Xiaoqing carefully took the braised pork from the aunt next door and thanked her repeatedly with a sincere smile on her face and her eyes shining.
But as Ji Wanrong stared at the fragrant braised pork, she felt something strange in her heart.
It's so weird.
In such a poor, dilapidated and remote small mountain village, it was the coldest month of winter and the crops were not harvested. Everyone's eyes were shining with hunger, but the aunt next door brought over a bowl of such tempting braised pork.
Ji Wanrong took a step forward, reached out and leaned against the door, took the bowl of braised pork from Xiaoqing's hand, and then smiled at the woman: "Auntie's craftsmanship is very good, this braised pork is amazing. I feel hungry when I smell it, but Xiaoqing, you can’t accept it.”
"It would be fine if my aunt usually takes care of Xiao Qing, but now, it's obvious that Xiao Qing can't eat so much braised pork by herself. Is my aunt specially here to take care of us?"
"It's okay for us to have one or two hungry meals, but we can't let my aunt's family go hungry. I think the crops in the village can't sustain themselves, and there's nothing to eat."
There was a hint of probing in Ji Wanrong's words, because he wanted to know the reason why this aunt had somehow conjured up so much meat and brought it all to them.
When the aunt heard this, she smiled at Ji Wanrong, with a bit of simplicity on her face: "It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter."
"In the past, when the village chief gave out food, Xiao Qing and Aunt Sun couldn't eat enough, and would always help our family. When I listened to the noise outside in the morning, I knew that the village chief didn't give it to Xiao Qing. There are so many of you now, Xiao Qing's grandma I also ask you to treat me, and you should have a good meal."
When the aunt said this, she didn't know what she was thinking of. She was slightly startled, and then nervously shook the corner of her clothes: "Don't worry, girl, this meat is all clean. It was sent by the village chief in the morning."
"I brought all the meat for you. My family won't be hungry. I'll give it to you next time..." When the aunt said this, she glanced outside and lowered her voice.
"If the girl has cured Xiaoqing's grandma, would you please come and visit our house? Our house is next door to Xiaoqing's house. The child is still young and I really don't want to follow the village chief's method of dealing with it..."
The aunt said and wiped her tears.
Xiao Qing listened to her aunt's words in a daze and almost jumped up: "Aunt, what do you mean? Is Dayong also suffering from madness?"
Auntie took a breath, knelt down again, touched Xiaoqing's head, and said with tears in her eyes: "No, Xiaoqing, it's nothing. But I want to thank you very much."
Xiao Qing was even more confused now, "Auntie gave Xiaoqing meat, Xiaoqing should be the one to thank Auntie!"
When the simple woman heard this, she smiled, stood up slowly, bowed to Ji Wanrong, and then turned around and returned to her house.
Having said this, Ji Wanrong looked at the aunt's face and knew that the aunt did not look like a liar. She took the braised pork that the aunt had brought and closed the door to the yard again.
From what his aunt just said, Ji Wanrong knew the purpose of her visit.
The aunt next door suddenly brought a big bowl of braised pork. In addition to missing Xiaoqing, it was probably also because the children in her family had the same strange disease as Aunt Sun.
The illness was probably not very serious yet, and no one else in the village noticed any clues.
The aunt next door was naturally reluctant to bear the thought that her child would be killed by the village chief in the usual way after he contracted a strange disease, so he begged Ji Wanrong.
Thinking of this, Ji Wanrong glanced at the heavy braised pork in his hand, then raised his head and looked at the two men in the yard.
Ji Wanrong put the steamed buns and glutinous rice balls brought by Xiaoqing into the space for testing, and the test results have come out.
The inspection results show that there are no disease-causing bacteria in the steamed buns and glutinous rice paste, and there are no excessive chemical substances. The only possibility now is that it is in the meat.
Perhaps the village chief brought wild game from the mountains and distributed it to the villagers, which infected the villagers with a fatal disease caused by a certain type of virus.
Ji Wanrong thought about it, then put the rice bowl in his hand on the table in the room, and then took out the test tube from the space again.
When Xiao Qing saw this scene, she thought they were going to start eating. She laughed happily and ran to get chopsticks.
But before Ji Wanrong picked up the braised pork with chopsticks and put it into the test tube, Mo Jiecheng walked to Ji Wanrong's side.
At this moment, he could clearly smell the aroma of braised pork. Looking at the soft, tender, salty and sweet meat, which was stewed until it was tender, Mo Jiecheng's whole body became more and more stiff.
Ji Wanrong noticed something strange about him and stopped what she was doing. Before she could speak, she heard Mo Jiecheng's voice shouting softly.
"No, no! This meat is wrong!"
Shi Heng was also staring at the bowl of braised pork in front of him at this moment: "That's not right. It is very unusual for a poor farmer's family to have so many seasonings and be willing to give away so many seasonings."
"It looks delicious, but it doesn't feel like pork." Ji Wanrong also said that she actually couldn't tell what kind of meat it was.
Because the texture of the muscles has been completely covered by the color of the seasoning, but she has never seen this meat before.
In other words, she looked vaguely familiar, but she had never seen him at the dinner table.
Mo Jiecheng's face at this moment was extremely horrified. He clenched his hands into fists and said in a serious tone: "This is not pork or game, this is human flesh! This is human flesh!"
When Ji Wanrong and Shi Heng heard this, their eyes suddenly shrank, and they both looked up at him in shock, their breathing stagnant.
Mo Jiecheng closed his eyes, and then took a deep breath.
"I will never forget that in my third year after joining the army, I participated in a battle with the army, the Battle of Hengjiang. The battle was very brutal. The enemy was powerful and resisted at all costs. Beili soldiers were killed and injured. It took countless people to regain the three cities that were robbed.”
"And when the last city was recaptured, the enemy army had clearly run out of ammunition and food, but they still defended the city gate for ten days, which was far beyond my imagination."
"Until I led a small team, broke through the city gate, and reached the enemy's camp, all I saw was big bowls of meat."
"There was meat on the table, and gnawed bones were scattered everywhere on the floor. In the pot, the meat was still stewed. Eyeballs were rising and falling in the churning broth, and even the five fingers of a person were stewed soft. It's rotten, lying limply beside the pot."
"I will never forget that smell. The meat in the bowl was cut into small pieces, and each piece was evenly covered with soup. It was as shiny as a gem... and the bowl of meat in front of me, Exactly the same.”
As Mo Jiecheng spoke, he pointed at the fat floating on the braised pork in front of him.
"You see, the fat floating on the broth is half-moon shaped. This is the fat of human flesh. The fat of pork is a complete circle."
Hearing this, Ji Wanrong stared at the braised pork in front of him, his face changed, and he felt a chill.
The aroma of braised pork penetrated straight into her nostrils, and Ji Wanrong felt an overwhelming feeling of nausea in her stomach.
