The news spread like wildfire, reaching every corner of the military headquarters in less than half a day.

Xu Xinghe was a recognized lucky star, and Jiang Linchuan was a renowned commander. The news of this happy couple spread to the nearby villages.

In the village clinic.

Feng Qiushi was helping Doctor Wang wrap the herbs.

Most of the villagers here have more faith in traditional Chinese medicine, and few people buy pills, so her daily work mostly involves dispensing medicine according to prescriptions.

The door opened.

An old man walked in, clutching his chest and coughing. "Dr. Wang, please prescribe some more cough medicine for me. The last one didn't seem to work very well."

"Then I'll change your prescription," Doctor Wang said as he wrote the prescription. "Why are you so late today?"

"I went to town to bring things for everyone!" The old man sat down with a smile on his face. "By the way, I also heard some great news. Comrade Lucky Star Xu is getting married to Commander Jiang! They'll get their marriage certificate on March 1st, but the wedding banquet will have to wait until June when it gets warmer. I'll have to prepare my wedding gift carefully then!"

"That's for sure!" Dr. Wang was also happy. "I was just thinking of suggesting to the village chief that we send a gift in the name of the village. That would be more appropriate. If it weren't for Comrade Xu's frostbite cream during the snowstorm, how many people in our village would have suffered frostbite on their hands and feet?"

Feng Qiushi tightened his grip on the straw rope, almost causing the medicine packet to fall apart. "The Comrade Xu you mentioned, is it Xu Xinghe?"

"That's her!" Dr. Wang glanced at her and smiled as he recounted Xu Xinghe's heroic deeds during the snow disaster. "You haven't been here long enough to know, but this girl is truly kind and has a good heart."

As Feng Qiushi listened to those details, his nails dug deeply into his palms.

Although she had gathered some bits and pieces of information in the past two days, she hadn't expected that Xu Xinghe would be so popular after only a few months in the business.

She forced a smile. "You're such a good girl. Dr. Wang, I suddenly remembered I have water boiling on the stove at home. I have to go back and check it. I can't help you now!"

"Hurry up, don't let the pot burn dry."

Feng Qiushi practically fled the clinic, running quickly back to his residence.

Inside the room, Xu Mingli was flipping through an old textbook.

There is no primary school in Hongqi Village, and not every family can afford the schools in the town. The so-called teaching is just gathering a few children in an unused mud-brick house, teaching them some basic literacy, and letting them go home at two or three in the afternoon. It's a very leisurely job.

"Sinking shore! Something's happened!" Feng Qiushi shouted as he pushed open the door.

Xu Mingli looked up, his brows furrowed. "What's the panic? What happened?"

After closing the door, Feng Qiushi belatedly lowered his voice and said, "Xu Xinghe is getting married to Jiang Linchuan. They'll be registering their marriage on March 1st!"

"What?" Xu Mingli stood up abruptly, the textbook in his hand falling to the ground with a thud. "Are you sure?"

"It's absolutely true, the old man who came back from town said it, there's no mistake!"

"No, they can't get married!"

Once the two get married, Jiang Linchuan will become Xu Xinghe's rightful husband. Wouldn't the assets of the Xu family that he has long coveted become Jiang Linchuan's possession?

Dealing with a woman carrying gold bricks is easy, but dealing with a soldier wielding power is as difficult as climbing to heaven!

He paced anxiously inside the house, thinking, "I have to find a way to stop them; I absolutely cannot let them get their marriage certificate!"

Feng Qiushi's mind went blank, and he couldn't think of any good ideas. After a long while, he finally managed to say, "How about... we find a way to make them sick? If they get sick, they definitely won't be able to get their marriage certificate."

"Idiot!" Xu Mingli roared. "The military headquarters is so heavily guarded that we can't even get through the gate, let alone get close. How are we going to make them sick? Besides, this method only treats the symptoms, not the root cause, and can only delay things for a very short time."

He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.

He was able to escape from a mental hospital and forge an identity to get here, so this is definitely no problem for him!

Suddenly, Xu Mingli's eyes lit up, and he slapped his thigh, exclaiming, "I've got it!"

Feng Qiushi immediately leaned closer curiously, "What method?"

“Xu Xinghe rarely leaves the military headquarters, making him too difficult to target. But Jiang Linchuan is different; he's a soldier, constantly on missions. If we just cause him some trouble and prevent him from getting the certificate, wouldn't that solve the problem?”

Xu Mingli had originally planned to deal with these two, but he didn't expect it to happen so quickly. He wanted to gather more information over the next few days.

But now that trouble has come knocking, there's no time to lose!

"We still need to think about the specifics." Xu Mingli paced back and forth, his fingers unconsciously rubbing his chin. "What's the most taboo thing for a soldier? Nothing more than a ruined reputation. As long as we can smear his reputation, get him investigated by higher-ups, or even temporarily suspend him, he'll lose all interest in getting married, let alone registering the marriage. Once Xu Xinghe loses him as her backer, things will be much easier to deal with!"

The more he thought about it, the better he felt it was.

Feng Qiushi pondered for a while and also thought it made sense. "Then why don't we say he's having affairs? We had a doctor in our mental hospital who was fired for touching female patients inappropriately. He was never able to hold his head up again."

"It's useless." Xu Mingli dismissed it outright, his tone laced with disdain. "Ye Wenshu made such a big fuss before, but it didn't really cause a stir. Who would believe it if you brought this up again now?"

They had only been in Hongqi Village for a few days, but they knew everything about Ye Wenshu's entanglement with Jiang Linchuan.

The village is so small, yet even the smallest thing can be talked about over and over again for half a month. When Feng Qiushi went out to get close to the villagers, he couldn't stop talking about this topic.

Feng Qiushi frowned, unable to think of any other excuse. "What other excuse could we possibly come up with?"

Xu Mingli suddenly stopped, a sinister smile playing on his lips. He leaned closer to her and whispered, "I've got it. You've forgotten what Ye Wenshu said about the military strictly forbidding them from accepting even a needle or thread from the common people. If it's confirmed that Jiang Linchuan accepted gifts, do you think he'll be in trouble?"

Feng Qiushi's eyes lit up, but quickly dimmed again. He felt that this method only sounded feasible, but would be difficult to implement. "But he's completely unyielding and won't accept our things at all. How can we make it a reality?"

"Silly." Xu Mingli poked her forehead. "We don't need to deliver it ourselves. We can just find a scapegoat. Didn't you say yesterday that scoundrel at the village entrance was always lecherously staring at you? Let's find him."

He was hesitant to let Feng Qiushi deal with such a scoundrel and planned to do it himself, but in order to keep the man under his control, he first needed to find something to hold over him.

"Go and call him over to the house. Tell him you have something for him." Xu Mingli's voice was even lower, tinged with ruthlessness. "Don't worry, I'll hide in the inner room. I won't let him touch you. If he dares to lay a finger on you, I'll rush out and catch him red-handed. We'll accuse him of indecent assault. At best, he'll go to jail; at worst, he'll be in serious trouble! With that leverage over us, will he dare disobey us?"