Her Cultivation Diary

Chapter 39: 39. Being stung once_1

Qiaoqiao’s desire to touch a bee remained unfulfilled. He squatted there, staring longingly:

“Why can’t I?”

The Beekeeper was familiar with Song Sancheng and already knew of Qiaoqiao’s situation, and he placated him like one would a child:

“Because right now, you’re not familiar with them. If you reach out, the bees will think you are going to hit them, and they’ll sting you.”

After securing the beehive closed again, he cautioned, “You mustn’t touch them carelessly, okay? A bee sting can be very painful for you, but the bee will die once it stings someone. These little creatures are pitiable too.”

“Besides,” he extended his own hand for everyone to see, which was covered in calluses, with swollen joints: “My skin is thick and tough. I’ve become used to it.”

Qiaoqiao looked at his hands, then held out his own palm—Wu Lan liked cleanliness, and had always kept him neat and tidy since he was little. Now his hand was still fine and fair, with well-defined bones.

If it hadn’t been for the slight ruggedness from doing farm work recently, it might still look like the hand of a pampered young master.

He let out a long, dejected sigh and turned his head to look elsewhere.

Meanwhile, Song Sancheng and Song Tan had inspected each beehive and inquired about the prices—after all, 560 yuan per hive was the final offer!

Sancheng hesitated, “Will there be any flowers after the milk vetch season is over? If there aren’t as many flowers later, we won’t need as many beehives.”

Song Tan, however, considered: They had come all this way, and the beehives weren’t expensive. If worst came to worst, she could use Spiritual Energy to nurture them! Honey is a valuable thing, after all!

So she counted on her fingers, “We have the milk vetch for the next two months, then the chestnut trees will bloom. Our village also has plenty of powdered peach and white pear trees for them to feed on. After June and July, when it gets hot and the bees need a little rest, there are vegetables in the garden, and I’m planning to plant a field of sunflowers…”

After accounting for all that, it seemed feasible to sustain the beehives.

Listening to all this, Sancheng felt overwhelmed—his daughter just had to talk, and he, as the father, had to run his legs off!

Between planting chestnut trees and sunflowers, there would be no end to this year’s farm work!

“Alright, alright, you make the call!”

Song Tan decisively said, “We’ll take five hives!”

The Beekeeper smiled—this deal would bring in a neat sum of three thousand yuan.

Still, he issued a reminder, “Beekeeping is simple, just set the hives properly. But if there’s any issue, don’t mess around—call me, and I’ll come over to check.”

No sooner had they finished the transaction than a sudden wail was heard!

“Ow…”

There was Qiaoqiao, his formerly fair face streaked with tears and mucus, running out of the woods, crying his eyes out.

He held one hand in a loose fist, with the base of his palm red, swollen, and shiny, clearly stung by a bee.

Song Tan couldn’t help but laugh and cry at the same time, “Didn’t I tell you not to touch the bees?”

Qiaoqiao felt wronged and cried even louder:

“I found one so fat and chunky…”

“This one’s robust, can work hard, a queen bee…”

Clearly, he remembered the handful of bees the Beekeeper had shown them earlier.

The Beekeeper was shocked, “That’s impossible, how could a queen bee leave the hive…”

As he murmured to himself, he leaned in to take a closer look.

Qiaoqiao cautiously opened his swollen fist with his other hand—

In his palm lay a round, plump bee as big as a thumbnail, carefully perched there. It was fluffy with yellow and black stripes and indeed looked large, round, and chubby.

It was actually kind of cute.

…

The Beekeeper couldn’t help but burst out laughing, “Oh boy, this is nothing serious! This is a bumblebee; it has a good temper just like our honey bees. As long as you don’t grab it, it normally won’t sting, and a little touch now and then is okay.”

Qiaoqiao half-understood, stretching out his red, shiny hand.

The beekeeper laughed again, “Of course, it’s bound to hurt a bit, but I have some medicine here to apply to it in a moment—this must be a newly emerged queen bee; she’s big.”

“Ordinary bumblebees are just a little bit smaller than this one.”

Song Tan was quite interested as well.

She flicked a wisp of Spiritual Energy with her fingertip, and while the queen bee was initially trying to fly away, it now stumbled and bumbled until it clung to her finger.

Song Sancheng was startled, “Oh!”

Song Tan quickly reassured, “Baba, it’s alright! Look, it didn’t sting me—how adorable!”

The fuzzy, plump little creature crawled back and forth on her finger; it really was quite cute.

Qiaoqiao watched, completely engrossed, having forgotten the pain of the sting from before.

The beekeeper brought out some medicine from the house and, while applying it to Qiaoqiao, looked at the bumblebee again and instructed,

“You all play with it for a while but let it go afterward; the queen bee needs to lay and hatch her eggs.”

Song Tan thought for a moment, “Can this one be raised? Does it produce a lot of honey?”

The beekeeper laughed, “Raise, of course, it can be raised. This one queen bee can birth over a hundred. They are even more hardworking and diligent than honeybees!”

“There’s just one thing, they earn a lot, but they eat a lot too. If you want to raise them, you won’t be able to get even a little bit of honey from their mouths all year round—not enough to feed them!”

“If they go an hour without pollen and nectar, they’ll just collapse like they fainted. Just like us with low blood sugar; if they can’t eat in time, they’ll just die.”

Hearing this, even Song Sancheng’s eyes gleamed with threads of mirth:

“These aren’t bumblebees; they’re just like piglets, aren’t they?”

But Qiaoqiao had already heard this conversation.

Although he didn’t fully understand, it didn’t stop him from looking over with pitiful, blinking eyes,

“Sister, I want to raise…”

He looked at the bumblebee crawling on Song Tan’s finger, very cute. Now, with the pain of the sting forgotten, he reached out his hand again.

However, the smell of the medicinal oil on his hand was too strong, and with a “buzz,” the bumblebee took off flying.

After circling around a couple of times, still reluctant to leave that bit of Spiritual Energy, it returned and latched on again.

The beekeeper laughed—

“If you want to raise it, then raise it. When the time comes, find a small box, prepare some sugar water for it, and leave the rest be.”

“Once the queen bee emerges, it has to lay eggs. It will secrete beeswax in the box and slowly form a little pot. All of her eggs will be in that little pot.”

“Then she’ll just sit on it, constantly vibrating and shaking until the temperature rises, and the worker bees will hatch. It’s quite interesting to raise.”

But he added one more thing, “But it truly won’t make money, they eat too much.”

“And they’re not as reliable as honeybees; they might just fly away at some point.”

Song Tan moved her finger, watching the bumblebee cling steadfastly to it, now smiling with full confidence,

“Does it still hurt? Qiaoqiao.”

Qiaoqiao looked at the bumblebee, then at his palm, and sniffled, “It hurts.”

“Will you grab things recklessly again?”

Qiaoqiao sobbed a little, tears falling again out of feeling wronged.

Song Sancheng’s heart melted watching him, and he quickly soothed, “Next time won’t do that, won’t do it next time.”

Song Tan chuckled and then asked the beekeeper for a small wooden box, into which she placed the bumblebee. Then she handed the box to Qiaoqiao:

“Hold it carefully, don’t open it to look, or you might scare it, and it’ll run away.”