Han Anniang looked at the two pieces of bacon in the bowl, biting her chopsticks, and whispered, "Uncle seems a little different since he woke up."
"How is he different?" Chen Mo paused, speaking calmly.
"I... I can't quite say, just feel there's something different. But uncle is quite good like this." Han Anniang pursed her lips, averting her gaze.
"Sister-in-law, hurry and eat..."
Chen Mo shoveled in his rice while studying the system.
The meat he'd just eaten brought his Blood Nourishing Technique to (Entry Level 0.3/100.)
Almost the whole plate of bacon was eaten by him.
It was probably about three or four taels (assuming ten taels to a pound), and the Blood Nourishing Technique showed progress of 0.3, doesn't that mean one pound of meat equals 1 point?
To verify his guess, Chen Mo said, "Sister-in-law, do we have a scale at home?"
"Yes, we do."
"Sister-in-law, bring the scale over and help me with something."
The cellar was under the kang in the room of his parents in the original body, known only to family members. You had to crawl under the kang and lift the cover to access the cellar, which was quite secretive.
It's just that getting in and out was rather difficult.
Chen Mo took the scale and the kitchen knife to the cellar, his Power reaching "4+5" with the knife in hand.
It seemed the Celestial Harmony Saber Technique wasn't limited to one type of sword.
Chen Mo swung the kitchen knife hard.
[Swinging the knife +1 time, Celestial Harmony Saber Technique experience +1.]
As expected, the kitchen knife worked too.
The cellar wasn't spacious, and his action startled Han Anniang beside him: "Uncle, what are you doing?"
"It's nothing."
Chen Mo cut a piece of bacon with the kitchen knife, weighed it, and it was about half a pound.
Then he handed this half-pound piece of bacon to Han Anniang: "Sister-in-law, have this bacon for dinner."
Han Anniang didn't take it, muttering, "Uncle, eating like this, the family's stored food won't last long."
She originally thought uncle just wanted a taste of meat to satisfy his craving, but now it seems he wants to eat meat every meal.
Not to mention in this year of great disaster, even before, they couldn't afford it.
"Sister-in-law, I have my reasons. Just trust me on this." Chen Mo said.
...
Winter was approaching, and it got dark early. Before the sky fully dimmed, Han Anniang had already cooked dinner.
She sliced the bacon with a knife after removing the smoky top layer, then steamed it with wheat rice, and it was ready to eat.
In the evening, Han Anniang didn't eat any of the half-pound of bacon, Chen Mo ate it all.
The Blood Nourishing Technique reached (Entry Level 0.8/100.)
"Looks like it's really one pound of meat for one point of experience..."
The meat at home was barely over two pounds, not nearly enough to max out his experience.
In normal times, a hundred pounds of meat, slaughtering a sheep, would nearly suffice.
But in this year of great disaster, it's not that easy.
The prices of pigs, cows, and sheep have skyrocketed. With his current savings, he couldn't afford a sheep.
So the other ways to get meat are down to two.
But to do these, he had to first recover to the level of a normal person.
...
Before 7 p.m., the entire Fu Ze Village was shrouded in darkness, falling into silence.
There were no evening entertainments in the countryside, and to save oil, the Chen family would not light lamps at night, so they slept early.
One reason was having to get up to work in the morning.
Another was that eating less means sleeping conserved energy.
But Chen Mo couldn't sleep, despite reminding himself of the saying 'when in Rome, do as the Romans do.'
But being a "promising young man" from the twenty-first century, who spent his days on novels and games, and nights drinking and partying, suddenly in a chaotic world where even meat is a worry, not going crazy was already quite good.
Closing his eyes, he could hear the wind outside the house.
Chen Mo forced himself to sleep.
At dawn, Chen Mo awoke to the sounds in the courtyard, trying to lift his hand to rub his face, he realized the hand he wielded the knife with yesterday was terribly sore.
"Not enough exercise..."
In the courtyard, he found Han Anniang already awake, with a headscarf tied around her head and a hatchet at her waist, looking every bit the typical country woman.
"I'm going up the mountain to chop wood. If you're hungry, just cook yourself something," Han Anniang said when she saw Chen Mo awake.
Before the sun was fully up, when it wasn't too hot yet, it was the perfect time to work.
By nine or ten o'clock, when the sun rose, it would be unbearable.
Enough firewood had to be prepared for the winter.
"Up the mountain?" Chen Mo was surprised: "Sister-in-law, just you alone, aren't you afraid of mountain tigers?"
One of the ways Chen Mo planned to obtain meat was by hunting on the mountain.
But with beasts roaming the mountain, it wasn't something he could handle at the moment.
This showed the original person's lack of understanding of life.
According to Han Anniang, when the grain was insufficient last year, young men from several nearby villages had teamed up to go hunting on the mountain.
The mountain tigers were fierce, but they feared humans too.
After several rounds in the mountain, the beasts capable of hurting people were driven into the deep mountains, and Han Anniang only chopped wood in the outer mountains and brought it back.
And the original person stayed at home all day and didn't go out much, naturally not knowing about this.
"Then sister-in-law, I'll go with you," Chen Mo said.
"But if you leave, who will guard the house?"
"We'll put all the valuables in the cellar and lock the door."
"But doing this..."
"It's no big deal if we lose something. Your safety is what matters. Wait for me." Chen Mo went back inside to pack.
While he was in the house, daring people had come to the door to harass sister-in-law. In such chaotic times, if sister-in-law were spotted in the wild, Chen Mo dare not imagine what might happen.
Chen Mo didn't notice the hint of joy in Han Anniang's eyes when he went back inside.
Indeed, going alone to the mountain to chop wood, it's natural to be scared, but with winter coming, someone in the family had to step up to work.
With someone to accompany her now, Han Anniang felt much more at ease.
"Is uncle concerned about me..."
Once he packed up, Chen Mo grabbed a kitchen knife from the kitchen. With a knife in hand, his Power was "4+5", making him feel a bit more secure.
The mountain was called Daze Mountain, and on the way, Han Anniang told him it belonged to the government, and unauthorized logging was against the law.
However, the government collected a wood-chopping tax every year, and this year it was collected twice.
Besides the wood-chopping tax, there was a hunting tax.
That's right, hunting required paying taxes.
And you were forced to pay them every year; not going up the mountain to hunt didn't exempt you; the government didn't care.
Yet, this wasn't the most unreasonable thing; the most unreasonable was the head tax, or Body Tax as the government called it, which had to be paid for every adult male in the family.
And since last year, even young unmarried males in the family had to pay Body Tax.
Living was already hard for the people, with this tax and that tax, it was even tougher.
After understanding all this, Chen Mo's face darkened, truly feeling the historical phrase "oppressive government is fiercer than a tiger."
On the mountain, Chen Mo took the hatchet from Han Anniang and began chopping wood, also accumulating experience for his Celestial Harmony Saber Technique, while Han Anniang gathered and tied the wood.
Unfortunately, they didn't find any wild chickens or rabbits in the outer areas, as Chen Mo had hoped to hunt some game to supplement their meat.
As for venturing deeper into the mountains, he wasn't ready to do that yet.