Chapter 46: Learning to Reason
Sunlight fell on the entrance of Huichun Medical Clinic, and three familiar figures were right in front of her. Shen Zhiyi called out, "Uncle Gouzi, Aunt Chen, and Sanni!"
"Uncle, Aunt!" Zheng San called out happily.
The shout made Sun Gouzi and Aunt Chen freeze, their gentle smiles instantly turning into disdain as they said, "San, keep your voice down."
"I'm just so happy to see you all!" Zheng San said excitedly, wanting to tell them more about the twenty taels of silver, but there were other people around, so he had to swallow his words for now.
Shen Zhiyi had already spoken with Sun Sanni.
"Are you all better?" Shen Zhiyi asked with concern.
"It's just a minor injury; I can recover at home," Sun Sanni answered honestly.
“Girl, I have something to tell you…” Sun Gouzi walked up to Shen Zhiyi, looking as if he had done something wrong and was being very cautious.
"What is it?" Shen Zhiyi asked gently.
“That three-headed guy, after waking up, refused to stay at the clinic no matter what. I was afraid of hurting him, so I didn’t dare to touch him at all.” Sun Gouzi became more and more anxious as he spoke.
“I know where he’ll go, I’ll go find him in a bit,” Shen Zhiyi replied.
"Okay, okay, that's good." Sun Gouzi said repeatedly, turning to look at Zheng San, "Are you coming back to the village with us?"
"No, no, I have to go with Da and Zhiyi," Zheng San said immediately.
After finishing their conversation at the entrance of the clinic, Shen Zhiyi watched them leave before leading Zheng San toward San Tou's house.
The alley was always dark and gloomy, and Zheng San even crossed his arms in an exaggerated manner when he arrived here.
Shen Zhiyi walked to the familiar courtyard gate and knocked several times, but there was no response from inside. She called out, "San Tou, are you home?"
She had just finished shouting when the gate to the opposite courtyard opened, and a voice with a buzz cut came from inside: "Sister! Sister, we're here!"
Just like last time, Shen Zhiyi and Zheng San entered the courtyard quietly. She was about to ask about San Tou when she looked up and saw a figure struggling to walk to the door. She was so frightened that she quickly went forward to help the person.
"With such a serious injury, why aren't you recuperating at the clinic!" Shen Zhiyi said angrily. Seeing that the bandages on San Tou's arm were old and still stained with blood, he knew that the dressing had not been changed according to the doctor's orders.
“Staying at the clinic for another day costs a lot of money,” San Tou whispered, then quickly added, “Besides, I’m fine now! I asked the doctor, and it’s the same to rest at home!”
The difficulty lies in the issue of "money." Only those with life-threatening illnesses will actively seek medical treatment; otherwise, they will simply brush it off with excuses like "it will get better with rest."
Shen Zhiyi knew that words alone wouldn't be enough to persuade her, and thinking of Aunt Qing's situation, her heart softened even more. She asked gently, "What are your plans now?"
“My mother…” San Tou’s voice choked with sobs as he desperately swallowed back his tears. “I will work hard to save money and find a good place for my mother to be buried.”
"Is there anything I can help you with?" Shen Zhiyi asked sincerely.
Before San Tou could finish speaking, Cun Tou said anxiously, "We're almost homeless."
Seeing that San Tou was winking at Cun Tou, Shen Zhi turned around and blocked San Tou's view, asking, "Why?"
The clueless crew-cut guy, unaware of the trickery involved and oblivious to the warnings, boldly declared, "Brother San Tou's house has been taken away, and that bastard even robbed him of all his savings! They said someone died in this house, making it unlucky, and they not only want us to leave but also demand compensation. Brother San Tou and his friends scraped together what they could, but they can't afford that much money, so they're planning to borrow it at interest..."
"Crunchhead!" San Tou shouted hastily, but the urgent shout caused him to choke, and all his words turned into coughing sounds.
After listening, Shen Zhiyi turned to look at San Tou with disapproval. Seeing his pale face, she changed her words to concern: "Sit down first, don't worry, things can always be resolved."
"You mustn't touch interest money!" Zheng San quickly advised. Although he had only seen cases of people in gambling dens who had been ruined by borrowing interest, he could still conclude that it was no good.
With Zheng San's words in the middle, Shen Zhiyi's nerves calmed down, and she said matter-of-factly, "You can't touch interest money. Now you have nowhere to stay, and you still have to compensate the homeowner because someone died here?"
"Hmm," the three-headed creature responded softly.
"Is the compensation mentioned in the contract? How much compensation does the homeowner want?" Shen Zhiyi asked.
"Five taels of silver," the crew-cut man said angrily.
"What? Why don't you just rob me!" Zheng San exclaimed in shock. Seeing that the two children in front of him were only a few years old, he seemed to understand why he was being bullied like this.
“It was rented privately at the time, without a written contract,” San Tou said slowly.
"Then..." Before Shen Zhiyi could finish speaking, the courtyard gate was pounded on, and the crew-cut man immediately hid behind her.
Seeing this, Zheng San asked softly, "Who is that? Should we open the door?"
“I know you’re in there, come and open the door right now! You rented my yard and someone died secretly, that’s so unlucky! I asked you to hang something to ward off evil spirits…” The homeowner’s loud voice could be heard clearly through the door, and if I let him keep shouting, he would probably say even more unpleasant things.
At Shen Zhiyi's prompting, Zheng San opened the courtyard gate and coldly watched the couple walk in. The woman then reluctantly shut her mouth and asked, "Who are you two to them?"
"This has nothing to do with you, the homeowner, right?" Shen Zhiyi said coldly, shielding San Tou and Cun Tou behind her. "As for the five taels of compensation you mentioned, we'll pretend it never happened and move out in the next few days."
"Why didn't it happen?! Is someone dead here?!" the woman shouted fiercely. "I only rented this outbuilding to them out of pity, and look what happened, they let that filthy woman next door live here, and she died here..."
"Don't say another word!" the three-headed man snapped.
The woman was completely unafraid, her arrogance growing even stronger: "What's wrong? It's the truth, why can't we say it! She used to be a whore who slept with everyone, I don't know who she seduced, but she was redeemed and given a place to live, right across the street, really..."
"Then let's report it to the authorities," Shen Zhiyi interrupted coldly.
Upon hearing this, the woman exclaimed in surprise, "What?"
At this moment, the man who had been silent all along gently tugged at the woman's sleeve, but she shook him off and became even more aggressive: "Go ahead and report to the authorities! I'm telling the truth. Even if the King of Heaven himself comes, it's still true!"
“Since it’s a private lease without a written contract, those verbal agreements are probably invalid,” Shen Zhiyi said calmly. “As for your claim of five taels of silver, that’s an unreasonable demand, and they don’t need to pay any attention to it.”
"Hmph, I don't believe it! You don't own the government office!" the woman said fiercely.
"Then let's go to the yamen and report it to the authorities," Shen Zhiyi said indifferently.
The woman's sleeve was tugged again. She turned around impatiently and said fiercely, not wanting to lose face, "You tell them."
The man then stepped forward, smiling kindly, and said, “Gentlemen, when it comes to funerals, people must give way to others to avoid being tainted by bad luck. Since the person has passed away, I will not go into details about their life. Just the fact that they died in this side room of ours means we still have to do some things to take care of the aftermath. It might be difficult to rent it out again in the future. We can’t bear this cost ourselves, can we?”
“Even so…” Zheng San was about to speak when Shen Zhiyi quickly interrupted, “Doesn’t everyone die? Can you guarantee that you’ll live for thousands of years and never die?”
“If every family avoids talking about the dead, wouldn’t your ancestors, who have been dead for countless years, have filled your house with bad luck by now?” Shen Zhiyi said in a deep voice.
"This..." The man tried to speak, but was abruptly interrupted by the woman: "You little brat, you haven't even grown your hair yet and you're already spouting nonsense. Believe me or not, I'll tear your mouth apart!"
"Hey! Let's be reasonable, we're all reasonable people, don't fight!" Zheng San hurriedly said, stepping forward to block Shen Zhiyi, not only because the other party was carrying twenty taels of silver.
“If you dare to come forward and hit me, it won’t just be a matter of the magistrate deciding whether or not to pay the five taels of silver; you’ll also be accused of injuring someone without cause, and everyone here is a witness!” Shen Zhiyi spoke with absolute certainty, relying entirely on his righteous spirit.
The woman hesitated, unsure how to lower her raised hand. Seeing this, the man stepped forward and pulled her back, a hint of weighing his options in his eyes. His tone was gentle: "Miss, you seem to be a polite person. Quickly throw those fallacies aside."
Shen Zhiyi slightly raised her chin, realizing that she couldn't win the argument, and at the same time hoped that both sides would compromise. It seemed that the other party still wanted so-called compensation.
Having encountered far too many unreasonable demands like this, Shen Zhiyi had honed her skills in reasoning, so she said, "Go ahead and say it."
"I'm sure you know what kind of work they do, they smell awful all the time..." The man's words were interrupted by the indignant crew-cut man: "We don't smell! Even if we're exhausted, we'll take a bath in the river before we come back, and we definitely don't smell bad!"
Shen Zhiyi stood closer and didn't smell anything foul. Instead, she sensed that some people's hearts were corrupt, emanating a rotten stench.
"I didn't know there was such a thing as a distinction between high and low status in the world's jobs. If they didn't do this kind of work, would the streets become clean and tidy?" Shen Zhiyi retorted with dissatisfaction.
The man, unwilling to dwell on the matter, didn't respond. Instead, he said, "This side room needs some repairs because they lived there before it can be rented out to the next person. Otherwise, even if we don't mind, others will."
"So?" Shen Zhiyi asked.
"We should set aside some money for repairs, how about three or two hundred coins?" the man said in a consultative tone.
"I……"
"I disagree!"
The woman's shrill voice drowned out Shen Zhiyi's words. She looked at the man with feigned helplessness and said, "That's perfect, let's report this to the authorities."
"Please wait a moment, young lady," the man said with a smile, pulling the woman aside to chat.
At this moment, San Tou whispered to Shen Zhiyi, "It only costs us two hundred coins to rent this place for a month, so why don't we..."
“No, that doesn’t make sense,” Shen Zhiyi said seriously. “If you back down one step today, you’ll have to back down two steps tomorrow. Everyone will think you’re easy to bully and will take advantage of you. Things can be discussed, but we can’t do it this way.”
Zheng San immediately chimed in, "That's right, we're in the right, we're not afraid of him!"
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