Chapter 232: Stewed Meat
When he woke up again, he could only see a square patch of sky.
The yellowing sky was framed by the eaves, which were lined with broken tiles and overgrown weeds. The weeds grew wildly, their aerial roots leaking down from the top like tiny waterfalls.
By the look of the sky, it was already dusk. Ying Jueran frowned, supported himself with his hands, and struggled to sit up.
He was lying in the courtyard. Two of the three rows of houses surrounding it were so dilapidated that their doors and windows were rotten, and only the one directly opposite looked habitable—and indeed, it was occupied.
He saw a fire lit inside the room. The room originally had a stove, but half of it had collapsed. Thus, the fire was not lit in the stove, but on the ground. A wooden frame stood over the fire, from which a small earthenware pot, blackened on the bottom and chipped at the rim, was suspended.
The pot seemed to hold water, and it was already boiling. It made a bubbling sound.
But it took Ying Jueran a moment longer to realize he was smelling a fragrant aroma coming from the pot. That smell was already mouth-watering, not to mention he was ravenously hungry right now. He spent a moment forcing his gaze away from the pot to look at the two people sitting behind the fire, in the shadows.
One was an old Taoist. His hair and beard hadn't been groomed for a long time, and they were tangled into clumps. He wore a blue Taoist robe, held a long spoon carved from a piece of wood, and was peering into the pot. He seemed worried that the bottom might burn.
The other one...