Chapter 341
He hadn't returned yet after Wang Jiazhi left, so A-ma asked, "Are Mrs. Yi and the others okay?"
Every time she came back from there, her mother would ask her the same question. She didn't know how they knew that there was always a Hongmen Banquet over there.
She smiled and said, "It's fine." Then she shook the bracelet on her hand and said, "He bought one for Mrs. Yi, saying that this year the husband should buy his wife a gold bracelet to ward off disasters. I went over and saw that I had one on my hand too, but I didn't say a word. I was wondering why he had to buy this bracelet for me to wear."
Grandma said, "These ladies are always competing with each other. If I didn't have this, I would be ridiculed to death by them today."
The little girl was holding her child in the kitchen, watching red bean and fermented rice balls being cooked. At this moment, she came over with the child in her arms and said, "Look, mommy is back."
Wang Jiazhi took off her coat, took the child and went upstairs.
The little girl and her mother whispered, "They say the eldest wife said we need to buy a gold bracelet and pay for it out of our husband's pocket to ward off disaster. But to my surprise, it's not just a gold bracelet, but she insisted on having six or seven gemstones inlaid on it. Isn't that a case of acting first and asking for permission later? The gentleman would probably be surprised when he sees the bill. How many gold bracelets can this buy?"
"Money is secondary," said A-ma. "The eldest wife's behavior this time was quite inappropriate. She had asked the master for it properly, and he would not have refused to buy it for her. But she had to use ulterior motives. He hates being schemed against. This behavior is too unbecoming of a wife, and it's more like the behavior of a concubine."
The little girl said, "Mother over there also said that ever since this aunt came into being, the eldest wife over there has become too petty. She's been the head of the family for most of her life, acting so self-centeredly that she can't even have a child, and no man has ever said a word against her. She's old and ugly now, and who wouldn't have played with a few women outside? And she's still not satisfied. She hasn't brought anyone home, so what else does she want? We're just pampering her."
Grandma said, "When we brought her from the countryside and took her out to meet people for the first time, she had never had coffee before, and didn't know how to add sugar or milk. She guzzled the whole cup in one gulp, then vomited it all out. She couldn't eat the food on the table, and she choked and coughed non-stop. Her husband never said a word about her shame, and even patted her on the back. But she went back home and made a big fuss about it, wanting people to think her husband loved her. Look, she's been putting on airs ever since. Only two or three years later, she's back home, acting all pretentious and city-savvy. When anyone brings it up again, she keeps a straight face and says nothing, ashamed. She wasn't the one who said it herself back then. Now, holding a coffee cup, she's telling people, 'This porcelain is really good German porcelain. Look at the glaze.' Does she still remember how embarrassing it was when she vomited up her first cup of coffee, and kept saying it was because the Chinese medicine soup was too bad?"
The little girl said, "Nowadays, they always talk about how the wife of a certain emperor caused a scene, smashed the mansion to pieces, and beat up everyone close to her. They mean to compare themselves to her and think they are so magnanimous."
Amma said, "Even if she doesn't want to be magnanimous, she has to have her own reasons. That guy's wife is a rich lady. Back then, that guy was a poor boy from the countryside, with a wife and children back home. His wife, an unmarried young lady, didn't mind his poverty or the fact that he had a wife and children. She had a falling out with her family and eloped with him to study abroad. They suffered a lot and were a couple who shared hardships. No matter what, she has the reasons to make a fuss. That guy is also dishonest, having a lot of fun outside, but people just turned a blind eye and pretended not to know anything until it got out of hand. If she hadn't seen that he was serious this time, she wouldn't have made such a fuss. Unlike this one, she didn't do anything and sent the successor here herself. It wasn't her who arranged our aunt."
He didn't come back that day, but he called at eight o'clock and asked, "How are you? Have you been bullied?"
She laughed and said, "I was saying that they had to give me a bracelet like this. I was wondering why they didn't say anything when I took off my coat and revealed the bracelet. You're such a fool! It's not worth buying such an expensive thing."
"Didn't you say we should avoid disasters this year?"
"Just buy a gold one to avoid disasters. So many stones, it's too extravagant. I..." She wanted to say that she wasn't the legal wife, so she didn't need to wear it at all. But she was afraid that if she said it, he would be unhappy.
"That's it for now. I won't be back today. Go to bed early."
"Okay~ Wanna talk to Dad on the phone?"
She put the receiver to the child's ear, and the child smiled and babbled.
Old Yi listened to the child for a while, then put down the phone with a smile.
His expression quickly turned fierce, and he said he would not sleep tonight.
He went down to an interrogation room, where Old Wu was hanging.
He laughed and said, "How come your basic skills are so poor? You can't even take the medicine in time."
Old Wu glared at him, teeth bared in anger, his whole body trembling violently. He'd always told others to take medicine before being arrested, but when it came to him, he was too afraid to commit suicide. Even though he knew he couldn't endure the torture, he always held on to a glimmer of hope, perhaps there was still a chance for him to survive. Now that he was there, he sawed through a flood of horrific scenes, as if he'd experienced them himself. Someone peeled the skin off one of his legs, scraping away the flesh piece by piece, slowly sawing at his leg with a rusty, dull saw...
"Ah!!!" he screamed in horror.
He smiled and said, "Yuankai, pick whichever one you like. We're old colleagues, so I have to take care of you."
Old Wu kept shouting, "You will not die well! You will not die well!"
Old Yi turned his head away in disgust. He was being too noisy. Old Yi ordered someone to pour pepper spray on the person across from Old Wu. This person wasn't from their side, but rather a matter between their internal factions.
"Fill it! Fill his nose too. Be careful, don't let him die before both buckets are filled!"
One man had his mouth gagged with a rope while another inserted a funnel into his mouth and poured chili water into it, scoop by scoop. He howled in agony, his eyes bloodshot and tearing from the sting. If it weren't winter, the chili water would evaporate quickly in the summer, and even in this room, the pain would have been so intense that it would have brought tears to his eyes.
The other torturer across from him said, "Director, I'll start with one leg. You can try the severity first, and then we'll slowly move on to the other three." He then used a rope to tightly bind one leg to a long wooden stick. Afterward, he pulled a pulley to twist the stick, the so-called "sick plum." In an instant, the place became a living hell.
Old Wu's limbs were tied with iron chains. He was so scared that his whole body was shaking, and the iron chains made a rattling sound.
The next day, Wang Jiazhi went to the magazine to discuss the next novel. When she came back, the little girl said she had asked someone to send her some wontons stuffed with wild celery. Would she like to cook them for lunch? He must have eaten something delicious somewhere and wanted to send them back raw.
"I won't eat it anymore. I'll eat it tonight."
She took off her coat and went upstairs. She saw the baby being held by the nanny. Seeing her return, the baby laughed out loud with joy. What a cute little kitten.
She took it in her arms, kissing and rubbing it like her sweetheart.
He came back at three o'clock in the afternoon, looking a little tired. He didn't sleep all night yesterday and stayed up until this time again today.
When his mother asked him if he wanted to eat, he shook his head.
When I went upstairs, I saw her wearing a white pajamas, lying on her back and sleeping. The kitten was also wearing a white dress made of the same fabric, and was sleeping soundly with its head resting on its mother's chest.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, smiling as he watched the kitten and the little one. He gently stroked her hair. The little one had a full, beautiful forehead, but bangs would spoil it. Her forehead, white as a bud about to bloom, was most beautiful when exposed. Some girls are very beautiful, but they wear bangs year-round. If they comb their bangs up, they suddenly become less beautiful. One of the most ruthless ways to test a girl's appearance is to comb her hair completely up, revealing her entire face without any obstruction. If that's still pretty enough, then it's truly beautiful.
Mrs. Ma is a recognized beauty. Lao Yi also thinks she is beautiful and has spoiled her for a while. However, Mrs. Ma's beauty is the type that is stunning at first sight and has no lingering effect. The temperament she exudes is also the purest charm, nothing else. The ladies said that Mrs. Ma was prettier than Wang Jiazhi, and Lao Yi only found out about it later. At the beginning, when he just treated her as a plaything, Lao Yi also thought that Wang Jiazhi was prettier than Mrs. Ma. In his eyes, Mrs. Ma was beautiful and Wang Jiazhi was beautiful. Beauty is simply the exquisiteness of facial features, while beauty is not only about appearance, but also includes too many good things. Whether in appearance or temperament, Wang Jiazhi has too much lingering effect.
Wang Jiazhi is the kind of woman who, at first glance, seems beautiful, though not stunning. The more you look at her, the more beautiful she becomes, a beauty that begs to be discovered. Her temperament is like the beauty of lotus blossoms in the marshes of the Book of Songs, a single white lotus in a pond, a poetic scene every moment and every day.
In their previous life, when they'd just been together, she'd tilted her head back, eyes closed, her long, butterfly-like eyelashes trembling slightly, her lips softly whimpering. He couldn't believe the way she looked. She was completely lost in lust, even twisting her body wildly in response, yet she was as pure as a lotus emerging from the water, an orchid in the depths of a valley. He'd played with so many women, but this was the first time he'd seen her like this.
Wang Jiazhi always exudes a pure, aloof beauty and a charming charm, and these two temperaments are equally matched, with neither overshadowing the other. This huge contrast and split personality is irresistible.
In reality, Lao Yi himself didn't realize it, but he possessed a number of these contradictions. Wang Jiazhi found the boys around her rather boring, partly because their personalities seemed a bit bland to her. Lao Yi could be fierce, sometimes gentle, sometimes with eyes as tearful as a kitten's or a puppy's, gazing at you with pity or tenderness, like a pure, innocent boy. Indeed, despite his age, he possessed many boyish qualities. It wasn't just his eyes; he simply didn't realize it.
At this time, the kitten woke up and smiled excitedly at him. Although Wang Jiazhi and the nanny took care of her the most, the little one seemed to know how to recognize her parents now and was much closer to them than to other people.
He picked it up and went to the next room to pet the kitten, making sure not to wake up its mother.
She woke up and felt herself being held like a rag doll, with him sleeping soundly beside her.
You look very tired. What did you do yesterday?
She reached out and touched his drooping hair. Even though this guy is middle-aged, with his hair down, he sometimes really looks like a little boy.
Soon he woke up too. Both of them were still half asleep, hugging each other tighter and tighter.
When he asked about what happened yesterday, she laughed and said, "You really are such a fool. Why did you give such an expensive gift? Mrs. Yi must be sad."
He took up her little hand, which looked even whiter and thinner with the ruby and gold bracelet.
"It has nothing to do with her. I'd rather believe it."
Wang Jiazhi hesitated to speak, wanting to say that the one who believed him was his legal wife, so what did it have to do with her.
In his heart, she was certainly more important than his wife. He knew Mrs. Yi was being evasive, but he still considered buying her one. He knew women were better at choosing things like jewelry and clothes, and at his age, he wouldn't have the confidence to pick something for a young woman like her. But this time, they insisted he personally give it to her, and his interest piqued. He decided to actually pick one out for her to see how she would react. He'd been debating what to get her, but when the jewelry store bill arrived, he realized Mrs. Yi had bought so many gemstone bracelets.
In the past, he wouldn't have cared less. A woman's tinkering with expensive things wasn't a big deal to him once in a while. But lately, she seemed to be making a fuss, which made him a little angry. Since she'd bought something so expensive, he naturally had to give Wang Jiazhi something comparable. Thinking of Mrs. Liang's pride in bringing her concubine, he also anticipated that Mrs. Yi might be using this to humiliate Wang Jiazhi. So, buying her something comparable wasn't enough; it had to be better than hers.
Wang Jiazhi said, "Of course I'm happy that you gave me something, but there's no need to act like I'm competing with her. I don't care."
In her previous life, Old Yi had asked her to move in here, and Mrs. Yi was deeply shocked. One day, she woke up from her sleep and heard Mrs. Liang comforting her in the living room, "No matter how good she is, she was just a casual couple. How can she compare to you, a married couple with decades of love. If I really had to choose one, it would definitely be you. Her Mrs. Mai could never replace you, Mrs. Yi. Who is the real one with his last name?"
Wang Jiazhi had never considered herself to be anything special to him, or that she was that important. But hearing that still stung her. It was true; they were a married couple, having been together through thick and thin. She was nothing, just one of his many women. Even though he liked her a little more than the others and put a little more effort into her, that was all. A week later, she died.
At that time, they were sitting on a car going to the quarry. She felt that the car was particularly large and empty. Although the guard had a light in his hand, the light was still very dim. They all lowered their heads dejectedly, their bodies hunched, and they could hear the sound of their teeth chattering. In the dim light, they couldn't see their faces clearly. They were just blurry, gray shadows without any edges. The brighter spots were tears on their faces. She remembered the story of the reincarnation of water ghosts. The drowned people became water ghosts, and then waited on the shore at night for living people to pass by. They would emerge from the river covered in mud and water plants, and grab a living person to use as their scapegoat, so that they could reincarnate again. Don't these five people look like water ghosts now? But she was alone, and they only caught her. No wonder they failed.
The two guards holding lanterns sat one beside her and the other opposite her. The five people were very far away from her and also very far away from the light. They were wearing dirty and dull clothes in the dim light. Although their fearful and decadent expressions could not be seen clearly, one could still feel the cowardly and disgusting aura coming from them.
Under the light, she wore a khaki trench coat, revealing a purple cheongsam and a blue diamond brooch underneath. The light from the gemstones reflected on her beautiful face, leaving a few bright spots. Her eyes were bright, and the sparkling gemstones in them made them even brighter. Under the night light, she was so quiet and beautiful.
When the two guards saw her, they were in a daze and didn't know what day it was. The girl in front of them didn't look like she was on her way to execution. It seemed like she was going to some wonderful place, where she would bloom like a flower and be her most beautiful self.
The ride was very bumpy, but the bumps made her feel relaxed and fun. She remembered a time when her uncle took her on a bicycle when she was little. The road was very bumpy, and they laughed happily every time they got bumpy. She was only four or five at the time. When she got home, her grandmother complained about her uncle's mischief. What would she do if he fell?
Children of that age don't have many memories, so she was very surprised that she suddenly remembered it. There was also a time when she was four or five years old, she was wearing a bright red dress and a red crabapple flower on her head, and her mother was holding her and spinning happily.
She also remembered that when she was twelve years old, her mother made her a light blue dress with pink rose flowers. She wore it directly and everyone in the tailor shops she passed by said it was so beautiful.
In the morning, my grandmother returned with a basket filled with plums and white apricots covered in dew, and a bunch of white orchids beside them. My grandmother wiped a white apricot clean with her clothes, woke her up, and told her to eat apricots and plums. After eating several, she said, "You can't eat any more. Eating too much will make you sick. Peaches nourish you, apricots hurt you, and under the plum tree, you'll be buried."
She asked, "Then why do people still grow apricots and plums and eat them?"
Grandma said, "If you eat less, it won't hurt you. It's like the saying goes, 'When the moon is full, it wanes.' Everything should be done in moderation."
"What does it mean when the moon waxes and wanes?"
Grandma strung the white orchids she had picked into a bracelet for her to wear, saying, "You'll understand when you grow up."
When she was in middle school, she wore a light pink dress with white butterflies to school. People behind her whispered, "That's Wang Jiazhi. She's a very good student, always gets first place in exams. She's also very beautiful, and her painting skills are famous throughout the school."
At this moment, she suddenly remembered that her mother, grandmother, and uncle were all gone.
She grew up, but had nothing but suffering, and this suffering was not a loss.
When she was sixteen, her mother passed away. She threw herself on her body and cried. She later lived on her own. She didn't recall the nightmare she had after encountering the group of ghosts she had met earlier. She didn't want to bring bad luck to herself before she died.
She also suddenly remembered the conversation between Mrs. Liang and Mrs. Yi at that time. After she died, he continued to lead a busy life as usual. Mahjong was played at home day and night. The wives continued to laugh and quarrel with each other, and he continued to change women.
Everyone wants to leave something behind in this world, and she wanted to leave something behind too. But the more time went by, the more she realized that even if she tried her best, she wouldn't be able to leave anything behind. It was like the people of ancient times, who, during famine, traded their children for food, sold their daughters, and forced women into prostitution. In the end, all they left behind was: famine, cannibalism. Those few pitiful words. Not even as many as the words Yang Guifei's skirt has etched in history books.
I am just a grain of sand in the vast ocean, destined to leave nothing behind.
Before she went to college, she'd always been the top student. Back then, she was incredibly unyielding. After entering college, due to family setbacks and the university being overcrowded with talented students, it was no longer possible to get the top spot. That unyielding spirit was somewhat tempered. Otherwise, she wouldn't have been so blinded as to join the group in the corner. But at this moment, her former pride returned. She looked at their bleak backs. What if they ruined her? They were just a bunch of losers, asking for trouble. After all, she had been happy. She was still the top student among them.
The guards treated her very well, speaking softly as if they were afraid to scare her, unlike the others who yelled and beat her. She thought it was because she was Lao Yi's lover, and they wanted to give her some respect.
That was just one point. Although they were Secretary Zhang's men, Old Yi was usually kind to his subordinates, and they still respected him. But more importantly, this was the first time they had ever seen a woman like this. Others who came here were either determined to die rather than surrender, or unable to withstand the confession. Few were fearless. She, such a young girl, surprisingly showed no fear at all; even on this journey to death, she remained calm and serene.
Look at those guys again. Their legs went weak the moment they walked in. After a few beatings, they rushed out to tell everything without waiting for questions. A few grown men, so spineless. And that squinty-eyed woman, she wanted to speak, but she was so frightened that her words were incoherent and her answers were irrelevant to the questions asked. It was so annoying.
On the way, Wang Jiazhi wondered where she would go after she died. Home? She had no home to return to. Looking for her mother? She didn't have the face to ask for her mother. Looking for him? She didn't know if he would still be willing to let her go with him.
Secretary Zhang had always disliked Wang Jiazhi, sharing the same sentiments as those other wives: "There are so many better women out there, but they'd settle for this one." But ever since then, he'd come to admire her. That day in that hellish den, under the nightlight, she was so noble and beautiful, gleaming like a diamond. She wasn't stupid at all, and in the end, she didn't say a single word against him.
For a long time after that, Secretary Zhang saw Lao Yi's back and thought to himself, "Why do you do that?"
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