My Demon Friends-Chapter 587 - 561: The Poor Little Bee

Baozi: Cousin, it's the second day of the new year.

Zhou Li: Yeah.

Baozi: It's already the second day.

Zhou Li: Time flies so fast.

Baozi: Did you have a good New Year?

Zhou Li: Quite good. Yesterday I went out and bought some new clothes, today I went to see a movie with Brother Nan, and tomorrow we plan to see Li Huanying.

Baozi: [Pitiful]

Zhou Li: What's wrong?

Zhou Li: Isn't the new year joyful?

Zhou Li: [Concerned]

Baozi: Just a little bit short of joyful.

Zhou Li: Which little bit?

Baozi: I don't know.

Baozi: But I always feel like something's missing, something that used to be there.

Zhou Li: Missing Brother Nan's company, I suppose. Don't worry, we'll be back in Chunming in a few days.

Baozi: Oh…

Sitting opposite, Brother Nan tilted her head and cast a puzzled look at him. "What are you doing? Who are you chatting with so happily?"

"Happy? Really?"

"Yes!" Brother Nan said as she took a sip of her milk tea and nodded vigorously. "You think you didn't smile, but you did; it's just not easy to notice. But Brother Nan has keen eyes, you can't fool me."

"I see…"

"You could just laugh out loud."

"Alright."

Zhou Li finally stopped holding back and showed a smile, then generously handed his phone to her.

"That's more like it!" Brother Nan said as she took the phone. "If you're happy, just show it openly. Why hide it… Huh, do you owe your cousin money and haven't paid her back?"

"Well, it's like this…"

Zhou Li briefly explained to her.

No need to go into detail; Brother Nan could grasp the essence herself. After listening, she shook her head. "So greedy, yet so thin-skinned. She keeps dropping stronger hints while telling herself it's different from asking outright. You're so obviously playing dumb, yet she still fools herself into thinking *you're* the one who didn't get her hints. Hopeless."

After she finished speaking, Zhou Li found the situation even more amusing, and his smile brightened.

People's sorrows and joys do not necessarily resonate with each other.

Brother Nan took a deep gulp and finished her milk tea, then said to him, "Tomorrow morning, after we watch Li Huanying, let's go find Miss Zheng. Yan City isn't that fun anyway."

Zhou Li nodded repeatedly.

「The afternoon of the third day of the New Year.」

The rapeseed flowers in the countryside bloomed, with vivid and expansive patches of yellow spread across the ground and the mountains.

Miss Zheng especially liked this kind of scenery.

Brother Nan was very lively. One moment she was standing on a small mound taking photos with her phone, demanding Zhou Li and Huai Xu pose as she directed; the next, she plucked a rapeseed flower, gently savored it, then told Zhou Li it was sweet before picking another for him to taste.

Zhou Li was genuinely afraid that a farmer might suddenly appear and scold them for damaging his crops.

But Brother Nan said that wouldn't happen.

Tuanzi kept up with Brother Nan from start to finish, trotting along friskily and full of energy.

It was evident that these rapeseed flowers had just bloomed; up close, they weren't as spectacular as from afar. The flowers were a tender yellow, seemingly tinged with green, not the dazzling gold of peak bloom, but rather mottled.

They must have bloomed due to the recent warming weather.

Bees had already begun to gather nectar.

Zhou Li couldn't help but feel reflective. When he last visited, there had been frost on the mid-slopes, and the pond had been covered in ice. It hadn't been long, yet now spring had arrived with blooming flowers. A month felt almost as long as half a year.

"Miss Zheng grows rapeseed too, doesn't she?"

"Definitely. It's used for extracting oil and for cooking," Old monster replied. "Stir-frying vegetables with rapeseed oil is especially fragrant."

"That's true."

"Flowers bloom earlier on the mountain than at the base."

"That must be very beautiful."

"TSK TSK…"

"?"

Zhou Li frowned at Old monster but decided to ignore him. Instead, he quickened his pace to catch up with Brother Nan. "Brother Nan, do you know Luo Ping..."

Indeed, the rapeseed flowers on the mountain were much better, forming a golden expanse.

The rapeseed field was just to the lower left of Miss Zheng's courtyard, not far away and visible from the front. But Zhou Li noticed that besides this field, the entire mountain village was also filled with gleaming golden rapeseed flowers, though not as densely packed as in this particular field. They grew in small, scattered clusters, dotted along roadsides or in fields that had become fallow as villagers moved away. Zhou Li looked carefully as he passed by; these rapeseed plants were also somewhat shorter.

Peach, pear, and plum blossoms, originally planted by villagers, were also blooming. They grew beside vine-covered, dilapidated houses or at the turns of mossy paths. Mostly white with a few pink, they adorned the quiet village.

The small mountain village had already entered spring.

Zheng Zhilan's small courtyard was nestled in this world brimming with spring, surrounded by blossoming fruit trees. Smoke curled up from a chimney, and a yellow dog sat perfectly composed in the middle of the path, waiting for them with an air of precision.

"Whoa! They're still using a wood fire!"

"I smell flatbread." Huai Xu sniffed the air, his figure suddenly disappearing. "I'll go ahead."

"No loyalty! Let's hurry too!"

"What's the rush…"

"I'm starving!"

"Oh."

Miss Zheng was indeed making flatbread—or more precisely, Qinghe was making them, while Miss Zheng was responsible for portioning out the dough for him, directing, and inspecting.

Quite a few flatbreads were already made, piled in a stainless steel basin that was about a third full.

Huai Xu grabbed one with each hand, eating eagerly.

Seeing Zhou Li and Brother Nan walk in, Miss Zheng smiled and said softly, "I heard you came without having lunch, so I made some flatbreads. The ones in the basin are ready; the ones on top are hot, so take from the bottom. That bowl next to it has honey for dipping."

Flatbread dipped in honey—a novel combination.

Zhou Li usually dipped them in white sugar.

He pulled out two from the bottom, felt that they weren't hot, then handed one to Brother Nan before taking a bite himself.

The flatbreads were ordinary, but each was cooked very thin, making the texture much better. The outside was crispy and slightly browned, while the inside was soft. Moreover, Miss Zheng used lard for frying, giving the flatbreads a subtle, comforting aroma of lard—not stunning, but very delicate and pleasant. In fact, Zhou Li found them delicious even without any filling and before he even tried dipping them in honey.

After dipping it in the bowl of honey and taking a bite, Zhou Li blinked.

Perhaps because he rarely ate honey, this was the first time he'd tasted honey where... with just one bite, he could tell what flowers it was made from.

Rapeseed Honey.

The honey carried the fragrance of rapeseed flowers, reminiscent of walking through a rapeseed field, yet it was different. The scent carried on the breeze in a rapeseed field is light and sweet, with a hint of moisture, almost like dew. This honey's fragrance, however, was richer and sweeter.

It smelled even better than the rapeseed field itself.

Rapeseed Honey might not be highly priced compared to other types, but at that moment, Zhou Li found he'd grown fond of its taste. He didn't know if honey was particularly nutritious, but its flavor was undoubtedly far superior to white sugar.

It just didn't quite complement the flatbread; perhaps it would be better suited for bread, rice cakes, or steamed buns.

While eating, Zhou Li watched Qinghe make flatbreads and said, "I saw many scattered rapeseed plants on the mountain; did you plant those too, Miss Zheng?"

"Sort of..."

"They all seem quite short."

"Because the seeds for the field were bought from down the mountain, and they were fertilized. The others are from rapeseeds we collected previously, which Qinghe and I scattered on the mountain. It looks nice when they bloom in spring, and the bees can collect nectar too."

"I see." Zhou Li nodded. "Did Qinghe collect all the honey from the mountain?"

"Yes, he just went yesterday."

"Was there a lot?" 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

"It was alright."

Zheng Zhilan glanced at them surreptitiously. Brother Nan was using a piece of flatbread like a spoon to scoop up honey. Zheng Zhilan then said, "If you like it, you can take some with you when you leave."

It seemed there wasn't much.

That made sense. Harvesting honey must be quite hard for Zheng Zhilan; she wasn't a professional beekeeper, and this was wild honey. She wouldn't feed the bees sugar water to increase production, nor would she transport hives to follow the blooms. Besides, she was kind-hearted; honey was the bees' food, so she would likely only take a little from each hive, leaving plenty for the bees themselves.

Zhou Li could already imagine the Dog Gang from Yin Yang Temple scouring the mountains for hives, and Qinghe sneaking off to collect the honey.

Qinghe was a Demon; the bees couldn't see him.