Upon hearing the security officer's words, Jia Dongxu was so frightened that he collapsed to the ground. He couldn't bear to part with either Jia Zhangshi or Qin Huairu.
Once both of them are in jail, the Jia family will basically fall apart. With a thud, Jia Dongxu knelt on the ground, his face instantly becoming amiable.
"Weihua, please give my mother and Qin Huairu another chance! Name whatever you want, just don't send them to jail. You know our family's situation; without them, the Jia family is finished."
If it weren't for the need to continue earning rewards, Wei Hua wouldn't want to pay any attention to Jia Dongxu. But in order to obtain more rewards, he had no choice but to continue arguing with Jia Dongxu.
“Jia Dongxu, this isn’t the first time you’ve done something like this. I’m not your father, so I have no obligation to unconditionally forgive you all the time. This time, your family stole nearly a hundred catties of my grain. Do you know what a hundred catties of grain can do? You can easily marry a beautiful wife by taking a few dozen catties of grain.”
"If I don't teach you a good lesson, you'll keep bullying me. If this continues, you might even take everything from my house."
Upon hearing Wei Hua's words, Jia Dongxu could only kowtow repeatedly on the ground, pleading with Wei Hua as he kowtowed. Within moments, a bump appeared on Jia Dongxu's forehead.
Even the security guards felt a pang of sympathy for them. Seeing that the situation was almost settled, Wei Hua decided to extort some money from the Jia family.
“Jia Dongxu, seeing how sincere you are, I’ll give you a chance. You stole more than 100 jin of my grain, so compensate me with 300 jin of grain.”
“I bought all mixed flour, so you can compensate me with 300 jin of mixed flour, including the principal and interest.”
Upon hearing Wei Hua's words, Yi Zhonghai nearly lost his footing. Previously, 300 jin of mixed flour would only cost a little over 100 yuan. But now the price of mixed flour had increased several times over. On the black market, a jin of mixed flour could sell for two or three yuan.
The problem is that even if people were willing to pay two or three yuan per kilogram, they couldn't find that much mixed flour on the black market. Everyone is tightening their belts these days, so who would sell their life-saving grain? This has caused grain prices to keep rising, and even at high prices, there's still demand.
I've heard that cornmeal used to cost as little as one yuan per kilogram. 300 kilograms of mixed cornmeal would be enough to marry 10 wives in the countryside.
Kneeling on the ground, Jia Dongxu felt his heart sink when he heard Wei Hua's words.
"Weihua, can you change your terms? I really can't meet this condition. You know how precious food is right now. Where am I supposed to get 300 jin of mixed flour?"
"Jia Dongxu, you know that food is precious! But do you know how much effort I put into getting this food? Do you know what this food means to me?"
"Now you know how to be frugal with food? When your family was stealing, why didn't you care about me? Just one question: are you going to compensate me or not? If you can gather 300 jin of mixed flour within five days, then this matter will be over. If not, you can expect your mother and wife to go to jail!"
“I’ll pay, I’ll pay. But you know my family’s situation, I simply can’t come up with that much money. How about this? We’ll exchange all the grain for cash, and I’ll pay back ten yuan every month.”
“Right now, a pound of mixed flour costs about two to three yuan on the black market. How about 300 pounds of mixed flour is worth 700 yuan? I’ll pay back ten yuan every month until it’s all paid off.”
“Jia Dongxu, these are the conditions you put forward yourself. Since you’ve said so, it would be unreasonable for me to keep pressing you. Write this down now. Not only should you explain the debt, but you should also write down the fact that your mother and Qin Huairu stole things.”
Hearing Wei Hua's words, Jia Dongxu could only nod in agreement. For now, he had no choice but to do as Wei Hua said, since he had already become Wei Hua's prey.
After Jia Dongxu finished writing, Wei Hua quickly had Yi Zhonghai sign his name, and then had a colleague from the security department witness it.
With this, the Jia family can do whatever they want from now on. If it weren't for the need to continue taking advantage of them, Wei Hua wouldn't have given them any chance.
After tucking the note into his pocket, Wei Hua carried the grain back home. Once the grain was locked up, Wei Hua went straight to work at the steel mill.
The news of Jia Zhangshi and Qin Huairu stealing grain spread throughout the courtyard, and the others hid their grain even more carefully.
Yi Zhonghai and Jia Dongxu dared not slack off, as they were both heavily in debt. At this moment, they both felt some blame for Jia Zhangshi and Qin Huairu, and some regretted not returning the grain sooner.
But what's done is done, and there's no use in regretting it now. Jia Dongxu didn't even go to the hospital after getting home from work.
The Jia family has run out of food. The little grain they had left had all been taken by Wei Hua. The Jia family had been eating his food for several days; it would be a huge loss not to get it back. Not only are they out of food, but they've also run out of money. Jia Dongxu doesn't know what the Jia family will do tomorrow.
Seeing that everyone else had already started cooking, but his own family didn't even have a single grain of rice, Jia Dongxu could only sit at home sighing.
At the hospital, Jia Zhangshi and Qin Huairu were also hoping that Jia Dongxu would bring them food. But they waited and waited, and Jia Dongxu never came.
It wasn't until the next day that Jia Zhangshi and Qin Huairu finally saw Jia Dongxu and Yi Zhonghai. Upon seeing her son, Jia Zhangshi burst into tears.
"Jia Dongxu, you heartless bastard! Are you planning to starve us to death? Why didn't you bring us food last night?"
"Old Jia! Do you know that your son already despises me? He wants to starve me and your grandson to death..."
Hearing his own words, Jia Dongxu's expression grew increasingly ferocious. Fortunately, Qin Huairu was observant and noticed the changes in Jia Dongxu and Yi Zhonghai's expressions.
"Mom, stop making a fuss. Wasn't the lesson learned last time profound enough? Didn't you see that Dongxu's forehead is swollen? The reason he didn't come to bring food must be because something else happened."
Hearing Qin Huairu's words, Jia Zhangshi opened her eyes and looked at her son. She saw a large bump on his forehead. Jia Zhangshi naturally knew something must have happened at home. Otherwise, her son and Yi Zhonghai wouldn't have such expressions.
"Yi Zhonghai, what exactly happened to our family? Why is Dongxu's forehead so swollen?"
"What else could have happened? It's because Wei Hua found out about what you did a few days ago. If Dong Xu hadn't knelt down and apologized to Wei Hua, you two would have been arrested long ago, and you might already be eating peanuts."
After finishing his sentence, Yi Zhonghai glanced around to make sure there were only the four of them in the ward before continuing.
“Even if you two were going to steal something, you should have at least paid a little attention. There were three chestnut cakes in the grain, and you didn’t even see them. It was because of those three chestnut cakes that Weihua discovered the grain was missing ahead of time.”
“We didn’t know there were three chestnut cakes inside. We were caught red-handed during the security search. Fortunately, the steel mill’s security department is handling this, otherwise you would probably be in deep trouble.”
"Now, not only has Weihua taken the grain back, but Dongxu has also incurred a debt of 700 yuan because of this incident. From now on, he must repay 10 yuan every month on time. If he fails to repay the money, Weihua will report you to the police station."
"This matter was witnessed by the security personnel of the steel rolling mill. Even if you want to deny it, you can't. If you fall into Wei Hua's hands, you two could both be shot. Even if you aren't executed, you'll be sentenced to at least ten years in prison."
Upon hearing Yi Zhonghai's words, Qin Huairu looked at Jia Zhangshi, as if asking her why she hadn't seen the three large cakes.
It wasn't just one person who was watching Jia Zhangshi; everyone else was watching her.
"Why are you all looking at me like that? How would I know there were three cakes hidden in the grain? In order to move the grain quickly, I just poured it into another bag. I really didn't notice that there were three cakes hidden in it when I poured it. If I had known there were three chestnut cakes, I would have eaten them long ago."
Hearing Jia Zhangshi's words, everyone could only let it go. Since the deed was already done, there was no point in assigning blame.
"Hurry up and pack your things. We've come to take you home. Given our current situation, we simply don't have the money to keep you in the hospital."
Hearing Jia Dongxu's words, Jia Zhangshi and Qin Huairu felt particularly helpless and could only let Yi Zhonghai and Jia Dongxu carry them out of the hospital. The four of them rode in the oxcart that Yi Zhonghai and the others had borrowed back to the courtyard house.
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