As long as the whole family saw Wen Ziqing and He Jingjing sleeping in the same bed, and as long as He Jingjing kept pestering Wen Ziqing, this time, Wen Ziqing would definitely be doomed. At the very least, Zhou Yuanyuan had to know Wen Ziqing's true face and have a falling out with him.
"Okay, remember to shout louder tomorrow morning." He Jingjing didn't want to say anything more to Wen Ziyun. She walked to the door, gently opened a crack, looked around to see if there was anyone in the corridor, and then slipped out.
Wen Ziyun watched He Jingjing leisurely return to her room, then turned around and slowly walked to the table and sat down on the rattan chair in front of the table.
After reaching out to turn off the bedside lamp, Wen Ziyun skillfully picked up a pack of cigarettes from the table, took out a cigarette, and put it in his mouth.
The light of the cigarette butt flickered in the darkness, just like Wen Ziyun's uneasy mood at the moment.
Wu Xiuli had been unhappy lately. First, all the money she'd saved for so many years was gone, then she had a falling out with her family. And then, Wen Yulong scolded her so badly that he almost came to blows.
After being kicked out by Wen Yiran, Wu Xiuli and Wen Yulong rented a house in a slum and lived a tight life.
Wen Yulong and his family are currently renting a large compound with eight rooms housing six families. Except for Wen Yulong and his wife and a newly married young couple, every family has elderly and children.
The room was only about 20 square meters, heavily partitioned, barely big enough for sleeping. Therefore, each family placed a coal stove by the door, where they cooked everything. When it came time to cook, the air in the courtyard mingled with the fumes of coal, oil, and cooking. For the first time in Wen Yulong's life, this was the first time he had ever experienced such a down-to-earth lifestyle.
Wu Xiuli had lived this kind of life in her youth. Although she was a little uncomfortable at first, the skill of lighting a stove was deeply ingrained in her mind, and after a day or two, she became proficient. However, it was difficult for Wen Yulong. It was easy to go from frugality to luxury, but it was difficult to go from luxury to frugality. The huge gap in life made Wen Yulong unable to sleep well for several nights.
Every night, when everyone was asleep, Wen Yulong would reflect on himself. He truly didn't understand why his life had become like this. Since childhood, Wen Yulong had always been under the aura of Wen Yiran. Even during Wen Yiran's downfall, Wen Yulong had been under the protection of the Wen family and hadn't suffered a single hardship.
Being successful at a young age is the best description of Wen Yulong.
It was precisely because Wen Yulong had never experienced the hardships of life that he resented the marriage Wen Yiran had arranged for him, ultimately ending up with Wu Xiuli. Wen Yulong had once believed that his life would become increasingly successful as he progressed, that reaching middle age, he would be full of energy and ambition, reaching new heights, like the Cao family's brothers-in-law, each holding a position he now admired. Yet, he was clearly someone others admired too!
Wen Yulong refused to accept this. He was clearly a very talented and promising officer, so how could one mistake wipe out all his previous hard work? More than ten days passed, and due to the Lunar New Year holiday, Wen Yulong's transfer to a new unit hadn't been finalized. These days, Wen Yulong stayed home, afraid to leave the house, for fear of running into anyone he knew.
Wen Yulong placed all his hopes on Wu Xiuli's eldest sister, Wu Xiuyun. Wu Xiuyun was a genuine "immortal," possessing powerful skills and priceless elixirs. He had been exiled to the Northern Military Region, and thanks to a single elixir, Wu Xiuli had found He Shumin and had him transferred back to Kyoto. If he could just ask Wu Xiuyun for another elixir, he figured a powerful figure in need would step in and help him avoid his impending demobilization.
Wen Yulong held onto hope for Wu Xiuyun, and initially treated Wu Xiuli with a warm and pleasant expression, even offering her comfort and words of encouragement like, "When Heaven wants to bestow a great responsibility upon a man, it must first test his heart and resolve." However, after Wu Xiuli had visited her parents' home several times and failed to "borrow" the communication talisman from her sister-in-law, Wen Yulong finally stopped laughing.
On this day, Wu Xiuli returned home empty-handed again, and Wen Yulong finally got angry.
"Xiu Li, won't you tell your sister-in-law that we borrowed the paper crane not just for ourselves? Their family is now in decline. If it weren't for your help, I don't know if they would have a chance to turn things around?" Wen Yulong said this with a frown so tight that it looked like water could be squeezed out of it. Although Wen Yulong knew that Wu Xiu Li's family was greedy and stingy, wasn't this a special case? He had taken care of them when he was in power, and now that he was down and out, were they showing no mercy at all?
"Yulong, you know my sister-in-law is just like that. She'd even think of scraping off a few pounds of oil from a mosquito's leg. It's impossible for her to give us a paper crane for nothing." Wu Xiuli felt a little embarrassed. She knew it was her family that had implicated Wen Yulong this time, but Zhang Meihua was just like that. Even her mother couldn't do anything about her, let alone her sister-in-law.
"Xiu Li, we are not asking for things from your mother's family for nothing. We just want the paper crane to convey a few words to your elder sister. When it flies back, we can use it again, right?" Wen Yulong couldn't understand Zhang Meihua's idea. He was not asking for things from others for nothing. He was just borrowing them.
To put it bluntly, the Wu family didn't take him seriously because they saw that their son-in-law was in trouble. Before, whenever he said a word, which one of them was not respectful in front of him?
"Yulong, my sister-in-law said you can use the paper crane, but you have to pay for it. I don't have any money, so I had to come back." Wu Xiuli also felt that her sister-in-law was too much. But the paper crane was not in the hands of Old Lady Wu, and Wu Xiuli had no way to get it out of the hands of stingy Zhang Meihua.
"So what do you say? Are we just going to give up everything and live like this for the rest of our lives?" Wen Yulong deflated at the mention of money. After more than forty years, he finally understood the saying, "A penny can make a hero fall." Now, his pockets were cleaner than his face. If the transfer allowance didn't arrive in two weeks, he and his wife would starve.
"Yulong, why don't you go home and ask Mom for some money?" Wu Xiuli asked cautiously, observing Wen Yulong's expression. Zhang Meihua had something even more pungent to say, but Wu Xiuli didn't dare repeat it to Wen Yulong. The pill she'd coaxed out of Old Lady Wu to get Wen Yulong a job transfer was the one Wu Xiuli had coaxed out of her. A few years ago, Wu Xiuli was so complacent that she'd let it slip, earning Zhang Meihua a grudge.
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