CMWKSD -Chapter 7 Jiu Yue Feels Like She’s Going to Starve to Death

Everyone in the room looked at Jiu Yue with different expressions. After all, Jiu Yue looked delicate and petite, while Ji Dahu was a big, burly man. All the men of the Ji family were tall and sturdy—yet Jiu Yue had nearly taken Ji Dahu’s life with just one hand.

Ji Dahai and Su Ruo stood there with their mouths agape, utterly dumbfounded. Heavens above—just what kind of person had they picked up and brought home?

Jiu Yue glanced at the things on the table and instantly lost her appetite. It wasn’t that she’d never eaten coarse food before—when carrying out missions in the wild, she’d even eaten raw meat at the foot of mountains.

But there was always a limit to that. Looking at this clearly discriminatory spread of food, it was obvious that what Hu Chunhua and the others were eating was the “good” stuff. And yet, even this so-called good food—Jiu Yue couldn’t swallow it.

If she had to eat things like this for the rest of her life, Jiu Yue felt she might as well just die.

Ji Yiqing grabbed Jiu Yue by the sleeve and pulled her back toward their room, ignoring everyone else in the house.

Ji Dahai and Su Ruo also took their own bowls and returned to their room, leaving Ji Shan and the others standing there in a daze.

Ji Yiqing took out the pastries he’d bought and pushed them in front of Jiu Yue. “You’re not used to those foods. What about these?”

Jiu Yue lowered her head and glanced at them, listlessly pinching off a piece of white cloud cake. It was barely edible—but she couldn’t possibly live on pastries for the rest of her life.

“Don’t you eat rice? Noodles? Buns, mantou, things like that? The kind made from white flour.”

Ji Yiqing gave her a look that was hard to read. “Very rarely.”

Jiu Yue gave an “oh.” “Then why don’t you eat them?”

After asking, she shut her mouth again. Wasn’t this the same as asking someone why they didn’t get into Tsinghua?

Was it because they didn’t want to? No—it was because they couldn’t get in.

Was it because they didn’t want to eat them? No—it was because they had no money. They couldn’t afford it.

Ji Yiqing ate the thin porridge that was clear enough to reflect a face. Jiu Yue blinked.

Alright. She’d originally thought that coming here wasn’t such a big deal. She was a modern person—coming to ancient times should be a total crushing advantage, right?

But now there was a huge problem right in front of her: she had no money, and no proper food to eat.

That stuff scraped her throat.

After a brief silence, Jiu Yue suddenly remembered some novels she’d read—she’d read plenty of farming novels too.

Right! Farming novels!

As long as she could grow crops with yields of a thousand jin per mu, plus some off-season vegetables…

Wouldn’t she be eating white rice and white flour at every meal?

Thinking of this, Jiu Yue abruptly stood up and rushed straight out of the room. Ji Yiqing had just swallowed the last mouthful of rice soup when he saw her dash out full of excitement.

He hurried after her. Jiu Yue was always acting on sudden impulses—if he didn’t keep an eye on her, he really couldn’t feel at ease.

Jiu Yue went to the vegetable patch in the front yard, cheerfully reaching out to pull up some plants.

Ji Yiqing followed behind her. “Why are you pulling that up?”

“I’m pulling out these scallions, then I’ll plant some crops with a thousand jin per mu yield.” She didn’t actually know what kind of crops could yield that much—attitude was what mattered.

Ji Yiqing felt that Jiu Yue might have hit her head when she fell off the cliff. He pointed at what she was holding. “Is there a chance… that what you pulled out is garlic sprouts?”

Jiu Yue abruptly let go. She’d wanted to prove she was the big female lead of a farming novel. Trembling, she pointed at another vegetable. “This is Chinese cabbage?”

“No. That’s greens.”

“And this?”

“Yardlong beans.”

“This one?”

“Eggplant.”

“And that?”

“Loofah.”

Jiu Yue didn’t recognize a single one.

She refused to believe it. Standing up, she walked out of the courtyard. Just a few steps away were the nearby fields. “Then this rice—”

Ji Yiqing pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling like the wound on the left side of his face hurt even more. “That’s wheat. White flour is made by grinding this finely.”

Jiu Yue trudged back in frustration. Fine—farming really wasn’t for her. She couldn’t tell paddy fields from dry fields, fertile land from poor land. She didn’t recognize vegetables, couldn’t tell rice from wheat, didn’t know how to read the weather, didn’t know how to fertilize. What farming, my ass.

Passing by the kitchen on her way back into the courtyard, Jiu Yue’s eyes lit up.

Oh, right—she’d read food novels too. Those big female leads could casually braise pig offal or make mala tang and earn buckets of money.

She could do that too.

She rushed into the kitchen enthusiastically. Meat hung from the beams, firewood lay on the ground. Jiu Yue reached up and took down a piece of cured meat.

But… how do you cook again?

Ji Yiqing entered the kitchen and saw Jiu Yue standing there, holding a slab of cured meat in a daze. He thought she was craving meat. “You want to eat this? I’ll make it for you.”

It wasn’t that Jiu Yue was craving meat—she hadn’t eaten it for only a day or two. The problem was, she only knew how pig offal and mala tang tasted.

But she didn’t know how to make them. She didn’t even have theoretical knowledge. Yes—Jiu Yue had never stepped into a kitchen before. At the base, there’d been an aunt specifically assigned to cook just for her.

When she wasn’t on missions, that aunt made all kinds of delicious food for Jiu Yue. Jiu Yue had only ever seen what food looked like when it was cooked—never what it looked like raw.

She didn’t know how to cook rice. She didn’t know the difference between front leg, hind leg, pork belly, or tenderloin. She didn’t know which dishes were better fried, stir-fried, or deep-fried with olive oil, vegetable oil, or lard.

Damn it!

She couldn’t even be the big female lead of a food novel.

Seeing the look of utter devastation on Jiu Yue’s face, Ji Yiqing walked up to her. “What’s wrong with you?”

Jiu Yue muttered to herself, “I can still make explosives… make glass, cement, concrete…”

Ji Yiqing was completely confused. “What are you talking about?”

Jiu Yue was on the verge of tears. “But I don’t know how to do any of it!”

“Don’t know how to do what?”

Jiu Yue wracked her brains, but in her heart she was desperately calling out to a system: “System? Little Six? Old Six? Ninety-Nine? Hello? Any system there?”

She called out every name she could think of. Nothing responded. She really was just an unlucky soul who fell off a cliff and transmigrated—without any golden finger at all.

At least she was only shouting in her head. Otherwise, Ji Yiqing would definitely think she was an idiot—though she wasn’t much better than one right now anyway.

Ji Yiqing brought the lifeless Jiu Yue back to their room. He really didn’t know what was wrong with her, and was about to try having a proper talk with her.

Even though he couldn’t guarantee white rice and white flour at every meal right now, he would work hard. Since they were already husband and wife, making sure Jiu Yue was fed and clothed was his responsibility as her husband.

He’d just opened his mouth when Jiu Yue suddenly slapped his thigh. Ji Yiqing sucked in a breath through clenched teeth—and before he could speak, Jiu Yue ran out again.

Ji Yiqing could only stand up and follow her once more.

Jiu Yue dashed excitedly toward the mountains. Didn’t transmigrators always dig up ginseng or lingzhi or something when they went up the mountains?

It was said that digging once could earn several hundred taels. Though she didn’t have much concept of money, the novels she’d read said that ordinary farming households might only save two or three taels a year if they worked themselves to death—some might only have a few hundred copper coins.

Mountain paths were nothing to Jiu Yue. She walked eagerly, eyes scanning everywhere. Just one plant would be enough for her to eat for a year; two or three, and she’d be rich.

Thinking this, Jiu Yue became so happy she forgot herself.

Ji Yiqing followed behind her. Watching Jiu Yue walk for over half a shichen without even turning red or getting out of breath, he gained a whole new understanding of her.

As for Jiu Yue, her mood went from excitement to complete dejection. She’d been walking for three or four hours, and hadn’t seen even a hair of lingzhi or ginseng—none of those valuable medicinal herbs.

All she saw were common ones like astragalus and tufuling.

Well, of course. Lingzhi and ginseng weren’t Chinese cabbage—how could they possibly be found everywhere?