（1）
“Alright, alright, everyone gather in this open space at the forest farm. Don’t keep looking around—you’ll have plenty of time to see everything later. Come on, hurry over~!” Ye Wen stood on an A-frame ladder and shouted at the students who had just walked into the lumberyard guesthouse.
“Don’t wander off! If you keep wandering, I’ll get angry! Hurry up—Lei Laohu on the far edge, come over here. And Zhou Chao… Zhou Zhao! Stop squeezing together with the girls!”
An Jing gently grabbed Zhu Ying’s wrist, but the latter was still curiously looking around in every direction.
“Don’t wander off. Teacher Wen told us to gather.”
“This lumberyard is huge.”
“Well, it’s a lumberyard, so of course it’s big…”
“But has it really been renovated? It still looks like a lumberyard. Xiao Jing, look—there are still a ton of logs piled over there!”
“Maybe they wanted to keep the original style? It can’t be that it wasn’t renovated, otherwise that wooden cabin wouldn’t be so new.”
“But there are ivy vines on it.”
“Those things grow fast. If someone planted them on purpose, they’d grow even faster.” An Jing paused and couldn’t help but exclaim, “This wooden cabin is really huge. It feels like a three-story school building. Xiao Ying, do you think it’s really made entirely of wood?”
“Maybe they just put wooden boards on the outside or something?”
“Yeah, that’s possible. Otherwise, how much timber would they need…”
“Ahem! Everyone quiet down!” Ye Wen adjusted her position on the A-frame ladder and slowly sat down on the top, while Qiu Yi below held the ladder tightly, looking both worried and helpless.
“Be careful.”
“Don’t worry, don’t worry.” Ye Wen lowered her voice to reply, then cleared her throat and raised it again. “Since we’re out to have fun, it can’t just be about eating and drinking. That would be no different from traveling anywhere else. So—today’s lunch will be made by all of you yourselves. Eat whenever you finish making it. You can form groups of three, five, or even ten people. If someone can organize it, you can all work together and make a big pot of food. Anyway, no matter what, today I’m only providing the ingredients and seasonings. When you finish making lunch, that’s when you can eat. Do your best!”
“Oh!!!” The boys inexplicably got excited—probably because the idea of free play was fascinating.
But the girls began to worry.
“Won’t the boys just cause trouble…”
“Maybe it’s better not to split into small groups?”
“Xiao Que, let’s be in a group together?”
“Huh? I’m… not really good at cooking…”
“It’s okay, just help with the prep work. Being in a group with boys is the real trouble!”
“Should we find a few more girls to join?”
“Yeah, if we divide the work, we can finish quickly!”
On the boys’ side, they were likewise enthusiastically forming their own teams.
“A Qiang, do you know how to cook?”
“No shit. Who doesn’t know how to cook?”
“Is it any good?”
“It’s okay.”
“Bro, let’s be in a group!”
“You mother…” Fang Qiang pressed his hand on Sun Wei’s head and laughed in annoyance. “You’re treating me like a tool, aren’t you?”
“No way, man. I’ll help you out!”
“Can’t you do it yourself?”
“Little master me is here to have fun. I’m too lazy to cook.”
“Then what help are you offering?”
“I’ll start the fire for you?”
“Damn, I don’t want a teammate like that!”
“Screw you! Are we brothers or not?”
“I think we should do a big pot of food. It’s easier to make and actually requires less work overall.” Fang Qiang rubbed his chin and looked toward Lei Laohu on the other side of the group. Lei Laohu happened to look back with the same idea—their eyes both lit up at that moment.
“Fang Qiang, let’s organize it!”
“I agree—we should do it together!”
“Damn, that many people will be too chaotic.” Sun Wei wasn’t too happy.
Sitting on the A-frame ladder like a lifeguard at a swimming pool, Ye Wen suddenly cupped her hands around her mouth like a megaphone and shouted, “Oh, by the way—you’ll be using earthen stoves—and—you have to chop your own firewood—!”
“Huh? We have to chop our own firewood?”
The girls’ side became even noisier.
“Who knows how to chop firewood?”
“I don’t…”
“That axe is really heavy, isn’t it?”
“Maybe we can pick up some small dry branches to use?”
“Should we ask the boys to help?”
“But if we team up with boys, it’ll be a mess!”
“I can chop firewood. As long as you master the technique, it’s not that hard.” Zhang Qiqi stepped forward.
The girls immediately acted as if they had found a savior, and many clamored to be in her group.
An Jing’s eyelids drooped. “Xiao Ying, let’s do it ourselves… That row over there is all stoves—there’s definitely enough for everyone.”
“Sure~!” Zhu Ying cheerfully rolled up her sleeves and flexed her nonexistent arm muscles. “How about I chop the firewood?”
“Huh? Do you know how?”
“But I’m stronger than Xiao Jing, right?”
“Ha—?”
“Hmph, I’ve already tried a few times. Xiao Jing is no match for me when it comes to strength~”
“What’s that supposed to mean? Let’s arm wrestle!”
“Let’s do it after we eat. Right now, Xiao Jing is definitely no match for me!”
“Tch! I’ll chop the firewood. You don’t know the technique. I’ve done it back in the village. You don’t need a lot of strength, but you have to master the way you exert force.” An Jing made a chopping motion with both hands gripping an axe handle. “Technique, you know? Technique!”
“Then I’ll do the cooking?”
“Uh… well…”
“What’s with that look?! You don’t trust my cooking skills or something?”
“No, no—absolutely not!”
“Playing dumb!”
（2）
On the boys’ side, Fang Qiang and Lei Laohu organized everyone uniformly. All twelve gathered together and began rapidly assigning tasks.
“A Wei, you’ve got good knife skills—you handle the cutting and prep. Wang Zai, you and Lao Diao wash the vegetables. Hei Pang, you move the tables and chairs, and later after the meal, washing dishes and cleaning up.” “A Qiang, you chop the firewood?” Lei Laohu interrupted Fang Qiang.
“Yeah, I’ll do that.”
“Okay, then I’ll be responsible for carrying water. You assign someone to tend the fire.”
“Tending the fire, let’s have…” Fang Qiang scratched his head and pointed at a boy who looked as thin as a pole. “Gun Zi, you do the fire.”
“Sure.”
“Then let’s get to work. First go to the bus and see what ingredients we have. We’ll pick what we can make.”
“Wait, who’s doing the cooking?”
“Hmm… A Wei, how about you?”
“Damn, I’ve got too much work.”
“Well, I can handle cutting vegetables.” A chubby, pale-looking boy raised his hand.
“Fine, Bai Pang, you cut the vegetables.”
The boys had already started bustling, while the girls were still making detailed plans.
Zhang Qiqi took out paper and pen and began a very thorough work schedule.
“There are twelve girls here. We’ll divide into four groups of three. Zhou Zhao, Yuan Lanque, and I are the Stove Group. We’re responsible for stir-frying, cutting vegetables, and chopping firewood/tending the fire.” Zhang Qiqi’s handwriting looked slender and generous. Zhou Zhao leaned in to take a look, then turned back to Yuan Lanque standing beside her.
This ordinary girl with a few freckles on her face was the class Hygiene Committee member—usually the type who couldn’t really control anyone, and often needed Zhang Qiqi’s help with tasks.
Zhou Zhao, having become a girl, naturally belonged to the girls’ group. And because of that, after excluding An Jing and Zhu Ying, both the boys’ and girls’ big groups happened to have twelve people each…
“Next is the Logistics Group. This group is responsible for washing and prepping the ingredients. For example, if we want to make stir-fried chives with eggs, they wash the chives, put them on a plate with the eggs, and set them on the stove. That way our Stove Group’s work will be faster.”
“Then there’s the Cleaning Group. After the meal, cleaning up and washing dishes are this group’s responsibility.”
“Then what does Group 4 do? It seems like all the work is already assigned…” a girl asked quietly.
“Group 4 is the Odd Jobs Group. Wherever it’s busy, they’ll go help. Besides that, they’re also responsible for moving tables and chairs out of the house, as well as tasks like carrying water, taking out the trash, picking up other items—things like that.”
Zhou Zhao added with a faint smile, “If anyone has any opinions, it’s best to speak up now, so we don’t run into arguments later.”
“That’s right. There will definitely be easier and harder tasks. Absolute fairness is impossible. For example, our Stove Group is especially busy, so I’m taking it myself—” Zhang Qiqi squinted slightly, scanning each girl’s face. “Alright, if there are no problems, I’ll start the assignment. The Logistics Group will be…”
（3）
Compared to the tense, busy atmosphere of the two big groups, An Jing and Zhu Ying’s corner was much more relaxed.
After all, there were only the two of them, so they didn’t have to think about too many things—trying to take care of everyone and keep things fair was a huge hassle. The double-decker bus was now like a mobile market, with a few boys and girls picking out ingredients there.
“Grab more beef!”
“Hey, what do you boys mean by taking all the beef?”
“Isn’t there another box?”
“But you took six boxes!”
“We boys can eat meat. Didn’t we leave you most of the vegetables?”
“Boys are so unreasonable.”
“Exactly. Can vegetables compare to meat?”
“Isn’t it good for you to lose some weight? Haha—” Sun Wei, acting as the chef, naturally had to come see what ingredients to pick. He laughed slyly, making everyone even more annoyed.
Unlike the boys’ side, the girls’ menu had been proposed and decided upon collectively, so they had to stick to the plan as much as possible. They couldn’t just grab whatever the person cooking was good at or liked, like the boys did.
“Xiao Ying, is there anything special you want to eat?”
“Xiao Jing?”
“Be serious!”
“Pfft, doesn’t matter.” Zhu Ying sat on a distant log, gently swinging her legs. “We’ll grab whatever’s left after they’re done picking.”
“Won’t it all be taken?”
“Then we’ll ask Teacher Wen for more. She said there’s plenty anyway.”
“True… Let’s chop the firewood first.”
“Xiao Jing, give a demo?”
“Okay, but you need to stand behind me, or the splinters will hit you.”
“Okay~”
“In the dream world, did I ever chop firewood?”
“No. There are many types of fuel there. Even if we burned wood, we only needed a few dry twigs.”
“I see… Here, look. You hold the axe with both hands like this to keep it steady. I don’t know the theory, but it’s from experience…”
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