Chapter 13
Chapter 13
“Lao Er.”
The sound of that voice was nothing short of heavenly to Zhang Family Second Son.
His face was smeared with snot and tears, and he hurriedly used his elbow to wipe it clean. He held up the clay pot he had been cradling in his arms for his mother to see. “Mother, we have water and food now.”
Zhang Family’s Second Son originally wanted to say he would cook some porridge, but then he remembered the house had long since run out of firewood.
He had no choice but to go to the kitchen and find a long-handled wooden spoon. He used it to crush the rice into the clear water, forcing it into a mash to feed his mother.
The old woman, her body swollen all over, dizzily managed to force down two bites.
But then she turned her head away and began to cry out in pain.
The Guanyin Clay she had eaten previously had expanded and was impossible to digest. It couldn’t be passed, either; it just sat there, bloating inside a person’s stomach. In the end, this substance-devoid of any nutritional value-would cause a person to literally swell to death while suffering from agonizing thirst.
Zhang Family Second Son had seen many people die this way.
However, now that it was happening to his own mother, the pain was exceptionally acute. They clearly had water and food now, so why could she still not survive?
He frantically massaged his mother’s stomach, then pulled a stalk of Cogongrass from a woven mat, intending to poke it down her throat to make her vomit.
But his mother could do nothing except retch up a bit of the water she had just swallowed; her stomach didn’t shrink in the slightest.
This ordeal left the already frail old woman deathly pale.
Just as Zhang Family Second Son was falling into deeper despair, his eyes fell upon the Cogongrass in his hand.
His spirit suddenly jolted. When he had collected the rice and grain, he heard that the water and rice that had suddenly appeared in the city were gifts from a Deity. Cogongrass was said to be able to invite spirits and communicate with the divine.
Since there were Deities in this world, he was willing to give up everything if he could only obtain a divine medicine to save his mother’s life.
Zhang Family Second Son carried the clay pot into the courtyard and knelt on the ground, praying to the rice grains bestowed by the “God.”
“Heaven above, my mother is critically ill. This humble servant is willing to trade a lifetime of blessings for the Deity to bestow a divine medicine.”
***
“A-choo!” Qin Ying sneezed.
“What was that?”
She thought she had heard a faint voice and assumed the pharmacist was speaking, so she reflexively asked for clarification.
The young pharmacist was baffled by her question. “I said… hello?”
The two of them stared at each other.
Qin Ying gave an embarrassed smile. “Maybe the heat is getting to me. I think I’m hallucinating.”
The pharmacist laughed as well. “This weather is practically killing people. I heard it’s a heatwave like we haven’t seen in sixty years. The Meteorological Bureau is even going to use cloud seeding to bring some rain and cool things down tomorrow at noon.”
After the small talk smoothed over the previous awkwardness, the two finally got down to business.
Qin Ying had researched a list of medications for drought victims. For people who hadn’t eaten for a long time, oral rehydration salts to replenish fluids and electrolytes were the top priority. Next were various vitamins and mineral supplements.
Some of the little people in the box had unnaturally bloated bellies. They had likely eaten indigestible things like Guanyin Clay.
Therefore, she also bought emetics, lactulose to help with bowel movements, and two large boxes of Enema Solution. Considering other potential issues, she also bought antibacterial and anti-inflammatory drugs, sucralfate, berberine tablets, furazolidone, and so on.
After checking out, Qin Ying stepped out of the pharmacy carrying two large bags of medicine, the sun immediately dazzling her eyes.
She cherished her current eyesight very much, so she used a promotional flyer from the pharmacy to shield her eyes as she walked onto the street.
The area where Qin Ying lived was originally an ancient town. The streets and narrow alleys branched out in all directions, as complex as a labyrinth.
The location of the pharmacy, if one went back two hundred years, happened to be the Caishikou execution grounds. In modern times, it had been converted into a marketplace. Pharmacies and shops were packed together, interspersed with crowded, somewhat unhygienic stalls selling local snacks.
In this area, one could see old-fashioned sundries stalls selling bright red embroidered insoles and white shell oil. Right next to a sundries stall, however, was an internet-famous trendy cafe.
Time intersected here in a strange way. It was likely because of this eccentric charm that foodies and tourists often wandered about.
Qin Ying walked into a shop.
Behind the glass tobacco counter of the small shop, an older woman’s hair was permed into tight, red wire-like curls.
A cash register and a payment QR code sat before her. She was busy knitting a bright red sweater, her eyelids barely fluttering when a customer entered.
Her phone’s speaker was blaring, just as the news mentioned the continuous heatwave and the Meteorological Bureau’s plan for cloud seeding at noon.
Qin Ying walked up to the counter. “Auntie, I’d like to buy some rice. Do you offer home delivery?”
Hearing Qin Ying call her “Auntie,” the woman knitting the sweater immediately looked displeased.
Her tattooed eyebrows, which had faded to a pale red, shot up. Before she even looked up, she snapped, “Who are you calling ‘Auntie’?”
“I don’t have a niece as old as-oh, it’s Qin Ying!”
The angry expression on her face instantly transformed into a smile. “When did you get back?”
Qin Ying smiled. “Just got back yesterday, Aunt Hong.”
Aunt Hong dropped her knitting needles, ready to drag Qin Ying to her house for a meal and a good long gossip session.
Qin Ying said helplessly, “Let’s do lunch another day. For now, please send five bags of rice to my house.”
Aunt Hong was a senior member of the Neighborhood Intelligence Station.
She might be forgetful about other things, but her skills in intelligence analysis were top-tier.
Hearing that Qin Ying wanted to buy rice, her eyes lit up. “Are you… staying for long?”
Qin Ying knew exactly what she was fishing for and said bluntly, “I’ve come back to my hometown to ‘lie flat.'”
After spending years away, Qin Ying had suffered her share of setbacks and injuries, but the money she had on hand was more than enough for her to live a life of leisure.
Aunt Hong’s face took on a gossipy look. “Then, what about that boyfriend who came back with you for your grandmother’s funeral?”
“He was tall and handsome. I heard he was some kind of billionaire.”
At the mention of someone she didn’t want to talk about, Qin Ying’s smile faded. “We broke up.”
“We weren’t the same kind of people. It wouldn’t have worked out.”
Aunt Hong was silent for a moment. “It’s that man’s loss. He didn’t deserve you.”
Qin Ying didn’t bother being humble and nodded. “You’re right. He didn’t deserve me.”
Her attitude was relaxed, but Aunt Hong assumed she was touching on a sore subject, so she rounded down the total when Qin Ying paid.
She even had her husband deliver the rice to Qin Ying’s house on his tricycle.
Aunt Hong’s shop was a husband-and-wife operation. Her husband was a very quiet man.
After delivering the rice and silently helping Qin Ying carry the bags inside, he drove off on his little tricycle.
Qin Ying only had enough time to shout a thank you to his retreating back.
As she stepped inside, the sole of her shoe caught on the doormat.
Qin Ying took off her shoe to check and found a gold earring wedged in the grooves of the sole.
It was 24-karat gold, a simple hoop style, and it felt fairly heavy, maybe a few grams.
She didn’t know which unlucky person had lost it, only for her to step on it and bring it home.
Qin Ying didn’t pay it much mind; there was a crowd of people in the box waiting for medicine to save them.
She pried the earring out, wrapped it in a piece of tissue, and tossed it into the small glass jar for spare change on the entryway shoe cabinet.
Carrying the medicine upstairs, Qin Ying thought about how she should distribute these drugs and instruct the people in the box on how to use them.
Calculating the time, she had been out for about twenty minutes, so it should still be daytime inside the box.
Qin Ying carried the box over to her dressing table.
When she lifted the lid, the small city was still there.
The difference was that the streets were now filled with people walking in a hurry.
At first, Qin Ying thought a riot had broken out, but then she saw orderly lines for distributing water and rice.
The numbers had grown significantly since she left; clearly, many of the city’s Able-bodied Adults had joined the self-rescue efforts.
Qin Ying watched the little people in the box cutting the rice grains and distributing them in an orderly fashion, finding it quite fascinating.
Just as she was about to look for Han Lie to give him the medicine, a very discordant voice of interrogation rang out.
“Han Lie! You have some nerve!”
On the street, a fat man who looked like a red-skinned peanut stood on the shaft of a black tung-oil ox cart, jumping and cursing.
“A lowly corpse-collector, and you dare meddle in such important matters?”
“A Divine-bestowed Auspicious Sign like this should naturally be presented to Luoyang! Who gave you the gall to order its distribution?”