Apocalyptic Hoarding Diary

Chapter 447 Waking Up in the Middle of the Night

"Perhaps it's not the right time yet," Xu Xiaoyan finally spoke, her voice not loud, as if she were talking to herself, or as if answering the question Lan Yue hadn't asked.

"In this kind of weather, with the rain constantly falling, the mushrooms might still be buried in the soil and haven't sprouted yet."

She paused, reached out and picked up a fallen leaf that had been washed in by the rain from the edge of the threshold, then threw it back into the rain.

"We're not in a hurry. We'll just follow when someone comes down the mountain with mushrooms."

"That's true," Lan Yue's tone was a little lighter than before.

"If someone picks it, we'll go with them. If no one picks it... well, then there's nothing there. We can't just dig it out of the ground ourselves."

After she finished speaking, she walked to the pot, scooped up a ladle of rainwater and poured it into the pot. She brushed it twice to rinse away the bits of wood ear mushrooms left over from the stir-fry, and then turned the pot upside down to drain.

When she turned the iron pot over, the layer of black ash from the bottom of the pot smeared her hand, but she didn't care. She wiped it on her trouser leg and put the pot back on the stone.

Xu Xiaoyan leaned against the wooden wall, watching Lan Yue bustling about, and suddenly spoke as if she remembered something:

"Ask those masters later. They've been here longer and know the mountain better than we do. If there really are mushrooms in this mountain, they couldn't possibly not know."

"Okay, I'll ask when I run into him."

Lan Yue hung the brush on the rope of the waterproof tarpaulin, turned around, leaned against the door frame, looked at the rain outside that seemed to never stop, and suddenly smiled.

"Xiao Yan, do you think there's something wrong with us? We get anxious when we can't sell our mushrooms, but now that we've stopped selling them, we have a place to live and food to eat, and we're starting to crave the mushrooms in the mountains again."

Xu Xiaoyan laughed and said, "That's how people are. When they're full, they want to be warmly dressed. When they're warmly dressed, they want to live comfortably. When they live comfortably, they want to find something new. If they're never full, they won't want anything at all."

Lan Yue nodded after hearing this, but did not reply.

In the middle of the night, Xu Xiaoyan was awakened by a sound she had never heard before, a faint, intermittent sound that never stopped.

She opened her eyes. The wooden house was pitch black, with only a sliver of dim light coming through the crack in the door.

Blue Moon was sleeping soundly in the tent next to her.

She tiptoed out of her sleeping bag, put on her coat, walked to the door, and pushed it open a crack.

It was still dark, and the rain was pouring down. The ground was soaked and shiny, with puddles reflecting the sunlight.

The faint crackling sound was still ringing out, coming intermittently from the hillside behind the wooden house, as if something was moving beneath the layer of fallen leaves.

Xu Xiaoyan gently closed the door, went around to the back of the wooden house, and walked a few steps up the hillside through the wet grass.

The morning light was not bright enough, and she squinted for a while before realizing that the source of the sound was neither an animal nor a person.

Instead, they are the tiny, white things that are pushing outwards from under the tree roots, deep in the grass, and in the cracks of the humus.

Mushrooms!

She crouched down, brushed aside a soaked fallen leaf, and saw a cluster of tiny, white mushrooms peeking out of the soil, their caps not yet fully open, tightly closed.

The umbrellas were covered with dew and bits of soil. They grew very densely, crowded together, with a dozen or so in a clump. The larger ones were the size of a thumbprint, while the smaller ones were just white dots the size of a grain of rice.

Xu Xiaoyan stretched out her finger and gently touched the largest mushroom cap.

The fingertips touched a cool and smooth texture, with a unique moisture and elasticity, as if they were touching the skin of some living thing.

She pulled her finger back, held it under her nose, and smelled it. It had a faint, sweet, almond-like aroma, completely different from the rich, mushroom-like scent of wood ear mushrooms.

Instead of picking them, she stood up and walked around the neighborhood again.

On hillsides, under pine trees, in bushes, beside fallen dead trees—wherever there is humus, you can almost always find these tiny white things.

Several thoughts raced through her mind: Are these mushrooms edible? Are they the same kind? Are any poisonous?

She had heard people say when she was a child that most mushrooms growing under pine trees are non-toxic, and some are even considered top-quality delicacies.

But she wasn't sure, because in this place, eating the wrong thing wasn't as simple as just getting an upset stomach.

She turned and walked quickly back to the cabin, pushed open the door, and found Lan Yue still asleep.

She crouched down and gently patted Lan Yue's shoulder.

"Blue Moon, wake up."

Lan Yue gave a muffled "hmm," turned over, and kept her eyes closed.

"Mushrooms are growing on the hillside."

Lan Yue's eyes snapped open, and she sprang out of her sleeping bag, her voice still hoarse from just waking up.

But her tone was as clear as could be: "Mushrooms? Where? What kind? How many?"

Xu Xiaoyan was amused by her reaction and smiled slightly. She stepped aside to make way for the doorway. "Go see for yourself. They're right behind the wooden house, in patches."

Blue Moon didn't even have time to put on her coat; she just slipped on her shoes and rushed out.

Xu Xiaoyan followed behind, watching her squat on the hillside, looking at the cluster of mushrooms again and again, reaching out to touch them, and then sniffing them.

Then he suddenly turned his head, his expression a mixture of surprise and joy. He reached out to pick it, but Xu Xiaoyan grabbed his wrist.

"Don't rush," Xu Xiaoyan squatted down to face her, her tone unhurried but earnest:

"Are you sure you can recognize them? There are many mushrooms that look alike on the mountain. Some are edible, and some are poisonous. Eating poisonous mushrooms is no joke."

"This is a pine mushroom!" Blue Moon nodded vigorously, her voice rising several octaves as she pointed to the cluster of small white things:

"I picked these when I was little. They grow under pine trees, they're white, and they taste best when the caps are closed! They're not poisonous, definitely not poisonous, I've eaten them!"

"When I was a child, I went to pick mushrooms every year. I really recognized pine mushrooms, green-headed mushrooms, and porcini mushrooms. Pine mushrooms are the easiest to recognize. The bottom of the cap is honeycomb-like, not a series of folds. Look at this one—"

She carefully used her fingers to pull the largest mushroom from its root, soil and all, and turned it over to show Xu Xiaoyan the back of its cap.

The cap did not have the fine, radial folds, but rather irregular, honeycomb-like pores, pale yellow in color, which were particularly clear in the morning light.

"These are the characteristics of pine mushrooms," Lan Yue said, holding the mushroom up to Xu Xiaoyan's nose.

"Smell it, it smells like almonds. Most poisonous mushrooms are fishy, ​​smelly, or have no smell at all. I've remembered this smell for fifteen years, it can't be wrong."

Xu Xiaoyan took a sniff, and it was indeed the faint, sweet almond scent she had just smelled.

She loosened Lan Yue's wrist and nodded.

"Then pick it. Pick a small piece to try first. Don't eat too much at once. Just in case, and I mean just in case, if something goes wrong, we'll have some room to maneuver."