memories that ice jelly could be garnished with things like osmanthus syrup, raisins, or dried hawthorn to enrich the texture.
It was a pity that their current household conditions didn't allow for it—none of those things were available. The only thing in the corner of the kitchen was a large plastic bucket, which seemed to have originally held lollipops at a small shop, and which his mother had brought back to use as a sugar jar.
Hou Yong initially thought about boiling some brown sugar, but buying it ready-made was better.
He planned to try a plain sweet version first. If it succeeded, he would go to the market to buy some ready-made brown sugar and dried fruit to see which variety proved more popular with city folks.
Gu Panpan had woken up while Hou Yong was washing the stone flower seeds. She stood at the kitchen doorway without speaking, feeling a pang of heartache as she watched Hou Yong pour half a jar of white sugar into the pot.
In this day and age, white sugar still required ration coupons to purchase, and those without coupons had to pay extra. Meat was expensive in the countryside, but sugar was even pricier. Unless the village was hosting a massive banquet, white sugar was rarely used in daily life. The sugar Hou Yong had just poured in was worth at least three yuan or so.
"You're awake?"
Hou Yong turned around to grab the spatula, and seeing Gu Panpan standing at the doorway, he greeted her with a smile.
Gu Panpan nodded with a smile, walked over, and leaned in close to the pot. "Brother Yong, are you making something delicious?"
"Yeah, making a little snack you've never had before. I'm sure you'll love it."
Gu Panpan nodded very obligingly. The girl had one great virtue: she never questioned Hou Yong. Otherwise, in his past life, she wouldn't have come running without a second thought when Hou Yong called for her help during the early stages of his venture.
Hou Yong went ahead and boiled the sugar water. Without even washing the pot, he added water and rice back into it—the leftover sugar wouldn't go to waste, and a bowl of sweet porridge once Dong'er woke up wouldn't be bad either.
Taking advantage of the time the porridge needed to boil, Hou Yong took a pair of chopsticks and walked outside. He poked the ice jelly in the wooden basin with a chopstick and frowned. An hour had passed, and the ice jelly in the basin still hadn't set.
Logically speaking, even with normal cooling, this stuff should have solidified after such a long time. Had he forgotten a step?
Hou Yong pinched the bridge of his nose and earnestly pondered the details of trying to make ice jelly in his past life. It seemed he really had missed a step.
Back when he was rubbing and washing the stone flower seeds, the worker seemed to have added something powdery to his container—that powder must have been the key to the solidification.
"Brother Yong, is this the treat you're going to make?"
Gu Panpan followed behind Hou Yong, stared at the chopsticks in his hand, squatted down, dipped a finger in, and licked it. "Huh? What is this? It's ice-cold and feels like it tastes really good."
"Well... this thing is called ice jelly. You can eat it now, but we can't sell it for money. The batch failed."
"It doesn't matter if it failed. I'll help you make it together."
Gu Panpan reached out and hooked her arm through Hou Yong's. Hou Yong smiled, and the minor sense of defeat from his very first failed attempt instantly vanished into thin air.
His girl always knew how to provide him with immense emotional value.
"We won't eat this. If I'm giving you something to eat, it has to be the best."
With that, Hou Yong picked up the wooden basin and dumped its contents straight into the pig trough nearby.
The family originally had three pigs, but to pay for Hou Yong's wedding, they sold one and slaughtered another, leaving just this single one now.
Gu Panpan followed silently behind Hou Yong as he rummaged through boxes and cabinets in the storeroom to find something. She quietly poured out some stone flower seeds from the back basket and, imitating his actions, sat down in the corner to start washing them.
Meanwhile, Hou Yong had remembered what that substance was. Just like the principle of curdling tofu, the powder added back then in Xinyang was gypsum powder.
Fortunately, there was still half a small bag of gypsum powder left in the storeroom. Since it was his first time making it, Hou Yong wasn't sure how much to use, so he simply scooped out a rice bowl's worth. When he turned back and saw Gu Panpan washing the stone flower seeds, he wanted to step in and take over the chore, but he held back.
He knew Gu Panpan's personality very well; though she seemed soft on the outside, she was actually quite stubborn at heart. Right now, she must have desperately wanted to do something to help this family, hadn't she?
He couldn't dampen the girl's enthusiasm at a time like this.
Once Gu Panpan finished washing the stone flower seeds, Hou Yong finally emerged from the storeroom with several basins.
Seeing that Gu Panpan was drenched in sweat from exhaustion, Hou Yong grabbed a towel and gently tapped it against the girl's forehead a few times.
"You've worked hard. Take a break, I'll handle the rest."
"Yeah!"
Gu Panpan nodded vigorously and stepped aside to yield her spot. In that fleeting moment of working together, she suddenly felt a small, joyful thrill of a young couple striving side by side.
Hou Yong didn't overthink it. He divided the mixture into a total of five small basins, adding different proportions of gypsum powder to each, and once again waited for the ice jelly to cool.
Taking advantage of the waiting time, Hou Yong went to wake Dong'er up for breakfast.
Breakfast was still rice porridge and the leftover dishes from yesterday's wedding banquet. Because of the hot weather and no refrigerator, if the leftovers weren't eaten today, they would spoil completely. Whether it was due to being exhausted from hard work or not, Hou Yong had an exceptionally good appetite today; the majority of the food left over from the wedding banquet the day before ended up in his stomach.
As for Dong'er and Gu Panpan, both tacitly let Hou Yong eat his fill.