“Wahhh, boo-hoo, Daddy! Jinjin’s bowl is gone! Boo-hoo-hoo!”
In the next moment, Jinjin burst into loud wails.
Jin Yao stared at the ground full of shattered pieces, momentarily stunned. Hearing Jinjin cry, he quickly hurried over, picked her up, and comforted her.
“Don’t cry, Jinjin. Now that it’s broken, we don’t want it anymore. Let’s go home, and Daddy will buy you another one like it later!”
Hearing her father’s words, Jinjin cried even more sorrowfully.
This bowl looked very similar to the ancestral bowl she had broken before she transmigrated. Perhaps it was connected to her transmigrating here in the first place. Now that the bowl was shattered, did it mean she could never return to that world again, never see her mom and dad again?
Thinking of this, Jinjin cried even harder, leaning against Jin Yao’s shoulder and sobbing out of breath.
“Boo-hoo, Liuliu, Little White, my bowl was broken by that bad woman!”
Jinjin called out to Liuliu and Little White in her heart, but neither responded to her, making her weep with even deeper sorrow.
Jin Yao looked back at the old man and the old woman, who were also staring blankly at the field of shattered pieces.
Casting a heavy glance at the two of them, he said in a cold voice, “I will come back tonight!”
With that, he carried Jinjin and strode away.
As for the bleeding back of the old woman’s head, he acted as if he hadn’t seen it. When he came over tonight, he was determined to get to the bottom of his parentage.
Since he was not their son, then who were his birth parents?
Seeing Jin Yao approaching, the crowd of onlookers gathered at the main gate quickly parted to make a path.
Carrying Jinjin with a very dark expression, Jin Yao left the Jin family home and walked briskly all the way back up the mountain to the west.
When the onlookers at the entrance saw Jin Yao leave, they dispersed as well, but along the way, they whispered and discussed in twos and threes. Judging by the words of old man Jin, the old woman, and Mrs. Xu, it was very likely that Jin Yao was not of their blood.
Before long, this news spread throughout the village.
Jinjin cried all the way up the mountain slope. Once the father and daughter reached the top, they saw Liu Dujuan waiting for them anxiously at the intersection.
Seeing that Jinjin’s eyes were swollen from crying, Liu Dujuan hurriedly took her into her arms, asking what had happened.
Jinjin sobbed in hiccups, “Mommy, boo-hoo, Jinjin’s bowl… boo-hoo… was broken by the bad eldest aunt!”
Hearing this, Liu Dujuan grew frantic instantly and looked at Jin Yao in a hurry, “What happened? How could she break it? That’s a divine bowl!”
However, Liu Dujuan noticed that Jin Yao turned his head toward the direction of the village, staring in a daze.
She hastily tugged on his arm and asked anxiously, “Husband, what on earth happened? I’m worried to death! How could she go and break the bowl?!”
With a gloomy face, Jin Yao patted Jinjin’s head and said, “Jinjin, go over there and play with Little White for a bit. Daddy needs to talk to your mother.”
“Boo-hoo… hic… okay!”
Jinjin let out a hiccuping reply, slid down from Liu Dujuan’s arms to the ground, and turned toward the bushes. Seeing Little White looking at her with concern, she led it to the grass on the side, crouching beside an anthill while continuing to sob.
Because there were too many people at the Jin family gate earlier, Little White had not dared to reveal itself. Climbing up a tree by the wall, it had witnessed everything in the courtyard.
However, its powers were sealed, and it could only break the seal at moments of life and death. To save Jinjin earlier, it had already broken through the seal once, leaving it extremely weak now. That tiny bit of strength had not been enough to save the bowl in time.
From the moment it first met Jinjin, she had been hugging that bowl in her arms. Now that it was shattered and Jinjin was crying so sorrowfully, it wished it could fetch another bowl for her right away.
“Boo-hoo, Little White, my bowl is gone!” Jinjin’s tears fell pit-a-pat beside the anthill as she spoke softly to Little White.
Little White slithered onto her arm, coiling around her wrist to comfort her.
*Don’t be sad, Jinjin. That was just an ordinary porcelain bowl. When you feel better, I’ll take you to find treasures! I’ll bring you lots and lots of treasures in the future, okay?*
Little White rubbed its snake head against the back of Jinjin’s hand to soothe her.
Grieving, Jinjin shook her head, “Little White, it’s not the same! That bowl was very important to me!”
Jinjin knew very well that her ability to beg for food had nothing to do with that bowl, nor was it a divine bowl. But it might have been her family’s ancestral bowl. She had transmigrated here, gaining the system and Liuliu, precisely because she had broken her ancestral bowl in that other world.
Liuliu had said it was the Divine Dragon Bowl. Although this bowl did not have that divine dragon on it, she firmly believed that it definitely had some connection to her family’s ancestral bowl.
Now that the bowl was shattered and Liuliu had disappeared as well, she could never go back.
The more Jinjin thought about it, the more miserable she felt. Yet she couldn’t share these thoughts with her parents—Liuliu had told her that his existence could not be revealed to anyone.
As for Little White, it was just a snake, so she couldn’t explain these things to it clearly, nor would it understand.
Boo-hoo, she felt so sad!
“Little White, that bad woman is too mean! Jinjin curses her to bump into a wall and knock out her front teeth while walking, choke on water while drinking, gag on food while eating, and fall into a manure pit and choke to death on the stench!”
Jinjin wiped her tears with her sleeve angrily while spitting curses at Mrs. Xu.
Little White could hear what Jinjin was thinking, so it knew about Jinjin’s transmigration, Liuliu’s existence, and how important that bowl was to her.
However, it held a different view. It felt that the bowl was likely not the ancestral bowl from Jinjin’s family, but as for what was truly going on, they could only wait for Liuliu to appear and give Jinjin an explanation.
Since Jinjin was saying in her heart that this matter could not be made known to others and had no intention of telling it about her origins, it decided to pretend not to know for now.
*Jinjin, we haven’t brought back the red fruits we knocked down yet, nor have we gathered those medicinal herbs. Shall we go pick them up now?*
Little White felt it should use another matter to divert Jinjin’s attention.
Jinjin looked over at her parents sitting on the large stone talking, rubbed her belly, and shook her head.
“Once Daddy and Mommy finish talking, I’ll ask them what we’re eating for lunch. Jinjin feels a bit hungry. If there’s no food at home, I’ll take Daddy and Mommy along to pick more so everyone can eat.”
Little White nodded, thinking to itself that she was truly a sensible child. To be bound to such a little master was a blessing in its own right.
Beside the large stone, Jin Yao stood in a daze for a moment before telling Liu Dujuan about the situation at the Jin house and his speculations.
After listening, Liu Dujuan widened her eyes in disbelief and said furiously, “So it’s actually true?! I used to suspect before whether you might not be their biological son.”
“Their attitudes toward the eldest and second branches were far too different. If you were their birth son, even if they disliked you, you would still be their child. Look at how they’ve treated our family all these years!”
“I just didn’t dare say it out loud, fearing you’d be upset and think I was trying to drive a wedge between you and your parents.”
In one breath, Liu Dujuan poured out all the feelings she had suppressed in her heart over the years.
Liu Dujuan recalled carefully their treatment from the time their marriage was arranged to when they got married—Mrs. Wang and old man Jin had treated them as if merely completing a task, making do with whatever they could. One only had to look at the difference in furnishings between their room and the eldest brother’s room to see how biased they were.
“Mainly, does no one in the village know about this? Have you really not heard a single whisper all these years?” Liu Dujuan asked Jin Yao softly.