Chapter 6: The Ending of That Book

When Song Miaomiao woke up, she found herself leaning against a big tree, with Lu Zheng standing nearby carrying her on his back. His tall figure blocked most of the sunlight.

Noticing she was awake, Lu Zheng turned back, visibly relieved.

Then he asked, “Do you want to go back now? I can take you!”

Song Miaomiao immediately recalled what had just happened, her face paling again. She nodded like a chicken pecking rice.

“Okay, I want to go back.”

Soft-bodied bugs were just too scary.

Lu Zheng slightly nodded and after escorting her down the mountain path, was about to leave.

Song Miaomiao felt a bit embarrassed.

She had earlier misjudged him, thinking he might make things difficult for her.

Unexpectedly, not only had he helped her get rid of the leech, but he kindly offered to send her back.

She mustered up courage: “Th-thank you! Sorry about yesterday afternoon, I didn’t mean it.”

Her voice was soft and sticky sweet, like a crystal-clear, extremely sweet maltose candy.

Lu Zheng tightened his grip on his bow, his expression softened, and without turning his head said,

“No need to thank me. Aunt Gui Fang was worried you might be in danger going up the mountain the first time.”

“She knew you insisted on going, so she asked me to look after you a bit.”

Song Miaomiao suddenly understood.

No wonder when they met at the foot of the mountain, Lu Zheng seemed to be waiting for someone.

It turned out he was waiting for her.

She had thought he was blocking her because of yesterday’s incident.

With the misunderstanding cleared up, Song Miaomiao’s impression of Lu Zheng improved a lot.

Although this guy looked tall, imposing, and stern, he was actually a good person.

She carried her bamboo basket home, and when Wang Guifang returned, she proudly showed her the mushrooms.

“Mom, look, all these are picked by me.”

Wang Guifang exclaimed, “So many!”

She took them out one by one, finding there were almost over thirty mushrooms, and most were edible.

“Really capable!”

But Song Miaomiao looked puzzled while taking out the mushrooms.

Had she picked so many before she fainted?

And what happened to the red and purple mushrooms she picked? They were missing.

Before she could think more, Wang Guifang’s words hit her like a bomb.

“Mushrooms keep fresh longer if you don’t wash them. I’ll take them to your Uncle Wang’s house for consignment.”

“I have to go to town every morning to sell tofu; these mushrooms might fetch five or six wen.”

Song Miaomiao was disappointed: “So many mushrooms only sell for five or six wen?”

Wang Guifang tapped her forehead.

“Mushrooms are sold by weight, and these are ordinary mushrooms; at best, one jin (half a kilogram) is worth twenty wen.”

“Besides, with recent rains, the mountain mushrooms come in waves, and many people sell them, so the price naturally dropped.”

While explaining, Wang Guifang picked out the broken mushrooms from the basket.

Those wouldn’t fetch a good price, so they’d keep those for home eating.

At dinner, the table had mushroom blanched rice, a plate of stir-fried wild vegetables, and two steamed buns.

Probably from a full day climbing the mountain, everything tasted good to Song Miaomiao—especially the mushrooms she picked herself, which were particularly fragrant.

At night, when her period came, she noticed it was almost over.

Thinking back that she had gone picking mushrooms with her period barely started, she found it unbelievable.

The farming manuals said the heroine would easily pick a big bunch after just a short time outside.

She thought it would be easy…

But it wasn’t.

She carefully washed the dirt from under her nails, soaked her feet in hot water.

During this time, Wang Guifang came to her room and lit some mugwort, saying it would keep mosquitoes away.

Though Song Miaomiao didn’t say anything, Wang Guifang could tell from the red spots all over her pale skin that she had been bitten badly.

After turning off the light, Song Miaomiao tossed and turned.

It was already the fourth day of her period.

From past experience, the farming manual said it would end within five days.

The novel “The Fake and Real Heiress” she had been reading—she stopped after seeing the heroine die and be buried by her birth mother.

Because afterward, it was all about Song Qingqing’s story, and she was still shocked by the switched-at-birth twist, so she never continued reading.

But if she didn’t keep reading now, after midnight, that book would disappear forever.

After hesitating for a while,

Song Miaomiao finally focused and opened the book in her mind again.

By dawn, with the village’s roosters crowing, she finished reading the entire book after staying up all night.

She sat up in bed, feeling a mix of anger and sadness.

How could it be a second wife story…

Qingqing had sacrificed so much for her husband in the book.

Paying for his studies, caring for his parents, even giving birth to a son and a daughter.

Why in the end,

did she have to share a husband with a princess who gave nothing?

And at the end of the book, no one thought this was wrong.

Everyone believed that for a merchant girl to stand equal to a princess was her blessing.

Bullshit blessing.

Song Miaomiao angrily got out of bed to dress, almost wanting to rush to Lin’an County to tell Qingqing not to choose that hypocritical male lead as her son-in-law.

But as she stepped out, a breeze blew, and she dropped the idea, worried.

Without proof, Qingqing wouldn’t believe her.

She might even think this was a scheme for custody of their foster parents.

Besides, what if she got caught by her foster father and forced to become a concubine?

Song Miaomiao shivered and trembled, thinking that there was still a year until the time when the book’s Song Qingqing would choose her son-in-law, so she decided to wait until then to worry about it.

During breakfast,

Song Miaomiao told Wang Guifang the story about the merchant girl and the princess.

She expected Wang Guifang to be as upset as she was, but unexpectedly Wang Guifang said,

“Isn’t that a good thing? A merchant girl can actually stand on equal footing with a princess—that means their ancestors are really blessed.”

“But, but isn’t that unfair to the merchant girl?” Song Miaomiao asked.

“What’s unfair about it? That’s a princess—royal family! For her to humble herself to be equal with a merchant girl is a huge honor.”

Song Miaomiao suddenly lost her appetite.

Thinking about how everyone in the book acted like Song Qingqing was getting the better end of the deal, she tapped her forehead and wondered if there was something wrong with her brain.

After Wang Guifang went to help Song Er Yong’s family, Song Miaomiao picked up her bamboo basket again and set out for the mountain.

Although afraid of the soft-bodied bugs, giving up was not an option.

This time she prepared in advance.

She first tied her wide sleeves tight with a rope.

Then took off her headscarf and wrapped it around her neck,

making sure not to give any soft-bodied bugs a chance.

This time on the mountain, she didn’t encounter Lu Zheng.

But relying on the mushroom-picking skills from yesterday, she still picked a lot of wild vegetables and wild fruits that looked edible and threw them into the basket.

In the distance, a few women dressed in cloth garments also carried baskets on their backs.

From time to time, they glanced at Song Miaomiao, their eyes full of mockery.

“I’m dying laughing, she picked so many sour berries that even birds won’t eat.”

“Doesn’t she know to taste one? She’s just wasted her whole childhood.”

“Oh, she’s the daughter of a high-ranking family’s noble lady. She’s not comparable to us farm girls. Her body’s precious.”

Their voices were not disguised at all; Song Miaomiao heard every word clearly.

Her face turned red, both embarrassed and angry.

Suddenly, a loud voice drowned out theirs:

“You weren’t born knowing how to recognize fruits either.”

“Is it so strange that she can’t recognize wild fruits and vegetables because she’s never been in the mountains before?”

Song Miaomiao looked up and saw a woman slightly bigger and two heads taller than an average woman, with thick eyebrows and big eyes.