Chapter - 1 {Ju Liang's typical day}

Ju Liang begins his day as any, dressing himself and tying his hair with a thin rope, next he begins to cook congee for the children, ten Wooden bowls set up on a small but mighty wooden table somehow big enough for ten little ones–– if you asked anyone else, they'd tell you Ju Liang definitely needed a new table, but he's as stubborn as a mule.

Once he's set everything up, Ju Liang next prepares a small treat for each, for each one of the bowls, the children get two steamed buns. Each bun is almost the exact same to ensure no arguments.

Ju Liang then goes to wake up the children, the bamboo hut is small with only four windows, it's rectangle shaped yet somehow he fits himself and ten children, the villagers wonder how he does it.

The children have a small area sectioned off with a thick red curtain in a corner of the hut, with bamboo mats laid out in a way that ensured they would have space to play in between, each with personalized little blankets.

It's around when the sunrises, The children all slowly awake and wander out of their lIttle area, dressed in tunics and lose pants or robes for sleeping. Ju Liang smiles gently as he watches their faces light up.

One of the children, a little girl with two buns, exclaims happily, "Congee for breakfast!!", the other children all run over to the table, little hands snatching the bowls and buns like sharks with meat.

Eventually, after a minute once they all had their Congee, they realized there were no spoons!-- oh dear. Ju Liang realises he's forgotten to put the spoons out and quickly dashes to find the crate he usually leaves the wooden spoons in after washing them off.

Lu Jiang returns with an armful of spoons, before he can even realize it, his arms are empty once more. Ju Liang let's out a sigh, watching the children all scoff down their congee and then their buns, it's fruitless at this point to even try to remind them to slow down their eating.

He watches as they all go and put their spoons and empty dirty bowls into a different crate, it's deemed as the "washing crate"–– in other words, Ju Liang takes the crate out in the evening to the near river and washes them while the children sleep, these kids are quite lazy sometimes, one would even consider them brats––but in reality thankfully they are not.

The children begin to excitedly crowd Ju Liang, their little voices clambering all asking the same question:" What are we doing today!!" after a moment, Ju Liang answers, "We're going to a creek today, go get dressed quickly and maybe we can have candied Hawthorn when we get back" Ju Liang replies, his voice gentle and a hint of playfulness, The children quickly run off to do as told.

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