Chapter 112: Instigating
Su Guilan hurriedly rushed to Anning Village and pushed open the door of Second Uncle Su’s house.
Second Aunt Su grumbled, “Why the rush? Is there a ghost chasing you?”
Ever since they suffered a loss at Zhaodi and her daughter’s place, Second Aunt Su now particularly disliked Su Guilan.
In Second Aunt Su’s view, if it weren’t for helping Su Guilan trick Su Yaoguang into marrying her fool of a son, they wouldn’t have fallen out with Su Yaoguang and her daughter. Now that Su Yaoguang and her daughter were earning money, they got no benefit at all. No matter how you looked at it, it was all Su Guilan, that jinx, who caused it.
“Where’s my mom?” Su Guilan also didn’t like this second sister-in-law.
Of course, Eldest Sister-in-law and Third Sister-in-law didn’t like her either. Anyway, all these sisters-in-law were annoying.
“She’s suffering from a head ailment and lying inside!” Second Aunt Su said sarcastically.
The old hag couldn’t boss Zhaodi around anymore, so she pushed all the household work onto her and pretended to be dying in bed all day.
“Mom…” Su Guilan ran inside. “Mom, those two cheap bitches Zhaodi and Su Yaoguang have opened a big shop in the city.”
Hearing this, Second Aunt Su forgot her complaints and chased after Su Guilan inside.
Grandma Su suddenly sat up and anxiously asked, “What kind of shop did they open? Does it make money?”
“A huge shop selling cosmetics. One box sells for two taels of silver. She even called her second and third sisters over. Her third brother-in-law, that sickly weakling, is even managing the accounts inside. Tell me, does it make money or not?”
“That heartless disaster star. We’re her family, but when she makes money, she doesn’t think of us and thinks of that bunch of freeloaders from her maternal family instead. No way, I have to go find her.” Grandma Su got out of bed.
Second Aunt Su stopped Grandma Su, her eyes rolling as she said, “Mom, if you go find her now, she won’t acknowledge you. She said she’s severed ties with us and has no relationship left.”
“She says no relationship and it’s gone? She married my son, and that money-losing good-for-nothing Su Yaoguang is also Su family blood. Should’ve never signed that deed of severance of kinship. Now it’s turned out like this. It’s all your fault!” Grandma Su hit Su Guilan’s arm, venting her anger on her.
Su Guilan dodged Grandma Su’s swings, feeling the pain: “Ow, Mom, stop hitting. Let’s think of a way to coax Zhaodi and Su Yaoguang back.”
“That mother-daughter pair has made up their minds like iron in a scale weight. It’s impossible to get them to share the money they’ve got in hand. To get the money from them, we need some other method.” Second Aunt Su beckoned to them. “I have a way.”
Grandma Su and Su Guilan exchanged a glance and leaned in close to Second Aunt Su to hear her ‘plan’.
Ever since Su Guilan appeared, Su Yaoguang had been on guard against that family coming to make trouble. But after waiting three or four days, she hadn’t seen any sign of them.
After Su Yaoguang went out again and returned, she asked if those extreme relatives had come knocking. Zhaodi said from the side, “Don’t worry. We’ve already signed the deed of severance of kinship. Even if they come knocking, they won’t get any cheap advantage from us. They’re not fools; why would they come looking for us?”
Zhaodi had been in a very good mood these past few days.
One reason was that Su Guilan and those extreme relatives hadn’t come knocking. More importantly, after Zhong Lanhua and her daughter suffered a big loss, their business had plummeted. The news that their shop had become a rat nest had spread long ago, and now no one was willing to step into their door.
A lot of their shop’s goods had also been damaged and dirtied by rats.
The more unlucky Fenghua Pavilion was, the louder Zhaodi laughed. However, Zhong Lanhua wasn’t one to take a loss either. Every time Zhaodi mocked her, she would curse back at Zhaodi. These past few days, they’d been making a big fuss, and passersby always stopped to watch them battle it out for three hundred rounds.
“It’s so strange, it’s raining again.” Zhang Pandi looked outside and said, “Whenever it rains, customers don’t like to go out, and our business gets affected.”
Zhang Yingdi chimed in, “Hasn’t it been raining too much lately?”
“A bit of rain in this season is normal.” Zhaodi didn’t think much of it.
But Su Yaoguang took it to heart.
It was like she had forgotten something important.
It had been too long ago, so she hadn’t even remembered that such a big event had happened during this time period.
In her previous life, there was a stretch of constant rain. She was busy supporting the family and rushed around every day with Zhaodi. Even in heavy rain, they still went out every day to seek work.
Xiao Yanci lived in the academy, oblivious to outside matters, and had no idea how the silver was earned during that time.
That was when she and her mom exhausted every effort, going door-to-door for work, taking the lowest wages to do the most work, barely scraping through that hardest time.
Most importantly, after the heavy rains, many sick people appeared in the city. The illness didn’t look scary—just ordinary common cold symptoms—but many people didn’t pull through.
She caught it too. Her mom sold the farmland to get her treatment. She lay in bed for half a month and finally survived. But she didn’t want to worry Xiao Yanci, so she never told him about it.
After she recovered, she went to see Xiao Yanci first thing, only to receive his cold glare. He said she hadn’t sent him vegetables or money during that time, and if she really couldn’t afford to support him, she shouldn’t pretend to be rich when she wasn’t.
“It hurts…” Wangshu’s pained voice woke Su Yaoguang.
Su Yaoguang came back to her senses and found her hand pinching Wangshu’s arm.
“Sorry.”
“What were you thinking about, so absorbed and full of killing intent?”
Wangshu pointed to the red mark where she had pinched him and complained, “It’s all red now.”
“Wangshu, the rain has been too frequent lately. Something’s off. I want to stock some medicinal herbs at home.”
“No problem. We already have a female doctor at home. Stocking extra medicinal herbs is better safe than sorry.” Wangshu said, “Make a list, and I’ll go to the pharmacy to buy them.”
“I don’t know what to buy either. I’ll go find Jing’er and have her make a list for me.”
Su Yaoguang immediately found Jiang Jing, told her about her worries, and asked if there were any symptoms similar to a common cold but not actually a common cold illness.
Jiang Jing didn’t know what she was referring to either, but she made a list based on the symptoms she described.
Wangshu took over this task. Su Yaoguang wasn’t at ease and followed him to the pharmacy, stocking up on all sorts of medicinal herbs.
“Later, buy some grain to store at home too. Think about it—the rain is so heavy, it will be harder to transport grain, and grain prices will definitely rise then.”
“Yaoguang is right.” Wangshu nodded. “I’ll tell Chen Buyu and Zhong Chushan too, so they can stock up on grain and medicine at home.”
Su Yaoguang and Wangshu walked along sharing an umbrella.
Xiao Yanci also held an umbrella as he came out of the bookstore.
Seeing the two chatting and laughing, nameless anger rose in his heart, and he ran over hugging his books.
He ran very fast and cut directly between Su Yaoguang and Wangshu.
“Watch out…” Seeing Su Yaoguang about to fall to the ground, Wangshu couldn’t pull her in time and positioned his whole body behind her, becoming her human cushion.
