The Battle to Defend the Lamb Chops
The biggest problem with Sun Miao leaving was: their lamb chops were temporarily unwatched.
Sun Miao was still somewhat worried and carefully exhorted Su Ruixi: “Susu-jie, you keep an eye on the lamb chops. Wait a little while, then flip them over. Don’t always roast one side, or it will burn.” Before leaving, Sun Miao also took down the prepared tin foil box of side dishes and several skewers of lamb meat, temporarily setting them aside.
“If you get hungry, eat these side dishes and sweet potatoes first. You don’t need to wait for me; I’ll be back very soon.”
Before the sky turned dark, she had climbed a sand dune to look. The Aunties’ campsite was quite close. The round trip was estimated to be just ten-something minutes. Adding the time to start the fire, it would be half an hour at most.
Sun Miao was only responsible for getting the fire started; she certainly wasn’t going to build them a bonfire.
The matters Sun Miao instructed were detailed, but to Su Ruixi’s ears, it felt like The Arabian Nights1: Watch the fire? Watch the lamb chops? Ah? Her?
In this moment, Su Ruixi somewhat regretted letting Sun Miao leave. Her eyes blinked rapidly. “Miaomiao, I can’t do it… I…”
The Auntie who was staying behind to wait, however, volunteered herself: “It’s fine, I can also help watch it!”
With someone else assisting from the side, Sun Miao was more relieved. “It’s fine, they won’t be done in this short amount of time. I definitely can return before they are ready.” After she finished speaking, she even took a bag of charcoal before following the Auntie into the off-road vehicle, heading in the direction they came from.
If they couldn’t start a fire with such complete tools, Sun Miao suspected it was a problem with the charcoal. Sending the Buddha all the way to the West2, Sun Miao simply took a bag of their own charcoal.
Watching the off-road vehicle go far away, Su Ruixi’s gaze gradually became bewildered. After a while, however, it became determined again. Then, her eyes stared unblinkingly at the barbecue grill, deeply afraid that because Sun Miao left for this short period, the lamb chops would directly turn into black charcoal. She regretted it a little again: If I had known earlier, I would have gone to help start the fire myself and let Sun Miao stay here!
But thinking about it again, regarding the matter of starting a fire, Su Ruixi herself… seemed indeed not very capable.
She could pitch tents and set up sky curtains, but if speaking of starting a fire, at most she could ignite a Kasi stove3. Wanting to create a fire pile—for Su Ruixi, that was simply The Arabian Nights. So… no matter what, the one staying here watching the roast lamb chops would have been Su Ruixi.
The Auntie beside her was very talkative. She dressed in a western style and looked expensive. If not for this, Su Ruixi would not have agreed to let Sun Miao go in a car with strangers. This was, after all, a bird-doesn’t-shit4 desert. Even if Sun Miao’s phone had the positioning device Su Ruixi installed, rashly going with others was very prone to accidents.
However, this was within the country, and Su Ruixi had also made observations; otherwise, she wouldn’t have let Sun Miao go with people.
The matter of her installing a tracker in Sun Miao’s phone had been told to Sun Miao. This included Su Ruixi’s own phone, which also had a positioning device installed. After all, her family was that kind of family. Not to mention kidnapping and extortion, one always had to take precautions. Therefore, her itinerary was generally sent to a specialized security department. The people over there would monitor her approximate location in real-time. Once the location had relatively weird fluctuations, they would immediately call the police and arrest people—a one-dragon service5.
So, Su Ruixi was considered fairly at ease.
But she very quickly could not be at ease, because although the Aunties hadn’t thought of murdering for money, the Auntie who stayed behind to accompany Su Ruixi had fixed her eyes on their roast lamb chops.
The lamb chops had already been roasting for a very long time. If not for the fact that the rack of lamb was relatively large, right now they would already be cooked. Even if not fully cooked, bursts of fragrance were already emerging.
The fragrance of roast lamb chops was the most primitive and also the most enticing. Golden-yellow grease slowly fell from the lamb chops, dropping into the fire pile. The tongues of fire licked upward, emitting two pipa sounds. In the silent desert night, such sounds were particularly obvious.
Under the foil of the burning fire sounds, those lamb chops were tempting others from almost 360 degrees without any dead angles.
The fragrance was even more obvious.
The lamb chops, soaked full of seasoning, carried the most plain, most overbearing fragrance, rushing directly at people’s noses. Su Ruixi had stayed here for a long time, continuously wrapped in the smell of roast lamb, so she didn’t feel it too greatly. However, even someone like her who preferred vegetables felt it smelled so fragrant.
The Auntie, who had just sat down for a moment and was suddenly impacted by the roast lamb fragrance, directly sniffed her nose and silently swallowed a mouthful of saliva.
Her eyes, amidst the faint bonfire, flickered with green light like a wolf.
Su Ruixi’s sitting posture, originally lying in the chair and considered quite leisurely, suddenly changed in this moment. She straightened her waist and looked at the Auntie from across the bonfire, deeply afraid the Auntie would propose some excessive request.
She knew Sun Miao. That was a top-tier good-hearted person. Perhaps later when she came back and saw the Auntie like this, she would directly take out a small knife and split off a piece of lamb chop.
Su Ruixi had craved this piece of lamb chop for a long time; how could she be willing to let it fall into another’s hands? She didn’t feel in the slightest that she might not be able to finish it; she didn’t want to share a single mouthful with anyone else. Thus, for the following time, Su Ruixi entered a unilateral battle to defend the lamb chops.
After another ten minutes or so, the Auntie suddenly spoke up: “Little girl.”
Su Ruixi jolted, her eyes also as fierce as a wolf. “What is it?”
The Auntie swallowed her saliva—it was unclear if she was made greedy by the lamb chops or if Su Ruixi gave her too much pressure. But she still said in a small voice, “Should the lamb chops be flipped over?”
Passively reminded by the Auntie, Su Ruixi finally remembered this matter; just now she was solely focused on guarding against the Auntie. Su Ruixi slowly nodded, got down from the chair, grasped the handle beside the rack, and turned it clockwise. As the lamb chops rolled, more grease fell into the fire pile, and pilipala sounds lingered incessantly in the ears.
After flipping, Su Ruixi returned to the chair, continuing to guard against the Auntie.
The Auntie’s eyes also stayed on the lamb chops, seemingly somewhat worried about Su Ruixi. Such good lamb chops—if she missed the mark for a moment, causing them to burn, what then?
The two people, each harboring ghost fetuses6, both stared tightly at the roast lamb chops, not moving a single inch.
This silent war continued until Sun Miao returned. The off-road vehicle cut across the sandy ground, its posture vigorous as it stopped not far away. The car door opened, and Sun Miao got down from the back seat. She wore a smile on her face, and after getting down, she said to the Auntie accompanying Su Ruixi: “Thank you, Auntie. The fire pile on your side has been raised; you can go back now.”
“Oh, okay, okay.”
The Auntie had an expression of coming back to her senses. Su Ruixi also hurriedly stood up, planning to send the person away. But the Auntie was indeed lingering with no intent to leave, repeatedly turning her head to look at the lamb chops on the roasting rack.
Sun Miao noticed this point, but before she could speak, her sleeve was pulled by Su Ruixi. Su Ruixi narrowed her eyes and directly saw the guest out: “Auntie, you guys go back quickly. It’s already not early, and your fire pile has just started burning. If you go back any later, who knows when you’ll be able to eat dinner.”
The driving Auntie felt Su Ruixi made a lot of sense. She called the unwilling Auntie, said thanks once again, then started the car and went back toward their own tent.
Sun Miao followed Su Ruixi back and showed her the shazao7 she got from the Aunties.
“The Aunties said this is a specialty of the Xin Province8 side. To thank me for helping, they gave me a lot.”
Sun Miao looked at the roast lamb chops and, confirming there were no issues, finally pulled Su Ruixi to sit down. Su Ruixi’s interest in the shazao was not high because she had eaten them when she came to the desert before.
She shook her head. “Not tasty, sour.” While speaking, she was still staring at the roast lamb chops. Sun Miao knew that right now, her Susu-jie’s entire mind was on the roast lamb chops. Thus, she went over again and examined the meat. “It can be eaten. The meat is very tender right now. Do you want to roast it a while longer?”
Hearing the words “can be eaten,” Su Ruixi unworthily swallowed a mouthful of saliva. “I-I’ll taste a bite first to see.”
She pretended to be reserved, but that appearance of a little greedy cat nearly made Sun Miao laugh out loud.
Sun Miao naturally would not refuse Su Ruixi. She put on large heat-insulating gloves, stripped the lamb chops down from the rack, and placed them onto a plate at the side. Wearing a glove on one hand, she picked up a specialized knife with the other and, with ease, directly sliced off a rib carrying bone and meat.
Su Ruixi immediately came over holding a small plate. Sun Miao followed the momentum and placed this rib onto Su Ruixi’s plate, then cut another strip for herself.
When she sat onto the chair, Su Ruixi had already started eating.
The rib had just been taken off the roasting rack. The meat on the surface of the lamb chop was still emitting heat. Being close to it, that fragrance was even more pressing, causing saliva to secrete ceaselessly in one’s mouth. She took a relatively thick napkin and carefully lifted a corner of the rib.
Clearly, it was still quite hot even through the napkin, but Su Ruixi could endure no longer. She opened her mouth and carefully bit onto the rib.
The first reaction was, of course, hot. Su Ruixi had a cat tongue9, and immediately was scalded into making a “siha” sound. Sun Miao reminded her from the side: “Susu-jie, you slow down. The air temperature is quite low right now; it won’t be hot in a moment. Don’t be anxious.”
“En, en.”
Although Su Ruixi verbally agreed nicely, she tried hard to blow on the heat and went for it with her mouth again. It was still somewhat hot right now, but it was already within an acceptable range. She clamped her teeth together, and with one drum of energy, directly tore off a long strip of meat.
Her movements were somewhat savage; the usually gold-venerable-jade-noble10 Eldest Miss definitely could not do such a thing. In the past, when eating lamb chops, she would certainly be sitting in a high-end western restaurant. A waiter dressed in formal wear would deliver the lamb chops to her front, wearing black gel gloves and a quiet, indifferent smile on their face, and slice the lamb chops properly for Su Ruixi first.
Then, Su Ruixi herself would pick up a metal fork, pierce a small piece, and slowly put it into her mouth.
Then swallow it like chewing wax11.
There was no high-end western restaurant atmosphere, only the primitive and empty desert. But only at this kind of time would the instinctual desire to eat meat dominate Su Ruixi, making her throw away all etiquette bestowed by modern society and gnaw on the meat before her eyes just like a wild wolf.
The lamb chop was just as Sun Miao said: still very tender. The instant she tore it off, meat juices mixed with charming seasonings exploded directly in her mouth. Boiling hot grease fell into her mouth, rolling amidst the chewing of teeth together with the meat, then falling into her stomach.
Her icy cold body was awakened by this mouthful of meat. Su Ruixi only felt as if her entire body’s strength was attacking the single lamb chop in front of her.
Tearing and biting like this until the meat on the rib bone was eaten completely clean, Su Ruixi finally paused, sated.
Nothing else to say—Shuang12!
The author has something to say:
Su Ruixi: QAQ Miaomiao! You finally came back!
Sun Miao: ?
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