Chapter 44: Come
The chattering sounds came from far to near, attracting Shang Wan’s attention.
She threw the screen that had been broken into two halves “bang” to one side, straightened up, and looked toward the entrance to the mountain forest at the foot of the mountain that had been trampled out by people.
“Sis, what’s wrong?” Shi Tou wiped the sweat from his forehead and also turned to look in the direction Shang Wan was staring.
“Monkeys.” Shang Wan furrowed her brows slightly. “A lot.”
As her words fell, an old monkey with whitish fur took the lead, grabbing a vine and swinging out from the entrance at the foot of the mountain, landing on a branch.
It turned toward the mountain forest and chattered, raising its arm and gesturing something.
In just a moment, Shi Tou watched as the bare tree that had just sprouted new buds became covered with monkeys of all sizes.
The later monkeys had no place to stand, so nearby trees also began to grow monkeys, as if the monkeys from the mountains had come down for a gathering, chattering noisily.
Yuan Yuan happily clapped her little hands, her soft and glutinous childlike voice repeating, “Come… come…”
“Yuan Yuan, what did you say?” Lu Chengjing leaned in close to listen.
“Come!” Yuan Yuan crisply popped out a word.
Lu Chengjing was puzzled. Come what?
The next second he knew what was coming—a group of brown-furred monkeys chattered and swarmed toward them, and on closer inspection, they even had a formation.
Lu Chengjing: ???
Monkeys could hurt people. Shi Tou instinctively picked up the wooden board at hand, while Xiao Huan simply gripped the kitchen knife she had just found, vigilantly staring at the group of monkeys approaching.
“No need to be nervous.” Shang Wan glanced at her unusually excited child, her tone a bit complicated. “They should be here to help.”
“What?” Shi Tou suspected he had misheard.
Xiao Huan asked, “Sis, did you summon them?”
Shang Wan thought to herself that she didn’t have that ability; the real culprit was over there clapping her hands.
“Come!” Yuan Yuan’s big eyes sparkled with excitement, her little meat hands clapping louder and louder.
Lu Chengjing’s eyelids twitched. His intuition told him that if he let Yuan Yuan continue, something uncontrollable would happen.
“Yuan Yuan.” Lu Chengjing grabbed his daughter’s little hand and gently shook it, saying warmly, “Daddy will tell you a story, okay?”
Her action interrupted, the sparkle in Yuan Yuan’s eyes faded. She suddenly realized her little hand hurt badly, quickly raising it in front of her daddy, her eyes welling up with tears. “Ouch! Blow blow!”
Lu Chengjing gently blew on the little hand in front of him as instructed, but his peripheral vision was observing the wild monkeys that had already run over to their side.
The monkeys happily joined the cleanup team. Even because there were too many monkeys and not enough space, the old monkey ran over and drove the three people—Shang Wan and the others—out of the cleanup area.
Under the old monkey’s command, the monkeys divided the work clearly: some carried, some lifted, some picked up small items, flexibly shuttling through the ruins.
The three people—Shang Wan and the others—went from being the main cleanup force at the beginning to helping the monkeys distinguish whether the things they were holding could still be used.
Intact ones in one pile, ones that could be used after repair in another pile, ones that could be made use of waste in another pile, and completely unusable ones in yet another pile.
Shi Tou and Xiao Huan were a bit awkward at first, feeling it strange to direct a group of monkeys, but gradually they got the hang of it, communicating more and more smoothly with the monkeys.
Shi Tou even self-taught a few monkey calls, dancing and gesturing along with the monkeys.
Xiao Huan covered her face, indicating she couldn’t bear to watch.
Shang Wan carried two undamaged wooden buckets to the well and fetched two buckets of water, dripping two drops of spiritual spring water into each while stirring, as a reward from Yuan Yuan to these monkeys.
She beckoned to the old monkey and pointed at the two buckets.
The old monkey ran over, looked at Shang Wan then at the buckets, stretched out its paw to scoop some water into its mouth, smacked its lips, then scooped some more.
Visibly, the old monkey’s fur, which had turned white due to age, restored to light brown like it had been dyed.
The old monkey felt the benefit and scooped two more mouthfuls with its paw.
In just a moment, the old wrinkles on the old monkey’s face smoothed out like they had been ironed, becoming much flatter.
Seeing the old monkey wanting to reach for the bucket again, Shang Wan grabbed its arm and said in a low voice, regardless of whether it understood, “Greed is not good. Share it together.”
The old monkey knew the human in front of it was not to be trifled with. Seeing Shang Wan looking at the monkey group busy in the ruins, it instantly understood what she meant.
It bared its mouth and chattered at the monkey group, receiving countless responses.
Shang Wan let it go, watching as under the old monkey’s command, the monkeys ran over one by one after finishing with things to scoop a mouthful of water, drink and leave, then come back for more after finishing work.
The spiritual spring water didn’t have as obvious an effect on the young monkeys as on the old monkey, but there must be benefits, otherwise the monkeys wouldn’t work harder and harder just to come scoop a drink from the bucket.
Seeing the second bucket almost empty, the old monkey looked at Shang Wan pitifully, humanely clasping its two paws together and bowing to her in supplication.
Considering the monkeys had worked hard and truly helped a lot, Shang Wan filled the two buckets again and processed them the same way.
Lu Chengjing, who had observed everything, certainly didn’t miss the old monkey’s changes. He suspected Shang Wan had added the spiritual medicine she used to treat his wounds into the water. He had always been curious where Shang Wan’s spiritual medicine came from.
Shang Wan noticed Lu Chengjing’s probing gaze, but she neither planned to confess to him now nor had a lie ready, so she pretended not to notice and let him stew.
Many monkeys mean great strength. With the monkey group’s help, the work that would have taken several days was completed in less than half a day.
It was just that the thatched hut was far from where the villagers lived, and everyone was busy cleaning the house with no time to visit, otherwise the villagers would have discovered the monkey group’s commotion long ago.
With no work left, the monkeys dozed off or groomed their fur one by one, showing no intention of leaving.
Xiao Huan looked at Shang Wan. “Sis, do we need to treat them to a meal before they’ll leave?”
People get wages and meals for work, so monkeys should be similar, right?
Even now, Xiao Huan still believed this group of monkeys had been summoned by Shang Wan.
Shang Wan glanced at Yuan Yuan, who was nestled in Lu Chengjing’s arms snoring little snores, walked over, and poked the little guy’s chubby cheek.
Yuan Yuan smacked her little mouth, turned her head to the other side, and continued sleeping soundly.
Shang Wan poked again.
Disturbed again, Yuan Yuan wrinkled her little nose, impatiently lifted her little hand and waved it, mumbling, “Bad… go, leave!”
As soon as the word “leave” fell, the bored monkeys collectively received some command and, led by the old monkey, ran toward the mountain forest.
Shi Tou, with his chicken nest head, reluctantly waved vigorously at a few familiar monkeys and shouted, “Next time I’ll help you groom your fur!”
Everyone: “…”
“What’s up with Yuan Yuan…?” Lu Chengjing looked up at Shang Wan, instinctively feeling Yuan Yuan’s unusual behavior was related to Shang Wan.
Yuan Yuan was too young, possessing an ability but not knowing how to hide it. Outsiders were one thing, but Shang Wan had no intention of hiding it from family.
However, not now.
She turned to look outside, only to see a small figure running toward them. Li Xiaoshan shouted while running, “Sis! Bad news! Something happened!”
