Ruling the Historical Romance Novel as the Female Supporting Character-Chapter 194: How Could Such Delicious Mushrooms Be Poisonous!

"One pound of pork belly costs one yuan fifty, and a foot of fabric is two yuan eighty. I’ve taken four feet of fabric, and the remaining change is eighty-four cents. I’ll also give you half a pound of pork belly, Auntie. Does that sound okay to you?" Su Yijia made sure to calculate the change accurately, not wanting to take a bit of advantage.

The woman happily nodded repeatedly, "Alright! Young lady, this is perfect!"

Four feet of fabric would be just enough to make a garment. The last time they had meat was during the New Year’s, which was already half a year ago. For their family, having two slices of meat was already a rare treat.

"Do you have something to carry these in?" the woman looked at Su Yijia and the man who had been silent by her side all along. Although they held two small hemp bags, they were clearly too small to carry thirty pounds of chicken mushrooms.

"Auntie, could you lend me that cloth sack? I’ll exchange something with you for it," Since Su Yijia didn’t prepare many cloth bags, she was afraid they wouldn’t be enough.

But the woman immediately declined, "No! This is our only sack, and it’s as valuable as fabric here."

Su Yijia was taken aback, quickly realizing what the woman meant. She suddenly felt a mix of bitterness and sourness, a feeling she couldn’t quite place.

Outside the world depicted in books, she had once visited Xiang City as a tourist. At that time, Xiang City was considered a paradise by many. It was filled with beautiful fireworks, lively water-splashing festivals, an abundance of fruits, delicious food, and unique clothing—a scene of thriving prosperity. But now, the poverty here was beyond her imagination.

As she held clean and neatly folded new cloth to make cloth bags for packing items, there were others so destitute that they were using hemp bags to clothe themselves.

"Then I’ll just use my bags, and if there’s not enough, I can store it in the basket," Su Yijia suggested with a forced smile, trying not to make the other person uncomfortable. Thankfully, the cloth bags her grandmother had prepared only appeared to be small when held in her hand. When opened, they were large enough to contain all thirty pounds of chicken mushrooms.

After packing everything, she handed over the exchanged items to the woman. Yu Yuchen immediately took the full cloth bag from her hands. Su Yijia took another, larger empty cloth bag from him.

Seeing her use cloth for exchange, other women nearby immediately crowded around. "Comrade, do you want some other mushrooms? I have bolete mushrooms," one offered. "I have porcini mushrooms!" exclaimed another.

They jostled fiercely, fearing that someone might snatch away the cloth before them. Su Yijia felt sandwiched in the midst of it all, almost like a sandwich cookie, and quickly spoke up, "I’d like to buy bolete mushrooms."

These mushrooms held high nutritional value and were perfect for making chicken soup or steamed eggs. Three women offering bolete mushrooms immediately squeezed towards her. They then uncovered the cloth covering their baskets, inviting Su Yijia to examine their goods.

In reality, the freshly picked mushrooms were not significantly different from each other. Moreover, these items could be dried, something Su Yijia didn’t mind having more of.

"How do you plan to exchange?" Su Yijia asked.

"We’ll also exchange for cloth!" the three women hurriedly declared.

"Alright, tell me you’re the ratio," Su Yijia readily agreed. After all, they had brought plenty of clothes, and the fabric coupons given by Qin Kaize and Uncle Xia were far more than they needed.

Both Qin Kaize and Uncle Xia used to rely on their units for clothing. The fabric coupons they held had been sitting unused for at least seven to eight years. In this area, the supply and marketing cooperatives did have fabric, but the locals lacked fabric coupons and money.

The three women looked at each other, uncertain.

"Altogether, the three of us only have ten pounds of bolete mushrooms. How much fabric can we exchange for that?" one of the women asked.

"The other lady just exchanged thirty pounds of chicken mushrooms for four feet of fabric. If you combine your total of ten pounds, that would only get you a foot of fabric. With such a small amount divided among three people, it’s not enough to make anything. Perhaps you’d prefer to exchange for something else. It’s four cents per kilogram; you can decide what you want," Su Yijia calculated the price of the chicken mushrooms and gave an accurate figure. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

She didn’t differentiate between the prices of different mushrooms, unlike in later times. During this era, mushrooms were exchanged privately among locals with little significant price variation.

"I have two pounds. If it’s eight cents, I’d like to exchange for half a kilogram of pork belly," one woman stated without hesitation. The other two promptly followed suit and exchanged for pork belly as well.

Su Yijia accepted a large amount of mushrooms in exchange, using eggs and brown sugar for the smaller quantities. Some requested two feet or one foot of fabric to make clothes for their children.

After being jostled for over half an hour, Su Yijia managed to exchange everything she could. Carrying a small bamboo basket, she happily headed towards Qin Kaize. Suddenly, someone bolted out from a corner, startling her heart into skipping a beat. Fortunately, she sidestepped; otherwise, with her current strength, she might have seriously hurt the person.

"What are you doing?" Su Yijia, holding her chest, slightly annoyed, looked at the person.

The woman looked a bit embarrassed and smiled, "Comrade, I’m sorry. I saw you were leaving and got a bit anxious. I still have some mushrooms and wanted to exchange them for some eggs."

Although each family could now raise chickens, due to limitations in the number of chickens allowed and a large number of children, they never had enough to eat.

"Okay, show me," Su Yijia replied after noticing the wrinkles on the woman’s weathered face.

The woman hastily lifted the cloth covering the basket. "These porcini mushrooms of mine are really good; see how thick and plump they are."

Um... they indeed looked like porcini mushrooms, but these were actually a type with thin flesh inside. Though they appeared similar, the entirely red stem was a sign these were not suitable for consumption.

"Auntie, you can’t eat these mushrooms; they are poisonous," Su Yijia said, feeling quite troubled.

The woman, upon hearing Su Yijia’s refusal, became anxious. "How can they be poisonous? These mushrooms are definitely not toxic. Maybe you didn’t cook them properly before? You have to fry them well."

"I cooked them thoroughly, but these mushrooms are poisonous," Su Yijia insisted, not only fearful for herself but also worried the woman might take them home to eat.

"That’s because you didn’t put enough garlic when you cooked them," the woman firmly asserted.

Seeing Su Yijia attempting to explain further, she immediately pointed at Su Yijia. "I get it. The mushrooms you ate last time must have been crawled over by an old rattlesnake. The mushrooms I have grow under pine trees and definitely weren’t crawled over."

Old rattlesnake: Really, how was that my fault?

Su Yijia couldn’t help but smile wryly as she licked her slightly dry lips. However, she knew that no matter what she said, it wouldn’t make any difference. Not only in the present time but even fifty years later, when Yun Province locals encountered problems from eating mushrooms, it would always be attributed to some supernatural or coincidental reasons, but never the fault of the mushrooms themselves.

How could such delicious mushrooms ever be poisonous?