“Well, my wife said that we can’t be lazy during training and we can’t be afraid of being tired or in pain. We need to sweat more in peacetime so that we bleed less in war. She said that soldiers shouldn’t be afraid of death. If you are afraid of death, you don’t join the army. Being timid will make you die faster…”

“Yeah, that makes sense…”

Lu Bocheng glanced at him secretly, and seeing that he was in deep thought, he lied again: “My wife also said that a real man who defends his country should not be afraid of losing his hands and feet. Having a man is always better than being a widow…”

Puff……

The captain was still thinking about the two sentences that Lü Bocheng said and thought they made a lot of sense and could be used as a slogan to motivate everyone during the drill. Unexpectedly, the boy changed the subject and said something like this.

The captain couldn’t stop laughing: “Your wife is afraid that you will give up hope of living, right? She is right. There is nothing to be afraid of with broken arms and legs. Many people are missing arms and legs on the battlefield. You can’t give up because of this. It’s not shameful. It’s all for the sake of defending our country. Since your wife doesn’t mind your broken arms and legs, you should try to return alive, and don’t let her become a widow.”

“Yes.” Lu Bocheng stood up straight and responded loudly.

The captain saw that he had an upright military posture and had regained his energy and spirit after running for such a long time. He was very satisfied. He patted him on the shoulder, encouraged him a few words, and then turned and left.

Hmm, what was his name? Lü Bocheng, right? Very good. It seemed they had collected some good seedlings this year.

When the dog boy next to him saw the captain leaving, his legs went limp and he fell back onto the grass.

He gave Lü Bocheng a thumbs up and said, “Lü Bocheng, you are this! You didn’t even tremble in front of the captain, your face didn’t change, and you were able to answer questions. You are amazing. I will follow you from now on.”

Lu Bocheng rolled his eyes at him, then sat on the grass and began to recite silently again…

From then on, everyone knew that there was a henpecked recruit in the camp. When he heard that his new wife didn’t want to be a widow, she made him recite slogans every day, saying that “sweat more in peacetime and bleed less in war” and that “broken hands and legs are not scary, but being a widow without a man is scary” and so on.

Almost everyone in the camp knew him, Lu Bocheng.

They heard from his comrades who slept in the same tent with him that he recited all these while sleeping, while doing drills, while taking a bath, and even when doing laundry! He just kept muttering to himself.

Besides training in the camp, the superiors of several camps would pull their soldiers out to practice fighting with each other. Seeing that Lu Bocheng had some skills, his sergeant pulled him to fight with other teams.

After this fight, Lu Bocheng was separated from his squad and became the squad leader with four subordinates, Gou Wa being one of them.

Every evening, the camp would have a bout of sparring, and everyone would start fighting. Before the sparring, they would shout at the tent: “Lü Bocheng, come out and get praised!”

“Liu Tiezhu, come over here! I’m going to feed you with my fists!”

“Come if you want, who’s afraid of who?”

“Come on! If you don’t come, it’s Wangcai! Woof woof woof…”

Several superiors came out of the tent with smiles on their faces and watched the new recruits training below from the high platform, also observing whether there were any good talents.

Lu Bocheng was good at fighting, and he could withstand beatings. He had the strength of a tiger and the more he was beaten, the more he fought back. In just one month, he stood out.

He had practiced with Master Ma for several years and it was not in vain. His wife said he was a poor student, but after seeing his kung fu, she no longer scolded him and said that everyone had their own specialties.

Lu Bocheng was very proud.

Several superiors took a fancy to this new soldier who was good at fighting and wanted to recruit him to their own division. He would be a great general in the future and would bring so much merit to the army! He couldn’t be let go.

At night, Gou Wa quietly asked him, “Have you decided which general’s camp you want to serve under?”

Lu Bocheng shook his head in the dark: “I haven’t thought about it yet.”

“Then you have to think about it carefully. Anyway, I will follow you. Sergeant, don’t think of leaving me behind.”

“Yeah. That’s for sure. We’ve been sleeping in the same tent for a long time.”

“Yes, we’re in the same tent. Brothers for life and death!” After saying this, Gou Wa saw that he didn’t respond, so he turned to look at him.

“Are you thinking of your wife again?”

Lu Bocheng nodded in the darkness: “Yeah, I miss my wife. She must have been feeling very lonely after I left. I feel like an outsider in that family, let alone her… I wonder if my son and daughter have found their mother…”

“Don’t worry, they will find her.”

“Yes, they will definitely find her. I really want the lotus and swan pastries made by my wife… They are so fragrant and oily. When you bite them, they burst into your mouth. They are crispy, fragrant, and soft, just like real lotus flowers blooming layer by layer, and like swans singing with their necks raised. I feel full just by looking at them…”

A silver line flowed from the corner of Gou Wa’s mouth, and he was shamefully greedy.

“Captain, please stop talking. You’ve already made me hungry. I want to eat it, too. What kind of pastry is that that looks like a real lotus or a real swan? It sounds delicious just by hearing it.”

“Mm, it’s delicious. But my wife didn’t let me eat enough. Humph, she also said it was troublesome to make. By the time I left, I only ate it three times. That’s why I think so now!”

What a bad woman. Humph, bad woman.

She must have done it on purpose, deliberately making me miss her so that I wouldn’t mess around with other women. Humph, woman, I know your tricks at first sight.

“Captain, if we can both survive, I will follow you to your Fengting Town. Can you also ask your wife to cook for me? I haven’t seen a swan yet. Is it the same as a big white goose?”

“It’s more beautiful and noble than a big white goose. A big white goose only pecks people on the ground, but a swan flies in the sky, so high.”

“Wow! Your wife can also make cakes in the shape of swans? No wonder you miss her so much. If I had a wife like this, I would also talk about her every day.”

Lu Bocheng raised the corner of his mouth: “You will find such a woman in the future.”

“I hope so if I can survive. Then I will use the military salary I saved to marry a woman who can make pastries.”

“Yes, she will definitely be alive. If you can’t find one in the future, I’ll let my wife introduce one to you.”

“Okay, it’s settled then.”

“Well, it’s settled.”

Su Qingyu had no idea about the man’s night talk.

She was so busy that she didn’t think about him at all, after all, he was gone and no longer around. But as soon as she returned to the Lu family and slept on the new bed, she would think of him, and some fragments of him would quickly pass through her mind.

In the days after she met Liu Juye, she was piecing together his past image in her mind every day, wondering what he would look like with unkempt hair and almost becoming a beggar. She really couldn’t imagine what the picture of him squatting in the corner without any image would look like.

Later, she got busy and gradually stopped thinking about it.

Because the cellar was built, the oven was built, the new stove was built, and the iron pot was set up, she had spent almost all the money she had earned in the past two months. The fruits, vegetables, and poultry were still being collected every day, and people kept bringing them to her store to sell. She was a little panicked because she spent more than she earned every day.

Other stores were trying to imitate her braised meat business, but none of them could make their taste as good as hers. Her store made a certain amount of money every day from selling braised meat, but one day someone would be successful in imitating her and make one that tasted similar.

Su Qingyu did not dare to underestimate the imitation ability of people of this era.

That day she was in front of the new stove, trying to make a new dish, crispy fried baby chicken.

The beginning of autumn had passed, but Fengting Town had not yet entered autumn, and the power of the autumn tiger had not diminished at all.

In the kitchen, a large pot of oil was poured into a newly placed iron pot, boiling hot, with bubbles coming out of the oil, and the kitchen was hot. Su Qingyu took Su Qingliu and Grandma Zhou to try again and again.

When everyone said the taste was right, she let out a long sigh of relief, and the tense nerves loosened. As soon as she let out the energy, she fell backward and fainted.

(End of this chapter)