I Transmigrated Into A Fantasy World To Farm And Build Houses!-Chapter 217: To Like or Not to Like?

"Actually... Max and I aren’t like what everyone thinks... so I can’t accept them." Eric hesitated.

Before he finished speaking, his ears were so red they looked like they were about to bleed.

Aunt Luci paled in surprise: "What?"

She had seen how these two kids interacted with her own eyes. Now Eric said it wasn’t what she thought; could it be her son still hadn’t conquered him?

No, that’s not right. She remembered Eric liked Max very much. Could it be that stinky brat rejected him again?

Truly ungrateful!

Luci clenched her fist, wishing she could find Max right now and give him a sound beating.

"Eric dear, don’t be sad. That brat Max, wait until he gets back, I won’t let him off!"

Aunt Luci was fuming with anger but still forced a smile to comfort Eric.

Eric looked blankly at Aunt Luci’s fierce expression, not understanding what she was imagining. Afraid of saying something wrong and implicating Max, he hurriedly explained:

"It’s not that, it has nothing to do with Max. It’s because I’ve thought things through myself. Before, I was young and immature, always causing trouble for everyone."

"Are you sure Max didn’t say something harsh again?" Aunt Luci looked at Eric suspiciously.

Eric shook his head vigorously.

Truly strange. Luci couldn’t figure it out; if Max wasn’t like before, why did Eric return the items?

She thought for a moment, then carefully asked:

"Eric dear, what do you mean by ’thought things through’? Do you not want to pair with my Max anymore? Could it be... really like what Anna said, you and Michael..."

"No, no, it has nothing to do with Michael!" Eric was startled, hurriedly waving his hands to explain.

Good heavens, he was truly helpless. Why did everyone have to matchmake him? He was really just a minor here; could it be the original host "matured" too early?

Luci clearly breathed a sigh of relief. Not liking Michael was good; otherwise, she really wouldn’t accept it, not knowing how long Anna would gloat in front of her.

Thinking of Max’s recent behavior, Luci still wondered.

Lately, finding Max meant finding Eric first. With such a situation, could they not be what they thought?

Luci had never seen Max so close to anyone. Even Sam and Michael, who were so close to him, were clearly just friends, only Eric was different.

Before, Max indeed didn’t like Eric, even avoiding him. But later his attitude changed. Luci had reason to suspect that in Max’s heart, a mother like her was losing her place...

"Then why on earth? Do you not like Max anymore?" Luci could only think of this reason.

Eric froze, unable to answer.

The words "don’t like" seemed impossible to say. It was just that every time his heart fluttered, he tried to suppress his feelings. The ending in the original story always reminded him, but...

Seeing his troubled expression, Luci didn’t have the heart to ask further. She decided to question Max thoroughly when he returned, then let Eric go, not forgetting to stuff some dried fruits into his hand to snack on.

Even after returning home, Eric was still a bit distracted. Seeing Evan meditating, he remembered him saying the bag of magic cores was carefully selected, and his heart became even more confused.

Sigh, asking someone single for thirty years to think about relationship problems was truly headache-inducing.

Eric rested his chin on his hand.

Actually, the original story had changed a lot. Him being constantly obsessed with the plot of the original story, was it unfair to those around him?

He faced this question for the first time.

Thinking for half a day without a solution, Eric decided to temporarily spare his brain, standing up to find something to do.

The white rabbit caught in the trap was a bit healthier.

Plus, the tribe had been grinding grain lately, and the bran wasn’t thrown away, so Eric fed it some.

Every day when he cooked, potato peels and outer leaves of old cabbages also went into the white rabbit’s stomach. Just like that, this rabbit would recover completely before long.

The traps they dug now occasionally caught prey. Unfortunately, the trap Sam dug was too deep; rabbits falling in only had a dead end. His rabbit survived luckily because it fell on top of its kin.

The traps dug by Eric and the children couldn’t catch rabbits; catching a few wild ducks was already remarkable.

Originally, he intended to wait until farming officially started to catch rabbits to raise.

But unexpectedly, the Ox-Head tribe gave so much food; even the bran was enough to raise many rabbits. Throwing it away would be wasteful, so Eric planned to catch a few live ones in a few days.

Max had used thorns from the thorn pig and steel wire begged from the Dwarves to make a small bone cage. Raising one rabbit was spacious, but catching more wouldn’t fit; he would have to make a bigger one.

There was a lot of food buried in the snow in the yard, so Eric put the rabbit cage outside. Rabbits ate a lot and pooped a lot; he didn’t want the food contaminated.

The Marble bird egg seemed about to hatch these past few days. Eric put it in the warehouse; occasionally he could hear a clucking sound.

Passing by the warehouse, he tapped on the eggshell again. Sure enough, a tapping sound came from inside in response.

Eric smiled, went into the cellar, took out black beans to prepare making bean sprouts.

In his previous life, he mainly ate bean sprouts made from mung beans and soybeans. Now mung beans weren’t plentiful, so he couldn’t bear to use them for sprouts. Soybeans had to be kept for seeds and making tofu. Therefore, black beans became the top choice.

Previously, his grandfather often used a large earthenware jar to incubate bean sprouts. Homemade bean sprouts always tasted better than store-bought ones. He only vaguely remembered the steps, knowing that incubating sprouts required absolute darkness.

Thinking for a while, Eric stacked two layers of linen and cotton cloth; the light-blocking capability was barely enough. Animal skin blocked light well but was airtight, so it couldn’t be used to incubate sprouts.

Black beans were washed clean, scalded with boiling water to stimulate germination, then soaked in cold water until the beans swelled to double their size. At this point, he drained all the water, covered them tightly with cloth to let the black beans slowly germinate.

During this time, water needed to be changed frequently; otherwise, the beans would easily rot. The temperature in the warehouse wasn’t as high as the bedroom, and black beans were large, so germination would probably be a bit harder.

Eric estimated it would take about a week to eat. If it were the small beans like in his previous life, placed in a warm place, there would be sprouts to eat in just three or four days.

Since he was making bean sprouts, Eric conveniently took some cabbages and pickled a few jars of mustard greens.

Growing up with his grandparents, he knew more chores than friends of the same age.

Like pickling mustard greens, many people always felt it was very complicated, but Eric found it extremely simple.

Cabbages were washed clean, left to wilt slightly, then arranged neatly in a ceramic jar. For every layer of cabbage, sprinkle a layer of salt, adding no water.

After filling the jar, Eric found a clean, heavy rock to press on top, and it was done.

After about one or two days, the cabbage would release water under the effect of salt. At that time, just add cooled boiled water to submerge the cabbage surface, then cover the jar tightly; it would be edible in ten to twenty days.

Thinking of the mild sour, crispy taste of pickled mustard greens, Eric couldn’t help feeling nostalgic. He pickled several large ceramic jars in the warehouse at once. Although more than half of winter had passed, making it now meant there would soon be delicious food to eat.