Chapter 12 Not Going Back: "Before leaving home, I repeatedly told him that if he could find the time the next day, he absolutely must remember to send Granny Feng..."
"Before I left home, I repeatedly told her that if she could find the time the next day, she must remember to send Granny Feng back. I have something to ask her. Is it because your in-laws have strict rules that the people around you can't leave?"
Even if a newly married daughter's family is worried, they can't send someone to check on her the very next day. If they did, no matter how polite and considerate they were, it would leave a lingering resentment between the two families.
Therefore, Madam Xu instructed her daughter to secretly have Granny Feng return, firstly to ask her daughter how she was doing in the Hesheli family, and secondly to see what kind of rules and regulations the Hesheli family, which produced figures like Sony, Soetu, and Empress Yuan, had.
Madam Xu had thought things through thoroughly, but she couldn't prevent her daughter from having her soul replaced. Shen Wanqing was busy establishing connections with this world at the time, and her request was completely swallowed up by the vast amount of knowledge she was given. It wasn't until Madam Xu asked her about it that Shen Wanqing remembered that such a thing had happened.
"You really forgot?"
"Oh, I really forgot."
"I think your brain is useless; you can forget everything, so what can you remember?"
Looking at Shen Wanqing's somewhat unfocused gaze, it was clear that she had only just remembered this matter. She had initially thought that her daughter seemed more composed and calm after getting married, even her eyes were different from before. But now, seeing this, she realized that she was still her troublesome little girl.
"Tell me, how have you been at Hesheli's house these past few days? This marriage is a good one, but their family is large and they've already separated their households. It's not ideal for two branches of the family to live under one roof. I'm afraid you won't be able to handle it and will suffer losses."
After complaining about her daughter, Xu pulled Shen Wanqing to sit close to her side. Her slightly damp and warm palms held her daughter's hand tightly, rubbing it back and forth. No matter how she squeezed it, she felt that her daughter was still a bit thinner.
“Mother, why didn’t you say these things before I got married? You always talked about how good his family was. Now that I’m married, it’s too late to say it’s bad.”
"You're really stupid to say you're not smart. If I had told you all this earlier, would you have refused to marry me? Your marriage to Yulang has been arranged by both families. Even if it rains knives from the sky, there can't be any mistakes."
In this world, it's always the woman who suffers in matchmaking. If a marriage is arranged but doesn't happen, Yu Lang can at most postpone it for a couple of years, and then he'll still find a wife. But Shen Wanqing will never be able to find a good family again.
If she was lucky, Xu would manage to marry her daughter off far away from the capital through her relatives and acquaintances; otherwise, she would only be able to become someone's second wife.
"Don't interrupt me. You have to tell me everything, whether things have been good or not. If they're good, then fine. But if they're not, I'll have to come up with a solution for you."
Xu gave birth to three children for the Shen family. The eldest, Shen Wanyun, was twenty-five years old and married into Shengjing eight years ago. Her husband was a military officer in Shengjing. Their home was only two streets away from the eldest son's house. Shen Wanyun had always been shrewd and capable, so she never suffered any losses.
Shen Wenyuan, the son, is twenty-two years old this year. He passed the imperial examination two years ago and became a scholar. Before Shen Wanqing got married, her sister-in-law Qin Lin had just given birth to a daughter. The couple was enjoying a loving time with their wife and child.
Shen Wanqing has a younger sister and a younger brother. The sister is seven years old and the brother is five years old. They were both born to Aunt Pan in the family. Xu Shi never mistreated the two children, but to say that she cared about them day and night was just a lie she told Shen Hongshi.
So, right now, the only one Xu Shi is worried about is Shen Wanqing. This second daughter is quiet and unassuming at home, and sometimes when Xu Shi is too busy, it's common for her not to see her for three to five days.
It wasn't until Shen Wanqing was actually getting married that Madam Xu became so worried that she couldn't sleep for nights on end. She suddenly realized that she had taught her second daughter too little over the years, and now she had so much to tell her daughter, but it was all too late.
Since Madam Xu wanted to hear, Shen Wanqing didn't hide anything and told her everything about the conflicts between the two branches of the Hesheli family, the seemingly distant and indifferent mother-in-law, the shrewish and mean-spirited sister-in-law, and the old lady who only knew how to smooth things over.
"My mother-in-law is easy to deal with. The eldest son's family has two children to raise. Whether they are distant or close is just a matter of appearances. They don't have that much energy to spare for me."
"The old lady is getting old. Besides her aunt Fuxuan and second aunt, she is very close to her. I just sit by her side. This morning before I came back, I went to the main courtyard to pay my respects. I only said three sentences in total."
"My aunt is in a bit of a predicament. Although she was picking on me, I realized from her words that she actually favored the eldest son's family. It seems like she wanted Yulang to find her a good family in the capital."
After working for a long time, Shen Wanqing also understood a principle. Don't always be stubborn and assertive. When you can leverage others' strengths, don't be arrogant. Sometimes, being unnecessarily assertive will only make you suffer.
Sure enough, when Xu heard her daughter say this, she immediately took charge of the matter. "Don't worry about this. It's not something a child like you can rush. I've noted down Fuxuan's marriage proposal. If there are any good ones, I'll think of them for her. Whether it works out or not, it's all up to you, her nephew's wife."
"Thank you, Mother. I knew you loved me and cared for me. If this had really fallen on my shoulders, I wouldn't know what to do."
The second daughter rarely acted so sweetly and obediently, clinging to her arm and acting coquettishly. Xu Shi couldn't even guess what her daughter's coquettishness really meant. She could only raise her hand to touch Shen Wanqing's cheek and tentatively ask, "How is the son-in-law? Has he been mistreated at his house these past few days?"
"No, really no, Mother, you can ask Granny Feng if you don't believe me." The original owner rarely received such care and affection from Madam Xu, and for some reason, a surge of bitterness welled up in her heart, making her eyes red. "I just feel that it's better to stay at home than to get married."
"Silly child." Xu wanted to say that she should never mention such childish words again, but when the words reached her lips, she felt her throat tighten and she almost couldn't hold back her sobs, so she swallowed them back. She just hugged Shen Wanqing even tighter.
With a new son-in-law arriving, the Shen family, with so many relatives, won't let him off easily.
When the banquet was set up at noon, Shen Wanqing was at the women's table in the inner courtyard and didn't pay attention to him. She wanted to ask Qing Shuang, who had come back with her, to go to the front courtyard and remind him to drink less at the banquet, but her two cousins-in-law stopped her.
“Look at our fifth aunt, she’s finally married. This girl who used to be so gentle and shy is now suddenly defending her own shortcomings right in front of us.”
The speaker was Helan, the eldest daughter-in-law of the Shen family. Her family was from Shengjing, and she was a colleague of her uncle, Shen Hongji, in Shengjing. After marrying her eldest cousin in Shengjing, she came to the capital with him.
The surname Helan immediately suggests that the woman is not Han Chinese. It is said that her sister-in-law's family descended from the Xianbei people, but whether this is true or not is hard to say. However, it is certain that Helan was physically robust.
Standing at 1.75 meters tall, she was half a head taller than Shen Wanqing, who was already considered tall. She became pregnant less than a month after entering the family. While it was considered auspicious for other families to have two children in three years, Helan Shi truly gave birth to two children in three years, a son and a daughter, making the whole family so happy that they didn't know how to pamper her.
She was capable. Her eldest cousin, Shen Wenbo, needed to study, so she managed all the shops and land owned by the eldest branch of the family in the capital. Her second son, Shen Wenyuan, and his wife, Zhou, had basically been living with their elder brother and sister-in-law for the past few years. They didn't have to worry about anything, so naturally, apart from their monthly allowance, they didn't get any other benefits.
Such a formidable person, her voice even had a sharp edge. The original owner used to be most afraid of this sister-in-law from the next room, mainly because she spoke so bluntly and without restraint, and the young girl was too thin-skinned to bear it.
"Well, to be honest, my sister-in-law isn't protective of her own. My older brother, with his terrible drinking capacity, dared to join in today's fun. Yulang is a scoundrel, spending all his time in the military camp. What kind of drinking capacity does he have, and what about my older brother?"
I kindly asked the maid to remind him to tone it down, but since my sister-in-law says so, I won't go. Let's see if Yulang has a better alcohol tolerance today, or if my brother can drink more."
"This..." He was so focused on the large number of Shen family members that he forgot Yu Lang was a son of the Hesheli family. It is said that no matter how well the men of the Hesheli family are educated, they are not allowed to lag behind in horsemanship. It is not surprising that such a warrior has a good capacity for alcohol. If Shen Wenbo were to have a drinking contest with him, it would be hard to say what the outcome would be.
Helan, in her moment of impulsiveness, no longer cared about embarrassing herself. She quickly whispered a few words to her maid, who then hurriedly went to the front courtyard. As for Shen Wanqing, having already made her statement, whether Yulang could survive today truly depended on his own fate.
Yu Lang had no idea how big a hole his great-grandmother had dug for him. Anyway, after the homecoming banquet at noon, he was carried back by his brother-in-law Shen Wenyuan and Chang Shun.
Before Shen Wanqing got married, she lived with her half-sister Shen Wan in the small courtyard behind Shen Hongshi and Xu Shi. After she got married, her family still kept Shen Wanqing's room. Today, knowing that her husband was accompanying her aunt back, Aunt Pan took Shen Wanhe to her place last night.
"Grandma dug a huge hole for me, what am I going to do? I'm afraid I won't be able to go back today."
The maidservant beside Helan was just like her. When asked to go to the front yard to deliver a message, she brazenly told Shen Wenbo that the eldest mistress was worried that the eldest master couldn't outdrink the fifth son-in-law, and told him to be careful.
Upon hearing this, everyone in the front courtyard burst into laughter, insisting that Helan knew her fifth son-in-law could drink. The little maidservant, unfazed, quickly and fluently exposed Shen Wanqing's true nature.
Shen Wanqing's attitude was extremely good at this moment. Firstly, she knew that Yulang had really been tricked by her this time. Secondly, ever since she entered this boudoir, the tension that Shen Wanqing had been holding back all day suddenly relaxed. Shen Wanqing instinctively wanted to stay in this room a little longer.
"You get some sleep first. I'll have Changshun go home and tell them we'll go back a little later."
"I'm not going back."
"What?"
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