Yan Xia chased her son and daughter-in-law away, and then asked her eldest son to watch over the front of the shop before going to the backyard to comfort her daughter.

At this moment, in the county government dungeon, the Tian family was tied to a wooden frame, and Zuo Li stood in front of them with a whip in his hand.

"Who was harassing Yan Changyu just now? Speak!" There were no windows in the dungeon, so even the slightest sound echoed. Zuo Li's authoritative words reverberated through the air and reached the ears of the group.

It added a touch of horror.

"I, I, I didn't flirt with her. I just said a few words to her. Sir, please investigate! I really didn't do anything." Li Changdui's previous carefree demeanor vanished. He shrank back like a mouse seeing a cat, not daring to speak loudly.

He's a complete bully at home.

"Crack—" Without saying a word, Zuo Li lashed out with the whip.

"Ah—" Li Changdui cried out in pain.

The wails echoed back and forth in the dungeon four or five times before finally stopping.

The others were so frightened they trembled, their eyes filled with terror.

"And you, the eight granddaughters you killed, where are their bodies?" Zuo Li walked up to Tian Shi again.

He smelled a foul, pungent odor.

"Drip, drip—" Following the sound of water, Zuo Li slowly lowered his head and saw that Tian's two trouser legs were wet and dripping urine.

He took a step back, and the flavor became milder.

"I...I didn't...I didn't kill them," Tian stammered.

"Still not telling the truth? Fine, I see you won't shed a tear until you see the coffin." Zuo Li raised his right hand holding the whip, swung it, and was about to strike Tian Shi when...

Tian shouted.

“I told you, I told you all that those girls, five of them were thrown into the mountains, two others were tied with stones and thrown into the river, and the last one, Lao Ba, was buried in my family’s field.”

Zuo Li's eyes narrowed slightly. "You guys, go to Baihua Village and search it. See if you can find any skeletons, and bring them all back."

He gave instructions to the officers beside him.

"Yes, boss." The group replied and left.

"Zuo San, you stay here and keep an eye on them. Keep asking around and find out what else they've done. I'll go report to the county magistrate."

"Okay." Zuo San took the whip.

He replaced Zuo Li in his position.

The next day, Magistrate Lu held court to interrogate the suspects, and many people were standing outside.

A soft cloth wrapped into a square was placed in the very center of the yamen (government office).

The Tian family was kneeling on the right side of the package, while the Yan family was standing on the left.

"Smack—"

"You audacious Tian, ​​how dare you plot to murder eight of your granddaughters! Do you know your mistake?" The gavel slammed down, and everyone's hearts trembled involuntarily.

Tian wet her pants again. "I, I didn't!" Tian trembled like a leaf. She was afraid that if she confessed, the magistrate would kill her, so she immediately recanted her confession.

"Guards, bring the torture device!" Magistrate Lu saw that she was being stubborn and didn't tolerate it.

He immediately ordered the constables to put on the torture instruments.

Before long, all ten of Tian's fingers were pinched up.

Two constables stood on either side of him.

At the same time, pull it like this.

"Awooooo—"

"Ouch, I'll tell you, I'll tell you everything, ahh, ooh ooh ooh—"

Tian screamed like a pig being slaughtered.

She cried and wailed.

The sound was so loud that everyone frowned.

"explain."

Magistrate Lu uttered only one word before the constables released Tian's hands, and Tian collapsed to the ground in a disheveled state.

The ten fingers are connected to the heart.

Tears streamed down her face from the pain.

“It was me who did it. I killed them, but they were baby girls, worthless to begin with. So what if they died? If they hadn’t died, my grandson wouldn’t have been born. If they hadn’t died, how could our family have raised so many children? Your Honor, I know I was wrong, but I don’t regret it. Eight of them died, but my grandson was born. It was worth it! My Zhu family cannot be without an heir!”

The Tian family's men were also brought over and knelt in the hall.

He remained silent, as if he had vanished.

He was clearly the biggest beneficiary.

"Oh--"

Yan Xia chuckled softly.

The quiet surroundings made her laughter all the more noticeable. Magistrate Lu pretended to cough twice but did not strike the gavel.

He asked Yan Xia, "Yan, what are you laughing at?"

"The woman laughed at this old woman, saying she was really stupid. She said that baby girls are worthless and shouldn't be born. But if there were no baby girls in the world, the world would have been destroyed long ago. You keep saying that your Zhu family wants to have an heir. Are you even a Zhu? To the Zhu family, you are just an outsider. Is your so-called helping the Zhu family have an heir helping yourself? No, you are just trying to please your man. You just want to have an heir for him. And your man? When you were being beaten, he didn't even lift an eyelid. Do you think that if only one of you could live, he would choose to live?"

Zhu Ershi did not expect Yan Xia to bring up the topic of him on the spot.

He turned his head and glared fiercely at Yan Xia.

But Yan Xia didn't even look at him, and continued speaking.

"How pitiful! How truly pitiful! Your entire life has been pitiful. You are even more miserable than your eight deceased granddaughters. At least they didn't have to toil their whole lives like you. If there is such a thing as reincarnation, they may have already been reborn into wealthy families who love and cherish them. Your Honor, I remember that there is a law that clearly states that female infants cannot be drowned. This old woman killed eight female infants, which is an extremely heinous crime!"

At this point, Yan Xia squatted down and gently opened the package with both hands, revealing five small corpses inside. Many years had passed, and the corpses had long since turned into bones.

Some could be pieced together to form a complete human shape, while others were missing arms or legs, and even had scars on their bones, clearly indicating that they had been torn apart by animals before their deaths.

Magistrate Lu's pupils dilated, and his hand gripping the gavel trembled uncontrollably.

The five bodies were found in the fields of Gaoshan and Zhujia. The river in Baihua Village was too deep to retrieve the remaining bodies, and the last body could not be found in the mountains either, as it may have been eaten by wild animals.

Nobody knows.

Those standing outside the hall could also vaguely see the white bones.

The soft-hearted woman burst into tears, and even the man's eyes filled with tears.

Yan Xia stood up and continued speaking to Magistrate Lu, her voice still trembling with tears.

“Once a baby girl is born, she is a person, no longer a fetus. She has life, she knows hunger, cold, and pain! Tian killed eight baby girls, which is to say, she killed eight people. I beg Your Honor to punish her for murder. If she is not severely punished, foolish people in Jiashu County will follow suit, and the world will be filled with many more wronged souls and ghosts. In the future, there will be more men than women; men will be unable to find wives, and women will be coveted and watched. The world will surely descend into chaos, Your Honor!”

If it were merely a matter of punishing Tian for killing the baby girl, Magistrate Lu might be lenient. However, if Yan Xia steers the conversation towards the chaos of the world, even if Tian's crime did not originally warrant death, she must now die.

Yan Xia lowered her head, her lips curving slightly, but in less than a second, she regained her previous sad expression.