CHAPTER 48: CHAPTER 48 GENDER CRIMES 48

"It’s nothing much, I’m just curious about what you’re thinking so deeply about. I’ve called you several times and you didn’t respond. Should we smoke this wild boar and make it into salted dried meat?"

The Eldest Lady, now renamed Qin Miao, had become more cheerful living with Qin Shuang over the years. She no longer had the timid and shy demeanor she once had, always with her head down, afraid to speak loudly behind Qin Shuangshuang.

Qin Shuangshuang nodded and brought the pork back into the house, saying to Qin Miao, "Let’s make it into dried meat!" She looked around the house but didn’t see Mrs. Bai, "Has our mother gone out to dig wild vegetables again?"

"Yes, lately every household has barely any greens. It’s too dry in the fields, and nothing can grow. Even wild vegetables are very scarce." As Qin Miao spoke, she skillfully came out with a knife and a basin, ready to cut up the wild boar meat.

The boar’s head and offal were already gone, and some of the fattier belly pork had been given away by Qin Shuangshuang. In those days, having fatty meat was considered the best because cooking with it was both delicious and economical on oil.

Qin Shuangshuang first went to check the place where she stored preserved meat. It was a loft she had specially built, filled densely with smoked meat dried and baked using a clay stove, allowing it to be preserved long-term! Qin Shuangshuang had spent nearly half a year secretly accumulating this stock.

After clearing a space among the packed dried meat for the new batch, Qin Shuangshuang went out, planning to help Qin Miao process the wild boar meat. Just then, Mrs. Bai returned, carrying a basket woven from willow, which contained only a small pile of poor-quality wild vegetables.

Qin Miao was carefully washing these wild vegetables, not even willing to throw away the yellowing wilted leaves.

Whether it’s vegetables or water, they’re both rare now. Water is manageable; last year, during the drought, Qin Shuangshuang spent a full twenty taels of silver to have a deeper than usual well dug nearby.

Now, all the wells in the village are dry, except this deep well, which still provides water, but it’s limited to domestic use only. Watering the fields is completely out of the question!

Pork belly was minced, wild vegetables chopped up, and together they were seasoned and mixed with black flour, as refined as white flour, formed into vegetable dumplings, and steamed! Dipped in garlic and chili oil, they tasted exceptionally delicious.

While eating, Qin Shuangshuang and Mrs. Bai discussed with Qin MiaoMiao about sending some to their master, mainly for Fang Yaoyao, because her master, Fang Zhongyi, was a pure carnivore who never tired of eating meat, and being served greens was like taking medicine for him.

Before Qin Shuangshuang could deliver the food, Fang Yaoyao arrived with a basket full of fresh elm seeds.

Qin Shuangshuang immediately recognized them; they were surely gathered by her master while in the mountains, as the village’s elm trees were so dry this year they hardly sprouted leaves, let alone elm seeds.

Fang Yaoyao joined them, conveniently sharing the vegetable dumplings. Afterward, she helped Qin Shuangshuang process the household’s wild boar, slicing meat, rubbing on salt, smoking, baking; it was a painstaking process that took over ten days to turn a wild boar into dried meat.

It still wasn’t raining in the village, and the villagers were becoming quietly desperate, yet they clung to a thread of hope for the next day, refusing to give up entirely. Many families were running low on grain, and yet market prices were sky-high, unaffordable. If they didn’t buy, they would run out of food, forcing them to scrape together all they had to buy some coarse grain.

Amidst this shortage, Mr. Qin somehow managed to transport a cart of grain and set up a stall at home, selling it to the villagers for two Copper Coins less than the market price in the town.

Qin Shuangshuang frowned; the Qin Family was ordinary with no connections, and profiting off their kin during a disaster would ruin their reputation. Furthermore, when people were starving to the point of cannibalism, families without any means of defense would be in trouble.

Qin Shuangshuang had experienced it herself. In her past life, Mr. Qin also acquired a batch of grain to sell, but as the spring planting season passed without rain, the villagers became panicked and desperately hoarded grain.

The Qin family’s grain prices kept rising, but eventually, even with money, Mr. Qin didn’t dare sell anymore, intending to keep it for themselves. When there was truly no grain left, silver became useless.

Yet, the Qin family’s grain wasn’t preserved; the villagers respected their shared surname and kinship, yet the neighboring villagers did not care. In the end, many resorted to eating those who starved, long losing their morality and humanity.

One night, several families from Qin Family Village conspired with villagers from two neighboring villages. They secretly infiltrated the Qin Family premises, stealing all the grain from the Qin family’s granaries and injuring several Qin family members.

Thankfully, the Qin family’s grain was hidden in several places, with two particularly well-concealed spots, enough to avoid starvation. Yet, after the robbery, even with grain in hand, the Qin Family didn’t dare to eat it, fearing that those driven mad by hunger would rob them again.

To dispel suspicion that their family still had grain, Qin the Third, Mr. Qin, along with Old Chen and Little Chen, conceived a heartless plan: to take their useless daughters to other villages and engage in the exchange of children for food.

The Qin Family intended to demonstrate they had no grain left, to avoid being targeted again by desperate people, and the girl exchanged for food was Qin Shuangshuang.

In normal times, such an event would have been strictly dealt with by the Qin Clan to avoid tarnishing their reputation, but in these times of widespread hunger, the family’s handling was merely a casual discussion and simple expulsion from the clan.

Later, Qin Shuangshuang was saved by Fang Zhongyi. When Fang Zhongyi died, she was brought back by the Qin family and soon after was marched like a prisoner to the border city by soldiers sent by the court.

But these are stories of the past life, and this time, Qin Shuangshuang will never let such events happen again!

The skies remained dry, and as the best time for spring planting drifted away in a month, everyone grew anxious. Qin Shuangshuang spent the next month trekking daily into the mountains, capturing countless pheasants and wild rabbits but never encountering game as large as a wild boar again.

The drought became increasingly severe, with every household nearly out of grain. Fortunately, Qin Shuangshuang’s deep well still provided enough water for everyone to cook a pot of porridge thick enough to stave off starvation.*

With not enough grain to eat, villagers had previously relied on buying from the Qin Family, but Mr. Qin lately sensed trouble and had ceased selling grain. Unable to purchase grain, villagers had no choice but to consume even more frugally.

Although the village was out of food, there remained a shred of hope that the court would decree the opening of the granaries to relieve the stricken! But this hope was dashed when the court issued an edict ordering the relocation of people to the border.