บท 64: Chapter 21 Everything in good order
yǒu tiáo bù wěn - everything in good order and well arranged; in perfect order; all in good order without confusion; arranged in an orderly way
The sky outside gradually turned a colour like the underbelly of a fish, the weather had turned colder, trees were bare of leaves, and the ground had dried up. For the past few weeks, in the Peace Swallow Town, it had rained twice, which made the despondent residents happy and dancing outside on the streets. They had collected the rain water and saved the water for other uses.
For the preparation of coming into Peace Swallow Town, aside from brining grains from the government granary, Murong LiWang had also asked to bring food that they could keep through winter, such as soya, dried meat, fruits, nuts, honey and even her wine that she had stored since she was young. YuQin did not even bat her eyes at her little master request.
When Murong LiWang was born into the mortal realm, she remembered the feeling of fatigue, it had been warm and dark then suddenly she awoke when she felt sunlight on her body. The familiar smell of peach blossoms made her feel happy and she continued to be sleepy. The first few days as a mortal was very perplexing for her, she could not speak words, but instead made gurgling baby
noises. To her shock, something soft was placed into her mouth and she drank a milky liquid to sustain her delicate mortal baby body.
At that time, it had felt very weird, and she felt like out of the body experience, watching the wet nurse to breastfeed her like how she saw some animals fed their young. Murong LiWang felt ignorant and unprepared – she did not know as a mortal, she needed to eat and drink often and later she needed to let it out. As an infant, she always landed herself in embarrassing situations of soiling herself and having other ladies to clean her up. She felt her soul had left her corporeal body when she was in infancy stage, until she felt strong enough to control her movement from sitting to crawling, she would crawl towards the pot herself and she even could do simple speech of yes and no.
Her first "no" was to the wet nurse, and her "yes" was towards plain rice and later to fruits. From then, she grew up steadily with rice and fruits until she could walk around independently.
Then when she started running, YuQin started to bring food that smell off putting for her, and LiWang found out that was from animal meat. Murong LiWang had grown up foraging fruits, nuts and other plants when she was in immortal realm, so in the mortal realm, she was termed as a vegetarian. As she refused food that contained meat, the General Murong's manor chef always carefully prepare and thought of ways to make vegetarian food for her.
Sometimes her mortal father would be considerate and follow her to eat vegetarian food but after a few meals together, he told her only he would only have 1 vegetarian meal per day, and the rest of meals, he would want his wine and meat. Her eyes had brightened at the mention of wine, and she almost salivate when she smelt rice wine Murong XieChu had taken out from his cellar.
LiWang looked at Murong XieChu with stars in her eyes, and he guffawed saying children stomach could not take strong wine and but he let the little child smell his wine and even a sip. That sip burnt her throat and she choked on the wine, tearing up. She wanted to really cry! All Gold Peach fairies loved to drink wines, especially fruit and blossom wines. Now that she was a mortal, she had to wait years till her body adjusted to be able to drink her most favourite drink.
Thus, being a mortal child and unable to drink wine, she could only make wine for her father and to store for future enjoyment. During early spring, when the peach blossom bloomed to their full glory in General Murong's garden, she happily went around with her basket on her small arms and picked peach blossoms in heaps into her basket. She had asked the big brother shadow guard to collect clear spring water specifically from the mountain, which was clean and crystal clear.
While waiting for the shadow guard to return with the water, the people in the kitchen would smile while they saw her small size busying about. The little master had told them to let her be and that they could stand aside and just watch her. The kitchen staff saw the little figure of their little master scurrying around the kitchen, pulling the stool over and later carried a big bamboo steamer to the table. All their offer to help were rejected.
Once Murong LiWang received her water, the little master softened the glutinous white rice by soaking them. Then LiWang took the rice out from the water and put them into the bamboo steamer and placed handfuls of peach blossoms from her flower basket and mixed together with the wet rice. Over a fire, she steamed the rice and flowers with blossom water.
The scent of the steamed peach blossom and glutinous rice was so divine for her, that Murong LiWang would close her eyes and remember her first time learning this wine making with her elders. She took some JiuQu (酒曲)/distiller yeast balls, and slowly ground them with her short stubby hands in a stone pedestal on the side. Then the little child would carefully open the steamer and asked YuQin to take the bamboo steamer off from the heat, and she would use a wooden spoon the spread and mix the cooked rice.
Murong LiWang ladled the boiled water and added another handful of peach blossom into a wooden bowl and mixed in the grounded yeast. With the yeast mixture, she would then pour it over the steamed rice in the bamboo steamer and she would use her small hands to mix the rice evenly, and accepted YuQin's help to mix together.
"It smells good, right?" The small one smiled and went back mixing the rice and flowers, the fragrant from steaming warm rice mixture wafted in the air.
'Too adorable!' YuQin as usual would be transfixed after seeing the child smile, her pretty eyes curved like crescents, small baby teeth smiling sweetly with dimples on her chubby cheeks.
Later, they let the rice mixture ferment inside in a closed flask in their storage room for weeks. Murong LiWang would clap her hand when they opened the flask to see the cloudy liquid and excitedly ask YuQin to help her strain to another flask, which she would seat while watching YuQin help her broiled the flask. It was after the tiny figure saw the broiled flask containing the cooked fermented rice, sealed airtight with mud and buried under the ground, would she then agree to take her afternoon nap. YuQin would then carry her back to her manor and help her change to her clean clothes to sleep.
It was very idyllic period for YuQin to take care of her mistress only child in the General's manor, a very stark contrast to what they were facing currently.
The epidemic and the famine made people very desperate and YuQin organized for their food aid a little further away from the new General's residence. As much as they had brought their food, they had not expected the number of people within the city and they had to thin out the gruel and added slices of the dried meat into the gruel.
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