As the earthenware jars in the Yangzhou dyehouse steamed with a sour vapor, Zhang Yifan's abacus bead dropped with a "clack" into a vat of yogurt, instantly bouncing into the Chinese character for "sour"—its surface teeming with fine bubbles, looking for all the world as if coated in a layer of nectar. Pei Hongxiu pinched the bead and raised an eyebrow: "Does the rascal really culture bacteria with yogurt? This vat of 'bead-bacterium milk' is enough to make ten catties of cheese!"
"Not at all, not at all," the Protagonist said, shaking a blue-dyed chopstick as the abacus bead bounced near the fermentation pool into the character for "bacterium." "Lactic acid bacteria are the saviors of the dyehouse—Huwa, fetch the Abacus-Bead Measuring Tool!" Huwa's wooden carving of a carving knife handed over a wooden spoon engraved with abacus-bead patterns, and the abacus bead immediately leaped onto the handle of the spoon, spelling out "three to one"—the golden ratio of mineral powder to yogurt.
Moli squatted by the pool to draw the *Abacus-Bead Bacterium Fermentation Diagram*, but the abacus bead bounced onto her wolf-hair brush, turning the lactic acid bacteria drawing into Huwa holding an abacus bead and drinking yogurt. Pei Hongxiu laughed so hard she fell backward onto the bags of dye, and the abacus bead seized the opportunity to leap into her hair, dyeing her golden hair-ornament indigo and spelling out the character for "beauty": "Sister Hongxiu wearing the 'bead-dyed golden h…
Chapter 195