Chapter 8 "Sister Li, please have mercy on me."...

Cui Xintang didn't return until Meng Yuanxiao had gone to sleep that night.

The door was gently pushed open and closed again. Light footsteps came in from behind the screen, stopping by the bedside, carrying a faint smell of alcohol.

Meng Yuanxiao closed his eyes and held his breath, his heart pounding.

Cui Xintang gently lifted the bed curtains, lay down on her outer side, and quickly became still.

Listening to the gradually even breathing beside him, Meng Yuanxiao wished he could kick the person down.

His words before leaving stirred her heart, but he didn't take them to heart at all, toying with her like a monkey.

She had never been treated like this in her entire life!

Meng Yuanxiao grew angrier the more she thought about it. She tried to hold back, but she couldn't help but kick him in the waist.

They failed to kick him off the bed, but heard him groan.

Meng Yuanxiao was startled and hurriedly closed her eyes guiltily.

She finally vented her anger, and once the people around her had fallen silent, she turned away nonchalantly.

But just as she turned over, she heard a muffled laugh behind her. Cui Xintang pulled her close and kissed the back of her ear.

The next day was the day for the bride to return to her parents' home, but Meng Yuanxiao still didn't want to talk to him.

Before getting into the carriage, Cui Xintang rubbed his waist, seemingly unintentionally, and gave her a meaningful smile.

Meng Yuanxiao gave him a bright, blinding glare, then lifted her skirt and boarded the carriage.

Upon returning to the Meng residence, Meng Yuanxiao first threw herself into Madam Feng's arms and acted coquettishly for a while, then pulled her sister-in-law to play.

The two women, sister-in-law and aunt, were whispering in their room when Li Keying asked, "Have you read the storybook I gave you?"

The storybook that caused Meng Yuanxiao's nosebleed on their wedding night was a gift from his sister-in-law.

The nanny taught her some things, but only included a fire-avoidance diagram in her dowry. She didn't dare to give her anything so outrageous.

Meng Yuanxiao blinked her almond-shaped eyes and whispered, "I saw it."

She finished speaking, blushing, her tone shy yet unable to hide her excitement, "I watched it with Brother Tang."

Now it was Li Keying's turn to be surprised. She had given Meng Yuanxiao this storybook because she was afraid that Meng Yuanxiao would be scared due to her young age.

Unexpectedly, the seemingly delicate young girl turned out to be someone destined for great things.

Outside the courtyard, Meng Xu returned after speaking with Cui Xintang.

Halfway there, Meng Xu saw Meng Zheng leaning against a sycamore tree with his arms crossed, guarding outside his and Li Keying's courtyard.

With a blade of grass dangling from his mouth, Meng Zheng stared intently into the courtyard through the bright moon gate, showing no intention of avoiding suspicion.

Meng Xu frowned and strode forward, asking unhappily, "What are you doing standing here?"

Having spent several years training in the military, Meng Zheng had become more perceptive than the average person. He had already heard Meng Xu's footsteps, but he simply ignored them.

Hearing this, he lazily withdrew his gaze without moving, only turning his head to look at his elder brother.

A mocking smile played on his lips as he spat out the grass in his mouth. "I'm in my own home. I can stay wherever I want and do whatever I want. Is it any of your business?"

Meng Xu: "..."

Two years had passed, and although Meng Zheng still maintained his carefree and irresponsible demeanor, Meng Xu knew all too well that his second brother was no longer the same as before.

However, he still acts according to his own whims, and in this respect, he has not improved at all.

Since he came back, his mother has shed many tears because of him.

Meng Xu was too lazy to pay attention to him, and only said, "Mother has never wronged you. You should restrain yourself and not make Mother sad again."

"Heh." Meng Zheng scoffed, clearly not having heard a word he said.

Meng Xu ignored him and stepped into the courtyard. Just as he entered, the two women, the aunt and the sister-in-law, finished their conversation and came out of the house.

Meng Yuanxiao called out "Big Brother," then turned and saw something on the stone table under the flowering tree in the courtyard. Curious, he asked, "Sister-in-law, what's that?"

After saying that, he walked over, picked it up, and took a look.

They were three small hazelnut carvings, each only about half the size of her thumb.

One of the coins depicts a beautiful woman in a red dress, while the other two depict two lifelike little rabbits.

To carve something so exquisitely inside a hazelnut shell must have taken a lot of effort.

She couldn't help but be surprised. Just as she was about to call her sister-in-law over to take a look, a slender, fair hand reached out from the side and took the hazel carving from her hand.

Meng Xu was stunned when he saw what he was holding.

If he wasn't mistaken, these three hazelnuts should have come from Fengzhou, from the hazelnut tree in front of Li Keying's old family home.

Only that hazelnut tree could produce hazelnuts that big.

His gaze fell on the hazelnuts in his hand, and he saw a pretty young woman in a red dress inside. The scene of the first time he met his wife flashed through his mind.

At that time, his father had just taken office in Fengzhou. Disliking that Meng Zheng spent his days hanging out with those playboys, he brought Meng Zheng to Fengzhou and sent him to the military camp for training.

Not long after his father arrived in Fengzhou, he suddenly fell ill. His mother was worried and sent him to Fengzhou to visit his father.

He arrived in Fengzhou and waited until his father recovered, which was already winter. Before leaving Fengzhou, he visited his second younger brother at the military camp.

The winter in Fengzhou was bitterly cold. On his way to the military camp, a heavy snow fell, and the ground was covered with a thick layer of snow.

The snow made travel difficult, and he rode his horse with great care. But as he approached the military camp, he and his horse fell into a trap just outside a village.

The trap was higher than him, and he fell and injured his leg, unable to climb out, leaving him in a sorry state.

The border was not peaceful, and the villagers would not come out during the snowy weather. He was trapped for a day and a night, suffering from hunger and cold, and was only discovered when he was in a daze.

In a daze, I heard a chattering sound above my head.

"Sister Li was right! The big pit you dug for us has indeed been lured by bad guys!"

The girl's voice was clear and bright, sounding like she was only fifteen or sixteen years old. "Stop flattering me. Go and call Uncle Wu over to drag him up."

After an unknown amount of time, he was dragged up and thrown into the snow, where he was surrounded by people.

"Sister Li, what should we do with this person?"

"Just throw it away!"

"But if we just throw it away, it will definitely be eaten by wolves."

"What should we do then! We've just picked up a person for nothing. If the village chief finds out, he'll definitely not let us off the hook!"

Just as the noisy voices were giving him a splitting headache, two slender fingers suddenly pinched his chin and turned his face.

A faint, sweet fragrance wafted over him, and in his half-awake state, the woman's voice rang out above him, "She doesn't seem like a bad person."

A teenager said, "If he's not a bad person, why would he run to the military camp in this heavy snow? Hey, Sister Li, you're not just attracted to him because he's handsome, are you?"

"Pah, Sister Li would never like a pretty boy. She wouldn't even look at that guy who hangs around at her house all day."

"That's right, Sister Li is going to be a female general in the future, she won't like this pretty boy!"

The young woman ignored them and simply instructed Uncle Wu to put him on the oxcart.

Uncle Wu hesitated for a moment, but the young woman said, "It's alright. Father will be back in a few days. When he does, please have him interrogate him properly. If he is a spy, just chop him up and throw him into the wild to feed the wolves."

Someone chimed in, "That's right, Sister Li's father is an officer in the military, the village chief definitely wouldn't dare to punish Sister Li!"

"Sister Li, why do I think this pretty boy looks a bit like the one who's been staying at your house?"

“That reminds me,” the woman said.

Then a hand landed on his waist, and a soft palm groped around his chest for a while before taking the money pouch from his arms.

“I can’t save him for nothing. I already have one freeloader at home, and I don’t want to raise another one.”

After the young woman finished speaking, she threw his money pouch away. "Mao Mao, isn't your father suffering from asthma again? Take this to get some medicine."

"Uncle Wu, take him home."

He felt like his body was falling apart, and he was lifted onto the oxcart by a bunch of people.

The oxcart rattled violently, and the stench of cow dung mixed with hay jolted him awake.

When I woke up, the oxcart had just entered a house. As soon as I entered, I heard a boy's voice rushing out from the courtyard.

"Sister Li!"

He couldn't help but be stunned; the voice sounded exactly like his brainless second brother.

When he struggled to open his eyes and forced himself to sit up from the oxcart, the first thing he saw was a pretty red figure in the snow.

The woman was facing him sideways, her figure graceful and tall, her red dress standing out against the snow, and she made him lose his composure at first glance.

Looking to the side, the boy dressed in black, holding a steaming bowl and slurping porridge, was none other than his good-for-nothing second brother.

After several months apart, my second brother had grown taller, but his brain hadn't grown any bigger. He followed the girl around just like the black dog he used to keep in the mansion when he was a child.

"Sister Li, I just swept all the snow out of your yard, please go and take a look!"

The woman's voice was full of disdain as she raised her chin and looked down at him, "Didn't you say you were injured? If you're injured, how can you still shovel snow?"

The boy fell silent, and the girl said angrily, "You're still refusing to leave even after your injuries have healed. I'm going to tell my father and have him punish you properly!"

The boy looked aggrieved. "Sister Li, please have pity on me. My arm still hurts. You can feel it if you don't believe me!"

The girl ignored him, but the boy persisted, "Sister Li, when I was sweeping your yard just now, I heard someone shout that they caught something in the pit you dug in front of the village..."

The girl quickly covered his mouth, "Idiot, keep your voice down!"

His second brother nodded dumbly, while the woman pointed behind her, "It's right there!"

The two men turned around at the same time and were surprised to see him sitting on the oxcart.

The woman's skin was pale, almost translucent against the snow, and her beautiful face was filled with astonishment. "You, when did you wake up?"

His second brother, that idiot, saw him, his face darkened, and then he exclaimed, "Eh? Sister Li, where did you bring back such an ugly thing?"

"Look at that face, so white, like it's dead and then back to life, with patches of blue and red, like someone performing in a theatrical play."

"Sister Li, look at me! I'm not a pretty boy. I spent half the day in the snow, and look, I've gotten a little darker!"

He only had a few bruises on his face, yet he became the "ugly thing" in his second brother's eyes.

If he hadn't been so weak that day, he would have gone up to him and, like he had a few years ago, pinned him to the ground and rubbed him hard.

His foolish second brother looked at him warily, then at Li Keying, holding a bowl in his hand, slurping his porridge while giving him a good scolding right in front of him.

Perhaps it was his murderous gaze that finally made the fool realize something was wrong. He stood there stunned for a long time before finally striding over with his bowl in his hand.

"Big brother?!"

...

Thinking of the past, Meng Xu couldn't help but feel a moment of daze.

Meng Yuanxiao was unaware of all this. She raised her hand to snatch the hazel carving from her elder brother's hand, but Meng Xu dodged it.

Meng Yuanxiao pleaded with him, "Big brother, did you carve this? Please give it to me!"

Meng Xu glanced at her, her face expressionless. "Your husband is waiting for you outside. Aren't you going to go find him?"

After saying that, Meng Xu subconsciously turned his head to look at Li Keying.

Li Keying stood still, not coming over, and was instructing her maid.

She and Meng Yuanxiao were laughing happily when they came out of the room, and now, as she spoke to the maid, a faint smile remained on her lips.

Only when facing him does she maintain her usual icy demeanor.

Meng Xu's heart sank slightly, and he unconsciously tightened his grip.

Hazelnut carvings are inherently fragile; they can be crushed to pieces with the slightest force.