The clerk who was still pulling her hadn’t even reacted yet before a clump of blood splashed onto her chest, with specks splattering across her face.
Her grip instantly went slack. Losing her support, Deng Yuyuan’s body went limp and she was about to collapse to the floor.
Zhao Erdong hurriedly caught Deng Yuyuan, preventing her from falling. Propping her up, she shouted furiously, "My sister just wants a divorce! Did you really have to beat her until she vomited blood?!"
The onlookers were also startled. What was just a lively spectacle had suddenly turned into a bloody incident.
"She just wants a divorce. Was it necessary to take it this far?"
"Hey, look at that clerk. Hasn’t she been in the newspaper?"
"Huh? She does look a bit familiar... The ’Most Beautiful Matchmaker’!"
A long-haired girl standing nearby, who didn’t know anyone there, couldn’t help chiming in. "I definitely wouldn’t mistake her for anyone else! That article was written by my mom’s second uncle’s cousin’s daughter! It said that every divorcing couple she handled was successfully persuaded to reconcile. Who would have thought she was actually beating them into submission!"
A man dashed out from the crowd. "I’m a doctor. Please move this lady to a chair so I can take a look."
"Yes, yes, hurry! You... you’re her, uh, ex-husband, right? Quick, go help! Don’t just stand there. Even if you can’t be husband and wife anymore, there’s still some lingering affection." The enthusiastic onlookers chimed in all at once, stepping forward to help and separating the clerk from Deng Yuyuan.
The older clerk was terrified and completely at a loss. "I really just wanted to stop her from leaving! I swear I didn’t hit her! Her vomiting blood has nothing to do with me!"
A camera flash went off right on cue. The clerk wasn’t the only one whose face drained of color; the male supervisor went pale as well. Divorce wasn’t some massive scandal, but causing a frail woman to vomit blood just to prevent citizens from getting divorced? That was a massive blunder in their line of work.
No longer relying on his authority as a supervisor to stand idly by on the sidelines, he hurriedly waved his hands to block the camera lens. "Stop taking pictures! Stop! You need to respect the lady’s portrait rights!"
Fang Zhongwen only realized as he got closer that this lady was even more beautiful than she had appeared from afar. She carried a hint of frailty between her brows, yet her eyes were startlingly bright.
It made sense. He figured that a woman who had spoken such words would never allow herself to fall into a state of lethargy just because of a difficult situation.
He was supposed to be on leave today, but he had suddenly received a brief call from his younger cousin. She told him that an incident had occurred at her workplace. Although she wasn’t involved, she was still feeling a bit panicked and hoped he could come over to give her some moral support. She also mentioned that the pitiful yet admirable female educated youth had become her idol. She had used all sorts of flowery language to praise the woman, not caring in the slightest about the phone bill.
Fang Zhongwen hadn’t even managed to get a word in edgewise before she hung up. The entire time, she had spoken so rapidly and softly that it sounded like a mosquito buzzing. However, her adoring attitude was enough to pique Fang Zhongwen’s curiosity, making him willing to sacrifice his time off to go check out the spectacle.
Arriving at the scene just in time to catch this blood-vomiting farce, Fang Zhongwen almost instantly concluded that Deng Yuyuan was the idol his cousin had spoken of.
Aside from her being as beautiful as a celestial fairy, just as his cousin had described, he noticed her gaze. After a brief moment of shock, she had quickly calmed down—she even seemed a bit overjoyed. She showed absolutely no worry or panic about coughing up blood herself.
At first, Fang Zhongwen thought it was a blood packet she had prepared in advance. It was only when he drew closer that he confirmed it was real blood. Her courage was commendable, but treating her own body with such reckless disregard and short-sightedness meant she wasn’t quite as worldly and transcendent as his cousin had claimed.
To successfully dispel the two women’s cautious misgivings and allow him to examine her smoothly, Fang Zhongwen had to give a brief self-introduction. "Hello to you both. My name is Fang Zhongwen. I am an attending physician in the internal medicine department at the First Central Hospital. I obtained my master’s degree in medicine while studying abroad, and I come from a family of medical professionals. My aunt is an obstetrician-gynecologist, my mother is a traditional Chinese medicine practitioner, and my father is a practitioner of Western medicine. They are all very kind. I am currently single, living alone in a small Western-style house purchased by my family, and I used my own savings to buy a four-wheeled car..."
Deng Yuyuan had no choice but to interrupt him. "Doctor Fang, I believe you. Thank you for your help."
The doctor stopped his rambling speech. He examined the coating on her tongue and the whites of her eyes, then checked her pulse. His grave expression eased slightly, though the corners of his mouth remained turned down.
He found it strange. Judging by the dark color of the blood, it looked like the final mouthful coughed up by a terminally ill patient whose life was at its very end. However, the owner’s body was... unexpectedly improving.
The young woman beside her was likely holding her child, which suggested she was a woman who had been sent down to the countryside and hadn’t been out of her postpartum confinement for long. Surprisingly, her body was recovering even better than that of a pampered lady of privilege. It was just a pity that pregnancy and childbirth had severely sapped her vitality. She would need a full year of quiet recuperation.
He lowered his voice for his first sentence, leaning slightly toward Zhao Erdong and Deng Yuyuan. "Her body is just too weak. She simply needs to rest and recover."
For his next sentence, he deliberately raised his voice. "This vomiting of blood was caused by acute emotional distress! Your body is in terrible condition. You must remember not to let yourself get angry again. If your heart can’t take it, you’ll be at risk of sudden death!"
Good heavens, she could even die! The older clerk was filled with genuine regret now. She shouldn’t have chosen to forcefully stop them from getting a divorce just to score a few extra points on her work report.
Offending a powerless peasant woman wasn’t a big deal, but causing a death was absolutely unacceptable. Even though no one had died yet, both reporters and doctors were present. The impact on public opinion wouldn’t be much better than if someone had actually died. In fact, a dead person might have been easier to handle—dead people couldn’t speak, and one could at least try to pay off the family for a settlement. She had used connections to get this job and had been hoping to push for a permanent position this year. Now, all hope for that was gone.
It was all that female educated youth’s fault for not knowing what was good for her. In just a brief encounter, the clerk had already seen that the husband was a good man who would protect his wife and listen to her. Why take out the frustration of mother-in-law issues on the husband?
She was a terrible woman who had been lucky enough to marry a good man, yet she didn’t know how to cherish him. Whose household didn’t have a mix of bitter and sweet? Yet here she was, kicking up a fuss about getting a divorce.
In the year she had worked here, the older clerk had only encountered one couple who truly needed a divorce. The man had been cheating and was domestically abusive, but under her persuasion, the woman had chosen to forgive him, and ultimately, the resentful couple had reconciled into loving partners. In this day and age, how was a beautiful, divorced woman with a child supposed to get by? Sure, she could find many ways to survive, but the simplest and easiest path would always be to stay married.
The older clerk sighed. Making such a life-and-death fuss now—she should have been more careful when they first got together. Most divorced women eventually chose to remarry anyway, and what would happen to her daughter then? A stepfather could never compare to a biological father. Furthermore, a woman who remarried would either have to marry beneath her station or find a man on his second marriage. And what was a twice-married man? He was someone another woman had discarded. Very few could compare to an ex-husband.
"Should we call the police? Or an ambulance?" Cai Jinfang crouched down, asking about the specific situation alongside her cousin. She was the younger clerk. Right now, she was filled with guilt and fear. If only she had been a bit braver earlier, perhaps things wouldn’t have escalated to such an extreme.
The supervisor’s face instantly turned green upon hearing this. He wondered why she had to keep adding to the mess.