Chapter 81: Death by a Thousand Cuts?

Qian Zhao scratched the back of his head, "The Captain said he's holding onto my share, and told me to just go to the Daduibu to collect it tomorrow."

Over these past few days, Qian Zhao had become familiar with the Captain and the others; he was very honest and worked hard, so the Captain had the intention of grooming him and had opened a back door for him on many small matters.

"Do you know how to dress a sheep?" An Yinan asked.

She had planned to finish cooking and then have Zhang Qian go call Qian Zhao over to eat; after all, when she was building her house, Qian Zhao hadn't asked for any compensation and had helped with the work for many days, so for this housewarming banquet, she had to invite Qian Zhao no matter what.

But now, there was no one to dress the sheep...

She saw him and asked a question.

Qian Zhao nodded, "I do!"

At his home, he did all the work, but he never got a share of any good things; there was nothing he didn't know how to do, and nothing he couldn't do.

"That's great, go help me dress it quickly." An Yinan was between laughter and tears.

Originally, she had been preparing to blanch vegetables, but a flash of inspiration hit her, and she suddenly remembered she had a yellow sheep in her space, which was when she remembered the matter of processing the yellow sheep.

"Alright, I'll go back and change my clothes first, then I'll come over in a bit." To handle this kind of work, one had to change into dirtier clothes; if they got dirty, they were hard to wash.

After An Yinan went back, she entered her space and used an electric kettle to boil two large pots of water, then poured them into a thermos; she didn't know if she would need them later, but she prepared them just in case.

She also peeled five potatoes, sliced them into thin pieces, then rinsed them in cold water twice before soaking them.

After thinking about it, she decided to just have noodles as the staple food; cooking noodles in the braised meat broth was still very fragrant. She acted as soon as she thought of it, immediately digging out white flour, kneading a whole basin of it, and rolling out five dough sheets; fortunately, she had great strength, as an ordinary person would have already collapsed from exhaustion.

She hung the noodles on a stick to air-dry just like that, and could take them when it was time to eat; she would take as much as she needed to boil.

Qian Zhao worked very quickly, and An Yinan stood to the side learning; she had too much prey, and she couldn't always trouble others.

"Pay attention here." Qian Zhao said, the knife in his hand moving very quickly, sliding smoothly across.

"This knife is really sharp." Qian Zhao was somewhat surprised; technical skill was one thing, but this knife was another—it was much cleaner than what he had processed before.

An Yinan learned secretly, her hands also moving non-stop.

"What are you two doing?" As soon as Xie Yuanyuan pushed the door open, she saw two figures, one squatting and one standing, along with the bloody animal in front of them.

An Yinan raised her head, and seeing that they had all come in, she hurriedly waved her hand, "Look quickly, Qian Zhao is dressing a sheep."

Zhang Qian went over to take a look, and sure enough, it was a yellow sheep, "Did you hunt this?"

An Yinan nodded, "Can I graduate yet?"

Zhang Qian gave her a thumbs up!

It wasn't that he hadn't hunted yellow sheep when entering the mountains, but it was also fraught with danger; he didn't even know when An Yinan had entered the mountains.

"I'll come help too; how are you planning to prepare this sheep?" Zhang Qian turned back and asked An Yinan.

An Yinan said hurriedly, "Slice it, thin slices, the thinner the better."

Zhang Qian was a bit speechless; you really know how to find work for people!

"Got it."

Once An Yinan heard this, she figured that was that, and went back to her room to continue doing other things, leaving this side to the two of them.

"Yuanyuan, I need to use your pot!" Someone who had originally thought two pots were enough suddenly realized she was a bit naive.

"Use it, use it, use it." Xie Yuanyuan stood in the kitchen, closed her eyes, and just kept sniffing.

Li Xiue smiled and pushed her; it was just that this girl was standing right in the middle, blocking the way.

"The pot in my courtyard can be used now too; I entrusted Zhang Qian to buy the pot back. What are you making? I'll help." Li Xiue said.

The two of them originally didn't have a pot, and they didn't have any coupons either; when they were tidying up things yesterday, they happened to talk about this matter, and Zhang Qian said he had a way to buy a pot and asked if they wanted one. And so, today the pot was installed, and the two of them had finally settled down completely.

"I need to wash a pot of rice." An Yinan handed over the rice she had prepared.

"Alright, leave this little bit of work to me." Li Xiue took the rice back to her own courtyard and started boiling water.

On the other side, An Yinan tugged at Xie Yuanyuan, who was still immersed in the smell.

"Are you planning to just get full by smelling it like this?"

"How could I? If you don't let me eat, I'll cry for you to see!" As soon as Xie Yuanyuan heard she wouldn't be allowed to eat, she immediately opened her eyes and looked at An Yinan, looking very much like she was about to cry.

An Yinan tapped her forehead, "Go to your courtyard and heat up the steamed buns and Steamed Bun."

"Guarantee to complete the mission." Xie Yuanyuan immediately took the mission and returned to her own home.

An Yinan continued to prepare the dishes; she had originally thought about using a hot pot to boil noodles, but there were too many people, and if everyone ate hot pot noodles, the pot wouldn't be able to keep up with the boiling. She simply prepared rice and steamed buns to divert everyone's attention.

However, there really weren't enough tables and chairs, and the hot pot was still missing the most important thing.

"Zhang Qian, let me use your coal stove." Zhang Qian had a coal stove; he was usually too lazy to start a fire, so he would just heat up food or cook porridge on the stove.

"I'll go bring it for you." Zhang Qian put down the knife in his hand and handed the thin slices he had cut to An Yinan, "Take a look, is this okay?"

An Yinan widened her eyes; this was too thin, and this was without having been frozen.

"The death by a thousand cuts of the past couldn't have been much more than this."

Zhang Qian put the knife on the table to the side, "There's still a gap; I'll practice more later."

An Yinan suddenly felt that this person was a bit terrifying...

Zhang Qian laughed heartily and returned to his own courtyard to fetch the stove; letting An Yinan always find trouble for him and teasing her seemed pretty good.

Just at four o'clock, Auntie Xie Er and Sister-in-law Li came over; both of them were carrying things in their hands. Sister-in-law Li brought twenty eggs, which were precious items.

And Auntie Xie Er brought the straw mat she had woven; the mat was very thick, and it was very soft when spread on the kang, plus it had a very good heat-retention effect.

"It would have been enough for you people to just come; why did you bring things?" An Yinan felt a bit embarrassed; she had originally intended to thank everyone, but as a result, everyone brought things over, which left her not knowing what to do.

"It was originally woven for you, but I just finished it these past few days; so I took advantage of coming over today to bring it to you." Auntie Xie Er propped the straw mat in the room and hurriedly washed her hands clean, preparing to come over to help.

This wasn't a small number of people: her own family of three, the Captain's family of five, plus this group of Educated Youth—at least fifteen people; that was quite a lot of work.

Auntie Xie Er and Sister-in-law Li coming early was also to help An Yinan, fearing that An Yinan wouldn't be able to handle it all. But they didn't expect that when they arrived in the kitchen, they would see two large pots stewing things; without even lifting the lids, they could smell a rich fragrance. How could this be something they could make themselves?

"Auntie, Sister-in-law, help me keep an eye on the two pots, don't let them burn." An Yinan saw that the two of them seemed a bit uncomfortable and hurriedly assigned them some tasks.