Chapter 8: Turning Waste into Treasure
Wen Nanxi met Su Muyao’s gaze and was struck by how beautiful and full of life her eyes were. When she smiled, her crescent eyes seemed to hold the moonlight, so clear and pure. They were exquisite, as if layered with sunshine, bright enough to easily shine into a person’s heart.
Wen Nanxi’s expression softened, a gentle look gracing his elegant, refined face. “Alright.”
After he sat down, Su Muyao handed him a pair of chopsticks and a spoon. Only then did she begin to eat.
She ate the fish noodles with her chopsticks, taking small, unhurried bites without making a sound. She was focused on her meal, not even glancing at Wen Nanxi. In the beastman world, people only ate twice a day. After working for so long, she was starving. The fish noodles were topped with a bird egg and cooked sweet potato leaves, which made them even more fragrant.
As Wen Nanxi ate, he was filled with a sense of disbelief. He never imagined that fish could be deboned and made into something so delicious, without even a hint of a fishy smell. He also noticed that she ate with a quiet elegance. Every dish was a complete shock to him.
When Su Muyao had nearly finished, she seemed to remember something and looked up at Wen Nanxi. She noticed that his every move, even while eating, was graceful and noble, like that of a distinguished young master from a great family. In truth, she knew nothing of Wen Nanxi’s origins or background. All she could recall was that her predecessor’s father had brought him home once and instructed her to treat him well.
“Is the food to your liking?”
“Yes, it’s delicious,” Wen Nanxi replied in his gentle voice. “If there’s anything you’d like to eat, my lady, you can just tell me the steps. I can cook so you don’t have to tire yourself out.”
Su Muyao smiled. “It’s fine. I don’t have anything else to do, anyway. Besides, I enjoy cooking.”
In the post-apocalyptic world, ingredients were limited and extremely precious; sometimes, all they had were nutrient solutions. Though the beast world was less advanced when it came to culture and cuisine, the environment was pristine and untouched by pollution. Resources were abundant, and all the ingredients were organic. The thought of being able to create all sorts of dishes made her genuinely happy. She could even cook over a real wood fire—something that had been impossible in her previous life.
Wen Nanxi saw the bright, captivating look on her face and knew she was telling the truth.
“Then I will help you from now on.”
“Okay.” Su Muyao didn’t refuse. With Wen Nanxi’s abilities, many tasks would be much easier for him than for her.
After they finished eating, Wen Nanxi naturally cleared the table. It was the first time since being exiled that he had eaten his fill.
Su Muyao went into the courtyard to burn some plants, intending to use the ash to clean the pork offal. Based on her previous life’s calendar, it was now early July. The days were still warm, and if the pork wasn’t processed properly, it would spoil. It wasn’t easy to hunt in the forest, and it was dangerous. She didn’t want to waste a single scrap of food.
The only thing she lacked was spices. If she had spices, she could make braised dishes. She’d heard there were all kinds of shops, including apothecaries, in a nearby city. Some members of the tribe would take their kills to the city to trade for salt, pottery, and other daily necessities. An apothecary might have spices, but she would likely need a lot of meat and pelts to trade for them.
She decided she would dry all the mushrooms she had picked. Later, she could grind them into a powder to use as a seasoning. The wood ears could also be dried and stored, then simply rehydrated whenever she wanted to use them.
Meanwhile, in the other room, Xiao Jihan and Hua Linye fell silent as they stared at their empty bowls and plates. They never thought food could taste so good.
“If I hadn’t seen it for myself, I would never believe she was the one who cooked,” Hua Linye said. “It’s incredible. I never had food this good, not even back in my family’s estate.”
Xiao Jihan said in a low voice, “By tradition, we should be the ones taking care of her, not the other way around.” Although Su Muyao had abused and tormented them, making them despise her, the idea that they should be the ones to provide for their Wife Master was deeply ingrained in them since childhood.
Hua Linye sighed in frustration. “It’s not that we don’t want to cook for her. She was always finding fault with whatever we made. She’d angrily flip the table over the food we worked so hard to prepare, and she’d rather throw it all away than let us eat it. And the three of us have always taken turns cooking.”
Even when they went hunting, one of the three would always stay behind to protect and look after Su Muyao, while the other two went out to find food. Although they were inside the tribe, which was safer than the forest, there was always a chance a rampaging mutated beast could break in and start killing people. Everyone was extremely cautious.
“It’s like the sun rose from the west today.” Hua Linye still felt a sense of surrealism. After a pause, he added suspiciously, “Wen Nanxi said she was different today. Could it actually be true?”
A ripple of emotion crossed Xiao Jihan’s cold eyes. He hadn’t given it much thought before, but now that he did, he realized her gaze had changed ever since she hit her head on the wall and woke up. At the time, he’d assumed she was just planning some new trick to torment them. But what if…?
The moment the thought crossed his mind, Xiao Jihan’s expression changed. But he couldn’t be sure.
“Let’s just wait and see. We can’t fall into another one of her traps.”
Hua Linye’s brief flicker of hope died down. “You’re right. Let’s clear the table first.”
After gathering the dishes, Xiao Jihan and Hua Linye took them to the cookhouse. As they stepped out of their room, they saw Su Muyao sitting in the courtyard, busily working on something. For a second, they both thought they were seeing things. Hua Linye even used his ability to check, but even then, the person he saw was still Su Muyao.
Su Muyao heard them but didn’t turn around.
Wen Nanxi finished washing the dishes, wiped down the table and floor, and tidied up the cookhouse before coming out. When Xiao Jihan and Hua Linye brought their bowls in to wash, Wen Nanxi saw Su Muyao in the courtyard. A look of surprise crossed his face, and he walked over to her.
“My lady, what do you need? Let me do it,” he said softly.
“It’s almost done. I just need to wash these.”
When Wen Nanxi saw what Su Muyao was scrubbing in the basin, his expression shifted. “Usually, when we bring back a kill, we just throw these parts away. They’re inedible.”
But after tasting what Su Muyao had cooked today, Wen Nanxi knew she had her own way with food, a way of turning waste into treasure.
Su Muyao explained patiently, “These are actually quite good. You just have to scrub them clean with plant ash before you cook them. From now on, we can keep the innards of any animal we hunt.”
“Wen Nanxi, I won’t let you guys go hungry anymore.”
Hearing her words and seeing the serious look in her eyes, Wen Nanxi’s heart softened, and his gaze grew gentle. “Yes. I believe you, my lady. But it is our duty to make sure you do not go hungry.”
“Is there anything I can help with?”
Su Muyao said, “Those sweet potatoes… I want to cut them all into thin strips.” This way, she could use a small portion to make sweet potato syrup, which could be used as a sweetener in her cooking. The rest she would use to make sweet potato starch, opening up even more culinary possibilities. Tonight, she would plant more sweet potatoes in her pocket dimension. Crops grew faster there and produced a higher yield.
“Alright, I’ll do it.”
By now, Xiao Jihan and Hua Linye had finished cleaning up, but neither of them moved from the cookhouse. They seemed to be trying to figure out what to do next.
“She always liked to take a bath after eating.”
“Then let’s heat some water.”
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