Ancient Eden

In the evening, Li Mang brought her a packet of fruits wrapped in large leaves, several of which she had never seen before, and which looked very tempting. All of them had been washed.

It was like this for several days in a row.

Once, he even brought her a fresh honeycomb full of honey.

When he did these, it looked like he was doing it secretly. He only brought over these things after it was dark and threw them in front of her. Mu Qing guessed he was probably afraid of being seen by his people. Of course, most of these were eaten by Youyou and her siblings the next day.

He probably could see that she was angry, so these actions could be interpreted as him trying to please her. At night however, when they slept, he still had to pull her to his side. The only difference was that his hands touched her with a lighter touch, and he often took care to watch the expression on her face.

Chapter 33

(11.2)

It seemed unrealistic to expect him not to touch her, and these few nights, he did make her feel better than the first nights. The only thing that made her feel equally at a loss was that he kept sniffing her down there at least every day or two days.

At first, she was confused by his behavior, but slowly she got the impression that he was waiting for something. As to what it was, she still couldn’t understand.

In fact, this thought just flashed in her mind, and after a few more times of it happening, she started to care less about him doing that, because he always just sniffed her and stopped, never proceeding to the next step with her. This made her feel a little comforted, but when she looked in her heart, sometimes she understood that the comfort she felt was actually just her deceiving herself.

During these past few days, she gradually learned more about the lifestyle of the people living in this settlement. According to her observation, the basic way of life in this group was probably one man and one woman getting together to form a relatively stable family, to make and raise children.

But there were also exceptions, she noticed that there was only one woman in some huts, but two men came in and out in the morning and in the evening. Mu Qing guessed that perhaps because there were relatively fewer women, this kind of family was allowed on the premise of individual consent.

Staying by Youyou and her mother’s side, she could now understand the basic meaning of some simple words, such as eating and drinking, good or bad. She also learned that Youyou mother’s name was Na Duo.

The food she ate every day had a bland taste, salt here was probably a very rare resource. But the people in this settlement did not seem to have signs of swelling on their body, and very quickly she understood the reason why. They did not waste any drop of the blood flowing in the veins of the preys they hunted, every day they gathered the preys and let their blood flow into a container, before cooking it and sharing it with everyone. She also got a share a few times, and she tasted the flavor of salt.

Mu Qing tried to borrow a needle and thread from Na Duo with a few words and gestures. But later, when she saw that the needle was thicker than the holes on her buttons, she gave up on the idea of sewing the buttons back on her shirt. She just used a needle and twine to attach and secure the two sides of her shirt, leaving only the collar open, making it alike a pullover, so that it would be convenient to put on and take off. This made her feel a lot more relaxed, at least she didn’t have to keep redoing a knot that kept untying itself depending on her movements, often leaving her with her shirt wide open.

Li Mang seemed to find these actions of hers ridiculous, especially the little thing she hung above the door curtain where the wind came in. That was her underwear that she hung after washing to dry on a clothes-hanger that she had made using branches. He did not seem to understand the reason why she liked to wear this thing, tirelessly washing it and drying it, drying it and washing it over again.

Sometimes, when he was in a good mood, he would go tug at it and fiddle with it, and several times he even went as far as to smell it. Mu Qing saw it but did not make a fuss about it, she just pretended not to see it.

But very quickly, Mu Qing thought of a rather troublesome problem. Women monthly period.

What made her think about this issue was that she saw a woman in the settlement having her period. She didn’t know whether the woman had stuffed anything down there, for that place was covered, but she saw a large streak of crimson blood flowing down her inner thigh, and then that woman used tree bark to wipe it clean, as if nothing was the matter, leaving a long red faint smear.

Mu Qing was a little startled, or rather, to be more precise, she was shocked. Then she noticed that another woman was in the same condition. Finally, one day when she walked by the ditch in the settlement, which was dug up for drainage, she happened to see a woman pulling out a narrow band from her lower body that looked like it was made of knitted reed. There was a pile of hay-like stuff on top of the band.

This scene made Mu Qing unable to forget about it.