Liang Feng’s brows shot up, and anger surged through him. He opened his mouth, ready to scold her.
“You’d better keep your mouth shut. Just looking at your face makes me sick.”
Zhong Yi spoke first, as if she had already anticipated his attempt to guilt-trip her. She cut him off before he could get a word out.
Liang Feng’s face instantly turned a deep shade of red. He pushed up his glasses, trying to hide his embarrassment.
And those damn glasses? The original owner of this body had paid for them herself.
The more Zhong Yi thought about it, the more disgusted she felt.
She turned away from him, took out the itemized list she had prepared, and slapped it onto the table.
“This document records in detail everything our family has provided yours over the past eight years, including various goods, food supplies, and money. It also includes compensation for the damage to my personal reputation. The total comes to 1,500 yuan!”
“What? One thousand five hundred yuan?!”
Upon hearing the amount, Liang’s mother’s vision went black. Her legs gave way, and she collapsed straight onto the floor.
Liang Feng did not even bother checking on his mother. He snatched up the bill and examined it so intently that he practically wanted to bury his eyes in the paper.
“Impossible! How could it possibly add up to that much?”
Zhong Yi replied, “If you don’t believe me, we can ask Grandpa Zhou and all the uncles and aunties here to settle this fairly. We’ll go through every single item one by one.”
Liang Feng gritted his teeth in fury. “Stop using Grandpa Zhou to threaten me!”
“Oh? Then we’ll report you to the police for fraud!”
Liang Feng was speechless.
How had he never realized before just how difficult Zhong Yi could be?
The old Zhong Yi had always been gentle and attentive toward him. He only needed to coax her with a few words, and she would believe anything he said, looking at him with those soft, affectionate eyes.
“Pay me back, ask Grandpa Zhou to mediate, or report the matter to the police. Pick one,” Zhong Yi said impatiently.
She had no intention of wasting any more time on Liang Feng. After all, she had already beaten him up.
Liang Feng was about to say something when Zhong Huilan stepped forward.
Zhong Huilan was unlike most women. She stood nearly 1.7 meters tall, had a broad frame, and always wore a stern, serious expression.
When their families had been on good terms, that was one thing. But now that everything had fallen apart, Liang Feng was genuinely afraid that Zhong Huilan might beat him up.
His face had been swollen like a pig’s head just a few days ago, and it had only started to recover today. He certainly could not afford to show up at the hospital with that kind of face again.
“Fine! I’ll pay you back, but I can’t come up with that much money all at once.”
Zhong Yi folded her arms, wearing an expression that said she had expected this all along.
“How much can you pay right now?”
Hearing this, Liang Feng breathed a sigh of relief. He figured he could just placate her for the moment. Once he left the village, perhaps he could find a way to avoid paying the rest.
“One hundred yuan,” he said.
“Too little. At least five hundred.”
Liang Feng nearly ground his teeth to dust.
“Fine! Five hundred it is!”
He was willing to do whatever it took to get out of the village first.
Zhong Yi continued, “Once you give me the money, I’ll write you a receipt. As for the remaining 1,000 yuan, you’ll write me an IOU. I’ll give you half a month to pay it back. If you don’t, I’ll take that IOU straight to your hospital.”
“You!”
How could she be so difficult?!
“Do you have a problem with that? Then let’s get Grandpa Zhou to settle this, or we can report you to the police!”
Liang Feng was speechless again.
He had never suffered such humiliation in his entire life, especially not at the hands of Zhong Yi, the woman who had once been so devoted to him.
As he wrote the IOU, his hand trembled.
He had considered asking his mother to write it on his behalf, but Zhong Yi flatly refused.
After signing his name, Liang Feng slammed the pen onto the table.
“Zhong Yi! Are you satisfied now?”
Zhong Yi picked up the IOU and checked every single character, making sure there were no problems before folding it and slipping it into her pocket.
“To be honest, I’m not that satisfied. I’d be much happier if you could pay me the entire 1,500 yuan at once. After all, I don’t want to see your disgusting face ever again. But there’s nothing I can do about it when you’re so poor.”
In the past, she had held back such words because she wanted to keep Liang Feng happy and avoid hurting his pride.
But now? Zhong Yi’s motto was simple: as long as she felt good, that was all that mattered.
Liang Feng was so furious that his entire body trembled. He could hardly find the words to describe how angry he was.
Yet Zhong Yi merely spread her hands and demanded the five hundred yuan.
“You—you—Mom, give her the money!”
Liang Feng wanted to stand his ground for once, but when he and his mother searched every pocket they had, along with the family’s savings, they could only scrape together 300 yuan.
That was after Liang Feng had just received his salary and the family had sold some of the wheat they had recently harvested.
Looking at the scattered bills in his hands, Liang Feng’s eyes turned red with anger.
“Here! Take it! Are you satisfied now?”
After all these years of shared history, she had actually forced him to humiliate himself like this!
Zhong Yi accepted the money without the slightest hesitation.
“You’re still two hundred yuan short!”
“You—!”
“Make sure you understand something,” Zhong Yi said coldly. “We’re only asking you to pay back the money you owe us. We haven’t even tried to ruin your career. That alone shows how generous we’re being. After all, everyone knows that without our family’s support over the years, you wouldn’t have been able to study away from home in peace, much less graduate from medical university and comfortably work as a doctor at the county hospital!”
Deep down, Liang Feng knew that everything she said was true.
But did she really have to say it out loud like that?
“Fine! You’re still owed two hundred yuan. I’ll find a way to get it and pay you back before tonight!”
“Good. You’d better keep your word.”
Zhong Yi did not care where he got the money. Her point remained the same: without her family supporting him all these years, Liang Feng would never have realized just how difficult it was to earn money.
Zhong Yi and her mother, Zhong Huilan, had already left.
The Liang family was left in a deathly silence.
Liang’s mother sat collapsed on the floor, staring blankly into space. It had taken them so long to save up some money, and now it was all gone. How were they supposed to survive from now on?
“Mom, what valuables do we still have at home? Chickens, ducks, geese—sell them all. I’ll also visit a few of my uncles and borrow some money.”
After saying this, Liang Feng hurried out, leaving his mother sitting on the floor, silently shedding tears.
That evening, Liang Feng appeared at the entrance to the Zhong family’s home. His face was dark, his expression so ugly that it was hard to look at him.
He had gone to several of his uncles to borrow money, only to be met with one excuse after another. Some complained that they were struggling financially; others said they were barely getting by themselves. They talked endlessly about their hardships, but not a single one was willing to hand over any money.
Eventually, Liang Feng promised to repay the loans with interest. He also assured them that everyone would fall ill sooner or later, and whenever they needed treatment at the county hospital, he would make things easier for them.
Only then did his uncles finally agree to lend him a meager 100 yuan.
As for the remaining hundred, he had sold nearly everything in the house that was worth anything. Only then had he managed to scrape together the full 200 yuan.
Zhong Yi accepted the money and wrote Liang Feng a receipt.
His eyebrows twitched with rage, but he could do nothing except turn around and leave.
Of course, he did not return home this time. Instead, he headed straight for the county town.
However, none of that had anything to do with Zhong Yi anymore.
She tucked the money into her pocket and thought for a moment before deciding to return it to Zhong Huilan.
“Mom, this money belongs to you. Here, take it back.”
“Since you managed to get it back, you should keep it. You helped make so much tofu over the years, and I never even paid you for your work.”
Besides, her daughter had recovered the money through her own efforts. How could Zhong Huilan possibly take it for herself?
If money was being handed to her, there was no reason to refuse it!
Zhong Yi happily accepted the money.
When she turned around, she happened to catch Zhong Shu staring at it with undisguised envy.
“Mom, you gave Zhong Yi so much money. What about me?”