Chapter 29

The main things Cui Yan had picked up this time were still clams and crabs.

In order to make it more convenient for their usual meals, Yin Xiaoman didn’t choose to stir-fry or deep-fry them, but instead used the simplest method of boiling them in water.

After the clams spat out the sand, she peeled their shells and cleaned them, then made soup by adding some vegetables and a small amount of salt, which was enough to make it delicious.

As for the steamed crabs, there was no skill required. After cleaning them, she placed them in a large bowl, added a few slices of ginger, and steamed them together when the pot was hot.

Yet, such a simple meal was enough to satisfy the several people, both big and small.

After the meal, Tiger even rubbed his belly and said to Yin Xiaoman, “Auntie Man, come to our house for meals every day from now on. I’ll go collect crabs for you every day!”

This made everyone laugh uncontrollably.

Cui Yan’s sons, Qiangzi and Huzi, were two years apart—one was nearly seven, and the other was just over four, almost five. They were actually close in age to Da Bao and Erniu.

When Da Bao and his sister had just been brought back by Shen Qingyun, Cui Yan had felt sorry for them, so she always asked Qiangzi and Huzi to play with them.

As a result, the four children had developed a very good relationship.

In such a short time, Da Bao’s speech had become much more fluent than before.

After the meal, the two children wanted to stay at Cui Yan’s house to play, so Yin Xiaoman took the things she had collected in the morning and went back home.

She took the items to the kitchen, put the clams that Da Bao and the others had collected into a basin to spit out sand, and took out the few small fish she had caught to clean them.

Since the little ones weren’t at home, the house was unusually quiet.

Actually, it was usually quiet at this time of day. After all, Shen Qingyun was always very busy, and it was rare for him to be able to come home for lunch. Usually, after eating, he would immediately go back to the camp.

But for some reason, Yin Xiaoman felt that the quietness at this moment made her heart feel empty.

She placed the cleaned fish in a basin, marinated them with salt, ginger slices, and a little bit of cooking wine.

Since the fish were small and there were only the three of them at home, she didn’t have to worry much about how much oil to use, so she planned to fry the fish for dinner.

After tidying up, Yin Xiaoman sat on a small stool and stared at the sea eels in the bucket, lost in thought. She didn’t know why, but suddenly she felt really tired and had no desire to continue working.

She told herself in her heart that maybe it was because she had been busy all morning and needed a rest.

Moreover, this eel was so large that the three of them definitely couldn’t finish it in one meal. If they ate it over several meals, the flavor would lose its freshness after a while.

But in her heart, she knew she still wanted to keep it, waiting for that man to return and eat it together with her.

She knew deep down that he must have never had this before.

After sitting for a long time, and “struggling” with herself for a while, Yin Xiaoman finally gave in to her obsession.

As a family, when there is something good, it’s natural to share it.

She finally comforted herself in her heart.

At the same time, she began to worry. The man had just left in the morning—how could he possibly come back so soon? If that was the case, preserving it would become a huge problem.

Speaking of which, Yin Xiaoman could easily store the eel in the room she had in the palace, because the things in that room wouldn’t spoil. It was just like the pastries, candies, and milk she had stored there before—except for what she had taken out to eat and use, everything else was still just as it was when it was first placed there.

However, everyone knew she had caught the eel today, and while putting it into that room would be easy, how would she retrieve it later?

After thinking for a while, she decided, for the sake of safety, to turn the eel into dried fish.

When she was in the palace, every winter, they would make some dried fish themselves. Although it could be bought elsewhere, the Empress Dowager particularly liked the kind of dried fish that Yin Xiaoman made.

In fact, compared to others, her recipe wasn’t particularly special. The only difference was that when marinating the fish, she would add a little sugar and some homemade soybean paste.

This small amount of sugar and paste would make the marinated fish taste much milder, unlike the ones bought from the market, which were often just overly salty.

Yin Xiaoman was good at marinating fish, but this was the first time she was preparing to marinate sea eel, so she was still unsure of the exact method.

After thinking for a moment, she decided to first head to the palace house and bring back some of the soybean paste she had made.

Also, she needed to check if Lichun had prepared the items she had asked for.

Looking through the half-open gate, she could see the four children happily playing at the neighbor’s door. They were squatting in the grass at the entrance, not sure whether they were catching bugs or doing something else, but they all looked very serious.

Yin Xiaoman smiled and left the kitchen to head directly to her bedroom.

Once inside, she closed the bedroom door and quickly entered the space. She first checked the items in the room, then used her mind to send the soybean paste and the half bowl of milk to the kitchen.

When she saw the nearly empty milk jar, she frowned. She thought that if Lichun had really prepared everything she had asked for, she could ask her to buy a little more milk next time and store it.

At this thought, Yin Xiaoman closed her eyes and silently murmured to herself, “Send me to the Imperial Kitchen.”

After the familiar dizziness, she opened her eyes and found herself back in the place where she had first entered.

This was the farthest corner of the Imperial Kitchen, where the porridge barrels were kept.

Yin Xiaoman had initially come to the Imperial Kitchen to learn how to cook porridge. Back then, she was shorter than the porridge barrel, so she had to stand on a small stool just to see inside.

Because the masters had different tastes, they couldn’t just make one type of porridge, so at the busiest times, she had to keep an eye on three porridge barrels at once, often standing there for half the day.

But over time, as she became more experienced in the Imperial Kitchen and her cooking skills improved, she no longer had to make porridge.

These memories had long been stored in the farthest corner of her mind. If it hadn’t been for the fact that she had appeared in this place twice in a row, she might have thought she had forgotten them entirely.

Yin Xiaoman, feeling a bit sentimental, reached out to touch the clean ceramic urn that was now used as a porridge barrel. The moment her hand touched it, she froze.

She realized that the empty urn was actually a bit warm!

It was already past lunchtime, and the chefs and helpers in the Imperial Kitchen had already finished their work. The large room was empty.

Clearly, there was no porridge or old-fire soup on the menu for the evening, so the urns had already been cleaned. The fact that it was still warm meant one thing: the fire hadn’t been fully extinguished.

Yin Xiaoman gritted her teeth, suppressing the sudden surge of anger in her heart. She moved the urn away from the stove. Sure enough, among the embers, she found a piece of charcoal that still emitted a faint red glow.

This kind of thing was a huge taboo when she had been the Head Maid. If anyone was found doing this, they would be severely punished.

After all, if the Imperial Kitchen caught fire, it would be a catastrophic event.

It could involve many people losing their heads!

Using tongs, she picked out the burning charcoal and extinguished it, eliminating the potential danger. She stared at the now cooling urn but furrowed her brows.

Lichun was still a bit young and inexperienced. She couldn’t completely trust her yet.

Although Yin Xiaoman had already passed away in this world, Lichun was her disciple, whom she had personally trained.

If something really happened, she would still be concerned.

She picked up the now extinguished charcoal with tongs and directly carried it into the small compartment reserved for the Head Maid.

Once inside, without even thinking, she placed the piece of charcoal in the most prominent spot in the center of the table, where anyone who entered would immediately see it.

By seeing the charcoal and noticing that the urn outside had not been properly placed back, Lichun should be able to understand what had happened, right?

If she still couldn’t figure it out—

Yin Xiaoman thought, then maybe she didn’t need to continue being Head Maid anymore!

After handling this matter, Yin Xiaoman finally remembered the reason she had come to this room.

She didn’t open the cupboard door, but instead used her mind to take out everything inside.

A large bag of glutinous rice, each grain pure white and shiny, plump and full. Even just looking at it made one imagine the fragrant aroma it must give off.

This was tribute rice, and even the princes of the palace only received a small portion each month.

Lower-ranked consorts could spend their entire lives in the palace without ever having the chance to taste it.

But as Yin Xiaoman looked at the precious rice, she didn’t feel any joy; all she felt was a headache.

The note she had left earlier had asked for brown rice—the most ordinary kind, the kind that servants ate every day.

Clearly, this was Lichun’s own decision.

If the bag had contained brown rice, Yin Xiaoman would have been able to steam some rice for dinner tonight.

Golden, crispy fried fish, paired with fragrant white rice—just the thought of it made her mouth water.

With brown rice, she could still use the excuse of the rice being from her grandparents to fool the two children.

But this premium glutinous rice—not only would they never have eaten it, they probably hadn’t even seen it before.

Da Bao, with all his cunning, how could she possibly fool him?

Looking at the rice bag, Yin Xiaoman felt extremely frustrated.

But when her gaze fell onto the other items, her heart skipped a beat. She immediately stopped worrying about the rice and quickly tore open the fine cloth bag filled with mountain goods.

Sure enough, the dried flowers and wood ear mushrooms were top-quality, with no ordinary mushrooms in sight. Instead, there were several lion’s mane mushrooms.

In addition to that, she had even seen several roots of ginseng and a few jars of exceptionally fine imperial swallow nests.

Yin Xiaoman took a deep breath.

Was Li Chun crazy? How could she dare to touch the items in the rare collection cabinet?

Those were precious items meant for the emperor and empress dowager; even the noble consort was not allowed to add anything to the supplements without an imperial order!

Faced with such a large pile of items, and looking at the blue and white porcelain oil bottle standing beside them, as well as the aged Huadiao wine that could only be used during imperial banquets as the main dish, Yin Xiaoman was no longer surprised. She didn’t want to say a word.

After sitting in a daze for a moment, she silently returned the polished rice, the imperial swallow nests, the oil bottle, the Huadiao wine… back to their original places, leaving only the chrysanthemums, wood ears, and a few roots of ginseng.

The man had only left for a day, and Yin Xiaoman had no idea what might happen. Instead of overthinking, she thought it was better to make some preparations in advance. By leaving these few roots of ginseng, it would be better to have them just in case, rather than scrambling at the last minute.

After tidying up, Yin Xiaoman took out the small silver coins from her pocket and counted them. No matter how she looked at it, it still seemed too little.

She placed the silver coins together with the items she had put back in the cabinet, and then, reluctantly, used her thoughts to take out a ten-tael silver ingot from the wooden box and added it to the pile of coins.

Looking at the small space that had suddenly become empty in the wooden box, Yin Xiaoman couldn’t help but feel a pang of heartache.

She was frustrated to realize that if she had to prepare things like this every time Li Chun arrived, her savings would run out in no time.

She knew that she could avoid paying money—the silly girl wouldn’t say anything about it.

But the problem was, she understood the prices of these items better than anyone. If she had to let Disciple cover the costs, she couldn’t bring herself to do it.

After putting away the items she had “purchased,” Yin Xiaoman returned to her room. But her mood still wasn’t as good as it was before she had entered.

Back in the kitchen, she slaughtered and cleaned the sea eel. She cut off the fish head, divided the body into several pieces, and placed them in a large bowl to marinate with seasoning.

The fish head was hard to season and didn’t have much meat. After being dried, it was almost inedible.

So, she planned to keep it aside to fry slightly with oil before making soup. The fish broth would go well with fine noodles, and the taste should be excellent.

Once everything was cleaned up, Yin Xiaoman still felt a bit uneasy.

After thinking for a moment, she decided to take out pen and paper again and wrote another note to Li Chun. She placed it along with the charcoal on the table that Li Chun frequently used.

As the Head Maid, Li Chun didn’t need to come at the usual hours that the Imperial Kitchen workers did every day; arriving a bit later wouldn’t have drawn any attention.

But these past few days, with a lot on her mind, she had developed the habit of checking the cabinet several times a day. Even after her workday ended, she couldn’t relax, always feeling uneasy and thinking about checking the cabinet, to the point where she even arrived much earlier than usual.

Today, as she had the past few days, she immediately opened the cabinet door when she entered the room. She had expected to be met with the same disappointment as before, but suddenly she realized that the items inside had been moved!

Without thinking, she rushed over and locked the small room’s door from the inside, then tried to calm her rapidly beating heart before walking back.

After a closer inspection, she confirmed that it was not her imagination—the items had indeed been moved.

However, the immortal hadn’t taken everything she had so carefully prepared. In fact, most of the items remained.

Not only that, but for the small portion of mountain goods and a few roots of ginseng that had been taken, there was silver left in exchange.

Seeing the silver, Li Chun’s heart filled with unease.

She couldn’t quite understand what the immortal’s intentions were.

Why hadn’t everything been taken? Did the immortal find the items unsatisfactory?

But this was the best quality she could find.

The more she thought about it, the more nervous she became, fearing that her actions had somehow offended the immortal.

Since the immortal had left a note, nothing else had gone missing from the small storage room, which had relieved everyone. 

Li Chun was afraid that if she hadn’t prepared everything properly, she might have angered the immortal again. What if… 

No, no, no! Li Chun quickly shook her head and pushed those unsettling thoughts away.

What was she thinking?!

The immortal was kind and compassionate, a savior who alleviated suffering. How could they be bothered by a mere mortal like herself?

Although she repeatedly reassured herself in her heart, a sense of panic still lingered.

With a sense of loss, she closed the cabinet door and returned to sit in her usual chair.

But as soon as she sat down, she was startled!

She saw that on the table was a note identical to the one the immortal had left before!

Li Chun quickly grabbed the note and was about to examine it closely when she heard a soft thud, followed by the sound of something falling to the floor. She looked down and saw that a piece of charcoal had fallen.

Li Chun picked up the charcoal and carefully examined it.

It was just a very ordinary piece of coarse charcoal.

If she wasn’t mistaken, this was probably the kind of charcoal they usually used in the Imperial Kitchen to cook food.

The charcoal wasn’t large and appeared to have been burning for quite some time, its overall color now a dull gray with only a few small parts still black and not completely burned out.

The immortal had placed such an ordinary piece of charcoal on top of the note, clearly intending for her to see it.

But what did this mean? What was the immortal trying to tell her?

Li Chun racked her brain, but the more she thought, the more confused she became, with no clear idea.

At that moment, she heard a loud knocking on the door, followed by the voice of a steward calling from outside, “Aunt, Aunt Li Chun, please come out and have a look.”

Li Chun furrowed her brows, quickly tucked the note and charcoal away in a safe place, and went to open the door.

“What’s the matter?”

The steward, upon seeing her, visibly relaxed and then, in a tense tone, said, “Aunt, you need to come quickly. There’s a thief in the Imperial Kitchen again!”

The words made Li Chun’s heart lurch.

She didn’t even bother to speak further with the steward and quickly hurried toward the group of people gathered not far away.

Seeing her approach, the people surrounding the area automatically parted, making way for her.

Li Chun walked in and saw two extinguished stoves with a few clay pots for porridge placed nearby, nothing out of the ordinary.

She frowned again. “What’s going on?”

Upon hearing her question, a middle-aged palace maid responsible for the porridge stepped cautiously out from the crowd.

After saluting her, she said, “Aunt, I swear to the heavens, before I finished my shift, I made sure the pots were placed properly. They were all on the stoves and weren’t carelessly arranged. But when I came back in the afternoon, I found that both pots had been tampered with and were placed in a completely disordered manner.”

The Imperial Kitchen was different from other places—it valued strict division of labor.

Everyone had their own responsibilities, and every item had a fixed place.

Everyone’s responsibilities were clearly defined, and both the beginning and end of each shift were thoroughly checked by all.

In fact, to prevent sabotage, some people would make secret marks at the places where they placed their items, so that if anyone moved them, it would be easy to notice. This way, any problems could be quickly corrected.

Otherwise, if someone took advantage of your absence to poison the food or place something unclean in it, and it harmed the health of the noble, then it would be a huge disaster.

So, when the middle-aged palace maid discovered that the clay pots she was responsible for had been moved that afternoon, it was no surprise that she was scared out of her wits.

Everyone knew about the previous incident with the thief in the Imperial Kitchen, and now hearing that someone had snuck in again made everyone anxious.

As the middle-aged palace maid explained to Li Chun, the other people couldn’t help but show signs of nervousness, worry, and fear.

At first, Li Chun listened intently. But as she kept listening, her attention was drawn to the pile of charred charcoal in the stove that had already gone out.

“Where are the tongs you use to handle the charcoal?” she suddenly asked.

The middle-aged palace maid was taken aback, then quickly began looking around. It was only then that she realized the bamboo tongs she had left by the stove were now nowhere to be found.

“Did the thief even steal the tongs for the charcoal?” she muttered instinctively, though she didn’t believe it herself.

She walked a few steps in each direction, as though still planning to search, but Li Chun coldly stopped her, saying, “No need to search. Bring someone else and flip the pots over.”

Although no one understood why Li Chun wanted to check the bottoms of the pots at that moment, no one dared to ask.

Following her orders, a palace maid who was usually friendly with the middle-aged palace maid hurried over to help her flip one of the pots over.

When the pot was turned, everyone gasped in shock, and a series of sharp intakes of breath echoed around the room.

The pot was a dark brown color on the outside, which made it resistant to dirt.

When it had been placed on the stove, no one had bothered to pay close attention to it, so no one had noticed that the bottom was now completely scorched from smoke, turned entirely black.

Both palace maids’ hands were stained with coal soot.

“Did you burn it?! Didn’t you put out the fire?!”

Before Li Chun could speak, the steward responsible for the staple food supplies sternly questioned the middle-aged palace maid.

The maid’s face had turned ashen with fear.

She had been working for many years and was experienced enough to understand what was happening. At this moment, she didn’t even have the courage to argue and immediately fell to her knees with a thud.

Li Chun turned and walked away.

She wasn’t interested in dealing with the punishment of the palace maid at that moment. Her heart was in turmoil, and she felt as if she wanted to scream!

She finally understood what the immortal had meant by placing the charcoal and tongs in her room.

The immortal was warning her.

Li Chun’s legs felt weak, each step seemed as though she was walking on cotton, and the fear made her heart race as though it would burst out of her chest. For some reason, it reminded her of her Teacher.

She couldn’t help but shiver, unconsciously curling her fingers tightly behind her back.

If her Teacher were still here, she knew that in a situation like this, she too would likely be punished with kneeling and the palm-slapping.

The thought brought a sudden sting to her nose, and tears almost spilled from her eyes.

She desperately wanted to say, “I’m willing, whatever punishment—kneeling, slapping—I will accept it, as long as my Teacher returns.”

But sadly, her Teacher would never return.

No one would stand in front of her anymore, protecting her while delivering harsh punishment…

Once in her room, Li Chun took out the note left by the immortal.

At first, she thought the immortal had left the note to scold her, just like her Teacher would have done, and warn her not to repeat the mistake.

However, the note didn’t even mention the incident, as if no such warning had come from the immortal at all.

Li Chun quickly wiped her eyes, trying to dry the tears that were threatening to spill, and carefully read the note.

“Twenty eggs, one bag of brown rice, one jug of oil, half a bag of corn flour, one barrel of milk…”

The content of the note wasn’t much different from the previous one; it simply listed the items the immortal needed.

However, this list was much more detailed than the last one, specifying the exact weight and quantity required for each item. More importantly, the immortal had even noted the prices for the items!

Staring at the prices written after each item: “twenty coins, fifty coins…”

Li Chun was so stunned that she couldn’t think properly!

Why were the prices the immortal listed almost identical to the prices they usually paid when buying things?

In fact, some of the prices seemed even clearer than she remembered!