Chapter 154
The next day, Widow Li came to Yin Zheng's house crying and making a fuss. Li Ergou was seriously injured and owed the clinic three taels of silver for his treatment. He was carried back last night and was told that the clinic would not treat him if he didn't pay her back. Since she had no money, she could only come to Yin Zheng's house to make a fuss.
Jiaojiao, who was sitting under a tree in the yard and drawing with a brush, puffed out her cheeks angrily. This aunt is so mean. She scolded my father yesterday and she comes to scold him again today!
Yin Zheng poked Jiaojiao's bulging cheeks and said, "Don't be angry."
Jiaojiao put down her pen, turned around, and burrowed into her father's arms. After rubbing her head against his chest, she grabbed his clothes with her little hands and said, "She scolded me. Jiaojiao was very angry, but she couldn't win the scolding."
There was a sense of grievance in his tone.
Yin Zheng was speechless and touched the back of Jiaojiao's head soothingly.
Widow Li came to the door to make trouble, so it was really difficult for him to go out. He was not good at speaking when it came to cursing. Besides, the kick he gave Li Ergou yesterday was almost like a kick that took half his life away. In the eyes of the villagers, this was too severe. They would think that Li Ergou had received the punishment he deserved, and he should not cause trouble for Li Ergou again.
For the people of Lijia Village, the surname Yin has always been a layer of separation from them. If he really wants to kill Li Ergou, he will be the next one to be disliked by the villagers.
Yin Zheng was not prepared to let Li Ergou go, so he ignored Widow Li and let her throw a tantrum and curse outside.
He raised his hands to cover Jiaojiao's ears. Calculating the time, he thought the people from the yamen should be arriving soon.
Widow Li didn't make a scene for long before she was interrupted by Li Shengbai who came running over: "Aunt, it's bad, the government is here to arrest Er Gouzi!"
"What?!" Widow Li tumbled and crawled away from the door. From a distance, Yin Zheng could still hear the trembling in her shrill voice: "Why would the government come to arrest Ergou?! My Ergou didn't do anything wrong. If anyone is going to arrest someone, they should arrest Yin Zheng. He beat my Ergou like this... Quick, let's go tell the official that he arrested the wrong person..."
The village was in turmoil all morning because of Li Ergou's case. Widow Li's heart-wrenching cries could be heard from halfway across the village. She cried out that the officials had arrested the wrong person, that her Ergou was innocent, and begged the officials to release her Ergou...
The situation continued until the end of noon, when Li Ergou was forcibly taken away by the official and Widow Li fainted.
After watching such a big commotion, the villagers returned home in silence, all feeling that Yin Zheng had gone too far.
Even though Li Ergou had stolen Jiaojiao and sold her, she was found, wasn't she? The little girl hadn't suffered much, and Li Ergou had been kicked nearly to death, and now he was lying in bed unable to get up. This punishment was already severe enough.
Moreover, the child was not Yin Zheng's bloodline, and Li Ergou knew this, so he stole the child and sold him. Yin Zheng sent Li Ergou, a fellow villager, to jail and killed him for a stranger he picked up. This is too cruel a heart.
"Bullshit!" Feng, who was already five months pregnant, couldn't help but spit when she heard what the villagers were saying in private. "It wasn't their baby that was stolen. They're talking without any hesitation. If Li Ergou steals their baby and sells it tomorrow, who knows how he'll fight back!"
"Didn't Jiaojiao get back? That's because Yin Zheng is capable. If someone else tries and still wants to get the baby back, Master Zhao will definitely give you a hard time!"
Chen touched her belly and looked up at Old Wang. "Mom, I think Yin Zheng did the right thing. If my child was stolen, I would chop him into pieces and feed him to the dogs. It doesn't hurt me, but these people are just talking nonsense with their mouths open."
Old Wang looked at Chen and Feng's bellies with delight. "I thought so too. I'll tell your father-in-law when he gets back. Your father-in-law and the elders must have had some issues with their brains from all the sun. There's no way they'd let someone like that off. If there's one, there's another. With someone like that in the village, I wouldn't dare miss my grandson tomorrow. But young Yin has a clear mind and knows that such a person shouldn't be let off."
Zhao touched her belly and hesitated, "Even though that's the case, isn't Jiaojiao alright? How could Li Ergou survive in prison with those injuries? And I heard there's been a decree from above that all kidnappers, regardless of the severity of the offense, who kidnap and sell children will be sentenced to death. Just for such a minor incident, they've taken a life. Isn't that a bit too harsh?"
As soon as she finished speaking, Mrs. Feng, Mrs. Chen, and Mrs. Wang in the room looked at her with a mixture of surprise and disbelief.
Feng rolled her eyes and said, "Mom, I have something to do in my room. I'll go over first." After saying that, she couldn't wait to leave, as if she was disgusted with staying in the same room with Zhao.
Old Wang also stood up and left with a sullen face, leaving Chen alone in the room, feeling extremely embarrassed watching the aggrieved Zhao. This was her room, and she couldn't find an excuse to leave.
Half a month passed in a blink of an eye. During this half month, Widow Li often came to Yin Zheng's house to make trouble. She even brought manure water to pour on the door several times. But for some reason, she slipped and fell several times, and the whole bucket of manure water poured all over herself.
After a few times, Widow Li stopped making trouble. However, every time she saw Yin Zheng in the village, or Jiaojiao and Qin Mianmian playing with Tiedan, she would stop and point at them and curse them, using words that were unbearable to hear.
Qin Mianmian was so angry that her face turned red. She stood up and started to curse at her. However, the eldest son of the Qin family in the capital had never been exposed to such dirty words. He kept cursing at her with words like "You are so unreasonable!" "You have a vicious tongue and will be punished!" "Evil woman!" and so on. After a while, he was crying.
Seeing Qin Mianmian crying, Jiaojiao frowned unhappily, raised her little paws and pointed at Widow Li, and was about to scold her. Tiedan and the others on the side saw that their little friend was being scolded and couldn't bear it, so they put their hands on their hips and started scolding before Jiaojiao.
Having grown up in the village, Tiedan has been immersed in the lively quarrels between the women of the village for a long time. He has learned a little bit, but he does not understand the deep meaning of it. When they start to curse, they are so unscrupulous, such as "unlucky star", "the god of death of the whole family", "beast", "evil beast", "a widow who is ridden by thousands of men and sleeps with thousands of men and is not loyal to her husband and steals men".
The children chattered loudly and energetically, and they managed to make Widow Li, who was invincible in the village, so angry that she fell backwards.
Jiaojiao and Qin Mianmian looked at Li Tiedan and the others with admiration. Meeting their friends' admiring eyes, Li Tiedan and the others scolded them even more vigorously.
The result was that at dinner that day, Li Tiedan and his friends were beaten with bamboo sticks by their mother, and they ran around their yard screaming in pain.
The next day, they limped over to play with Jiaojiao. Jiaojiao looked at their gait and asked them what was wrong. Li Tiedan wiped his nose and said proudly, "Don't worry. We didn't betray you two, so you didn't get a beating with bamboo sticks. How's that? Isn't that a sign of loyalty?"
Jiaojiao and Qin Mianmian, who had never been beaten before, tilted their heads in confusion, with a look of bewilderment in their eyes. Why didn’t they understand?
After Jiaojiao carefully learned a few swear words from Tiedan and the others, she ran home in a hurry.
My dad is always bullied. How can I stop him from being bullied?
Jiaojiao held the bottle with a thoughtful look on her face, following closely behind her father.
Yin Zheng stopped and Jiaojiao, who was thinking with her head down, didn't notice and bumped her head against his leg. She was knocked back a few steps and was about to sit on the ground. Yin Zheng reacted and stretched out his hand to pull Jiaojiao into his arms.
Jiaojiao, sitting on her father's arms, blinked blankly while holding the bottle, obviously not knowing what was going on.
"Be careful when you walk." Yin Zheng said as he put Jiaojiao into the backpack, intending to take him up the mountain.
After the last experience, he would not feel comfortable leaving Jiaojiao alone at home for a short time.
Just as Yin Zheng was about to go out with the things he needed to go up the mountain, he saw Qin Mianmian standing at the door looking at him and Jiaojiao eagerly. After thinking about it, he walked over, picked up Qin Mianmian, held her in his arms, and took her up the mountain together.
He felt more at ease knowing that Jiaojiao had such an older kid accompanying her on the mountain.
In the capital, Zhou Chenxu, whose food was thrown into the pond, pursed his lips and looked at the fat child in front of him with clear eyes.
The fat child is Zhou Yicheng, the third legitimate son of the Zhou family. Zhou Chenxu is a concubine's son. His biological mother is Aunt Zhao, a maid in his father Zhou Bingyan's room. She was promoted to concubine after she gave birth to him.
Madam Zhou was not a person of good character. The illegitimate sons and daughters who lived under her had a very hard life. The legitimate son of the Zhou family treated the illegitimate sons and daughters like slaves and maids, ordering them around and beating and scolding them at will. Among them, the five-year-old Zhou Yichen was the worst offender. The person he loved to bully the most was Zhou Chenxu, who was about the same age as him.
Some time ago, Zhou Chenxu was pushed into the pond by him and almost drowned. After lying in bed for a few days, his temperament changed subtly. He was no longer as timid as before. Instead, he inexplicably had the temperament of a young man from a noble family who was carefully raised by a noble family. He also made a lot of progress in his studies and won the favor of Old Lady Zhou.
Zhou Yicheng pointed at Zhou Chenxu and raised his chin proudly. "Even if you use some tricks to please Grandmother, I will still bully you if I want to. A bastard is a bastard. My mother said that he will never be presentable in his life."
Zhou Chenxu glanced at Zhou Bingyan, who was standing nearby and had a grim expression on his face when he heard this. He lowered his eyes and said sadly, "Third brother, you misunderstood. I was able to please Grandmother because I'm Dad's son. Grandmother loves me and everyone in my family, so she'll naturally love us younger generations. Grandmother is dissatisfied with you because she likes quietness, and you're a little too lively and noisy. As long as you act nice and please her, Grandmother won't..."
"Shut up! Who wants to please that old thing? She doesn't like me, but I don't like her even more!" Zhou Chenxu was interrupted by the angry Zhou Yichen before he could finish his words. It was obvious that his grandmother didn't like his mother, so she also disliked them. Last time, his elder sister was punished by her to copy Buddhist scriptures, and her wrists were swollen. He didn't want to please her.
Zhou Yicheng angrily took two steps forward and reached out to push him. Zhou Chenxu pretended to be afraid and moved to the side, causing Zhou Yicheng to move to the left as well. His knee accidentally hit the sharp rockery, and he staggered to the side twice in pain, bumping into Zhou Chenxu and falling into the pond together.
Zhou Chenxu only had time to shout "Third brother!" before he fell into the water. His eyes were extremely cold as he pretended to struggle while grabbing Zhou Yichen and pushing him into the water.
He really wanted to drown him, but unfortunately Zhou Bingyan came to rescue him too timely. If he had been a little slower, he would have drowned Zhou Yichen.
Zhou Chenxu closed his eyes and pretended to be dizzy, feeling sorry.
Zhou Chenxu had not expected that he would not be taken back to the mansion by Mrs. Qin to be raised.
In his plan, Mrs. Qin had just lost her beloved son and was in great grief. At this time, he appeared and looked very much like the lost Qin Zhiyi in every aspect. Mrs. Qin, who was sick with longing for her son, was overjoyed to see him suddenly. She took him back to the house and then proposed to Zhou Bingyan to adopt him as his son. It was a foregone conclusion.
No one knew what went wrong, but Mrs. Qin mistook him for Qin Zhiyi when she first saw him. She was so excited that she fainted from crying. After waking up, she did not intend to bring him back home.
Zhou Chenxu didn't understand that as a mother, no matter how much other children looked like her own child, they were just similar. She would not bring other children home and take up everything that her child should have.
However, although it did not achieve the effect Zhou Chenxu expected, after learning about his situation in the Zhou Mansion, Mrs. Qin still could not remain indifferent to watching this child who looked 80% like her own child being treated like this.
She sent people to deliver things to the Zhou Mansion every now and then. As long as Zhou Bingyan knew that the Qin Mansion valued and liked this child who looked like Mianmian, Zhou Chenxu's life in the Zhou Mansion would be much easier.
Although the Zhou family's backyard is managed by Madam Zhou, as long as the male owner Zhou Bingyan is willing to pay more attention to Zhou Chenxu, she dare not do anything too much. After all, the right of a female housekeeper in the backyard is ultimately given by a man.
On the mountain, Jiaojiao and Qin Mianmian were sitting under a tree eating berries. As they were eating, they felt something bump into their buttocks. With the berries in their mouths, Jiaojiao looked back in confusion and met a pair of watery deer eyes.
"?" Jiaojiao, who had never seen such a creature before, tilted her head in confusion: "Brother Mianmian, what is this?"
Qin Mianmian got closer and looked carefully again and again, then hesitantly said: "This should be a fawn!"
The reason for his hesitation was that this deer was a little different from the deer he had seen before, and it was white, and he had never seen a white deer before.
"Little deer?" Jiaojiao looked at the little deer in front of her and tentatively touched its head with her hand.
Seeing that the little deer didn't hide, Jiaojiao couldn't help but smile.
The little deer let Jiaojiao touch his head, and when Jiaojiao withdrew her hand, the deer walked forward and nudged Jiaojiao's hand with its nose.
Jiaojiao, who was being helped, looked at the berries in his hand, then at the little deer that was looking at him eagerly, and handed the berries in his hand to the little deer: "Here."
The little deer nudged Jiaojiao to express its gratitude before lowering its head to eat the berries. Its wet tongue swept across Jiaojiao's hand, causing Jiaojiao to laugh and shrink back.
Qin Mianmian looked at it curiously and reached out to touch the deer. Unexpectedly, the deer, which was busy eating berries, took a step back to avoid his hand, trotted behind Jiaojiao and hid itself, then vigilantly stuck its head out to look at Qin Mianmian and hid again.
Qin Mianmian: “?”
Does he look scary?
This little deer is a little timid, but it is not afraid of Jiaojiao. Qin Mianmian doesn’t understand this.
Yin Zheng was a bit surprised to see the little deer when he returned. He had seen this kind of deer before when he was in the army. This kind of deer is called an elk, much larger than the average sika deer. Logically, there are no such deer in Wushan. This little elk appeared here, probably because it was captured by some curious merchants and was about to be sold south. But for some reason, it escaped along the way.
Yin Zheng glanced at the shivering elk hiding behind Jiaojiao because of fear of him, then squatted down and tied up the prey in his hand.
Strangely enough, every time he brought Jiaojiao to the mountain, his luck became surprisingly good. For example, this time, in addition to the prey, he also picked a ginseng and two Polygonum multiflorum. These medicinal herbs were all found next to Jiaojiao.
Jiaojiao patted the deer's head and ran to his father. He took out the biggest and reddest berries he had specially collected from his pocket and handed them to his father: "Dad——"
Yin Zheng skillfully lowered his head and took a bite of the berry in his hand.
When Jiaojiao and her father were going down the mountain, the timid little deer followed them down the mountain with its hooves. Jiaojiao, lying in her father's arms, saw it and pointed at the little deer, looking up at her father: "Dad, little deer."
Yin Zheng glanced back, then lowered his head to look into Jiaojiao's bright eyes and suddenly asked, "Do you want to raise her?"
"Yes!" Jiaojiao nodded heavily: "Dad, Jiaojiao wants to!"
Yin Zheng patted his head and said, "Well, then, raise him."
Although the deer was small, its four hooves moved very quickly. Yin Zheng didn't have to wait for it before it caught up with him.
I followed Jiaojiao and the others down the mountain. The deer stopped at the door at the foot of the mountain and stood outside the door a little hesitantly. Jiaojiao, who had just gotten out of her father's arms, saw it and ran to the door and waved, "Come in!"
When he shouted, the deer really ran in. Qin Mianmian was very curious and ran to Jiaojiao and quietly asked Jiaojiao why the deer listened to him so much.
Jiaojiao shook her head: "I don't know."
"Is that why you feed it berries?"
"have no idea."
"Do you have any berries left? I'll try feeding it."
Jiaojiao lowered her head and rummaged in her pocket for a long time before pulling out a berry: "Here."
Qin Mianmian took the berries and ran towards the deer excitedly. The deer started running as soon as it saw him. The man and the deer ran around the yard, and as they ran, their range narrowed to circling Jiaojiao.
Jiaojiao tilted her head in confusion: "Huh?"
Jiaojiao, who couldn't understand what they were doing, ran to squat beside her father who was building a fence for the fawn. She looked up and said to him, "Dad, Jiaojiao can help."
Yin Zheng glanced at Jiaojiao, who looked like a tiny figure squatting beside him, and raised the corner of his mouth: "Help me get the things."
Jiaojiao's eyes curved with joy, and she said crisply, "Okay!"
Qin Mianmian and Xiaolu were both stubborn. They chased each other around the yard for the entire afternoon. Finally, they were so tired that they sat on the ground with their backs to each other, breathing heavily.
After catching her breath, Qin Mianmian got up from the ground, walked over to Jiaojiao and squatted down: "Jiaojiao, you have to give the deer a name."
Jiaojiao reached out and scratched her face: "Why?"
"Because you raised it, you have to give it a name."
Jiaojiao frowned and thought for a moment before finally deciding, "Call me Yoyo."
"Yoyo?" Qin Mianmian was very curious about why Jiaojiao gave it such a name: "Why is it called Yoyo?"
"Because it can make a yo-yo sound." Jiaojiao said and imitated the deer's yo-yo sound twice.
Qin Mianmian thought about it and it was true, so she accepted the little deer's call of Yoyo.
"Yoyo, come here." Jiaojiao called to Yoyo behind her.
The little deer lying on the ground tilted its head, and as if it really understood, it stood up from the ground and walked to Jiaojiao, nudging Jiaojiao with its head.
The squatting Jiaojiao was pushed down by it and fell to the ground with his buttocks. When Youyou saw Jiaojiao fall, the little deer looked a little panicked and hurried to push Jiaojiao to help him up. As a result, Jiaojiao, who had just supported himself to stand up, was pushed down by it and fell to the ground again.
Not knowing why Yoyo wouldn't let him get up, Jiaojiao blinked blankly. Confused, he reached out to his father beside him for help: "Daddy, hold me."
Yoyo was raised at Jiaojiao's house for more than ten days before she dared to go out to the yard to play with Jiaojiao and the others. Tiedan and the others looked at Yoyo with curiosity and envy. But it was a deer. There were people raising pigs, mules, and cattle in the village, but this was the first time they saw people raising deer.
In the surrounding villages, Jiaojiao is the only one who raises a deer, and it’s white. Wouldn’t it be very impressive if he took it out?
While Tiedan and the others were trying to figure out how to borrow Yoyo from Jiaojiao to save face, the villagers who learned that Jiaojiao had a deer were increasingly confused by Yin Zheng. Not only had he picked up another child when he brought Jiaojiao home, but why had he now taken care of a deer, named it, and made it yoyo-yo all day long? It looked like he wasn't planning on raising it and eating it. What was his goal?
"Jiaojiao, look what that is?" Tiedan on the tree pointed at a black object flying in the sky in the distance.
Jiaojiao looked up: "No, nothing."
"Over there, there's a huge dark area."
Jiaojiao stood on tiptoe and looked over there. Sure enough, he saw the black thing that Tiedan had mentioned. Before he could say anything in confusion, the villagers shouted at the top of their lungs: "Locusts, the Locust Queen is coming!"
The hoarse shouts were filled with unconcealable panic and despair.
An elderly man came out of the house, looking towards the direction where the locusts were flying with fear in his eyes, kneeling on the ground and kowtowing, praying to the Locust Goddess to spare the crops in their fields. The village chief quickly organized people to pick up tools to kill the locusts. Children over five or six years old in the village were using nets that were used to catch cicadas to catch locusts. However, these efforts seemed powerless and futile in the face of the locust swarms that covered the sky.
The autumn harvest was approaching, and the crops that they had managed to preserve under the scorching sun by fetching water from the river day and night were about to be destroyed by locusts.
How could this not make the villagers, who regarded crops as their lifeblood, despair? While swatting the locusts, they couldn't help crying and cursing, their expressions full of unconcealable panic and helplessness.
Jiaojiao, standing on the slope, stared blankly at the scene, not understanding how the village had become like this in the blink of an eye, his eyes filled with confusion.
Yin Zheng picked up Jiaojiao and held her in his arms. Jiaojiao subconsciously buried her head in her father's arms and rubbed it. The young Jiaojiao didn't understand what the locusts represented, but she instinctively disliked this atmosphere.
Two-in-one, the update schedule has been a bit chaotic in recent days, but I will try my best to update as much as possible~
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