The moment Chen Zui finished speaking, it was like a spark dropped into a frying pan of oil.
Aunt Zhang’s earlier hesitation from yesterday’s kick flickered for a moment—but being “ridden over the head by a three-year-old brat” was humiliation she absolutely could not swallow. If she let this go, how could she ever hold her head up in Qingshui Village again?
“I’ll pick your damn legs!”
Her face trembled violently with rage. The thick flesh on her cheeks quivered as she suddenly rammed her shoulder into the already unstable bamboo fence.
Crack.
The fence split open with a jagged hole.
“Dabao! Go in and take the pot! I want to see who dares stop you!”
She shouted while lunging at Li Shi, trying to shove the weak-looking woman aside first.
Chen Dabao, his face still red and swollen like a pig’s head from the scalding earlier, instantly forgot his pain at the smell of meat. Drooling, he squeezed through the broken fence like a rolling ball and reached straight for the iron pot.
“That’s my meat!” he howled, eyes locked on the golden chicken.
Chen Laosan reached out to grab him—but he was too slow.
Chen Zui didn’t even blink.
The moment Chen Dabao’s fingers were about to touch the pot—
She moved.
Not to block him. Not to push him.
Her small hand, no thicker than his wrist, shot out like lightning and grabbed the back of his dirty shirt collar.
“Lift.”
She uttered the word calmly.
In the next instant, the hundred-plus-jin boy—like a calf—was lifted off the ground.
It wasn’t brute strength.
It was leverage.
Feet rooted, waist twisting, she used his forward momentum and flipped it sideways in one clean motion.
Whoosh—
Chen Dabao flew through the air in a clumsy arc, flailing like a rag doll.
Thud!
A heavy impact.
He landed outside the yard, straight into a filthy manure pit. Black sludge splashed everywhere, coating his mouth and face.
“Ugh! Ughhh!” he thrashed, stuck in the mud like a flipped turtle.
The yard went dead silent.
Aunt Zhang, who had just grabbed Li Shi’s collar, turned back slowly—and froze completely.
Her son… a hundred-jin boy… had been thrown out by a three-year-old?
“I dare see who moves!”
Chen Zui clapped her hands lightly, then raised her voice toward the villagers who had gathered nearby.
“Everyone can see it clearly! The severance agreement was written plainly—life, death, and relations are all separate! Now they broke in to steal—that’s robbery! Bandits!”
She pointed toward the sky, her expression turning eerily fervent.
“The heavens are watching! You break the agreement and bully the weak—be careful of divine punishment!”
The villagers shivered.
The child’s eyes were too strange.
Too unsettling.
Aunt Zhang, shaken but still furious, saw her son screaming in the mud and her temper flared again.
“Bullshit! What heaven? It’s just this little monster being strong! I’ll tear your mouth apart today!”
She let go of Li Shi and charged forward like a mad cow.
Chen Zui didn’t move.
She bent down and picked up a fist-sized green stone used to support the stove.
Hard mountain stone. Solid as iron.
As Aunt Zhang closed in—just two steps away—
Chen Zui raised the stone in front of her.
And slowly clenched her tiny fingers.
Crack—!
A sharp, grating sound pierced everyone’s ears.
The stone shattered instantly, crumbling into fragments and dust that slipped through her fingers like sand.
Aunt Zhang’s steps froze midair.
Her eyes widened in terror.
A stone… crushed in one hand?
She imagined, in a flash, what would happen if that hand closed around her throat.
A sudden urge to urinate hit her.
This… this wasn’t a child.
Chen Zui stepped forward.
She pressed her small, dust-covered hand onto Aunt Zhang’s arm. From the outside it looked like a child pushing an elder.
But Aunt Zhang’s face twisted instantly.
A stabbing, spreading numb pain shot through her entire arm, locking half her body in agony.
Chen Zui leaned in close, her voice soft enough that only the two of them could hear.
“Auntie… I know medicine.”
“There are 365 acupuncture points in the human body. Some only need a light press to make you wish you were dead…”
Her fingers pressed slightly harder.
Aunt Zhang trembled violently, unable to scream.
“…and the injuries won’t show up.”
Chen Zui’s voice turned colder.
“If you dare come back again, or touch my parents even with one finger…”
She paused.
“Next time I break won’t be stone.”
“It’ll be your neck.”
She released her hand.
Then stepped back and suddenly raised her voice again.
“Auntie, have you thought it through? Do you want to get struck by lightning—or go home and sleep?”
Aunt Zhang clutched her arm, fear finally swallowing her completely.
She was terrified.
This child wasn’t human.
She was a ghost. A death messenger from hell.
“I… I’m leaving! I’m leaving!”
She scrambled away, dragging her son out of the mud. The two fled in utter disgrace, screaming as they ran.
The villagers at the gate stood frozen in silence.
The stone-crushing strength was real.
No one dared to question it.
“Stay away from their third branch from now on…”
“That little girl carries evil energy…”
“Go, go, hurry—don’t let her see us…”
Like a receding tide, the crowd scattered.
The yard returned to silence.
Only then did Chen Zui relax her tense little body. She dusted off her hands and turned back toward her stunned family.
Chen Laosan’s fence pole fell to the ground.
Li Shi still held her broom, forgetting to lower it.
The two sisters stared at Chen Zui as if they were seeing her for the first time.
“What are you all staring at?” Chen Zui suddenly smiled sweetly, all the coldness vanishing in an instant. She pointed at the pot.
“Dad, Mom, the meat is ready. Eat it before the soup dries up.”
Chen Laosan swallowed hard, looking at his youngest daughter—both proud and afraid.
He didn’t know where she had learned such abilities.
But he knew one thing for sure:
From today on, no one in Qingshui Village would dare bully their third branch again.
“Eat!”
He slammed the fence pole into the ground like a declaration.
“Everyone eats today—no leftovers!”