Chapter 18

Discovering a Tangerine Tree!

When they returned, Du Xiao Li burned a pile of firewood in the courtyard, borrowing the light to treat Du Xiu Heng’s split open wound. Afterwards, the siblings each returned to their own room to rest.

At sunrise, Du Xiao Li got up to make breakfast. Yesterday, they didn’t eat well all day. Before the sky got bright, her stomach was already grumbling.

“What, over at your place there’s machines that can fly in the sky? And people can even sit in them?” Du Xiu Heng ate breakfast while letting Du Xiao Li tell him about her past life. When he heard about airplanes and cars, his eyes widened.

“Not just airplanes, there’s also satellites.” Du Xiao Li said, “However, you won’t understand even if I explain it. Besides, a lot of things at our place can’t be compared to the things now.”

Although her past life wasn’t a happy one, some things she still rather missed, for example, air conditioners. At present, the weather was getting increasingly hot. She exceedingly missed air conditioners, electric fans, and what not.

“You were a physician in your past life?” Du Xiu Heng asked.

“We don’t say ‘physician’, we say ‘doctor’. However, it’s also someone that treats illnesses.” Du Xiao Li shrugged, as she explained.

(T/N: In Chinese the old term for doctor is ‘dai fu’; this is a very feudal way of addressing. The modern term is for doctor is ‘yi shen’. However both terms translate to English the same so lines like these make translating quite headaching.)

She didn’t tell him that she was also an a.s.sa.s.sin in her past life, fearing she would scare him if she told him. However, for him to know her real ident.i.ty now was also a good thing. That way, she can relax her hands.

In the days after, Du Xiao Li began exercising her body at home. Sometimes she would even teach Du Xiu Heng some body strengthening exercises. And Du Xiu Heng no longer restricted her from entering the mountains alone. However, majority of the time, he still accompanied her.

“Big brother, the time is still very early today, let’s go a bit further in the mountains.” In the dense forest, Du Xiao Li looked towards the deeper parts of the mountain and said.

Du Xiu Heng didn’t chop wood today. He only entered the mountains to accompany Du Xiao Li, because Du Xiao Li said there were a lot of rare medical ingredients in the mountains. If they were to dig up a good one, a single one can make up for several days of chopped firewood. That’s why, she told him not to chop firewood for the time being, and just focus on studying at home.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

At first, Du Xiu Heng didn’t agree. Afterwards, he asked Niu Jing, learning that there really were a lot of valuable medical ingredients in the mountains. And moreover, even an ordinary medical ingredient, if dug a lot of, then it would still be more worthwhile than for him to chop firewood. Just the medical ingredients Du Xiao Li dug up last time, all sold for several hundred copper coins. Comparing the two sides, he thus agreed to Du Xiao Li’s words.

It has already been half a month since that day. After a period of training, Du Xiao Li’s body distinctly improved quite a bit. She also recovered some of her previous agility. But because this body was still too small, she couldn’t achieve the same standards as when she first started training in her past life.

“How about we don’t? What will we do if we encounter a vicious wild beast?” Du Xiu Heng urged. In the basket on his back, there were already a lot of medical herbs. Today’s harvest was rather abundant.

“Don’t worry, I brought this.” Du Xiao Li waved the dagger in her hand.

Two days ago, she went with Du Xiu Heng to the city again. This time the two of them directly headed towards the blacksmith shop. Blacksmith w.a.n.g had already finished forging her things, just waiting for her to come fetch the goods.

“This dagger is very sharp. I made a sheath for you for free.” Blacksmith w.a.n.g took out the prepared things and explained.

“Thank you.” Du Xiao Li took the dagger and pulled it out for a look. And just as he said, it really was very sharp. One could feel the chill coming from it without even touching it. The barb hook and blood grooves on back side were also like how she’d imagined them. She nodded her head in satisfaction and said, “Not bad.”

(T/N: The ‘blood groove’ is an old term for the fuller, which is a rounded or beveled longitudinal groove or slot along the flat side of a blade.)

Blacksmith w.a.n.g also took out the silver needles. The silver needles were carried in a container. Du Xiao Li looked them over, and aside from one or two that needed additional work from him, the others were all quite good. Overall, she was still satisfied.

Once she got the sliver needles and dagger, she finally felt at ease. After they returned home, she used a piece of cloth to sew herself a little knapsack. Although her skill wasn’t good, her st.i.tching crooked, she still had her dagger and silver needles placed in, taking it with her whenever she went out.

She waved the little knapsack on her back towards Du Xiu Heng, telling him that she’d brought the dagger. Du Xiu Heng then reluctantly followed her deeper into the mountains.

The two walked for a long while before finally climbing over their current mountain. The further in they went, the rarer the medical ingredients Du Xiao Li found. This made her extremely happy.

“Big brother, let’s go down below.” Du Xiao Li saw how the area below was practically unexplored by anyone before, and suspect that there should be even more good things below.

Seeing how excited Du Xiao Li was, and knowing that these medical ingredients that she dug up were all not bad, Du Xiu Heng also surmised that there were probably good things below, but seeing the dangerously steep cliff, he was also a little worried. But his objecting words were swallowed back down when he saw Du Xiao Li’s excited look.

The siblings mutually supported each other as they went further down. After finally coming down with great difficulty, she instead discovered that there weren’t any valuable ingredients like she’d imagined here. This made Du Xiao Li somewhat dejected.

“Let’s walk out through the ravine and return by going around that other mountain.” Du Xiu Heng surveyed the terrain and discovered that the place they came down from was the steepest. The other mountain beside it appeared much more leveled.

This place was the dark side of the mountain. The trees here weren’t that dense. Compared to the other side of the mountain, it was practically like two different places.

Du Xiao Li originally wanted to go explore the mountain across from them too, but after seeing the already west leaning sun, she eventually gave up, following Du Xiu Heng through the valley in the direction back home. However, her eyes still looked around all over the mountain, digging up anything good to take back.

“Ah!” She suddenly shouted, startling Du Xiu Heng, who thought something had happened to her. Yet when he turned around, he saw her pointing to a short tree at the waist of the mountain, unable to say anything due to excitement.

“What’s wrong?” Du Xiu Heng turned back and asked as he looked to the unfamiliar tree.

“That’s, that’s a tangerine tree!” Du Xiao Li excitedly said.

“Tangerine tree? You recognize it?”

Du Xiao Li nodded. When she was at her rural relative’s home in her past life, their family were precisely planting this kind of tangerine tree. Every year, they could get several thousand in income. For the rural village, this was already considerably difficult.

At the time, she often followed her relatives up the mountain to work. Towards how to manage this kind of tree, she was very knowledgable.

She arrived at the slope and saw the fist sized underripe fruit hanging from the tree. She suddenly had a kind of kindly feeling. This was something she was familiar with, and was also be something that might make her rich in the future!

“Can this be eaten?” Du Xiu Heng also climbed up and asked as he looked to the fruit on the tree.

“It still not ripe right now. Need to wait until eighth or ninth month.” Du Xiao Li said, “Big brother, after the fruits ripen, let’s have this transplanted back on to our mountain, how about it?”

“Okay, but that mountain isn’t ours. If we want to use it, then we need to go ask the village chief, and have that mountain bought.” Du Xiu Heng said.

“Then let’s go back.” Du Xiao Li roughly calculated. There were a hundred of different types of tangerine trees here. Once the fruit ripens, it should be able to sell for quite a lot of money.

When Du Xiao Li returned home, the sun was more or less already setting. Just as the two placed down the basket on their back, they saw Leng Er, frantically charge into the courtyard. He pulled over Du Xiao Li and ran, saying: “Quickly come save our young master!”

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