My Romance Game Updated – Chapter 42
by Little PandaPicky Eater
“Let me see that pill bottle again!” Mu Ning remembered now. It seemed she had once received a bottle just like it. In the blank space on the label, someone had carefully written in red pen: 3 times a day, 2 tablets at a time. The red font was very similar to the bold, enlarged font she had glimpsed.
“What? Are you worried I’ll poison her?” The moment Mu Ning reached out to ask for the bottle, Ren Chenxi had already put the empty bottle back into her backpack. She then spread her hands at Mu Ning and said, “Relax. With injuries as severe as Sun Jia’s, there’s no need for me to poison her. Besides, I have no grievances or grudges against her…”
“I’m not afraid you’ll poison her. I just want to look at that stomach medicine bottle again.”
Seeing Mu Ning’s insistent expression, as if she absolutely had to see the bottle, Ren Chenxi’s face fell. She casually pulled another bottle of stomach medicine from her backpack. Stomach medicine, well, it was possible to get an upset stomach while traveling, so it was definitely something to keep on hand.
After taking the medicine from Ren Chenxi, Mu Ning gave it a slight shake and said unhappily, “Not this one. I want the empty one from just now!”
“What empty bottle? I don’t remember! My space is so big, and there are so many things, I don’t know where I tossed it. Wait until I have time to find it!” Ren Chenxi started to play dumb1 impatiently. Seeing that Mu Ning still wouldn’t give up, she pointed at Sun Jia and said, “You should hurry up and get some water so your friend can take the antidote! What if her withdrawal symptoms act up? Do you want to watch her suffer through the torment of addiction?”
“…” Mu Ning stared at Ren Chenxi for a long while before finally compromising. She turned and said to Wu Tong, “Go downstairs and boil a kettle of water.”
“N-no need, I still have some water I haven’t finished here…”
Having nervously watched the two who seemed on the verge of arguing, Sun Jia was first stunned to hear Mu Ning call a truce, then quickly propped herself up to grab a thermos on the bedside table. However, Zhang Tongqi was a step faster. She helped pick up the thermos, twisted open the lid, and after a single glance, shook her head. “Where’s the water? Xiao Tong, hurry up and go boil some. And Ge Yijin, really, did he think leaving him here to watch over you just meant literally watching you? He didn’t even refill your water when it ran out…”
“N-no, it’s not that. Ge Yijin is a guy, after all, so it’s not convenient for him to come into my room. And I didn’t ask him to get me water…” Sun Jia’s attention had been on Ren Chenxi and Mu Ning. It was only when Zhang Tongqi opened the thermos that she remembered she had finished all the water in it yesterday.
“Sigh, it really is inconvenient to have a guy stay behind! Well, next time Boss goes out to find supplies, either I or Xiao Tong will stay.”
Zhang Tongqi was just speaking casually and didn’t mean to blame Ge Yijin. Now that she thought about it more carefully, leaving a grown man like Ge Yijin to take care of Sun Jia was indeed improper. But… wasn’t that because Ge Yijin was interested in Sun Jia, giving him a chance to show his attentiveness? In the end, that straight man2 completely failed to seize the opportunity! He was told to watch over her, and he really just sat in the living room all day, not even daring to enter her room!
“Um… maybe by the time everyone goes out again, my injuries will have healed?” Sun Jia said in a soft voice, smiling as she looked at Ren Chenxi. “With your miraculous medicine, even this addiction can be cured, to say nothing of my small wounds, right?”
“…” Such horrifying wounds, and she called them “small”? Big Sis, you’re a real badass3!
Though she was snarking internally, Ren Chenxi still nodded very seriously at Sun Jia and promised, “Don’t worry, it will definitely heal!”
Seeing Ren Chenxi’s confident attitude, even though Zhang Tongqi and the others still had doubts about her so-called antidote, they couldn’t help but be filled with anticipation for Sun Jia to be free of her addiction and for her wounds to heal quickly. “That’s great! As soon as Xiao Tong brings the water up, we’ll take the medicine right away!”
Just as Zhang Tongqi’s voice fell, Tantan, who had been quiet all this time, suddenly started meowing coquettishly again. It rubbed its small, fluffy head against Ren Chenxi’s leg, occasionally lifting a tiny paw to bat at her pant leg. Seeing Tantan like this, Ren Chenxi smiled. Even after two years of the apocalypse, some of Tantan’s little habits hadn’t changed at all~
“Oh, what’s wrong with Tantan now? Could it be that it knows Xiao Jia’s addiction can be cured, so it’s happy too?”
“No… Tantan’s just hungry.” Back when she was raising Tantan, whenever it was hungry, or had a craving, or saw her eating something it also wanted, it would always act cute like this, scratching her pant leg with its little paws.
“…” Hearing Ren Chenxi’s answer, Zhang Tongqi was speechless. Normally, when this little ancestor4 got hungry, when had it ever begged them for food so coquettishly? It would always glare at them with a cold, disdainful look, and then—Peng!—smash its food bowl with one paw. Its expression was like it was saying: “Stupid humans, this daddy is hungry, why aren’t you feeding this daddy yet!”
It was the apocalypse, and all supplies were scarce. After Tantan had furiously broken three bowls, they had switched it to a stainless steel food bowl. As a result, they no longer had to worry about the bowl breaking, but every time mealtime came around, this little ancestor would bang the stainless steel bowl, making a heaven-shaking racket. It was noisy enough to kill a person!
And now, you’re telling her that Tantan’s current cute and cuddly appearance is it begging for food???
Comparing people really makes one sour to death5!
Mu Ning looked at the constantly fawning kitten, then at Ren Chenxi’s doting smile, and asked in a very sour tone, “How do you know Tantan is begging for food?”
“…” Ren Chenxi gave Mu Ning a sidelong glance.
“Oh, I know. Ren Muhui told you, right?”
“…” Heh, good that you know.
Ren Chenxi bent down to pick up Tantan. As if suddenly remembering something, she instructed Sun Jia, “This antidote should be taken after a meal. So why don’t you eat lunch first, then take it?”
“…Why is this antidote as particular as regular medicine?” Zhang Tongqi couldn’t help but grumble.
“All medicines are particular!” Since the so-called antidote was actually just an anti-inflammatory, Ren Chenxi stressed again with a serious expression, “Three times a day, two tablets each time, after meals!”
“Okay, I’ll remember. Thank you~” Sun Jia’s reply was also very solemn.
It was already past 12 o’clock. Everyone had eaten breakfast very early, so when Ren Chenxi said Tantan was hungry, the stomachs of the few girls from S University started to rumble one after another. As Zhang Tongqi was calling everyone downstairs to eat, the guys from upstairs also came down and stood at the door, urging them on.
“So hungry! Boss, when are we eating?”
“How about now?” Mu Ning looked at Ren Chenxi and said, “To thank you for the wound medicine and the antidote, let us treat you to a meal today?”
“A treat? It’s got to be a feast, right? Don’t you dare try to fob us off with instant noodles or something!” Ren Chenxi raised an eyebrow at Mu Ning. It was the apocalypse; she had no reason to be difficult when it came to good food. Besides, she had been gnawing on nang bread for a week. Now that someone was offering to treat her, she wasn’t going to be stupid enough to refuse just because she was annoyed with Mu Ning.
Are you kidding me? This is the apocalypse! Food is incredibly precious, okay! Since she was unhappy with Mu Ning, she would just eat more of her food stores and make her heart ache!
“Okay! A feast it is~” At the mention of food, Mu Ning saw the excitement and eagerness in Ren Chenxi’s eyes and couldn’t help but smile and agree. Even though Ren Chenxi denied being Ren Muhui time and time again, and the look in her eyes was different from his, just seeing that familiar face and that familiar smile made her unable to resist, wanting to grant this person’s every request.
“You can cook?” Seeing Mu Ning’s confident look, Ren Chenxi was full of disbelief. She knew Mu Ning’s cooking skills, or lack thereof. The girl couldn’t cook at all! But looking at the sheer confidence on her face… could it be that after two years of being beaten down and tempered by the cruel life of the apocalypse, the young miss had finally become a new-generation Apocalypse Kitchen King?
“I can’t, but Wu Tong, Zhang Tongqi, Chen Gu, and Wei Yuze all can.”
“…” If you can’t cook, what the hell are you so proud of6! You’re not even as good as your underlings! Fine, having underlings to cook and curry favor for you is indeed impressive…
“Meow meow meow meow!” Its plea for food having gone unanswered, Tantan once again frantically tried to make its presence known at Ren Chenxi’s feet. Ren Chenxi scooped Tantan up in one arm and said with a smile, “Oh my, our Tantan wants a big meal too~ By the way, what’s Tantan’s appetite like now? It’s mutated and its body can grow to be half the size of a mutated leopard, so it must…”
“Its appetite is only a little bit more than a normal cat’s.” Mu Ning glanced at Tantan. “And it’s a good thing Tantan’s appetite isn’t too big. Otherwise, we would have been eaten into poverty by it over the past two years of the apocalypse.”
“So the cat food is…” Ren Chenxi wanted to ask where, in the apocalypse, Mu Ning had found enough cat food that Tantan was used to eating to last for two years. Before the apocalypse, probably due to her excessive spoiling, Tantan had been extremely picky about all kinds of cat food and treats. And back then, Ren Chenxi wasn’t short on money, so she had magnanimously bought almost every brand of cat food for Tantan to pick its favorite. Ren Chenxi clearly remembered that the cat food this precious Golden Shaded7 had finally chosen after being so selective was also very expensive, and was even foreign imported.
It had been two years since the apocalypse started. Imported cat food definitely couldn’t be imported anymore, and that expensive cat food, which advertised itself as “fresh, hygienic, clean, and delicious,” had a shorter shelf life than normal cat food—only half a year. It’s been two years… had Tantan been forcing itself to eat expired cat food all this time? That must be it. In the apocalypse, even people learned to grow in harsh environments, let alone the pampered Tantan. Tantan must have suffered a lot these past two years, right?
Ren Chenxi gently stroked Tantan, her eyes filled with love and heartache.
“…” Seeing how concerned Ren Chenxi was for Tantan, the sour feeling in Mu Ning’s heart surged up again. “You’re overthinking it. This is the apocalypse, how could we possibly go out of our way to find cat food for Tantan? Besides, that cat food… was snatched up by other survivors long ago! For some people, as long as they have something to fill their stomachs, that’s enough. They don’t care if the food is for cats, dogs, or humans.”
Ahhh! Tantan hasn’t had any cat food for two years! Tantan really has suffered so much! But she couldn’t blame Mu Ning for letting Tantan suffer. Life was already hard for everyone in the apocalypse. The fact that Mu Ning hadn’t treated Tantan as emergency food8 and had fed it for two years was already quite good. “Then what has it been eating these past two years?”
“Meat! Raw meat! And it has to be the freshest! It won’t even eat leftovers from the night before!” Even someone as noble and aloof as Mu Ning rolled her eyes uncharacteristically at this point.
“And if you add a raw egg to the raw meat, Tantan will eat it with even more relish!” Zhang Tongqi added from the side.
“…” This feeling… Tantan had actually eaten pretty well these past two years of the apocalypse? At least… much better than some ordinary people who couldn’t fight or hunt for themselves, right? Ren Chenxi subconsciously hefted Tantan in her arms, only now realizing with a delay… that while Tantan’s size hadn’t changed, its weight had clearly increased a lot! “What… what kind of meat does it eat?” As she asked this, Ren Chenxi’s voice was noticeably weaker.
“What kind of meat? Hmm… Tantan isn’t too picky about that. Chicken, duck, goose, beef, mutton, it eats basically all of them… As long as it’s fresh and you cut it into small strips for it, it can eat a whole bowl.”
“Then… does Tantan eat wolf meat…” After last night’s battle, where she had killed so many mutated wolves and taken the opportunity to sneak-attack some other mutated beasts, Ren Chenxi’s backpack was indeed stocked with a lot of fresh animal meat. There was goose, wild boar, and snake meat, but the largest quantity by far was wolf meat.
The author has something to say:
Tantan (to others): (╯°Д°)╯︵ ┻━┻ Stupid humans, this daddy is hungry!
(To Xixi): Meow meow meow meow meow~ Master, I’m hungry, meow~
Wooden-head (sourly): This cat is so annoying! As expected, cats are the worst!
ps: Saw in the comments that some little darlings reminded me that taking medicine out and putting it in another bottle can make it damp. Don’t worry, the author usually keeps the desiccant from the original pill bottle and puts it in with the transferred pills.
However, for capsule-type medicine, they still end up sticking together later even with a desiccant……
Footnotes
- Original term: zhuang sha. To feign ignorance or pretend not to understand something.
- Original term: zhi nan. A slang term that literally means ‘straight man’. It’s often used to describe men who are perceived as dense, unromantic, or oblivious to a woman’s hints.
- Original term: henren. A slang term, literally ‘ruthless person’, used to describe someone who is impressively tough, formidable, or extreme in their actions. It can be a term of respect.
- A term of endearment, literally ‘little ancestor’, used for someone who is doted on, pampered, and often difficult to please, as if they were a revered elder.
- A colloquial saying. The word ‘suan’ (sour) is often used in Chinese to mean ‘jealous’ or ‘envious’. The phrase means that comparing oneself to others leads to intense jealousy.
- Original phrase: 得意个屁 (déyì gè pì). A vulgar dismissal, literally ‘proud of a fart’.
- Original term: jin jian ceng. A specific and often expensive cat breed, known in English as the British Shorthair (or Longhair) Golden Shaded.
- A darkly humorous term in an apocalyptic setting, implying that a pet could be eaten as a last resort.
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