At breakfast time, Ye Wen, as usual, held the large ladle that controlled the family’s food supply and began serving the meal.
Everyone had a full bowl placed in front of them, but when it came to Tian Chunhua, the ladle skipped right over her bowl.
“Mother!” Tian Chunhua’s eyes widened.
What was going on? Not even a mouthful of thin porridge for her?
Ye Wen calmly stirred the porridge in her own bowl without even lifting her eyelids. “I already said it yesterday—those who work more get more, those who don’t work get nothing. Since you’re unwilling to work, then you might as well not eat either. I’ll personally come back to cook lunch at noon, so you won’t need to bother.”
Tian Chunhua’s heart sank.
If this set a precedent, how was she supposed to live in the future?
She wasn’t stupid. She immediately understood that her mother-in-law was dissatisfied with her deliberately slacking off in the morning. She quickly forced a smile and said, “Mother, I know I was wrong. Yaozu wouldn’t let go of me this morning, so I was delayed. Don’t worry—at noon I’ll definitely cook properly. Mother, please forgive me this once.”
Only then did Ye Wen raise her eyes to look at her second daughter-in-law. Her sharp gaze made Tian Chunhua extremely uncomfortable. After a long moment, Ye Wen finally withdrew her eyes.
She had plenty of ways to deal with people who tried to be slick and lazy.
Tian Chunhua’s behavior was exactly like those people in the workplace who just muddle through their days—no ability, bad attitude, and you wouldn’t feel the least bit sorry firing them.
Ye Wen had managed people before; she had encountered plenty of troublesome employees like Tian Chunhua. By her usual methods, anyone who lacked ability and loved to stir up trouble would be directly advised to leave—the company didn’t raise freeloaders.
Now, however, the situation was special. The system had only given her one option: reform them. There was no room for choice at all. Otherwise, with her temperament, she would never have been willing to take on such a mess.
But since she couldn’t shirk it, giving this family a bit of a lesson wouldn’t hurt.
Today was the first day she was reestablishing the household rules. Whoever was foolish enough to run into her today would be used as an example to warn the others.
Tian Chunhua stood by the table, staring longingly as everyone else drank their rice porridge.
Her mother-in-law ignored her show of weakness completely. She could only swallow her saliva at the side. Last night, her mother-in-law had given her only half a flatbread and a bowl of clear soup thin enough to reflect a face. Her stomach had long been empty, and now it was growling nonstop.
Ye Wen slowly finished the last mouthful of porridge in her bowl, then looked up at Tian Chunhua. “Since you understand in your heart, that’s for the best. At noon, I’ll calculate the grain for you by headcount. You cook according to the portions and have Xiaonan deliver the food to the fields.”
She paused, her eyes suddenly turning sharp. “I’ve got a scale in my heart. I’ll know if there’s even one bite missing. Let me say the ugly words first—if you dare sneak food, don’t blame me for making your second brother divorce you!”
In the Dayu Dynasty, where filial piety came first, a mother-in-law’s words were ironclad law. Hearing this, Tian Chunhua’s heart gave a hard thump.
She wasn’t worried about truly being divorced. After all, she had borne a son for the family, and no matter what, her mother-in-law wouldn’t really throw her out. But keeping her without driving her away didn’t mean making her life easy.
Her eldest sister-in-law’s situation was a perfect warning. Like now—starving her for a few meals as a show of authority—her mother-in-law was absolutely capable of doing that.
The whole family was holding their bowls and eating, while she alone stood there with an empty bowl, watching. That feeling was even worse than being beaten.
Seeing that Tian Chunhua had finally behaved herself, Ye Wen took the opportunity to say to the whole family, “When I said yesterday that I was going to change this household, I wasn’t joking. If anyone is dissatisfied, say it now. I’ll split you off early so this old woman doesn’t have to struggle to command people.”
This frightened everyone into quickly putting down their bowls and declaring their loyalty. “Mother, we’ll all listen to you!”
The second son even shot a vicious glare at his wife. This idiot—he had clearly said they just needed to endure for one month. And now, on the very first day, she was already pulling faces. Wasn’t she just asking for trouble?
Ye Wen got up, opened the grain cabinet, took out some flour, and handed it to Tian Chunhua. “Use this flour to steam mantou at noon, and also make a vegetable soup. I’ve calculated it—this flour should be enough to steam at least fifteen mantou.” She narrowed her eyes. “If something goes wrong with this meal again, don’t blame me for being ruthless.”
She even specified the exact number of mantou, all to prevent Tian Chunhua from skimming food for herself. The second household had done this more than once.
“Make lunch first. I’ll come back early in the evening to help you cook dinner. I won’t give you the evening grain for now,” she added plainly—so you won’t sneak food.
Ye Wen spoke bluntly, and everyone present understood the implication. Tian Chunhua immediately flushed red with shame, wishing she could crawl into a crack in the ground.
The atmosphere was so awkward it felt suffocating. Seeing this, the eldest son hurriedly made an excuse about going inside to fetch the bowl Jiang Lian had used and slipped away.
Only the second couple and the fourth child, Wen Xiangnan, were left at the table, staring at one another.
Ye Wen seemed completely unaware and turned to instruct Wen Xiangnan. “Xiaonan, remember to feed the chickens, and deliver lunch to us on time at noon.”
Wen Xiangnan obediently nodded in agreement, but inside she was full of amazement.
In the past, Mother’s voice had always been loud. Whoever she disliked, she would scold the moment she opened her mouth. If this had happened before, she could have cursed in all kinds of ways for the entire morning without repeating herself.
Yet the second brother’s family had always let it go in one ear and out the other, treating it all like background noise.
But today, it was as if the sun had risen in the west. Mother hadn’t raised her voice to scold anyone at all—she had just said a few calm words.
And yet those few light, understated sentences carried more weight than all her previous shouting, firmly subduing the usually impervious second sister-in-law.
Wen Xiangnan was secretly astonished. Ever since Mother woke up yesterday, she had completely changed. Every gesture and movement carried an unquestionable authority.
Even the second sister-in-law, who usually acted compliant on the surface while defying orders behind the scenes, had been thoroughly dealt with this time and obediently went off to work.
She secretly resolved to learn this skill well from her mother.
Ye Wen had no idea that her image in her daughter’s heart had already grown taller and more imposing.
She walked straight to the chicken coop and, relying on memory, felt around until she indeed found three eggs that were still warm. After carefully storing the eggs in the cabinet and locking it, she took the eldest and second sons to the fields to work.
By September morning, the stifling heat of midsummer had faded, and the breeze carried a faint chill.
Walking along the field ridges, Ye Wen felt quite at ease. Going to work in the fields—what was so hard about that?
Wen Family Village was located in the southwest of the Dayu Dynasty. They mainly grew rice and wheat, both with a single harvest each year.
Although this dynasty did not exist in any history Ye Wen knew, it already had crops like potatoes, corn, and chili peppers. Almost all the crops seen in modern times could be found here.
Most of the Wen family’s land was used to grow grain crops, with the majority planted with rice and corn. Only a small corner plot was reserved for seasonal vegetables like eggplant and cucumbers. Out of ten mu of land, grain crops took up nine and a half mu.
Every autumn harvest season, the whole family was run ragged—just after harvesting the rice, they had to immediately go pick corn. The autumn harvest workload was extremely heavy.
Looking at the vast stretch of fields before her, Ye Wen wondered how the eldest son had managed to farm all this land by himself in the past.
In the original owner’s memories, the eldest son always went out before dawn and didn’t return until it was completely dark, often missing dinner altogether. What was even more heartbreaking was that the original owner, biased as she was, sometimes only left him a bowl of thin porridge—at times, not even that.
Yet even so, the eldest son had never complained even once.
Looking at this young man who was only twenty years old, Ye Wen felt a bit emotional. At this age, in the future world, he would still be a carefree college student. But here, he had already shouldered the burden of the entire family.
And yet his mother had been so biased, not even letting him eat his fill.
Thinking of this, Ye Wen’s impression of the eldest son improved somewhat—setting aside the issue of domestic violence, he wasn’t entirely useless after all. At the very least, he was far better than that third son who only knew how to leech off others.