Transmigrated Farmgirl's Scheme to Get Rich - Chapter 10
Heatstroke
Mo Ling was sick of Mrs. Liang calling Lu Junming a bastard in every other sentence and said, “Who said he was a bastard? According to the Lu family’s genealogy, Lu Junming is the Lu family’s rightful heir.”
“A son born to a mistress is a bastard. Even if he’s been added to their family genealogy, how can he be the Lu family’s rightful heir? The blood of a mistress still runs in his veins!”
No wonder Mo Feng had had the audacity to call Lu Junming a bastard. It was because he had learnt from Mrs. Liang.
Mo Yan still wanted to interject, but Mo Ling pulled her behind her back to protect her. She knew that if this continued, the topic of Mo Feng’s injury would be brought up, and Mo Yan would be the one to suffer.
“Tomorrow, go to the fields with your sister. Replant sorghum in places without any crops, and plant some green beans on the ridges of the fields!” After saying that, Mrs. Liang closed the curtain of the sisters’ room and went back to taking care of her son’s injuries.
In this household, no one could disobey Mrs. Liang’s orders. Early the next morning, after a quick breakfast, Mo Ling wheeled Mo Yan and a shovel to the field using the cart they bought.
The sorghum plants in the field were already almost a foot high. Mo Ling dug up some of the ones which had grown in large clusters and planted them where there weren’t any sorghum plants, and Mo Yan flattened the soil of the troughs. Then, Mo Ling dug up the soil of the fields’ ridges, and Mo Yan placed some seeds in it, then flattened the soil again.
The work was much easier than harvesting wheat and tilling the ground, but the summer sun was so incredibly hot, especially since it was currently mid-morning, and it felt like it was going to cook them alive. Mo Yan felt something roiling in her chest.
“Sis, I want to throw up!”
As soon as Mo Yan said that, she bent over and threw up. She had only had half a bowl of porridge this morning, so it was mostly bile and some dry heaving. Luckily, she had thrown up in the open fields, so the smell wasn’t as bad.
Mo Ling made her sit down under the shade of a tree, and Mo Yan leaned against her sister, not wanting to move at all. Mo Ling wiped off her sweat with a towel she had slung over her shoulder, and wanted to use it to wipe her sister’s sweat as well, when she realised there wasn’t a single drop of sweat on Mo Yan’s forehead at all.
She was suffering from a heat stroke! Mo Ling touched her sister’s forehead, which was indeed a little warm.
Mo Ling pushed her sister to the village using the cart and went straight to the Cao family’s house, which wasn’t far from the school.
The Cao family’s long-time worker Daqiang was carting animal manure out of the courtyard when he saw Mo Ling carrying Mo Yan inside, and immediately asked, “Sister Ling’er, is Mo Yan sick again?”
Remembering what had happened at the threshing field last night, Mo Ling decided to ignore him and went inside with her sister in her arms.
“Mr. Cao hasn’t come back yet!”
Mo Ling thought, If Mr. Cao isn’t here, what should I do?
Mo Ling was still worrying when Cao Zhang, who had just come home from school on his lunch break, entered the courtyard and saw them.
“What’s wrong with Yan’er?”
“I think she might’ve gotten a heatstroke. Mr. Cao isn’t here, and I don’t know what to do!”
“Come inside. I know how to help you.”
Cao Zhang immediately led Mo Ling to the northernmost room of their house, which was where his father’s in-home clinic was situated.
As Mo Ling sat down on a bench with Mo Yan in her arms, Cao Zhang ran to the medicine cabinet where his father kept his medicine and started searching. He quickly grabbed a small porcelain bottle, which had a label that read “Cooling Pills”.
Uncorking the bottle, he poured out two pills and gave them to Mo Yan, “Yan’er, take this. These are cooling pills which are used to treat heatstroke.”
Mo Yan obediently swallowed the pills, and Cao Zhang ran out to give her some water, “Drink some water! You need to drink more water to cure your heatstroke!”
After drinking the water and taking the pills, Mo Yan felt less uncomfortable, so sat down on her own. Meanwhile, Cao Zhang sat in the seat where his father always sat.
Cao Zhang’s mother probably heard the sound of talking and thought that Mr. Cao had returned, but it turned out to only be Cao Zhang and the Mo sisters .
“It’s the sisters of the Mo family? Are you here because you’ve fallen ill?”
Mo Ling hurriedly stood up and bowed low, “Madam, my sister was suffering from heatstroke. It’s thanks to young Mr. Cao, who administered some medicine, that she’s now better.” [1]
Mrs. Cao turned her gaze towards her son, “Zhang’er, you aren’t a doctor, how can you give people medicine so carelessly. If you gave someone the wrong type of medicine, the consequences would be dire!”
Cao Zhang said disgruntledly, “I just gave her a couple of cooling pills. There wouldn’t have been any side-effects even if she weren’t ill.”
“It’s fine as long as no one is hurt. You aren’t allowed to touch your father’s stuff without permission in the future.”
Mo Ling asked what many people in the village wanted to ask, “Madam, why isn’t the young Mr. Cao studying medicine?”
Mrs. Cao fanned herself with a paper fan as she replied, “What future do you have as a doctor? I want my son to pass the imperial examination and become a scholar.”
After resting for a short while, Mo Yan felt better, so went home with her sister. Mo Ling asked how much the pills cost, but Cao Zhang kept waving her off.
“There’s no need. My father makes all of his medicine himself.”
“The medicinal herbs cost money too! I have to pay for their cost.”
“I don’t actually know how much they cost. How about we talk about this again when my father returns home?”
Mrs. Cao urged Cao Zhang to return to school, implying that she didn’t want the Mo sisters to negatively affect his studies.
The two sisters excused themselves and left. When they left, they could hear Mrs. Cao scolding Cao Zhang, but they didn’t hear what was being said.
When they returned home, Mrs. Liang knew without asking that they hadn’t completed their work yet with how early it was. When she saw how listless Mo Yan looked, she also knew that Mo Yan wasn’t feeling well again.
“You’re always sick! You don’t have Xi Shi’s looks, but your body is as delicate as her!” [2]
Mo Ling told her sister to lay down and rest, then entered the kitchen to open a jar of white flour and poured the contents into a kneading bowl.
Mrs. Liang followed her inside the kitchen and asked sullenly, “It’s neither the early morning nor the night, what are you doing with white flour now?”
Mo Ling replied while still kneading the dough, “I’m making some dough soup for Yan’er.” [3]
Mrs. Liang kicked the broom which laid behind the door out with her foot as she scolded Mo Ling, “Are you trying to bankrupt us? She does nothing all day, and now you want to give her an extra meal! Do you want to go against the heavens! Let’s see if she dares to eat all of this on her own!”
Mo Ling was in no mood to answer her and continued kneading the dough. Mrs. Liang became even more incensed at being ignored and pushed the kneading bowl with the dough to the ground, “She won’t be able to eat this now!”
The kneading bowl broke in half, but the dough did not fall to the ground and landed perfectly in one half of the bowl. Mo Ling bent down to pick up the dough, put it on a chopping board and continued to knead it, saying slowly, “If Yan’er doesn’t get dough soup today, then no one else does!”
“If Mo Yan can’t eat the dough soup, no one else does? Just who do you think she is?”
With that said, she tried to grab the dough again. Mo Ling dodged and glared angrily at her, “She’s your own daughter! If you can’t raise her properly, why did you give birth to her at all? By giving birth to her but not caring for her well, you’re generating bad karma. Aren’t you afraid of suffering retribution in your next life!”
“We’re poor! I can’t afford to raise a sick child!”
“Then why doesn’t your son work in the fields? Is he more valuable than gold?”
“He’s the only one who’s holding this family together! If it wasn’t for him…”
She didn’t finish the sentence, but Mo Ling had already guessed what would have happened. If it wasn’t for Mo Feng, Mo Zenian would’ve retired or divorced her a long time ago, and this family of theirs wouldn’t have existed in the first place.
PS: Edited Sept 7, 2023, to try and get the rest of the story up to the current standards. This includes using the current terms and polishing up the translation. Thanks for reading!
[1]: I went for young Mr. Cao instead of young master Cao because Cao Zhang isn’t a member of a significantly higher social class than the Mo family.
[2] Xi Shi is one of the renowned Four Beauties of ancient China, said to have been alive in the Warring States Period.
[3]: Dough soup is just a soup with hand-torn pieces of dough and various pieces of vegetables. It’s also found in Korea a traditional Korean soup called Sujebi.