Ganli was taken aback by his self-righteous manner, but when she came to her senses, she was so angry that she laughed.
She carefully placed the wooden basin of popsicles on the table before looking up at the boy who barely reached her chest, her tone tinged with sarcasm:
“What does it have to do with you that I set up a stall? When your father and I divorced, it was all written down in black and white. You were to stay in the Chen family, and your sister was to come with me. Your father wrote the letter of severance himself. What, does this town now belong to you, Chen Yaozu? Do I need your permission to sell some sweet soup?”
Chen Yaozu blushed at Gan Li's sharp retort and remained speechless for a long time.
He certainly wouldn't dare say that he was in charge of the town. Even though he was always proud of his father's status as a scholar, he knew that in this town, a scholar wasn't anything special.
Upon hearing Gan Li say that her street vending had nothing to do with him, Chen Yaozu seemed to have heard the biggest joke in the world. He jumped up like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, pointed at Gan Li's nose, and cursed, "I wish it had nothing to do with you, so I wouldn't lose face today!"
It turned out that recently, the classmates had been talking about the dessert stall at the town's dock, saying that the dessert there was incredibly delicious and that they always wanted to try it. To fit in, Chen Yaozu naturally said he wanted to go with them. So, they chose today, a day off, and decided to go to the dock together to buy dessert.
They came together as a group. Chen Yaozu was still fantasizing about the delicious sweet soup when he suddenly heard his classmate shout, "Yaozu, Yaozu! Look, isn't that your mother?"
Gan Li dotes on her son, and has personally picked him up and dropped him off every day since Chen Yaozu started school. As a result, many of his classmates know what Chen Yaozu's mother looks like. When they heard the voice and looked over there, they recognized her and couldn't help but smile.
"Isn't that his mother? Oh, Yaozu, you should have said so earlier! If we had known it was your mother's business, we would have come to patronize it much sooner!"
"Yaozu, you kept this a secret! Your mother was running such a 'big' business, why didn't you tell us sooner?"
"No wonder he treasured that silk dress so much. Now that I see it, how could he not treasure it? How many bowls of sweet soup would his mother have to sell to buy him one? Hahahaha!"
These classmates came from wealthy families and already looked down on poor scholars who were arrogant just because they had the title of Xiucai (a lower-level scholar). Therefore, they also looked down on Chen Yaozu. When they saw his mother setting up a stall here, they burst into laughter and began to mock him.
Chen Yaozu didn't react at first, but when he heard his classmate's words, he looked in the direction his classmate was pointing and saw a familiar figure busy in front of the stall. It was none other than his mother!
Hearing those mocking words, Chen Yaozu felt his face burning with embarrassment. His self-esteem was being trampled on and rubbed into the ground. Enraged, he rushed to the pear stall and overturned the table.
Chen Yaozu's self-esteem was hurt, and he felt that if it weren't for Gan Li, he wouldn't have been ridiculed.
Now, his classmates were still watching him from afar, their eyes filled with disdain and mockery. He was filled with shame and indignation, his blood boiling, and he roared at Gan Li:
"I'm absolutely not allowing you to set up a stall! You might not feel ashamed, but I do!"
Gan Li was amused by his words: "What's shameful about me? I earn money with my own hands, is that a problem for you? Did I eat your rice?"
"You..." Chen Yaozu was speechless for a long time before finally managing to stammer out, "Anyway, you're not allowed to set up a stall here. Look at the way you're acting now, what kind of behavior is this!"
"What I think is none of your business. Who do you think you are?" Gan Li sneered. "Let me tell you, Chen Yaozu, I'm not the mother who used to do whatever you wanted. What I do is none of your business. Get lost!"
"You..." Chen Yaozu was furious and blurted out, "No wonder Father doesn't want you. You're no match for Aunt Zhao no matter what. You're a disgrace!"
After he finished speaking, he saw that Gan Li's face froze, and he thought that his words had hurt her, so he became smug.
He puffed out his chest, as if announcing some momentous occasion:
"Let me tell you, my dad is going to marry Aunt Zhao soon. You'll regret it then! A shameful woman like you deserves to be rejected by my dad!"
The people around Chen Yaozu were immediately in an uproar upon hearing his words.
The mention of "scholar" and "divorce" immediately brought to mind Chen Xiucai. It was only then that everyone realized that the sweet soup vendor, Manager Gan, was actually the legendary Chen Xiucai's wife and the Gan family's vampire!
The things she did before had been condemned by everyone for a long time. Now that they had finally met the real person, all the pointing and whispering eyes fell on Gan Li, and those old stories about Gan Li were also brought up.
"So Manager Gan is Chen Xiucai's lazy and gluttonous wife?"
"I also heard that she specifically leeches off her own family and even managed to get her father out of his job!"
"That's not all! My relative lives next door to them. I heard that because the secret recipe was leaked, her father was beaten up and kicked out in the middle of the night. He went to her house to beg for shelter, but she wouldn't open the door!"
"No way? That's too heartless! No wonder Scholar Chen divorced her. He's a scholar of Confucian classics; he would never look down on such an unfilial daughter!"
Chen Yaozu was initially a little guilty, but seeing everyone speaking up for him, he immediately became smug.
Just as he was feeling smug, he heard someone calling his name: "Chen Yaozu!"
Chen Yaozu subconsciously turned his head to look, but before he could see clearly, he heard a loud 'smack' in his ear, followed by a sharp pain on his face!
He covered his face, taking a long time to come to his senses. When he finally saw who was in front of him, he was so angry that his eyes almost popped out of their sockets.
"Chen Pan'er, are you crazy? How dare you hit me!"
Gan Tian was not afraid at all. She stood up straight and said in a crisp voice, "If you dare to curse my mother, I dare to hit you!"
When Chen Yaozu saw that she dared to talk back, he was furious and raised his hand to slap her. But Gan Tian was as agile as an eel and dodged it in a flash. Instead, he almost fell flat on his face.
The surrounding teenagers burst into laughter. Chen Yaozu felt his face burning with shame and indignation, but he was powerless against the agile Gan Tian. In his anger and frustration, a clever idea struck him. He turned and glared at Gan Li, shouting:
"Are you blind? Didn't you see this good-for-nothing dare to lay a hand on me? You'd better beat her to death right now!"
Upon hearing this, countless past scenes flashed through Gan Tian's mind, and a hint of fear flickered across her face. However, when she thought of the changes in her mother these past few days, a glimmer of hope rekindled in her heart. She stood there, trying to appear calm, though her body was somewhat stiff.
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