Chapter 18: Still a good person, just very narrow-minded

Song Shijie didn't indulge her, saying coldly, "I am not your husband; I don't do whatever you say. If you don't eat, you can go hungry."

Lin Jiaojiao wasn't afraid of hunger, but the wet nurse Guo Shi had to eat, otherwise she wouldn't be able to breastfeed Pei Tiezhu.

Thinking of this, she could only soften her stance and tone down her voice when speaking to Song Shijie.

"I don't have to eat, but the child needs milk, and the wet nurse needs to eat. If she doesn't eat, how can she produce milk to feed the child?"

"But you saw it at the Pei Mansion; they don't like me, so they certainly don't like the child either. Therefore, we absolutely dare not eat the food sent by the Pei Mansion."

"The food they sent is not even as safe as your Dali Temple prison food."

Originally, Song Shijie thought she would be stubborn to the end, but who would have expected her to be genuinely considering the child.

How afraid of poison in the food was this woman?

In the end, Song Shijie agreed. He took away the food sent by the Pei Mansion and prepared to have someone prepare the same food for the wet nurse as the prison guards ate.

The Jailer found it strange. How could this decisive Master Song listen to a female prisoner this time? It was truly as if the sun had risen from the west.

Lin Jiaojiao saw him taking away the food from the Pei Mansion and breathed a sigh of relief. "At least I won't be poisoned to death by the Pei Mansion's food tonight."

The Jailer yawned and signaled for her to return to the cell.

Just then, someone rushed in from outside. Upon seeing Song Shijie, their knees went weak, and they knelt directly on the ground, reporting urgently, "It's bad, it's bad! Master Song, the Eastern Yi pirate imprisoned in the dungeon has taken poison and committed suicide!!"

Song Shijie frowned upon hearing this. "Is the person still alive?"

"Still alive. He was discovered by the patrolling prison guard just after taking the poison. Currently, he is still alive."

Song Shijie ordered, "Go find a doctor to detoxify him. Make sure he stays alive. He hasn't handed over the list of accomplices yet. Want to die? It's not that easy."

Lin Jiaojiao had just entered the cell when she heard their conversation. Upon hearing the words "Eastern Yi" and "pirate," she pricked up her ears. Even when the Jailer urged her to hurry, she didn't take a step.

When she heard the pirate had taken poison to commit suicide, she immediately shouted to Song Shijie, "Don't look for a doctor to detoxify him! It'll be too late by the time you find one! Force-feed him feces to induce vomiting now! Hurry! Otherwise, there won't be another chance to make him hand over the list of accomplices!"

Her shouting echoed throughout the prison. For a moment, the talking, snoring, teeth-grinding, and the rustling sound of chains in the women's prison all ceased, as if they had been muted.

Song Shijie stared at her in disbelief, also frozen there.

"Chief?" the subordinate who came to report called him twice. "Should we try the method the female prisoner mentioned? The situation is urgent, and I'm afraid that running outside to find a doctor back and forth..."

Song Shijie gritted his teeth and said, "Then why aren't you doing it yet!"

"Yes!" the subordinate nodded and rushed out of the prison, letting out an irrepressible laugh as he left.

Song Shijie didn't linger; he had to hurry over to interrogate the pirate who had taken poison.

If the person died and couldn't confess his accomplices, then his work this month would have been in vain.

As soon as he walked out of the women's prison, he sent someone to deliver an extra meal to Lin Jiaojiao, and at the same time handed the food box from the Pei Mansion to his subordinate, telling them to have it tested for poison.

Once Song Shijie left, the dim women's prison suddenly became noisy. Some were laughing wildly, others were vomiting. Among them, the most crazed laughter belonged to Mo Siniang in the cell next to Lin Jiaojiao. "Hahahaha, force-feed him feces! Hahahaha!"

She was disheveled, her prison uniform was tattered, and her sharp laughter suddenly woke up Zhu Geer!

"Waa~!" Zhu Geer cried at the top of his lungs. As soon as the female prisoners heard the infant's cry, they all suddenly quieted down.

With him crying, Mo Siniang stopped her crazy laughter, stared over with a pair of bloodshot eyes, and reached her hand through the gap in the cell door pillar, wanting to help coax the child.

"Good, good, little treasure is good," one second she was coaxing the child in a soft voice, the next second she let out a lion's roar at Guo Shi, "Hurry up and feed him!"

Guo Shi was startled, and Zhu Geer cried even harder. Lin Jiaojiao quickly took the child, stayed far away from the side adjacent to Mo Siniang's cell, turned her back, and coaxed the child with shushing sounds.

Zhu Geer's crying gradually subsided. At this time, the food was delivered, and Lin Jiaojiao signaled for Guo Shi to eat first.

Strangely, after each female prisoner received their food, they picked and chose, wanting to pass the best part of their bowl into Lin Jiaojiao's cell, signaling for Guo Shi to eat so she could breastfeed.

The Jailer scratched his head; the female prisoners acting so unanimously was truly unprecedented.

Lin Jiaojiao didn't take the food given by other female prisoners. What she and Guo Shi received were two steamed buns and a few pieces of meat paired with some vegetables. Although the portion wasn't large, at least it wasn't rancid.

The portion of this meal was a bit too much for one person and not enough for two; it was truly prepared just right.

Lin Jiaojiao cursed Song Shijie in her heart, then pushed the food to Guo Shi. "You eat first. Eat your fill so you can breastfeed."

Guo Shi didn't decline and picked up the food, eating it with her head down.

Zhu Geer looked at her quietly in Lin Jiaojiao's arms, the candlelight making his little eyes shine, making one feel pity and love.

Guo Shi ate extremely fast, sweeping away the two steamed buns and the few pieces of meat in one go, not leaving a single bite.

After she finished, she realized she hadn't left a bite for Lin Jiaojiao. Embarrassed, she wiped her mouth, picked up a steamed bun that another female prisoner had thrown over earlier, blew the dust off it, wiped it on her clothes, and handed it to Lin Jiaojiao. "Mistress, you eat a little too."

Was something picked up from the prison floor fit for human consumption?

Lin Jiaojiao was shocked inside, but she had to keep her expression calm, so she twitched the corners of her mouth and gave a dry laugh. "I'm not hungry."

"Oh, alright Mistress," the wet nurse Guo Shi responded, took the child from Lin Jiaojiao's hands, and lifted her clothes to breastfeed.

She didn't forget to lecture Lin Jiaojiao while she was at it. "You eat so little. It's not that I'm lecturing you, Mistress, but if you go on like this, your body won't hold up. You're still in your confinement..."

Zhu Geer was clearly extremely hungry, gulping down the breast milk, his little cheeks bulging. Lin Jiaojiao looked at the child and felt he was even more adorable, unable to resist reaching out to poke the infant's tender, soft cheeks.

She thanked Guo Shi from the bottom of her heart. If she hadn't followed, she wouldn't have known how to feed an infant in the Dali Temple prison.

If something really happened, could she entrust the child and the wet nurse to Song Shijie, asking him to let Guo Shi go home and help Pei Tiezhu find a good family to raise him?

After two days of contact, Lin Jiaojiao had roughly figured out Song Shijie's temperament. He looked hard-hearted, but he was actually reliable.

Although he had arrested her and brought her to the Dali Temple in accordance with the law, he hadn't made things difficult for her and the child.

"He's still a good person," Lin Jiaojiao muttered to herself, "it's just that he's very narrow-minded, and he really didn't prepare a meal for me."

As the saying goes, if you sneeze, someone must be talking about you.

Because at the same time, Song Shijie, who was watching his subordinates force-feed the pirate feces, suddenly sneezed several times in a row.

"Chief, it's too smelly here. You should go out and wait." His subordinate saw him sneezing and thought he was choked by the stench.

Before he could speak, the pirate opposite suddenly vomited with a "waa" sound and knocked over the feces bucket. The prison officers on the side couldn't avoid it and were splashed with filth, and even Song Shijie's lapels were stained with some.

Song Shijie shook his lapels in disgust, turned, and left the prison. Before leaving, he ordered, "If he doesn't hand over the list of accomplices, keep force-feeding him!"

"Yes, Master Song." No matter how unwilling the subordinates were to do this dirty work, they couldn't disobey orders.

Just as he walked out of the dungeon, another subordinate came to report, "Master Song, General Lu requests an audience."

"It's so late, what is he coming to find me for?" Song Shijie's frowned brows could almost crush a fly.

Originally, he didn't want to see this general, but after hesitating, he thought he should tell this guy to pay back the money, so he said, "Let him wait! I'm going to change my clothes before seeing him." ===== CHAPTER 19 =====