บท 3: Episode 2: White-Faced Steamed Buns
Hua Xiaomai felt a bead of cold sweat trickle down her forehead; trembling, she turned around to see Hua Erniang standing with one hand on her hip, an imposing aura about her as she stood at the entrance of her own courtyard. Her furrowed brows resembled arrows aimed to strike, her hand brandishing a divinely shining object—the unbeatable rolling pin indeed.
In fact, Hua Erniang was quite beautiful with almond-shaped eyes, willow-leaf eyebrows, and cherry lips, and her figure was gracefully curvaceous. A mere pose from her could turn her into the most enchanting flower of Fire Knife Village. Sadly, her temperament was excessively fierce and aggressive, and her voice so sonorous that when she yelled, the whole village shook, her voice as formidable as a dragon's roar or a tiger's bellow. Over time, her notoriety spread far and wide, with just the mention of her name turning people pale.
At this moment, she was wearing a half-worn silvery red jacket with a slightly disheveled collar, revealing much of her fair neck, and her hair was a bit unkempt, adding to her intimidating presence, as if she was ready to devour someone. Hua Xiaomai shuddered violently, whispering timidly, "Erjie..."
"Jie my foot!" Hua Erniang quickly reached out, grabbed her by the ear, and twisted it as she berated her furiously, "If you want to court death, do it far away! When you're in my house, you follow my rules! What did I tell you? To come home before sunset, and you forgot it all? If I don't discipline you today, you won't know how many eyes the Ma Wangye has!"
Hua Xiaomai thought: I did want to return earlier, but with the intensity of the fight in the house, I feared it wouldn't be good to interrupt you two suddenly, would it?
She couldn't get these words out as her ear was being pulled painfully, feeling as if it was about to come off. She could only cry out meaninglessly with repeated "ow, ouch" sounds of agony.
"Erniang, please don't hit, don't hit her!" Pan Taigong hurried over to intervene, pleading repeatedly, "Don't blame Maizi, I had just fallen, and she kindly wanted to take me home, that's what delayed her, you..."
"Pan Taigong." Hua Erniang turned her scowl into a sweet smile, smilingly saying, "Look at her, thin as a rail, so clumsy with her hands and feet, if she had hurt you, that would have been terrible. Just wait here a moment, I'll have Taihe come help you."
With that, she dragged Hua Xiaomai back into the house by twisting her ear, while Pan Taigong indeed stood still, not daring to move an inch. From inside, a sappy voice called out, "Taihe, Pan Taigong has had a fall, and who knows if he's hurt his legs or feet. Be quick and see to him, will you?"
Pan Taigong felt a chill run down his spine, his body breaking out in goosebumps from head to toe, trapped somewhere between laughter and tears, he just shook his head.
Hua Erniang brought Hua Xiaomai back home, but didn't really do anything to her. She simply tossed her into the main room before taking the half-basket of mushrooms straight to the kitchen to start on dinner.
This small courtyard had been newly built when Hua Erniang and her husband Jing Taihe moved here from the eastern edge of Fire Knife Village two years ago. The estate comprised merely three rooms; the kitchen was built in the yard, and Hua Erniang with her husband Jing Taihe lived in the large room on the east side. The west side room, once storage for miscellaneous items, was cleared for Hua Xiaomai to sleep in after her arrival. The courtyard wasn't large, and the items in use were quite ordinary, even verging on shabby, but everything was kept neat and tidy. Living here was, after all, quite comfortably heartwarming.
Hua Xiaomai sat sheepishly in the chair for a while. Remembering the look on Pan Taigong's face when the sugar cake was mentioned—like a man facing a great enemy—she felt a wave of concern. After much thought, she eventually stood up and edged toward the kitchen door, peering around hesitantly and whispering softly, "Erjie, let me help..."
Before she could finish her offer with the word "you", Hua Erniang spun around, her face flushed with urgent anger as she exclaimed loudly, "You blockhead, I don't need your help! If you break the plates and dishes, can you afford it? Even selling you wouldn't cover the cost, so stay away from me!"
Hua Xiaomai sighed, hung her head, and walked back out.
Hua Erniang forbidding her to cook was not only an insult to someone who had graduated top of her class from Chef School, but it was also a torment. If Hua Erniang had any culinary talent, if the dishes she made were fragrant and delicious, then she might have been able to endure it. Unfortunately, the "tyrant of Fire Knife Village" possessed a miraculous ability to turn the divine into the rotten, which was truly astonishing to behold.
In her lifetime... no, in both her lifetimes, the only thing she had been proud of was her culinary skills, and now, they were of no use. So what was the purpose of her existence?
Before long, Jing Taihe came back from Pan Taigong's house, and dinner had already been set on the table. Hua Erniang graciously awarded Hua Xiaomai with a roll of her eyes and called her husband to the table with a charming, delicate voice.
On the table was a bowl of something indistinctly black and sticky, its origin dubious. After careful examination, Hua Xiaomai thought it might be the mushrooms she had gathered from the mountain. There were three bowls of watery yam porridge, and a winnowing basket with overly salty flatbread. As for the four steamed buns, which had turned out a bit misshapen, they were positioned in front of Jing Taihe.
"Little sister, Grandpa Pan said we have you to thank for today, so I wanted to say thanks," Jing Taihe said with a generous and honest smile as he sat down at the table, turning his head to speak to Hua Xiaomai, "Your second sister didn't mean to lose her temper at you on purpose. She was just worried when it got late and you hadn't come back, thinking something might have happened to you."
"I know." Hua Xiaomai nodded seriously, "Second sister always means well for me."
"Dream on!" Hua's stepmother walked into the living room from the kitchen and sat down beside Hua Xiaomai, her voice devoid of warmth, "Worry about her? Ha! Heaven and earth are my witnesses, I'd rather she got lost! One less mouth to feed at home would mean more rations for me, making life more comfortable! Don't say I didn't warn you, Hua Xiaomai, that wheat flour bun is for your brother-in-law alone, you're only fit to eat this coarse pancake. If you dare to touch that bun, I'll beat you to death!"
With that, she placed a chopstick-full of "blackish" food into Jing Taihe's bowl, and sweetly smiled, "Husband, why aren't you eating your vegetables? I made them specially for you!"
Hua Xiaomai shook her head secretly: Don't do this, he still wants to live a few more years.
Hua's stepmother was truly talented, managing to turn sweet yams into something bitter and sour. Hua Xiaomai took a sip of porridge and found herself unable to swallow any more, not daring to touch the possibly poisoned vegetables on the table. She grabbed a pancake instead. Though rough, the salted pickles inside were extremely salty, which when combined with the pancake was just about palatable.
After finishing one, she felt it wasn't enough and reached for a second, only to have her stepmother land a chopstick smack on the back of her hand: "Eat, eat, eat, all you do is eat! You look so skinny, how can you eat so much? Hey, you haven't gotten a case of 'starving consumption,' have you?"
Jing Taihe tried to intervene from the side, "That's enough, what's one pancake worth? Little sister had a tough time back in Fire Knife Village..."
"If she eats it all, what will you have left?" Hua's stepmother was adamant and held Hua Xiaomai's hand to keep her from touching anything on the table.
Hua Xiaomai looked up to the sky: I knew you cared about me, preferring to poison your own husband rather than harm your sister in the slightest. Thank you so much.
Jing Taihe shook his head helplessly and began to argue with her. Hua Xiaomai couldn't be bothered to listen anymore and simply left the table to return to the west room.
After the meal, as usual, fearing Hua Xiaomai would break something, her stepmother wouldn't let her help clean up in the kitchen. Instead, she hurried her off to take a bath.
"You're always crawling around in the woods; who knows if you'll bring fleas back with you! Hurry up and go get yourself properly washed!" Without further discussion, she shoved Hua Xiaomai into the makeshift bathhouse made of thin wooden boards and closed the door behind her.
Hua Xiaomai let out her third sigh of the day but seeing the steam rising from the tub, she slowly made her way over.
Her stepmother had already brought her change of clothes inside, neatly folded on a wooden rack, with a white object seemingly placed on top of the pile.
When Hua Xiaomai went over to look, the corners of her mouth couldn't help but curl up slightly.
It was a still-steaming wheat flour bun... uh, its shape was quite... unconventional.
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A new little character here, seeking an audience, seeking support~
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