“It’s too heavy, you can’t carry it, I’ll do it myself.” Jin Rulan steadily carried it forward.

Ni Sitian followed, wanting to help share the burden.

Xu Tingchuan frowned slightly as he watched Ni Sitian circling around Jin Rulan.

Xu Jiayue came out carrying a basket of strawberries. Seeing Ni Sitian lingering around Jin Rulan, offering to help carry the basket, she walked over to Xu Haicheng and reminded him, "Dad, go over there quickly."

Xu Haicheng was still fishing. When he heard Xu Jiayue's voice, he turned around, understood what she meant, smiled, and handed her the fishing rod, saying, "Please take this."

As he spoke, he stood up and strode towards Jin Rulan. Just as Ni Sitian was about to grab the basket to help Jin Rulan, he took the basket directly from their hands and smiled at Jin Rulan, saying, "Let me do it."

Jin Rulan said thank you in a light tone and walked forward, with Xu Haicheng walking beside her carrying a basket.

Seeing this, Ni Sitian turned to look at Xu Tingchuan, who went over and took her hand. "Let's go."

Four people, two couples, walking one in front of the other.

Xu Jiayue was still by the river, enjoying the breeze and reeling in her fishing line when she looked up to the sky and shouted, "I want to fall in love too!"

She finally finished reeling in the line, but both pairs of figures had disappeared. Poor her, she had a fishing rod tucked under her arm, strawberries in one hand, and a bucket in the other, with two lively crucian carp in the bucket.

When she got home, she saw that all four of them had sat down to drink tea. She glared at her father and brother and said resentfully, "You two have no humanity when it comes to women."

Xu Tingchuan gave her a faint look, as if to say, "Isn't that just the way things are?"

Xu Haicheng smiled and said, "Alright, you've worked hard. The big one is yours today."

“I also want to add your 2009 Petrus,” Xu Jiayue bargained.

"You've got some ideas. You think you can just take my King of Wine by bringing some things?" Xu Haicheng shook his head and chuckled.

“It’s not just about carrying things, I gave you one…” Xu Jiayue didn’t finish her sentence, glancing at Jin Rulan.

The meaning is quite clear: she gave her father an opportunity to curry favor with her mother.

“Okay, let’s drink that bottle of King of Wine for lunch today.” Xu Haicheng looked at Jin Rulan with tenderness in his eyes and said softly, “You should have a little too.”

Jin Rulan's expression was indifferent, but she nodded at his words, which was quite unusual.

"Uncle Wang, go to the wine cellar and take out that bottle of King Wine to decanter!" Xu Jiayue shouted happily to Butler Wang.

Ni Sitian was also happy, and the family looked very harmonious.

The first day of the Lunar New Year was spent like this. On the second day, Xu Haicheng was to accompany Jin Rulan back to her parents' home.

Ni Sitian was very nervous when she met Xu Tingchuan's maternal grandparents for the first time. Xu Tingchuan hadn't mentioned the Jin family much before, so she could only play it by ear.

Xu Tingchuan's maternal grandparents and Jin Rulan shared similar personalities: elegant, dignified, and self-possessed, with the arrogance of scholars and intellectuals.

Jin Rulan also has an older sister, Jin Ruzhi, who divorced a few years ago and returned to live with her parents. She has a son who is two years younger than Xu Tingchuan, but Ni Sitian has not met him.

I stayed at the Jin family's house for about half a day, which was considered visiting relatives.

Ni Sitian became increasingly curious about the Xu family's situation. It seemed that the two elders of the Jin family did not like Xu Haicheng, their son-in-law, and Jin Rulan and Jin Ruzhi had a very distant relationship.

Overall, they were all quite unfamiliar with each other, and even Xu Jiayue didn't seem very close to her maternal grandparents.