"No!" Madam Zhao interrupted Shen Yuan urgently. "You can't go to Ziyun Academy. My son is a scholar, and scholars value their reputation above all else! How can you tarnish my son's reputation!"

face?

Shameless people are indeed the most concerned about their reputation!

Shen Yuan sneered, "If you want to save face, then pay back the money."

"My brother doesn't owe you any money!" Chunhua suddenly rushed out from the corner, trying to snatch the IOU from Shen Yuan's hand, but Shen Yuan closed the lid first, turning around to avoid Chunhua's touch while also sticking out her leg.

Chunhua tripped and fell flat on her face, and by sheer coincidence, she landed right on top of Zhao, causing Zhao to also fall hard.

Ouch!

Zhao cried out in pain.

"Juxiang, are you alright?" The village headman instinctively helped Zhao up.

With the help of the village head, Zhao stood up unsteadily, her gaze towards Shen Yuan venomous. "What on earth is wrong with you today, you wild girl? When my son comes back, I'll tell him about how you injured my Chunhua and Qiuyue today, and he'll..."

Before she could finish speaking, Zhao suddenly choked.

Shen Yuan laughed out loud: "What should he do? Make him annul the engagement with me?"

The words "announce the engagement" seemed to burn her tongue; Zhao couldn't bring herself to say them, and her previous cursing and swearing instantly vanished.

Shen Yuan continued to provoke her: "Do you dare to ask your precious son to break off the engagement with me? If he leaves me, who will pay his tuition? Without my financial support, can he pass the exam? Your whole Chu family are like worms, all dependent on me for survival. Do you dare to break off the engagement with me?"

"What's there to be afraid of!"

Having already torn off all pretense, Madam Zhao simply stopped pretending. She arrogantly raised her chin and said, "My son is exceptionally talented. Countless young ladies and wealthy young men in the city admire him! Without you, someone else will surely help him!"

"As for you, you wild girl who spends all day holed up in the deep mountains and forests, not a single man in the village would dare to want you without my son! So what if you want to break off the engagement? Break it off now! I don't even want you!"

As Zhao spoke, she rushed into the house, pulled out the marriage certificate kept at the Chu family's residence and Shen Yuan's copy, tore them up together, and threw them on the ground. "Reject it! It was our Chu family that rejected the engagement. You are not good enough for my son!"

Zhao stood with her hands on her hips, stepping on the torn marriage certificate.

Annulling the engagement is fine! But returning the money is out of the question!

It wasn't until the village head handed Shen Yuan the letter of annulment written on behalf of Zhao that Shen Yuan finally smiled. In this life, without the shackles of a marriage contract, she had long since gotten rid of Chu Yuning, this burden!

Seeing Shen Yuan still smiling, Madam Zhao said angrily, "You'll regret this when my son becomes the top scholar in the imperial examination!"

"Pay me back one hundred taels in three days, or I won't be asking the village head to uphold justice, but the magistrate of the yamen!"

Shen Yuan was too lazy to waste words, and after speaking, she turned around and left the Chu family.

Chunhua cried incessantly, clutching her scraped knees, and was irritably sent into the house by Zhao.

After only Zhao Shi and the village head were left in the courtyard, Zhao Shi buried her face in the village head's arms.

"She has an IOU written by Yu'er herself. What if she takes this evidence to the yamen? Am I really supposed to cough up all the money I've swallowed over the past ten years? I'm just a woman, and I lost my husband early on. Where would I get so much money? That's a hundred taels! Our family's annual harvest is only five taels of silver!"

The village head comforted her, saying, "Don't worry, I'll help you think of a solution!"

Zhao stopped crying. "Is there any way?"

The village head lowered his voice: "She doesn't go into the mountains every month, but she stays for ten days or half a month at a time. The best medicinal herbs are all in the deep mountains and forests. What do you find most in the deep mountains and forests?"

"Jackals and tigers?" Zhao's eyes lit up: "This wild girl, who knows when she'll be eaten by wolves!"

When a person dies, their debts are settled; why should she repay any money?

Do you go to the grave to burn paper money?

When Shen Yuan returned home, she told Granny Liu about her annulment of her engagement with Chu Yuning.

Granny Liu was somewhat surprised, "Don't you really like that child from the Chu family?"

"That's in the past, I don't like it now."

Sitting in the courtyard, Shen Yuan raised her head and looked at the rolling mountains in the distance, murmuring, "Moreover, I've suddenly realized these past two days that liking someone is the most unreliable thing in the world. It's like the clouds and mist in these mountains, ethereal and fleeting. Grandma, isn't that right?"

Granny Liu didn't answer whether it was right or wrong; she simply patted Shen Yuan's back gently.

"It's all that Chu family boy's fault, he let you down! It's all his fault!"

Shen Yuan breathed a sigh of relief. She had thought that after telling Granny Liu about this, Granny Liu would definitely ask her about the cause and effect and why, but Granny Liu didn't ask anything.

She didn't ask anything, nor did she say a word; she just stood behind her and said it was Chu Yuning's fault.

This is probably what unconditional protection from family members looks like.

There are things in this world far more precious than love, but in her past life, she was blinded and could only see Chu Yuning.

Suddenly, the gate to the courtyard was pushed open from the outside. Shen Yuan turned around and saw that it was Zhao Dayong, the old hunter from the village. She frowned involuntarily.

Zhao Dayong, with his rough appearance and impulsive personality, walked into the yard carrying a bloody rabbit leg. "Yuan girl, I hunted a wild rabbit in the mountains today. I'll share some meat with you!"

"Thanks!"

A rabbit leg doesn't have much meat, but it's still a good wild game for these villagers. Shen Yuan smiled and thanked her.

Zhao Dayong continued, "Guess what I saw in the mountains today? I saw ginseng, a particularly large one, probably over a hundred years old! Look, these are its leaves!"

Zhao Dayong handed the leaf in his hand to Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan only needed to glance at it to know that what Zhao Dayong said was true.

Zhao Dayong continued, "I dare not dig it up, I'm afraid I'll break it and won't be able to sell it for that much money. Just go and dig it up and give me two strings of cash as a tip fee."

Because she often went into the mountains to collect herbs, Shen Yuan gradually became acquainted with Zhao Dayong, who often went into the mountains to hunt.

Sometimes, Zhao Dayong would tell Shen Yuan which patch had good medicinal herbs and let her pick them. Because he didn't know how to gather herbs, he didn't know which herbs needed to be dug up by the roots and which only needed to be picked by the leaves, so he only earned money from Shen Yuan for information.

Moreover, Shen Yuan is very generous. Sometimes, if he has collected a lot of medicinal herbs, he will give him some herbs for free to stop bleeding, detoxify, and relieve colds.

Shen Yuan stroked the leaves in her hand and asked about the approximate location of the ginseng. She learned that it would take about three hills to get into the mountains from behind the village, but it was already evening. If she went into the mountains now, it would probably get dark before she even got over one hill.

Seeing Shen Yuan hesitate, Zhao Dayong urged her again, "Hurry up and go. That location is easy to find. If people from other villages see it and dig it up, we won't have any money left!"

Shen Yuan didn't reply.

No matter how valuable ginseng is, it's not as valuable as life.

She shouldn't risk her life for such a small amount of money.