Blessed Girl From a Farm Family: Surviving the Famine With Space - Chapter 9

Fu An took out a patched quilt stuffed with reed catkins, spread it over the dry grass, and had Fu Manman tuck Little Maodan inside to sleep.

After the little one was asleep, the three of them gathered around the fire to warm themselves. Soon, all their stomachs began to growl loudly.

“I’m hungry!” Fu An said with a pained expression. He wanted to take out the rice to cook porridge.

Just thinking about the clean, fragrant scent of rice made him drool.

“I’m hungry too!” Fu Manman clasped her hands over her stomach, which was rumbling incessantly. She glanced back at the group of people across from them.

Many of them were also moaning from hunger. Some were grinding tree bark, while others had children crying and complaining about how awful tree bark tasted.

Taking out rice now would be asking for trouble!

These people would snatch every last grain.

“Is there anything else we can eat?” Fu Manman asked.

“There’s tree bark powder,” Fu An said, his face twisting at the mention. The paste made from tree bark powder was downright disgusting.

“Then let’s have that,” Fu Manman said. She had never tried it before and was curious about what it tasted like.

Both Fu An and Fu Qiang understood perfectly well that they couldn’t take out the rice. Neither of them complained and obediently brought out a cloth bag containing tree bark powder. One boiled water while the other added firewood.

Soon, a pot of grayish, bubbly tree bark paste was ready.

Fu Manman looked at the paste in the chipped bowl, nearly gagging from the bitter smell.

Do I really have to eat this?

Heavens, this is too miserable.

She looked up at her two younger brothers across from her. The two children were already drinking the paste without batting an eye, completely unfazed.

If they could drink it, then so could she.

Fu Manman mustered her courage and took a sip, but the bitter and coarse texture made it impossible to swallow.

It’s too awful! The thought that impoverished people had to eat this made her heart ache, and her eyes involuntarily reddened.

Suppressing her nausea, she forced down one mouthful after another until she had finished about half a bowl.

She couldn’t bring herself to drink any more.

Seeing what was left, Fu An said regretfully, “Sis, don’t waste it.”

“I’m full,” Fu Manman replied, though it wasn’t true.

Fu An hesitated for a moment, then silently poured the remaining half bowl of paste into his own. He even asked Fu Qiang beside him, “Second Brother, do you want some?”

“No!” Fu Qiang refused outright. He wouldn’t eat something Fu Manman had left behind.

Fu An happily finished the leftover paste. Although it tasted terrible, it at least filled his stomach.

Now that he wasn’t hungry anymore, he felt sleepy.

Being able to take shelter from the bitter wind in this dilapidated temple felt like a warm spring day to him.

“Sis, I’m sleepy,” Fu An said, yawning.

“Go to sleep,” Fu Manman replied, planning to keep watch tonight. Someone needed to guard their belongings.

“Okay, I’ll sleep for a bit and then switch with you.” With that, Fu An crawled into the reed catkin quilt, hugging Little Maodan as they both fell asleep.

Fu Qiang sat by the fire, lost in thought, though no one knew what was on his mind.

“You should go to sleep too! You can switch with me later,” Fu Manman said to her cold-faced, quiet second brother.

Fu Qiang ignored Fu Manman. He didn’t trust her—this “madwoman”—to keep watch. He would do it himself and only sleep after Fu An woke up.

Seeing that Fu Qiang was ignoring her, Fu Manman pursed her lips and sighed inwardly. Being the eldest sister isn’t easy!

No authority at all!

“If you’re not sleeping, then keep watch properly. I’ll take a short nap.” After walking all day, she was exhausted, and her feet were frozen and aching.

Fu Manman crawled into the quilt fully dressed, burying herself under the covers. Instantly, she felt a bit warmer.

Buried in the quilt, her mind was a chaotic mess—thoughts of her past life, the present, and the future tangled together. The more she thought, the more confused she became, until she finally drifted into a fitful sleep.

Suddenly, she felt herself entering an underwater world, floating in the deep blue sea. The ocean floor was neatly lined with countless shipping containers and the wreckage of numerous ships.

She drifted toward the containers and opened one, finding it packed to the brim with instant noodles.

Food! So much food! Fu Manman reached out to tear open a box but, in her haste, accidentally cut her hand on the packing tape.

The sharp pain jolted her awake!

That dream felt so real!

Fu Manman poked her head out from under the quilt, taking a breath of fresh air. The cold air stung her lungs, making her cough uncomfortably.

Ouch… Why does my hand hurt so much?

She looked down and saw a cut on her hand—exactly like the one from her dream where the tape had sliced her!

This… The dream just became reality!

That dream was so strange. And what were those underwater containers? Could it be some kind of space or something?

Before she could ponder further, Little Maodan began crying under the quilt. The newborn, not yet a month old, was always hungry.

When he was hungry, he had to be fed immediately, or he would cry nonstop.

It was the middle of the night. Most of the people nearby were asleep, with only one or two drowsily keeping watch.

Fu Manman secretly grabbed a small handful of rice and began boiling rice porridge.

Fu An soon woke up and came to help. Seeing that Fu An was awake, Fu Qiang—who was utterly exhausted—crawled into the quilt and fell asleep.

This time, she used more rice, making the porridge thicker and even forming a layer of rice oil on top. Little Maodan ate contentedly and fell asleep as soon as he was full.

The remaining rice grains were shared between her and Fu An.

Fu An was overjoyed to eat real rice. In the end, he even licked the iron pot and bowls clean.

This move left Fu Manman stunned—both amused and heartbroken!

The next day, while the sky was still dimly lit, Fu Manman woke her brothers, packed their belongings, and prepared to set out.

Before leaving, Fu Manman quietly tucked a small bag of rice into the bundle belonging to the woman who had breastfed Little Maodan the night before.

By the time the sky fully brightened, the people from Liujia Village began crawling out of their cold bedding one after another.

Someone noticed that the four siblings from the previous night were no longer in the temple.

“Everyone, check if anything is missing,” someone called out.

Soon, everyone began inspecting their belongings. No one had lost anything—instead, one family found a small bag of rice.

The woman secretly opened the cloth bag, and her eyes widened at the sight of the gleaming white rice grains. Her heart swelled with joy. If they rationed carefully, this rice could last them seven or eight days—long enough to reach Fengcheng.

“Where did this come from?” her husband asked in a low voice when he saw the rice.

The woman smiled thoughtfully, hiding the rice securely. “Probably from that girl,” she whispered to her husband.

The man’s face lit up. “Your breast milk wasn’t wasted. That girl is truly kind.”

The couple exchanged a smile and then fell silent, quietly packing their things.

The four siblings tried their best to avoid crowds, but along the way, they kept encountering other refugees.

Some, seeing that they were just children, couldn’t help but approach and ask where they were from and where their parents were.

The world was harsh, and people’s hearts were unpredictable. Fu Manman had warned her brothers to speak as little as possible on the road.

So, no one tried to strike up a conversation with them again.

(End of chapter)