Chapter 013: Waiting for her here
The last time he handled something, although the result was safe, after it was over, Qin Laicai began to consider his daughter's marriage.
He once stubbornly believed that finding a son-in-law was the best choice for their family.
Now I am somewhat loosening my mind about this idea.
Any family with some financial resources would not let their son become someone else's son-in-law.
Families with little financial resources but many sons are willing to let their sons marry into the family.
But people who grow up in such a family are destined to have little experience.
This kind of person, if he is willing to work hard and teach, may be of some benefit in the future.
But he knew very well that he was choosing a son-in-law in order to find someone who was easy to control and would not be able to bully his daughter in the future.
In other words, the son-in-law must not have any skills.
People who have no ability will not calculate the Qin family's wealth and daughter, but they are destined to have nothing to rely on when encountering problems.
He once thought that he could live smoothly until he was old enough to raise his grandson into adulthood and ensure that his daughter would have no worries in her life.
This salt policy reform by the imperial court suddenly made him realize that there are unexpected changes in the world and people are subject to misfortunes and blessings at any time.
Accidents could happen at any time, and he couldn't protect his daughter forever.
So, in addition to agreeing to let her learn skills on her own, he began to consider finding a partner for him.
He had originally thought that this matter didn't need to be so troublesome, but now with Wang Xingsheng's situation, he felt that he couldn't hesitate any longer. "What do you think of the third son of the Cheng family?"
"Why would Dad bring up someone for no reason?"
"What if Dad says he wants to choose him as your husband?"
"Dad, you don't have a fever, do you?" She stood up and wanted to touch her father's forehead.
The Cheng family in Qimen, who made a living from making rice paper, had a wealthier fortune than the Wang family, who had almost monopolized the salt business in the Huaiyang area through generations of accumulation.
How could a family like this agree to let their son become someone else's son-in-law?
Qin Laicai waved his hand to reject his daughter's concern. "There's nothing wrong with my health. I just suddenly realized that instead of marrying you a man with no ability, it would be better to find you a young man with a good family background and ability, and marry you off in a grand manner."
Because the Cheng family has always been doing business for scholars, they have a clean and upright family tradition and strict family management.
This can be seen from the fact that the Cheng family's wives and concubines get along harmoniously, and their legitimate and illegitimate children get along well with each other.
Moreover, among the Hui merchants in Yangzhou, the Cheng family is the only one that can compete with the Wang family.
If my daughter can get engaged to the Cheng family, then she won't have to worry about Wang Xingsheng.
Qin Xue didn't expect that her father suddenly changed his mind. He opened his mouth, but didn't know what to say.
Since she was a child, her father has said that he would find a husband for her. She always thought that she would not have to face the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law problem in her life, so she never thought about how to get along with her mother-in-law. When she was learning needlework, she was lazy as much as possible.
Suddenly, someone said they wanted to marry her off, and Qin Xue was completely bewildered.
Seeing the bewildered look on his daughter's face, Qin Laicai knew that becoming someone else's daughter-in-law was something she had never thought of. She couldn't help but feel uneasy and couldn't help but slow down her speech and explain to her, "Mr. Cheng San is the youngest son of the Cheng family. If the marriage can be successful, Dad will try his best to let you live separately. That way, you won't have to face the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law problem."
"But Dad, I've grown up with nothing but a few foreign languages I've learned recently. Who would want to marry a daughter-in-law like me? Besides, although the Third Master Cheng didn't pursue the imperial examinations like the Second Master Cheng, he's still quite talented. But I, your daughter, am what people call an uneducated, unlearned fool."
"If you were my father, would you want your son to marry a daughter-in-law like this?"
In the past, when I interacted with the two girls from the Cheng family, I could hear from their words that the third son of the Cheng family was very important to him. The Cheng family was not short of money, so when arranging marriages for their children, they would try their best to consider families with high positions of power.
To put it bluntly, it would be better for a man to marry any girl from a poor scholar's family than to marry her.
"So, don't think about it, don't do it, lest I feel uncomfortable seeing Sister Jingshuang in the future."
When Ruan Ruyi bullied her before, only Cheng Jingshuang stood up and supported her.
Just for this reason, Qin Xue didn't want to make relationships awkward with others.
Qin Laicai was completely speechless after being asked a question by his daughter.
If he were in his shoes, he really wouldn't want his son to marry a woman who could do nothing but eat, drink and have fun.
At this moment, Qin Laicai, the old father, deeply realized that his past indulgence of his daughter might have harmed her life.
Fortunately, it's not too late to understand now. "Let's not talk about other things for now. Starting tomorrow, you should learn how to manage the household first."
Qin Xue also knew that she could no longer be like she had been in the past and ignore everything, so she agreed to her father's proposal.
That night, the father and daughter failed to come up with any effective solution regarding Qin Xue's marriage.
Qin Xue agreed to learn to be a housekeeper, which was a good result of the conversation between father and daughter that night.
The next day, after arriving at Fang's Dessert Shop, Qin Xue told Liu Zhiyan to arrive two hours later. "After all this time studying desserts, I still can't even make the most basic chiffon cake. Learning more is a waste of time. I might as well use this time to learn something useful."
Qin Xue only said that she wanted to learn to be a housekeeper, but did not explain why she wanted to be a housekeeper.
Liu Zhiyan just thought that this was a necessary course for every woman before getting married and didn't think much about it.
After all, his two sisters had both gone through such a stage.
However, he discovered that since that day, the little girl, who had already made fast learning progress, now seemed to be learning at a fast pace.
Specifically, she not only completed his daily instruction but also began to learn independently. When she encountered a word she didn't understand, she looked it up on her own. Regarding reading and speaking, she used to simply repeat what he said, but now she can discuss it with him.
If this was not a student he had taught personally, judging from her reading and speaking skills, he would never believe that she was a novice who had only been exposed to a foreign language for less than two months.
In less than two months of teaching her, he had already used up all the teaching materials he used to teach college students in a year.
In the past, due to his extremely high talent for languages, he was unable to muster more energy and conduct more in-depth research.
Now that he has met a student who is more talented than himself, Liu Zhiyan is afraid that if he does not continue to conduct in-depth research, he will one day be left behind by his rising star.
So, during this period of time, he taught Qin Xue during the day and went home at night to read the foreign books his mother had collected for him. His life was quite fulfilling every day.
While teaching Qin Xue seriously and studying on his own, he did not forget to pay attention to the man Wang Xingsheng.
After that time when he blocked Qin Xue at Fangfang’s Dessert Shop, he didn’t make any move for a long time, as if their meeting that day was really a chance encounter.
But Liu Zhiyan didn't believe in the so-called chance encounter and kept someone keeping an eye on Wang Xingsheng.
Sure enough, two days before the Dragon Boat Festival, he discovered the other party's conspiracy.
Wang Xingsheng and a woman named Ruan Ruyi planned to frame Qin Xue on the Dragon Boat Festival so that Qin Xue would have to marry Wang Xingsheng.
Qin Xue had asked him for leave on the Dragon Boat Festival a few days ago, saying that she wanted to attend the Dragon Boat Festival party organized by the ladies of Huizhou merchants.
Of course Liu Zhiyan would not refuse such a gathering of young sisters.
Now that he knew someone was planning to plot against her at the party, he didn't want to put Qin Xue at risk. After telling her the truth, he said very pertinently, "A gentleman doesn't stand under a dangerous wall. I suggest you cancel this matter before tomorrow's banquet."
Qin Xue had no idea that there would be a trap waiting for her at tomorrow's party.
Although she did not have a very deep friendship with those ladies, she had known them almost all since childhood.
It's not that they haven't had conflicts with each other, but at most they just kept quiet and argued with each other, and they have never done anything like plotting against others behind their backs.
"I've known for a long time that if anything happens to me or the Qin family, none of these people will lend a hand. Of course, I won't help them if something happens to them either, because I don't have the ability to do so. So, I can accept this kind of relationship between us where we can't help each other."
"But I never thought that one day they would plot against me like this behind my back."
If you ask her if she is sad, it seems not.
After all, she realized early on that her relationship with these people was only about eating and drinking.
But not being sad doesn’t mean not being upset.
Liu Zhiyan hates to establish close relationships with others because he thinks people are complex and changeable, and he doesn't want to waste time on things with too many variables.
Because he was unwilling to spend time maintaining any additional relationship, Liu Zhiyan had never encountered anything like Qin Xue.
Of course, just because he hadn't encountered it before didn't mean he didn't understand. "Even if her father didn't value her before, she would have had enough to eat, wear, and use. But her father ignored her objections and forced her to marry a man older than her father as a concubine. It's easy to imagine that her future life will be difficult."
Upon learning that Ruan Ruyi was planning to plot against Qin Xue, Liu Zhiyan thoroughly investigated her and knew her background very well.
"You are all young ladies playing together. Everyone else has their own misfortunes, but you, even though you don't have a mother, have your father's undivided love. Especially since your father has already promised to find a husband for you in the future, and he won't let you become a humble daughter-in-law to someone else."
"If Wang Xingsheng stirs up trouble in front of her again, she'll want to destroy you, who has the best of everything. It's only natural."
Qin Xue found it difficult to understand such a dark thought. In her opinion, Ruan Ruyi's misfortune was not caused by her, so why would the other party want to destroy her?
But she is not stupid.
She knew there were many dark and ugly things in this world that she didn't understand. It didn't matter if she didn't understand, but she had to believe and respect them. "Now I understand the truth that 'you can't guard against thieves for a thousand days.' If I don't go this time, their plan will fail. The next time they plot against me, I may not be as lucky as I was this time, because you warned me in advance."
"So this time I want to go. Not only do I want to go, but I also want to take this opportunity to completely solve this problem of Wang Xingsheng."
After what happened last time, she thought the other party had given up.
She didn't expect that something bad was waiting for her.
This was indeed what Qin Xue said, so he had people keep a close eye on Wang Xingsheng.
Fortunately this time, the person who was following him knew his credit plan.
What if the other party fails this time and realizes that the plan may have been leaked?
Next time he did something bad, he would use more subtle means so his people wouldn't be able to detect it. "What are you going to do?"
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