Braised Dragon with Soy Sauce

Chapter 3

"The kid's awake!"

A slightly hoarse voice rang in my ears.

Mo Yuming finally came to his senses from the chaos and saw clearly that the old man with snow-white hair and a thin face was standing in front of him, leaning on a cane made of gnarled and twisted vines.

"Where...is this?"

"This is the Valley of Heartbreak. Kid, you're incredibly lucky! To fall from such a height at such a young age and still survive is a miracle! Congratulations on becoming the seventy-eighth resident of the valley!"

The old man spoke without the slightest expression.

"Grandpa went to Ruimu Valley to gather herbs and happened to find you, so he rescued you. You had many cuts and scrapes on your body and bled a lot. If Grandpa hadn't found you, you probably would have been eaten by monsters long ago!"

A little girl, about five or six years old, stood at the head of the bed, looking at him curiously with her big, round eyes.

"Thank you, Grandpa, for saving my life!"

Mo Yuming said gratefully.

"No need for thanks, it was just a small favor."

"Get some rest. Your injuries are quite severe, and the wounds won't heal quickly. If you need anything, just call for the little girl; she'll take care of you!"

After the old man finished speaking, he walked out.

The little girl was left alone in the room, sitting on the edge of the bed, swinging her legs listlessly.

The little girl was quite pretty, with rosy cheeks and a pair of large, bright eyes that looked especially innocent. However, her hair was a bit messy, tied in two pigtails, one tall and one short, the style rather crude. Her clothes were made of coarse linen and animal hides pieced together, utterly lacking in aesthetic appeal, making her look almost like a little wild child.

"twitter……"

"Coo coo, coo coo..."

"..."

A series of clear birdsong drifted over, and Mo Yuming tilted his head to look out the window. Sunlight filtered through the dense leaves, casting countless golden spots on the green grass.

A few golden rays of dawn shone through the window, casting golden patches on the floor and bringing some light to the dim room.

A new day has begun. Seven days have passed since Mo Yuming arrived in this unknown world, the day he transmigrated here. From the day he fell into a deep sleep on the stone slab until he was rescued by the old man, he had not woken up for five days and five nights, only waking up yesterday evening.

The events that occurred during the five days he was unconscious were all told to him last night by the little girl whom the old man called 'Girl'.

The old man gave him a bowl of porridge and then left. He hasn't returned this morning.

The girl told him that he had fainted on the rocks that day, but luckily he was rescued by an old man who happened to be passing by.

After Grandpa took him home, he cleaned the blood off his body, changed him into clean clothes, and applied herbal medicine to the wounds and bandaged them up.

Seeing that he had lost too much blood and was in imminent danger of dying, they killed the reindeer that they had kept for the winter without saying a word and used its blood to help him recover.

Because he remained unconscious and unaware of his own appetite, his grandfather, despite his advanced age and frailty, risked his life to gather herbs from the cliff, including the herb Tongxin and the herb Huoxuehua.

The deer blood mixed with the blood-activating flower was divided into several portions, one small bowl at a time, which was then carried by the maid. One end of a heart-clearing herb was placed in the bowl, and the other end against his chest. Under the grandfather's manipulation, the activated deer blood flowed through the tiny channels in the heart-clearing herb to his chest, smoothly seeping into his body and flowing into his heart…

Perhaps due to a long-standing habit, the girl went to bed early after chatting with him for a while.

Mo Yuming, who had just woken up, was not sleepy at all. He lay alone on the bed, thinking about random things to pass the time. In fact, this was all he could do now.

Back on Earth, his ability to become a self-taught legend in the aquaculture industry was not only due to his intelligence, but also to his unwavering dedication over twenty years, as well as his keen observation and analytical skills.

Actually, after waking up yesterday evening, he hadn't slept at all, and had stayed awake in bed until dawn.

He was racking his brains to think about what he had learned during this time. Through his brief conversation with the little girl and his own observations and reflections, Mo Yuming had gained a general understanding of what was happening before him.

The world he is in now is a completely different world from his original one.

First, there are the people here. Although he has only seen one old man and one young man so far, from their appearance and behavior, it can be seen that although they are largely the same as Earthlings in terms of physical characteristics, they are very different in terms of eyes, skin, hair and clothing.

Based on his observations of the two people, the old man's eyes were pale green, and his pupils were particularly bright green.

The little girl's eyes, however, were pale blue, with pupils as blue as the deep starry sky. Their eyes were different colors.

But they all shared a common characteristic: as they spoke, their expressions changed in sync with their tone of voice and emotions—their colors shifted, their pupils even dilated or constricted. Although the changes were extremely subtle, Mo Yuming, with his exceptionally keen observation skills, still noticed them.

Secondly, there is their skin and hair; the old man's skin is dark brown and as dry as old tree bark.

Although his hair and beard had turned white, a closer look revealed a faint green tinge at the roots of his hair and beard. To be precise, his hair was originally light green.

The little girl's skin was incredibly delicate and smooth, white as if carved from the finest white jade. Her hair and eyelashes, at first glance, appeared dark and lustrous, but upon closer inspection, you might discover that her hair was a deep, very deep blue—almost black, a glossy black. Only at the tips of her hair could you easily discern its blue hue.

Furthermore, their clothing was also very different. Although it was made of rough linen, the style of the sewing was somewhat similar to clothing from ancient China.

As for whether it resembles the clothing of the Xia and Shang dynasties more or more like that of the Spring and Autumn period, Mo Yuming, having done little research in this area, could not say for sure.

However, one thing he was certain of was that the weaving techniques used on these fabrics were not very sophisticated. They were coarse hemp that had been roughly processed, and the cloth was made using a very crude weaving method. It was then sewn together with some processed animal hides. There were three large holes at the cuffs and neck area. It didn't resemble a garment at all, and the sewing techniques were extremely crude. It was practically indistinguishable from the clothing of primitive people.

Another significant difference is their language.

Listening to their language, which sounded like singing, reciting poetry, and even had elements of birdsong, Mo Yuming was astonished and couldn't help but sincerely exclaim that it was the most beautiful language he had ever heard. Strangely, though it felt a little awkward to speak this language now, it didn't seem difficult at all, as if he already knew how to speak it.

He knew this was mainly due to the original consciousness of his current body. Although his memories had largely disappeared after the severe injury, his basic ability to communicate in language had not been lost. Therefore, he could not only understand the language here, but also speak it effortlessly.

Besides discovering that the people here are different from those on Earth, the meticulous Mo Yuming also found, through what he saw and felt, that things here are also very different from those on Earth.

First, I heard the girl say that while he was unconscious, the old man replenished his energy by collecting two kinds of plants, "heart-clearing grass" and "blood-activating flower," using a method similar to giving patients intravenous infusions on Earth.

He was surprised because he was unconscious at the time and did not know exactly how it was done.

However, simply introducing a foreign blood type directly into the human body is a highly specialized technique that cannot be taken lightly. It could be life-threatening due to differences in blood type or the invasion of viruses.

The situation described by the little girl was unheard of. Leaving aside the fact that he had never heard of or seen those two plants, the mere fact that deer blood could seep directly into the skin and be transformed into energy was unbelievable to Mo Yuming, a man of immense knowledge and experience.

Furthermore, after it got dark, Mo Yuming did not see them light any lamps or burn any luminous objects such as pine branches or wax. Instead, they brought out a simple wooden box about a foot square from outside, which emitted a pale blue light.

When the little girl took it out of the groove in the large wooden pillar in the center of the house, Mo Yuming was surprised to find that it was three fist-sized stones.

After the stone was embedded in the groove, its brightness increased, and the small thatched hut was instantly illuminated by a bright, pale blue light, as if it were daytime. Although Mo Yuming was surprised, he quickly realized that these glowing stones should be very common in this world, and be everyday items, not precious items like moonstones, otherwise they wouldn't be in a simple thatched hut.

This stone is quite ordinary, but it emits a lot of light. However, unlike luminous gemstones, it doesn't seem to glow indefinitely. Instead, like fluorite, it needs to absorb sunlight to emit light, but the intensity of its light is much greater than that of fluorite.

There might be a time limit, otherwise the little girl wouldn't have taken all the stones off and put them back into the wooden box before going to sleep. The wooden box also seemed to have a special function; once the stones were put inside, they would stop glowing and didn't need to be covered with a lid.

Mo Yuming spent the night in the dimly lit room, lost in thought, recalling all his experiences from his past life.

But he found that his state of mind had undergone a complete change with this time travel, and he felt extremely lost.

I felt no pride whatsoever in all the achievements I had made in my past life. Instead, I was moved by the dedication I had shown in my past life to working day and night to overcome a certain problem.

I actually feel a little regretful about taking this path. I regret wasting decades of my precious time for the sake of so-called achievements.

I regret not having enjoyed life to the fullest over the past few decades; I regret not having made more time to care for and love my only relative, my sister, who, though not my biological sister, is closer to me than any biological sister.

I wonder if she's doing well now, if she's found a boyfriend. These are things he needed to care about in his past life but neglected.

My biggest regret is that I've never had a proper relationship! I regret not having the courage to pursue the one and only in my heart during my most youthful years.

How boring that so-called status and position are! How dull that worldly perspective is! And those girls who tried to get close to me—all my memories of them have been fundamentally changed.

What I once thought was ugly now seems to have a certain charm in retrospect; what I once thought was hypocritical now appears to have a different kind of sincerity; what I once didn't want to see now evokes a sense of longing. But all of this has become the past, a memory forever.

……

Mo Yuming didn't slowly calm his turbulent thoughts until dawn. He quietly tried to think of nothing, closed his eyes to rest, and cleared his mind until he heard birds chirping.