Chapter 68: Wu De's New Assignment (Part 2)

"I think you'd be better off sticking with bioengineering—that would help the crossing enterprise far more."

"If you don't like my smoked fish, just say so." Hu Yicheng's face fell. "Fine. I just finished dissecting a rabbit anyway..."

"Rabbit?!" Wu De perked up instantly. Now that was the good stuff.

"Caught it yesterday." Hu Yicheng grinned like a fox who'd found the henhouse. "I'm planning to roast it for lunch."

Wu De's heart sank as he realized that by noon he'd be standing watch at the construction site—no chance of tasting that roast rabbit.

"But I could save you a front leg..."

Wu De was about to thank him when an old saying surfaced in his mind: When someone offers favors for nothing, they're either a thief or a swindler. He barely knew this Xiao Hu—why the sudden generosity?

Sure enough, Hu Yicheng immediately revealed his true intentions: "Yesterday, um, I saw you making that seafood rice. Could I maybe... join your mess?"

"Sure, but bring your own rice." Wu De agreed readily enough—seafood rice only got better with larger portions.

"That would be wonderful—I could learn from you too." Hu Yicheng gestured toward the back kitchen. "Group Leader Wu Nanhai just got back. They caught over ten baskets of fish this morning and he's trying to figure out how to process them all."

"Process? I should take a look—don't want it ruined like last time." This timespace really was blessed with abundant resources.

"I'll take you." Hu Yicheng clearly admired Wu De's culinary skills, and the prospect of having him supervise the cooking had put a spring in his step.

Out back, a canvas shed had been erected on tree-trunk posts. The moment Wu De stepped inside, the steamy heat hit him like a wall. A row of large pots sat over roaring fires while workers chopped wood and hauled water in a ceaseless rhythm of activity—and he noticed several women among the crew. Wu De silently congratulated himself on his foresight in putting on underwear that morning. Otherwise he'd have been quite the exhibitionist.

Inside the makeshift kitchen, a man sat hunched over a laptop. Xiao Hu called out to him: "Nanhai, someone's here to help with the fish!"

Wu Nanhai looked up from his screen. "Ah De? You're a fisherman—why haven't I seen you on the boats lately?" He looked Wu De up and down with an amused expression. "A few days away and you've gone completely native."

"Been on guard duty. Used to be a sailor; now I'm a marine." Wu De glanced at himself: stripped down to essentials, lean and wiry, his already dark skin now deeply tanned, barefoot and bare-chested in nothing but shorts. He certainly looked the part of a primitive.

"Nanhai, aren't you in the Agriculture Group? Shouldn't you be building vegetable greenhouses and raising chickens and pigs—not playing head cook?"

"Xiao Zishan's brilliant idea." Wu Nanhai's voice dripped with resignation. "That kid wanted to dump the cafeteria headache on someone else, so he argued that agriculture naturally encompasses food issues, which made me the 'obvious choice' for Cafeteria Office Director." He sighed heavily. "What I actually want is to care for the rabbits and chickens. The chickens haven't adjusted—or something spooked them—they haven't laid a single egg since coming ashore. No idea when they'll recover. And the pigs aren't doing well either—refusing to eat—it's worrying..." The tender concern he showed for the pigs, cattle, sheep, chickens, and ducks made Wu De shudder.

"Still, the Cafeteria Office has quite a few ladies. Lucky you..."

"Lucky? They're all someone else's wives." Wu Nanhai showed zero interest. "Besides, I'm not into modern women. If I'm going to raise one, I'll start from a loli. Speaking of which, shouldn't the Committee be sending someone to Guangzhou soon to buy lolis?"

They were deep in discussion of critical matters—at precisely what age lolis reached maturity, and whether to raise them as tsundere, kuudere, natural airhead, or glasses girl—when a heavyset man stormed in, fury radiating from every pore. Wu Nanhai's face went pale; he tried to bury his head deeper into the laptop, but the man yanked him upright.

"Where is my 'Blue Lightning'?"

Wu Nanhai's voice came out miserable: "Well... please accept my condolences... we buried it. You know how hot the weather's been..."

The newcomer's expression froze. Tears welled in his eyes. He turned and walked out without another word—leaving everyone stunned in his wake.

"Who was that?..."

"That's Nikecha, just back from Australia," Wu Nanhai explained. "He brought two racehorses and some carrier pigeons."

The two retired racehorses, "Alanchi" and "Blue Lightning," had both been registered with an Australian racing association, though they were getting on in years. Nikecha had hoped to use his expertise to form a cavalry someday. But harsh reality had crushed those dreams the moment they arrived. Horses are sensitive creatures, and the chaos following their landing had thoroughly spooked Blue Lightning. Despite the restraining frames, the horse had stubbornly kept smashing its head against the wooden beam. Only after all personnel and supplies were unloaded were the horses and livestock hoisted ashore—by which time the damage was done. The camp had no proper stables or horse hay. The nascent base could barely pipe in drinking water for humans; the daily supply of clean warm water that horses required was simply impossible to provide.

"He personally went to the Committee," Wu Nanhai continued, "repeatedly explaining how precious the horses were. He demanded 'at least five human portions' of beans and wheat daily."

"And?"

"Need you ask? Where would the ship find soybeans, black beans, or barley? I only have seeds. We brought grain, but to save space, it's all rice."

"So they refused him?"

"More precisely, they politely declined—because that bastard Xiao Zishan kicked the ball to me again!" Wu Nanhai's indignation boiled over. "He insisted I have the most love for animals. I'm interested in obtaining animal products—that's not the same as love! Now anything involving live creatures gets dumped on the Agriculture Group."

As if to prove his point, barking erupted from behind a bamboo fence—rising and falling in a canine chorus, soon joined by horse neighs, cattle lowing, pig grunts, and the frantic clucking and quacking of chickens and ducks. A cat with a bow tie around its neck wound itself around Wu Nanhai's leg.

"That's Yang Baogui's dog. He brought five of them—says they're future military and police dogs..."

"What happened to the horse?" Wu De couldn't let go of the racehorse's fate.

"Embarrassingly, Nikecha personally delivered the horse and pigeons to me, asking me to care for these 'voiceless friends.'" Wu Nanhai grabbed a small fish from a basket and tossed it to the cat. "I never learned horse husbandry—didn't know what I was doing. The horse refused to eat anything—"

Hu Yicheng nodded in confirmation. "That horse was impossible to please. Wouldn't touch the grass we cut for it. Just fasted."

"Right, and it seemed agitated too," Wu Nanhai added. Nikecha had tried everything but couldn't calm the animal. Days without eating, combined with the relentless heat and swarms of flies and mosquitoes—the horse had collapsed yesterday.

"Last night I called Yang Baogui—he's a vet. He took one look and said it was hopeless. Then it died. I didn't dare tell Old Ni..."

"That's a real shame—racehorses have excellent bloodlines."

"Actually, nothing to mourn," Hu Yicheng said dismissively. "They were both geldings. What use are eighteen- or nineteen-year-old geldings?"

"I agree—no great loss." Wu Nanhai was equally unmoved. "Racehorses can't do farm work—can't pull carts or plow fields. Draft horses are what we actually need."

"Anyway, what about the fish?"

"All in those baskets." Wu Nanhai frowned at the pile. "I have no idea what to do with them—it's been boiled fish every single day..."

"Tomorrow there'll be—"

"Shh! What are you babbling about?" Wu Nanhai shot a meaningful look toward the women working in the shed and dropped his voice to a whisper. "You want to be drowned in spit? I'm warning you—if this leaks, I know nothing."

"Fine, fine."

"What about the rabbit meat?"

"Hey, first help me figure out what to do with this mountain of fish." Wu Nanhai dragged him over to the baskets—dripping wet, reeking of brine and the sea. The smell felt strangely familiar to Wu De.

The baskets held fish of every variety, large and small—even a small shark lurked among them. That thing had far too much ammonia; it would need special processing before anyone could stomach it.

"For true seafood appreciation, boiling is best—it preserves the original flavor," Wu De explained. "But for daily protein supplementation, plain boiling is too bland. My approach isn't fancy—just seafood rice or grilling."

"Grilled fish? We don't have any spices..."

"You can do without spices. And seafood rice is even simpler." He checked his watch—nearly ten o'clock. His shift started at noon; he had time to eat and demonstrate. "I'll show you."

"What's the maximum the field-kitchen rice pot can handle?"

"About one hundred portions at 200 grams per person."

"Fine, I'll make one batch first—then you can continue from there."

Wu Nanhai, delighted to have found a volunteer, quickly assembled the Cafeteria Office staff.

Wu De directed everyone to clean the catch and sort it by size and species. Red-meat fish went in one pile, white-meat fish in another; oily specimens were separated from lean ones; everything graded by size.

"Sea fish come in countless varieties, and we use them differently," he explained. "Once the catch is ashore, sort it promptly—makes processing much easier."

He then led a group to the riverside to gather wild vegetables. The night before, he'd discovered an abundance growing nearby: plantain, bitter greens, wild onion, and wild perilla. He picked two generous bundles, washed them clean in the river, tied them with grass, and brought everything back to the kitchen.

The stove was fed great quantities of firewood. With someone working the bellows, flames roared to life. Water boiled; rice went in. While the rice cooked, Wu De led by example in processing the fish.

Fish heads, tails, and guts went into a separate pile; bodies were chopped into bite-sized pieces. Shellfish were pried open for their meat. Seaweed and wild vegetables alike were roughly chopped. A few stirs later, the rice had expanded into a thick porridge. In went the fish meat, shellfish, and seaweed all at once. Using a large ladle, Wu De stirred rice and fish together, covered the pot for several minutes, then added the wild vegetables and wild onion, covered it for one more minute, sprinkled in some salt—and a pot of seafood rice was ready.

The fish offal and worthless small fry could be fermented into fish sauce. The Cafeteria Office lacked cement tanks, but they'd salvaged some large ceramic vats from the Patrol Inspector's kitchen. Wu De instructed them in the art of making fish sauce.

Theoretically, any fish could produce fish sauce, but typically only small, worthless fry were used. Processing byproducts like fish offal worked just as well. Add roughly one-third the fish's weight in salt, mix thoroughly, cover with bamboo-mat lids, press down with heavy stones—and the work was done. Fermentation proceeded best at 30°C or higher, so Wu De had them place the vats outdoors to take advantage of the tropical heat.

"It takes a full year to mature," he told them. "But the flavor is absolutely exquisite..."

He also taught them the techniques for salting and drying fish. Before long, the kitchen reeked with an overwhelming fish-stench, and flies swarmed in thick clouds. Everyone bore it as best they could. Finally, one girl couldn't take it anymore and fled outside to vomit—today's seafood rice would not be gracing her palate.

(End of Chapter)