This chapter opens with a soliloquy in which the protagonist explains that only the lower classes can stay in such a place. He tells the young master that he has come to see how preparations are being made for supper. The congee smells good, and he tells the others to bring it back to the master immediately. He also tells the sheng woman that he is the eldest son of the family and that what he wants must become his. She tells him that she dares to hit him, but he is not a child. The protagonist then goes on to explain that he must go to the "mass grave" on the fifteenth of August to reunite with his family.