Chapter 59 Who's Playing the Victim for?

Sanwa has been working particularly hard lately. He gets up very early in the morning, washes up, and then recites poems under the apricot tree outside.

Song Chunxue got up to make soup, and he drank the soup before going to school.

His home was quite far from the school, so he wouldn't come home for lunch; he always carried dry food and water with him.

When he came back in the evening, he would still work, watering and feeding the livestock, and chopping wood to feed the donkey.

Of course, he did this after he finished writing two pieces of calligraphy in the courtyard.

After the fourth brother brought the sheep back, the third brother would go to the sheepfold to see which sheep was thin and which sheep had yellow snot because it was inflamed.

When he returned from school that day, he saw the sheep standing peacefully in the pen, with a bundle of corn stalks lying in the pen.

After asking Jiang Hongying, he learned that the fourth brother didn't want to herd sheep anymore.

“But sheep that are too thin are hard to sell for, they’ll lose more than half their price. I’ll go talk to Lao Si.” With that, Sanwa stepped out the door to find Lao Si.

"Come back!" Jiang Hongying called out helplessly. "Mother said you don't need to worry about it, she has her own way of handling things."

"What method?"

Sanwa was getting anxious. "We can't just stand here like this forever. The sheep buyers will come in a few days. Sheep sell best this season. If we go hungry for a while, it's better not to sell them at all."

Before Jiang Hongying could say anything more, Song Chunxue, carrying a firewood basket in one hand and Xiujuan in the other, walked into the kitchen.

Seeing Sanwa's tense face, Song Chunxue knew what he was worried about.

“I’ve already told the fourth brother that if he lets the sheep get too thin, he can forget about going to school next year. He promised to hoe the sheep tomorrow, so just you wait and see. He’ll be going to herd the sheep again in a few days. Don’t worry, just focus on your studies.”

Sanwa still felt it was inappropriate, "But..."

"Listen to me, otherwise if he makes you herd sheep, will you go to school or herd sheep?"

"..." Sanwa lowered his head, feeling very sorry for the sheep.

Hay is definitely not as good as green grass; it's less likely to make you fat.

Moreover, as the weather gets hotter, a large flock of sheep crammed into a small pen all day long gets their wool dirtier and they are more susceptible to disease.

“You have to be patient. The sheep can be fattened up and we’re not in a hurry to sell them. But if you can’t be patient, I’ll just send you to school for nothing. Sanwa, don’t worry about it.”

After struggling for a moment, Sanwa nodded, "Then I'll listen to Mother."

*

The next morning, the fourth brother, who was cutting grass in the field, was soaked to the bone by a sudden rain.

To fill his basket as quickly as possible, he went to a place far from home. The rain was heavy and torrential, and by the time he got home, he was soaked to the bone and his feet were covered in mud.

As soon as he entered the courtyard, the fourth son, who had never suffered such humiliation, stood in front of the steps and burst into tears.

Jiang Hongying, who was comforting her child, was startled. She stood at the door with her child in her arms and looked at her fourth son crying loudly in the yard, feeling both angry and amused.

Is that considered unfair?

Sanwa started herding sheep when he was less than ten years old, and it was common for him to get soaked by the rain in the summer.

Once, Sanwa was herding his sheep to the river to bathe them. In the summer, there were many thunderstorms, and the weather could change in an instant. Suddenly, a thunderstorm broke out, and Sanwa was almost swept away by the flood.

If the old shepherd hadn't thrown him the sheep shovel and pulled him out of the river, Sanwa would have been dead long ago.

The fourth son is fifteen years old this year. Although he is from a poor family, he has never suffered much. Like the son of a wealthy landowner, he has been too well protected by his mother.

Seeing her fourth son cry, Jiang Hongying felt no pity, but rather resentment at his lack of ambition. Her mind was filled with the image of her third son, a small child, herding sheep on the mountain year after year, nine years passing in the blink of an eye.

Nine years! How many nine-year periods does a person have in their entire life?

She overheard the fourth brother going to the thatched hut outside and cursing the third brother with the eldest brother, saying that he was clearly destined to be a farmer, but was wasting money and time studying, and didn't know his own limitations.

If it weren't for the fact that she didn't want things to get too ugly, and that she was a married daughter, Jiang Hongying would have rushed in and questioned them on the spot.

"What are you doing? What are you yelling about in the rain? Are you wailing like a mourner?"

Just as Jiang Hongying was about to stop the fourth brother, Song Chunxue, soaking wet, appeared at the courtyard gate.

She had several streaks of mud on her body, obviously from slipping and falling on the road on her way back.

"Mother." The fourth son stopped crying abruptly, looking at Song Chunxue with red eyes, full of grievance.

"Go back inside and change your clothes!"

No one knows a child better than their mother, so how could Song Chunxue not see why he was crying?

"Are you really that sad?" she couldn't help but yell at the fourth son. "How many times has Sanwa rolled in the mud? Have you ever seen him cry even once?"

"You still have the nerve to cry? If you had just become a scholar earlier, I wouldn't have scolded you."

“If I hear you being so pretentious again, you can go with the boss. Get lost, so I won’t feel sorry for Sanwa every time I see him, for making him suffer for so many years.”

"You think you're the only one with a mouth who knows how uncomfortable it is to be out in the rain?"

Song Chunxue stood in the rain, wiping the water from her face, the salty tears flowing into her mouth.

"I want to cry too, but who can I cry to?" She became angrier and angrier as she spoke, her voice rising higher and higher. "You were only a few years old when your father died. Sanwa and I raised you all together, and in the end you flew away and left us here to suffer. Who can I cry to?"

At this point, Song Chunxue realized that it was truly she and Sanwa who had raised his older and younger brothers.

But what good did she and Sanwa get in return?

The second son left his wife and children behind to come to his hometown. He squandered all his money on the way, treating his classmates to food, drinks, and entertainment. In the end, his wife said that he had given it all to her and the third son.

Because of two taels of silver, the second son refused to come back.

The fourth sister, who was doing business with others, envied those who had the protection of their ancestors and complained that she and the third sister couldn't make any money.

He became successful, but when he came back, he complained about the outhouse, the house, and the strong earthy smell of the kang (heated brick bed). It was as if he had forgotten where he grew up.

Whenever she thinks about this, Song Chunxue feels so angry she can't live with herself.

What did she want in this life? What was she striving for?

Standing at the entrance of the thatched kiln, the eldest son, Jiang Yeming, heard his mother's voice in his ears, and a sense of shame welled up in his long-numbed heart.

"Tch, who are they trying to impress with their tantrum? The mother and daughter are standing in the rain, crying and cursing. Are they trying to make a scene or to give everyone a good show?"

Chen Feng sneered from inside the room, "Does she expect us to comfort her by acting pitiful like this?"

"Shut up!" Jiang Yeming turned his head coldly. "That's my mother. Please watch your mouth."

"Jiang Yeming, you've really grown up. You think you're so great, yelling at me like that?"

Chen Feng raised her chin, dropped the needle and thread in her hand, and said angrily, "You want her to sew clothes and quilts for your child? All she knows is to use the fact that she raised you to play the victim. Which mother in this world isn't like that?"

Jiang Yeming's pupils trembled, and he pursed his lips and clenched his fists tightly.

After a long pause, he gave a cold laugh.

"Next time I go to your house, I'll tell your mother what I said. Now that you're married to me, everything you eat and drink is provided by my mother, but I can go without eating a single bite of food from your family. Let's have a good talk."

"Jiang Yeming, are you trying to pull a fast one?"

Chen Feng was furious. She hadn't expected him to side with outsiders like this, so she grabbed the awl next to her and threw it at him.