“Stop pretending! Get up! Don’t play dead!”
Xie Li raised her hand and pointed at Pei Shuchen:
“Look at the bourgeois lifestyle you’re living! Drinking coffee! Listening to Western music! Purely the filthy habits of the bourgeoisie!”
She turned to face the already enraged crowd:
“Down with the capitalist spoiled brat!”
She jumped around and caused a ruckus with such energy that Pei Shuchen nearly bit his teeth to pieces. He yelled in despair:
“You’re a fucking”
Slap, slap, slap…
The second half of his sentence was drowned out by the crowd’s angry shouts and the sound of slaps.
People surged forward.
Old shoes and stinky socks flew everywhere!
Pei Jianmin and Qi Yuehua, seeing the scene, shivered and huddled to the side, barely daring to breathe.
For the moment, they set aside their personal grudges and prayed together:
“If you hit my son, you can’t hit me too, right?!”
Pei Shuchen was beaten badly and was finally dragged away.
Xie Li tore off her headscarf, stared at Pei Shuchen’s retreating figure, and calmly muttered two words:
“Serves him right!”
After this public humiliation parade, the capitalists in Shanghai became even more fearful and dared not make a single move, staying quietly at home and waiting for an opportunity.
The Xie family, meanwhile, fell into chaos.
When Xie Li returned home, she ran into Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao, who were dragging a pale-faced Xie Silin around, asking questions:
“Silin, is the bracelet still not ready? Didn’t they say forty-nine days? But now it’s sixty-four days!”
Xie Silin barely had the strength to speak.
She was anxious too!
Every day she had been feeding the jade bracelet with her own blood, and she was now severely anemic but the bracelet hadn’t responded at all.
She shook her head.
Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao immediately scowled.
Silently, Xie Silin gritted her teeth. These two old bastards weren’t even her real parents. Her face was pale enough to match the snow in Beidahuang, yet all they cared about was that jade bracelet!
When Xie Li walked in, Xie Qingsong noticed her and immediately picked a fight for no reason:
“Xie Li! At a time like this, you still have the mood to go out playing? Things are urgent!!”
Xie Li smirked your eyebrows are on fire, not mine.
Suddenly, Xie Silin seemed to remember something, and her voice shot up three octaves:
“Xie Li! Did you get a marriage proposal?!”
According to the original text, at this point, Xie Li should have received the marriage report from the Shen family and would soon be going to Liaoning Province with the military!
Xie Li lowered her gaze.
In the original story, the protagonist was schemed against by Xie Silin and Pei Shuchen on her way to join the military; the ship sank, and she died.
She was just a step away from living a peaceful life.
Xie Li pressed her lips together.
Now that she had dealt with the Pei family, only the Xie family remained.
Thinking of this, Xie Li reluctantly nodded and sighed:
“Yes! I was just thinking about how to tell the family. It must have been grandpa acting on his own to arrange the marriage. The marriage report arrived a few days ago. Mom, Dad, I’ll go with the army it will also ease your burdens. With the situation outside so tense, it would be even harder if you brought me along. One less person is one less burden. Mom, Dad, you take Silin and go!”
As she spoke, Xie Li wiped her tears.
Xie Silin was stunned. At a time like this, joining the army should be good it could avoid this reckoning but why was she crying?!
“Mom, Dad, I pawned that gold bracelet and got some money to investigate information for our family. You need to run now. I heard our family is first on the purge list we’re definitely being targeted. Mom, Dad, the money in the basement, I don’t want it. You take it and use it. Just leave!”
Xie Li wiped her tears, grabbed Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao’s hands, her face full of urgency.
The couple was silent.
They hadn’t raised or loved her, and had even planned to sell her off as cannon fodder. Yet here she was, thinking of them!
She really was their biological child.
They exchanged a glance and nodded.
Since Xie Li was so filial, they would let her filial piety be fulfilled!
“Good child. We can’t leave now, Silin’s jade bracelet still hasn’t responded, and the basement money can’t be moved the authorities are watching too closely. We’ll have to rely on the bracelet to transfer assets.”
Xie Qingsong looked helpless. Xie Li gave him an incredulous look:
“How could it be? Grandpa said forty-nine days is the longest. Usually, it wouldn’t take that long to activate!”
After speaking, she thoughtfully looked at Xie Silin.
Xie Silin: “???!!!”
What the hell is that look?! Suspecting me?!
Xie Li hurriedly withdrew her gaze and flusteredly explained:
“Maybe my sister has been too weak recently. Yes! That’s it!”
She held Xie Qingsong’s hand and sincerely said:
“Dad! Here’s the plan! You and Mom take Silin and leave first. I’ll stay home to draw the attention of the Revolutionary Committee and those Red Armbands from the Thirteenth Bureau.”
Xie Li was sincere and sensible, performing her role perfectly.
Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao immediately burst into tears!
He hugged Xie Li tightly, crying uncontrollably:
“Wuwuwu! My child! My child! Then Dad and Mom will follow your wishes!”
Xie Li: “…”
They had to take Xie Silin away because the jade bracelet was still on her!
Inwardly, Xie Li thought, what a pair of selfish bastards they can’t even get the two roles of a blanket right. And ‘follow your wishes’? Screw that!
Xie Silin, watching, became increasingly uneasy.
Xie Li becoming a military wife meant she could escape the purge. Meanwhile, Xie Silin’s father was captured, she and the Xie family would go into hiding, and the jade bracelet hadn’t activated…
She had a god’s-eye view of things, yet events still developed this way.
She refused to accept it!
But for now, she had no choice but to wait for the jade bracelet to activate. Then even Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao would have to obey her!
That night, Xie Qingsong and Wu Fengrao tossed and turned, unable to sleep.
“Fengrao, do you think Silin’s bracelet really hasn’t activated yet?”
Xie Li’s words today had planted doubt in him.
Wu Fengrao also felt a strange unease, as if a seed of doubt had been planted in her heart. It began sprouting at lightning speed:
“Qingsong, let’s check the basement. If necessary, grab what we can carry and run. Xie Li is staying home as cannon fodder, so let her filial piety take its course. The things we can’t take will be her ‘accompaniment.’ At least we’ll have Silin with us. If she keeps lying after a long time, then we’ll…”
Wu Fengrao made a throat-slitting gesture. Xie Qingsong understood immediately:
“Child, don’t blame your parents blame the world!”
They got up and left the room to collect some things from the basement. Passing Xie Silin’s room, they noticed the door open but didn’t think much, quietly heading downstairs.
Xie Qingsong used a flashlight to unlock the basement. The moment they stepped inside, a marmot-like scream echoed:
“Ahhh!!!”