“You go outside and watch, tell me when it’s safe to go out.” Su Tang sent the orange cat out for observation.
The divine beast stretched lazily and disappeared from the space. Since she had known that the Su family would throw her into the river today Su Tang had long planned to use her space to escape.
Every time she entered the space, she would basically be in the same place when she went out again, but if the orange cat went outside, it could move the exit of the space. But the orange cat was just an orange cat so it couldn’t run very fast, and it could only cover small distances.
Su Tang had prepared two stones in advance and put them in the space. So, just now as soon as they had been put into the river she had quickly moved herself and her brother into the space. At the same time, in order to avoid the baskets from being too light and floating back to the surface, the orange cat had moved the two stones into the baskets so that the baskets would continue to sink, as if they still had people inside.
In fact, the candy she gave to Su Dalang was nothing special, it was just a medicine that would make him faint. Although he was the younger brother of this body, her space was her greatest life-saving straw and she did not want it exposed.
Su Tang saw that it was time to harvest the crops in the fields again, so she went over and harvested them. She was then informed that third-level crops like corn and potatoes had been unlocked. She already had a large amount of rice and wheat in the space warehouse, so she planted corn and potatoes in the fields this time.
As for the pastures, Su Tang’s chickens and cattle had all produced more things she needed to harvest, so soon there was more milk and eggs in her space warehouse.
Just as she finished putting all that away, the orange cat came back inside with soaked fur, “Su Yonggui’s family left quickly but Su Fuhua took a few of his brothers and is looking for you two in the river. Maybe you should go out and have a look.”
“Su Fuhua?” Su Tang heard that name and looked at the orange cat confusedly. She didn’t know this person.
Xiao Four licked his paws and jumped onto a nearby cat tree. “Su Fuhua is Su Yongshun’s second son, presumably he is here instead of his father because he is a good swimmer. Su Yongshun and Su Laochuan were close neighbors, to the point that Su Yongshun even used to call Su Laochuan his uncle.”
Su Dani had never gone out much, so she hadn’t known many people, and Su Tang had only just arrived in this world recently. Those two facts together meant that Su Tang wasn’t that well informed about the other villagers, which was why she had especially asked the orange cat to go out and investigate the people around her. Outsiders could not see the orange cat because Su Tang’s space’s level was still too low, which meant that the orange cat didn’t have enough power to manifest it’s form in front of anyone but her.
But that was actually very appropriate for doing a secret investigation and, in only one day, the orange cat had managed to learn many things about Sujia Village.
When Su Tang heard the orange cat mention Su Yongshuan she realized what was going on. It was a case of ‘two parties happening to work toward the same goal!’ She smiled at the thought that Su Yongshun’s family had wanted to help her and her brother.
The orange cat saw her smug look and rubbed its face with its paw. “When they’re nearby, you should go out and let them ‘save’ you.”
This was the host the orange cat found after a very long time, so he needed to make sure she didn’t have any accidents. It was only with great difficulty that he could finally wake up, so he didn’t want to have to go back into another long hibernation waiting for another master.
Su Tang did not object to his advice and, after about ten minutes, when she saw that Dalang was starting to wake up, Su Tang grabbed him and exited the space.
The two were directly engulfed by the river and, with great effort, she firmly held Dalang and swam to the shore, before collapsing on the beach completely drained of strength.
As she gasped for breath she couldn’t help but complain that this Su Dani’s health was actually far worse than her own health in her previous life. And in her previous life, she had not been particularly healthy or anything, because she rarely exercised. But Su Dani and her brother were much worse because they were never even able to eat full meals, so her body really had no strength at all. And this was after Su Tang had been energetically eating everything she could get her hands on from the Su family kitchen over the past two days. If she hadn’t been doing that, she probably wouldn’t even be able to drag herself this far.
Su Tang cursed these damned ancient times in her heart. The level of medical treatment was so low that in order for her to live happily she would have to exercise seriously in the future so that she wouldn’t get sick. Sickness in an era with no medical knowledge was too scary after all.
While she was thinking random things, Su Tang spotted some other people not far away trying to find the siblings in the river, so she tried to cough loudly, “Cough, cough, cough…”
Su Fu’an was not as good at swimming as his younger brother Su Fuhua and the Qing River had a fast-moving current, so swimming was dangerous if you were inexperienced. He didn’t want to become a rescuer who found himself needing rescue himself, so he hadn’t gone into the river. Instead, he was standing on the bank and monitoring the situation anxiously.
Everyone here knew that the longer the time dragged on, the smaller the chances that the children would survive, so Su Fu’an was very anxious as he watched his brother and the several other young men who were continuously diving into the river to look for them. But then Su Fu’an suddenly heard the sound of coughing nearby.
Su Fu’an thought to himself, ‘That’s impossible.’ but when he turned to check he really saw the brother and sister pair lying side-by-side on the shore. Their clothes were all wet and the girl was softly coughing while the boy beside her was lying motionlessly in the water.
“Dani, Dalang, are you all right?” As he walked over, Su Fu’an looked back and shouted, “Come on up, I found them!”
Su Tang also acted like she had just seen Su Fu’an. She looked at him and cried out “The River God said that my brother and I are fated to face adversity, so he did not accept us, grandma is definitely going to kill us, wu wu wu…*”
Su Fu’an had just come over when he happened to hear Su Tang’s words. He was surprised, “You have met the River God?”
Su Tang nodded. “Who are you? The River God doesn’t want us. wu wu wu.”
When Su Fu’an heard her say that they were fated to face adversity, he gave Su Tang a look of pity, and then went over and picked up Dalang. He found that the child was still warm and didn’t seem hurt, so he breathed a sigh of relief.
It was at this time that the medicine Dalang took wore off and he slowly opened his eyes and saw his sister. He immediately broke free from Su Fu’an’s arms and hugged Su Tang while wailing.
When Su Fu’an called out to his brother and his friends who were still searching in the river they all returned to the shore. When they came over, they saw the brother and sister pair hugging and crying together. Su Fuhua asked his brother what had happened. When they heard that the River God disliked the siblings and refused to take them, they all looked at the brother and sister sympathetically.
They were afraid that the lives of these two children would only get more difficult in the future.
But Su Tang had actually done that on purpose. She knew that people in Sujia Village believed in the River God and she didn’t want to have anything to do with her former family, so she deliberately said those words that she knew would give her a bad reputation. Now she estimated that most ordinary people would not want to get too close to her and no one would suspect any of the things she was planning for the future. She had not been married in her previous life so she was not hoping for love now after she had come to these strange ancient times, which was why having a bad reputation that would lose her marriage prospects didn’t faze her at all.
After all, this reputation would discourage many useless suitors from bothering her. As for her younger brother, if he could not find a good family’s daughter willing to marry him in the future, then she would find a way to cultivate such a woman on her own. There would always be a way to solve that sort of problem.
Su Fu’an and the others felt sad when they heard the crying brother and sister pair.
After a few words of consolation, Su Fu’an squatted down and said to Su Tang, “You don’t know me but my name is Su Fu’an. Since the River God didn’t want you, would you like to go live in another family?”
Su Fuhua and the several other men watched as Su Fu’an talked to the girl. The girl was drenched and her big black eyes were filled with surprise. “Go to another family? Is that alright?”
Su Tang was not shy about her desire to leave her family. Even if she was only eight years old, it was perfectly normal that she did not want to go back to a family that was not good to her at all.
Sure enough, Su Fu’an and his group did not suspect anything when they heard her reaction. Instead, when Su Fu’an heard her question, he just nodded and said, “Yes, it will be alright.”
*wu wu wu is an onomatopoeia representing the sound of crying