Before Mu Er Pang could respond, Mrs. Zhou couldn’t help but interject, “Mother-in-law, forgive me for being meddlesome. Reading and practicing calligraphy are exhausting activities, so he should eat more nutritious food.”

“Nutrition is important. Although Er Pang is a bit plumper than other children, it’s not good to compromise like this. If he doesn’t eat well when he’s young like his father did, his health will…”

At this point, Mrs. Zhou abruptly stopped speaking, her fair face flushing red.

Shen Cui waved her hand nonchalantly, “It was my fault before, but now I understand. What you said makes sense, but my cooking skills…”

With her current cooking skills, not cooking for Mu Er Pang would actually be the best way to take care of him!

Mrs. Zhou tentatively asked, “Should I do the cooking then?”

Of course, this was even better.

Shen Cui happily agreed and accompanied her to the kitchen, where they gathered the few remaining ingredients in the house.

A few hard buns that had been left overnight, a few eggs, and a handful of dried noodles.

As for semi-finished products like cured meat and sausages that were similar to what they had during the New Year, they had already been eaten up during that time and hadn’t been replenished.

After rummaging around, Shen Cui found a jar of lard that she had been reluctant to use.

Mrs. Zhou didn’t think the ingredients were lacking. She skillfully started the fire, then beat the eggs, washed and chopped the vegetables, soaked the noodles, and went back to her old house to pick some spring onions she had grown herself.

In the blink of an eye, she had prepared several ingredients, and then she began cooking.

In just about a quarter of an hour, scrambled eggs with spring onions, cabbage stewed with noodles, and freshly steamed soft buns were ready.

Although the dishes were simple, Shen Cui and Mu Er Pang couldn’t help but salivate while waiting for the food.

People are like this. If they’ve been eating poorly for a period of time, it’s fine. But after visiting the Shen family several times during the New Year, their appetite had been aroused.

After the New Year, Shen Cui felt embarrassed to go back and eat for free, especially since her sister-in-law, Mrs. Chen, always looked at her with cold eyes, making her even less willing to go.

She did want Mu Er Pang to go to his maternal grandparents’ house for a meal every now and then, but now the kid was becoming more and more stubborn. He said, “If Mom doesn’t go, then I won’t go either. Besides, our food at home is pretty good.”

Regardless of what happened before, now that Mrs. Zhou’s dishes were ready, mother and son happily helped to bring the bowls and dishes to the table.

Once the meal was served, Shen Cui and Mu Er Pang didn’t rush to eat. They waited until Mrs. Zhou came out of the kitchen before instinctively reaching for the buns.

Mother and son enjoyed the meal, eating the buns and dishes with relish.

Their eating wasn’t exactly refined, but it surprised Mrs. Zhou nonetheless. She hesitated and tasted her own cooking—it was as delicious as ever, but maybe not as delicious as she thought!

However, being praised felt good. Mrs. Zhou couldn’t help but smile. Her empty heart from earlier in the morning was now filled, and her appetite improved.

The three of them ate five buns in total—Shen Cui and Mu Er Pang each had two, and Mrs. Zhou had one. After the meal, Mrs. Zhou went to wash the dishes and tidy up the table. Shen Cui had already set up her new image of being reformed and didn’t need to pretend to be someone she wasn’t anymore. She got up to help.

Mrs. Zhou tried to avoid it, saying, “These buns cost one penny each in the city, and I also had eggs and vegetables. It’s really not much work. Mother-in-law, don’t bother. I’ll finish in no time.”

Noon was Mu Er Pang’s break time, so Shen Cui let him rest in the main house.

After Mu Er Pang fell asleep, Shen Cui, as usual, tucked him in before bedtime. Mu Er Pang was almost asleep but couldn’t help muttering, “Sister-in-law’s cooking is really delicious, even better than grandma’s. If sister-in-law could cook for us every day… It’s not that Mom’s cooking isn’t good, it’s just… I don’t want Mom to tire herself out.”

He had mentioned this on New Year’s Eve, but the problem that troubled Shen Cui then still hadn’t been solved—

No money! Should they let Mrs. Zhou cook without being able to provide for her?

Just making someone work without providing them food, what’s the difference from before?

There wasn’t much food left from before the New Year, and they had to count every penny from now on. How could they afford to feed a third person?

After muttering this sentence, Mu Er Pang fell asleep.

Shen Cui then left the bedroom. By now, Mrs. Zhou had finished tidying up the kitchen and had brought some more clothes and sewing supplies from the broken-down house.

She found a spot with good lighting in the room and began mending clothes.

With Mrs. Zhou’s nimble hands, even the smallest tears in the clothes were quickly repaired, leaving no trace.

Everything that Shen Cui couldn’t do now was no problem for Mrs. Zhou’s skilled hands.

Shen Cui watched with admiration, making Mrs. Zhou a little embarrassed. Shen Cui then looked away.

【Thinking back to my past life, I was just as nimble as her.】

With that thought, Shen Cui lay back on the recliner, closed her eyes, pretending to doze off. In reality, she unblocked the system and habitually opened various regulations related to the system, browsing through them one by one.

Whenever the system saw her browsing through the regulations, it would panic. Shen Cui complained, [I’m telling you, this is too unfair. Mu Er Pang’s attributes can grow with the help of the system and through his own efforts in daily life. But what about me? My cooking and sewing skills are useless. Why can I only rely on the system to upgrade?]

The system saw that her mood wasn’t high, so it patiently explained: [Because the accompanying person is a real person in this world, but the host is here because of the system. In a sense, the host is a complete derivative of the system. So if you want to grow, it will be a bit stricter.]

[Give me a body that knows nothing, cut off the financial path I just thought of, I have no skills and no money. In my previous life, I was a white-collar worker in a management position. I can’t find a job here in this life. It’s really difficult…] Shen Cui sighed repeatedly,

even saying, [Now that I think about it, I was already so tired in my previous life. Sudden death might not be a bad ending. People die like extinguished lamps, and perhaps after death, they won’t feel any pain. It’s better than being a derivative of the system like now.]

The system was deployed to various planes to collect data, with thousands of hosts before and after. There have indeed been several hosts who suddenly lost their will to live and self-destructed along with the system.

Today, he did indeed immediately repair the system loophole that Shen Cui found, and the arrival of the Zhous inevitably made Shen Cui feel somewhat emotional.

The system immediately spoke rapidly: [Host, don’t be discouraged. Why would you have such negative thoughts? The current situation is far from as bad as you think. It’s just that you’re not allowed to resell system outputs. If you want money, I can adjust the system tasks for you…]

As he spoke, he urgently accessed Shen Cui’s EEG data, fearing that she might actually become so negative as to develop suicidal tendencies.

But when he looked at the data, he found something wrong.

The exceptionally active brainwaves, how could they belong to someone who is feeling downhearted?

Data never lies, so the only one lying must be—

[Huh? 962464, look at this system regulation. It says the system can conceal some information that the host doesn’t need to know, but it can’t lie to the host or convey false information.] Shen Cui smiled, [What did you just say? You can adjust the system tasks for me? If you don’t do it, I wonder if that counts as deceiving the host.]