April brought bright spring sunshine and a strengthening heat that made it hard to keep one’s eyes open.
Ye Jia knew she couldn’t keep delaying her visit to her maiden home. After all, she now occupied the body of the original owner.
They had just finished their market stall, and the ox cart was still loaded with rice, flour, and condiments. It would be no trouble to send the cart back to the Zhou family home first.
She glanced at the tall, lean young man sitting at the front of the cart. After a moment’s thought, she pulled Zhou Jingchen down from the seat.
“Old Man Sun, could I trouble you to take this cart back to the Zhou house?” she asked.
“My husband and I need to head into town again.”
Old Man Sun understood immediately. He nodded and drove the ox cart away, swaying gently as he went.
The last time Madam Ye had dragged her back, Ye Jia had left without even showing her face. Now, her own brother had come to her door, claiming their mother was ill. As the new son-in-law, Zhou Jingchen would be visiting for the first time. No matter the circumstances, they had to make an appearance.
Ye Qingjiang watched his sister and brother-in-law with awkwardness. Seeing they had nothing to bring, his lips twitched, but he said nothing.
Ye Jia went to the tile market, where she bought a chicken and two cuts of meat. Satisfied that this was enough, she pressed the items into Zhou Jingchen’s hands and followed Ye Qingjiang back to the Ye family home.
Yejia Village lay to the south of town, a bit further than Wangjia Village, but only by a short distance. It was still a mere fifteen-minute walk. The three of them kept a slow pace, mindful of Zhou Jingchen’s healing leg.
Ye Qingjiang was seeing his new brother-in-law for the first time. To be honest, he was so stunned he could hardly find his words. He had never imagined his third sister would marry a man who looked like a celestial being.
He tried to speak several times, but he had always been clumsy with words. After a few halting sentences, he ran out of things to say. Zhou Jingchen, however, took the lead and kept the conversation going.
If Zhou Jingchen ever decided to be charming, he could win over anyone. By the time they reached the village entrance, Ye Qingjiang was already throwing an arm around his shoulder, calling him “Brother-in-law.”
Though Zhou Jingchen had said very little, he had managed to draw out Ye Qingjiang’s entire life story in just a few words. Even Ye Jia, the “fake” sister, now knew everything about Ye Qingjiang’s twenty-three years.
He had studied until he was eleven or twelve, but lacking any real talent, he gave it up at sixteen or seventeen to return home to raise sheep and farm. Yet, his constitution had always been weak, and his wife ended up doing all the heavy lifting in the fields. If he hadn’t married such a capable woman, their lives would have been a complete mess.
Ye Jia stood by, utterly stunned. When it came to smooth-talking, this man was even more skilled than she was—and she was a seasoned veteran of the corporate world.
The Ye family courtyard was eerily quiet. A steady stream of visitors had come to see Madam Ye Su, but they all left without staying for a meal. This time, her illness was severe. She had collapsed the previous night after spitting out a mouthful of blood and hadn’t woken up since.
Today, the courtyard was hushed. Adults and children alike kept their heads down, working in silence, afraid to speak above a whisper.
As Ye Jia and Zhou Jingchen approached, they ran into Madam Ye, who was coming out to empty a basin of water.
Half of her face was swollen, and a large lump bulged on her forehead. She kept her head down, her eyes fixed on the ground. When she saw Ye Jia, she didn’t dare utter a word. She simply dumped the water on the ground and shrank back into her room, disappearing from sight.
Ye Qingjiang’s eyes burned with hatred as he stared at the closed door. But this was his sister-in-law. With his eldest brother away on military duty at the border, he had no choice but to swallow his resentment. He turned and gestured for Ye Jia and Zhou Jingchen to come inside.
The main room was small. An old man sat there, his thin frame hunched over. Ye Jia recognized him from her last visit. This was Ye Wangshan, the original owner’s biological father.
Ye Wangshan remained silent as Ye Jia returned, his gaze fixed on the tall young man beside her.
This was his first time meeting his third son-in-law, and like Ye Qingjiang, he seemed momentarily stunned. But when Zhou Jingchen greeted him with a respectful “Father,” Ye Wangshan snapped out of his daze and nodded repeatedly.
He then gestured for his granddaughter to pour tea, inviting his new son-in-law to sit and drink.
Ye Jia glanced at him but didn’t interfere. The man’s social skills were beyond her concern. She lifted the curtain and stepped into the room.
On the bed, covered in a coarse jiegeng mat, lay a figure—gaunt, with a sallow, sickly complexion. Two young women, one standing and one seated by the bed, were both wiping away tears.
Ye Jia recognized one of them: Fourth Sister Ye, whom Madam Ye had ordered to wash clothes during her last visit. The one sitting by the bed, weeping, was the youngest daughter of the Ye family, Fifth Sister Ye.
The two girls looked up at the sound of movement. Seeing Ye Jia, their tears fell even faster.
“What happened?” Ye Jia asked, walking over to the bed.
The woman lying there had a deathly gray pallor. Though she had never seen the woman in person, the original owner’s memories told her that Madam Ye Su, while gentle in nature, had always been physically strong. How could she have deteriorated so much in just a few days?
Fourth Sister Ye was a sealed gourd—nothing would ever come out of her mouth.
Fifth Sister Ye, on the other hand, had always been terrified of her third sister, Ye Jia. But with their mother in such a state, what was there left to fear? She burst into tears and spilled everything.
It was Madam Ye’s doing again.
A few days ago, Zhang Chunfen had been publicly shamed in town. She’d been caught stealing, and the victim had come for her. A group of young men had stripped her bare in the street. It was a scandalous affair, one that even the relatively open customs of the northwest couldn’t cover up. As a result, the families Madam Ye had arranged for Zhang Chunfen to meet before the New Year all rejected the idea of a match.
Zhang Chunfen was seventeen, nearly eighteen. At her age, finding a good husband was already difficult. Another year, and she’d be an old maid. If they waited any longer, she might never marry at all. Madam Ye had worked so hard to raise her younger sister—how could she bear to see her become an old spinster?
But with her reputation ruined, no respectable family would take her. The only men willing to marry her were the village’s blind, lame, or elderly widowers. Worse, they demanded a substantial dowry as the price for their consent.
When Zhang Chunfen heard this, she threatened suicide that very night. Her sister-in-law at the Zhang Family home washed her hands of the matter, refusing to get involved. Only her older sister, Madam Ye, was left to bleed with a broken heart.
Madam Ye was desperate. She began to hatch a scheme, her thoughts turning to her two unmarried younger sisters in the Ye family. They were both beautiful—not as stunning as Ye Jia, but still the kind of women who drew praise wherever they went.
She devised a cunning plan. She went to the red-light district on the north side of town and procured something to lure Fourth Sister Ye out.
The plan was to use Fourth Sister Ye as bait for a matchmaking meeting. They would slip something into the young man’s tea, and once he was incapacitated, they would lock Zhang Chunfen in a room with him. Once the deed was done, the marriage would be finalized.
It was a shameless plot, but Zhang Chunfen’s reputation was already in tatters.
But fate intervened. The young man Madam Ye had chosen was someone Zhang Chunfen looked down upon. Despite her own ruined state, she still deemed him too poor. In the chaos that ensued, Zhang Chunfen never made it into the room, but Fourth Sister Ye was pushed inside and then fled.
Fourth Sister Ye had been a blossoming beauty, a prize many families had been quietly watching. Madam Ye Su had already arranged a match for her with the eldest son of a wealthy family in town—a man of good character, hardworking and kind. They were only waiting for June to finalize the engagement.
Now, Fourth Sister Ye had been ruined. The promising marriage was over before it had even been announced.
Madam Ye Su had never truly recovered from the trauma of her third daughter’s ruin. Now, with her fourth daughter’s life shattered in the same way, her vision went black, and she coughed up blood.
Fourth Sister Ye kept her head bowed, her eyes red and swollen, remaining silent.
Fifth Sister Ye’s face was ashen with rage.
She wanted to scream, but her mother’s condition kept her quiet. Old Master Ye had thrown a furious tantrum the day before, vowing to divorce Madam Ye. But after the grandsons cried for a while, he had fallen silent, and no further action had been taken.
Ye Jia was stunned. The whole situation seemed absurd, yet she couldn’t find the words to describe it.
“What about the young man in the room that day?” she asked, her voice cutting through the tension. “Did he ever come back?”
The question struck a nerve. Fourth Sister Ye’s face turned deathly pale, and Fifth Sister Ye stammered for a moment before shaking her head. Ever since their mother’s collapse yesterday, they had been keeping watch constantly. They had no time to worry about the young man from that day.
Ye Jia fell silent, her thoughts churning. She told the sisters to take good care of Madam Ye Su, then lifted the curtain and stepped outside.
Now that things have come to this, she thought, we have no choice but to investigate.
She walked over to Zhou Jingchen and whispered in his ear. As she leaned in close, he stiffened slightly, clearly uncomfortable. But Old Master Ye, who was watching them, didn’t move. He waited for Ye Jia to finish speaking before nodding.
“There’s no need to send for a doctor,” he said. “I visited the medical clinic before I left. The physician should be here any moment.”
Ye Jia froze for a moment. After a brief glance at the Ye family, she said, “…Fine. I’ll go check outside.”
Madam Ye had gone to great lengths to arrange Zhang Chunfen’s marriage. The scandal involving Fourth Sister Ye was known to the entire village; Ye Jia didn’t even need to ask—she could have heard the whole story just by walking around.
The young man was from Yujia Village, not far from Yejia Village, so she went there to inquire.
The news she gathered was grim. The young man was cursed with a miserable fate, his circumstances even worse than the Zhou family’s had been. He was an orphan, a mixed-race man who had wandered in from the north with no family or friends to his name. He lived alone in a wooden shack on the back mountain of Yujia Village. No one knew where he went to find work during the day; he only returned home to rest at night. Madam Ye had set her sights on him precisely because he had no ties—he would be easy to control.
Ye Jia went to see for herself, but as expected, the place was empty. The wooden shack was dilapidated and completely bare inside.
By the time she returned to the Ye family home, the old doctor was just stepping out of the room.
He had treated Zhou Jingchen’s leg before and recognized Ye Jia immediately. He shook his head. Madam Ye Su had suffered a severe emotional shock, and her already frail health had been compromised. The doctor stated plainly that even with medicine, she would never fully recover. She would likely never be able to do heavy work again.
Old Master Ye’s face darkened instantly, his hunched back curving even further.
Medicine was expensive. The west room already housed a patient who needed a constant supply of it, and now his wife had fallen ill. With none of the three men in the family able to work, the burden of the fields fell entirely on his second daughter-in-law.
His lips moved for a long time, but he couldn’t bring himself to refuse the medicine for his wife.
His old eyes reddened as he finally asked, “How much will the medicine cost?”
“At least three taels,” the old doctor replied.
He wasn’t making an arbitrary demand; Madam Ye Su’s recovery would require ginseng.
“Forget it. You should think it over.”
Ye Jia watched from the side, her gaze meeting Zhou Jingchen’s.
He said nothing else, only that he would see the old doctor out. Ye Jia hadn’t even taken a sip of water the entire time. She walked to the table, poured a glass, and drank it slowly, her eyes downcast.
Scholar Ye let out a heavy sigh.
He glanced at Ye Jia and said gloomily, “Your mother has spent her whole life raising you all, never tasting a moment of peace or prosperity. She’s endured endless hardship, and now, in her old age, she has to suffer this. What kind of karma has she brought upon herself…”
Ye Jia remained silent.
Scholar Ye continued, “First it was your youngest brother, then you, and now Yuanniang… It’s all fate!”
His face turned a sickly yellow. “Your mother has a bitter fate, a bitter fate…”
“This isn’t fate,” Ye Jia replied.
She had intended to keep her mouth shut to avoid revealing her true nature, but Scholar Ye’s words were clearly directed at her.
“This is self-inflicted. If you could just control your eldest daughter-in-law, a lot of this could be avoided.”
Scholar Ye’s face went pale, and his head slumped forward. He huddled into a ball, resembling a mere shadow.
Ye Jia felt a pang of pity, but she also knew that sometimes people’s lives were miserable because they were too foolish to see the truth. It wasn’t that she was cold-hearted, refusing to help in a life-or-death situation. But there had to be a limit to her help. How could she keep pouring resources into a bottomless pit?
After all, the original owner of her body had been sold by the Ye family. Even in a transaction, once something is sold, there is no reason to take it back only to sell it again.
Besides, the 120 cakes she’d sold today hadn’t earned much. After buying a few things, she was left with about half a tael. She had two taels in her pocket when she left this morning, and now she had two and a half.
She did have money in her hand. She looked up at Ye Wangshan. “Father, what exactly do you plan to do about Eldest Sister-in-law?”