When the two of them arrived home, they happened to catch Zhong Shu mounting his bicycle, ready to head out.
“Xiao Yi, you’re back!” Zhong Shu called out when he saw his younger sister. He then added, “I’m in a hurry to go work at Xiuxiu’s house, so I’ll be leaving first. Mom, I took the can of malted milk powder from the house. I’m bringing it over for Xiuxiu’s parents.”
Zhong Shu was twenty-four years old, and Xiuxiu was the woman he was currently courting.
Even without Ji Mingxuan in the picture, the Ji family’s circumstances were still quite good. Zhong Shu was tall and burly, and he shouldn’t have had much trouble finding a wife. Yet, despite several matchmakers introducing him to potential partners, he hadn’t taken a liking to a single one.
Instead, he had fallen for Miao Xiuxiu from the neighboring village.
Miao Xiuxiu wasn’t particularly beautiful, though she could be considered pretty enough. She was the eldest daughter in her family, with six younger sisters already beneath her. Now, her mother, who was over forty years old, had become pregnant again and was determined to give birth to a son.
Needless to say, much of the burden of supporting the family fell on Miao Xiuxiu’s shoulders.
Her family claimed they couldn’t bear to see their eldest daughter marry and leave home, yet in the next breath, they demanded five hundred yuan in bride price.
Zhong Huilan wasn’t satisfied with this choice of daughter-in-law and hadn’t yet agreed to the marriage.
Unfortunately, her son was so smitten that he kept going to the Miao family’s house every few days to ingratiate himself with them.
Watching her son behave so foolishly, Zhong Huilan grew furious. She ordered him to leave the malted milk powder behind because she had bought it for her youngest daughter, who was attending high school in the county town.
But Zhong Shu refused. He pushed down on his bicycle pedals and sped away.
Zhong Yi watched the scene unfold.
Remembering the plot of the original novel, she recalled that when the original owner’s pregnancy was discovered, the Miao family would immediately seize the opportunity to make trouble. They would accuse Zhong Huilan of failing to raise her daughter properly and claim that a girl becoming pregnant before marriage was a disgrace.
They would also criticize the Zhong family’s morals and come up with all sorts of excuses to raise the bride price to one thousand yuan.
Already overwhelmed by the situation, Zhong Huilan would also be pressured by her son. With no other choice, she would eventually hand over the money.
After Miao Xiuxiu married into the family, she would constantly find fault with and look down on Zhong Yi, her younger sister-in-law. Not wanting to make things difficult for Zhong Huilan, the original owner would eventually move into a dilapidated house and live on her own.
Of course, all of that belonged to the future.
Now that Zhong Yi was here, she absolutely would not allow herself to end up on the same miserable path as the original owner.
The two returned to the house, and Zhong Yi immediately poured herself a glass of water.
She had actually been thirsty for a long time. Saying that her throat felt as though it were on fire would hardly have been an exaggeration. Although there had been plenty of water in the river earlier, she simply couldn’t bring herself to drink it.
Now, she went into the kitchen, scooped up a large ladle of water, and gulped down more than half of it in one go.
As the water soothed her parched throat, she felt as though she had come back to life. She finally felt comfortable again.
It was time to discuss the important matter.
By the time Zhong Yi came out of the kitchen, Zhong Huilan was already pushing her tricycle, preparing to go out and sell tofu.
After the government had loosened restrictions on private business, Zhong Huilan had secured a tofu-selling stall in town. However, Ji Mingxuan and Lin Fengxian had deliberately decided to make things difficult for her by setting up their own stall nearby.
Zhong Huilan had a straightforward temperament. After enduring so many hardships in life, she rarely smiled, and her expression often looked stern. People who didn’t know her might even think she looked intimidating.
Lin Fengxian, on the other hand, smiled at everyone she met. Gradually, customers began buying tofu from their stall instead. Zhong Huilan’s business continued to decline, and when she could barely sell her tofu anymore, she had no choice but to go from street to street selling it herself. Naturally, this made her work even harder.
“Mom, I have something to tell you.”
Zhong Yi felt that this matter was urgent, so she stopped Zhong Huilan.
Zhong Huilan’s expression remained stern. “I’m in a hurry to sell tofu. Whatever it is, wait until I get back.”
“I’m afraid it can’t wait.”
Zhong Yi insisted on stopping her. She knew Zhong Huilan was a good mother, and she had no intention of keeping this matter a secret from everyone.
At the very least, she wouldn’t hide it from Zhong Huilan.
Seeing the serious expression on her daughter’s face, Zhong Huilan hesitated. Although she was in a hurry, she eventually relented.
This daughter had always been sensible and rarely caused her any trouble. If she was being this insistent, something important must have happened.
Zhong Yi knew she had judged correctly. Although Zhong Huilan could be rigid in her ways, she was kind at heart.
The mother and daughter sat down, and Zhong Yi recounted everything that had happened the previous night.
Zhong Huilan listened in silence, her expression growing more and more solemn. Finally, she slammed her palm onto the table and abruptly stood up before heading straight for the kitchen.
Even though Zhong Yi had anticipated this reaction, she still failed to stop her in time.
When she hurried after her mother, she found Zhong Huilan holding a kitchen knife aloft. She genuinely looked as though she intended to chop Liang Feng to pieces.
Zhong Yi panicked. She quickly wrapped her arms around her mother’s waist and used every ounce of her strength to hold her back.
“Mom! Mom, listen to me! Don’t act impulsively. I’ve been wronged, and we can’t just swallow this humiliation without doing anything. But you have to calm down! If you kill Liang Feng, what will happen to the rest of our family?”
At those words, Zhong Huilan’s entire body trembled.
Looking at her eldest daughter clinging tightly to her, she thought of her youngest daughter, who was still studying in the city, as well as Zhong Shu, Zhong Qiang, and the others.
Gradually, she calmed down.
“All right. Mom will listen to you. I won’t do anything rash.”
“Mm.”
Fortunately, it had all been a false alarm.
Zhong Yi quickly took the kitchen knife from her mother and put it away in the cupboard. If there had been a lock nearby, she would even have locked it up.
She was genuinely afraid that Zhong Huilan might lose control and chop Liang Feng to death. Taking on a murder charge for a scumbag like him simply wasn’t worth it!
The mother and daughter returned to the main room and sat down.
“Xiao Yi, what… what are you planning to do from now on?”
For a young woman, something like this could feel as though the entire sky had collapsed.
Now that Zhong Huilan had calmed down, she looked at her daughter with eyes full of heartache.
Zhong Yi replied, “Zhou Shu said he would take responsibility for me, but I haven’t decided what to do yet. He was innocent in this matter, too. Liang Feng only wanted to get rid of me, so he deliberately set him up. At worst, I could simply remain unmarried for the rest of my life and stay by your side, Mom.”
Zhong Huilan had never actually met Zhou Shu, the outstanding grandson of the Zhou family.
Although many villagers had gone to help when Grandpa Zhou held his birthday banquet, she usually made a point of keeping her distance from such occasions.
After all, both her parents were gone, and she was divorced from her husband. Whenever another family held a wedding or celebration, she would avoid attending because she worried that people might consider her presence unlucky.
Still, she wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with Zhou Shu. She had heard people talk about him and knew he was an excellent young man who had achieved quite a lot in the military.
The Zhou family was also fairly well-off. His father was reportedly a government official, while his mother was a vice principal at a school.
For someone like them, marrying into such a family would be a considerable step up.
For a moment, Zhong Huilan wasn’t sure what to think.
Her daughter had suffered such a terrible injustice, but Zhou Shu was genuinely an innocent party in all of this.
“Mom…”
In Zhong Yi’s opinion, what happened with Zhou Shu wasn’t the most important issue. Even if the plot unfolded as it had in the original novel and she really did become pregnant later, she wouldn’t consider it the end of the world.
She was confident that she could support herself and raise a child. If she ended up having a pair of adorable twins, raising them herself didn’t sound so bad, either.
But there was one thing she absolutely couldn’t tolerate.
“The Liang family has benefited from our help for so many years. Even now, if Liang Feng had come to our house honestly and apologized, telling us that he didn’t like me and had fallen for someone else, I would have respected him for being straightforward. As long as he returned the money we’ve given his family over the years and sincerely apologized, I would have considered him a man of principle. We could have parted ways amicably.”
Zhong Yi’s expression turned cold.
“But instead, he resorted to such despicable tricks. I absolutely cannot let that slide!”
Zhong Huilan was equally furious, her chest heaving violently.
All that money had been earned through her own backbreaking labor selling tofu. She had gone out of her way to help the Liang family, never asking for anything in return beyond one thing: that they treat her daughter well.
Who could have imagined that…
“Xiao Yi, do you already have a plan?”
Zhong Yi nodded, a fierce glint appearing in her eyes.
“Of course. If someone has wronged us, we’ll make them pay. If someone has a grudge against us, we’ll settle the score!”