It now seems that this shrewd military woman will soon be at my disposal.
Song Lao Er, as an elder, was qualified to arrange marriages for the three of them.
If Song Liyun doesn't want to be married off to just any family, she has to be obedient.
In the short span of a cup of tea, before Song Lao Er's tearful complaints to Xiao Gu Shi were even over, Lin Da Gong Zi had already made arrangements for the rest of Song Lao Er and his two siblings.
In court, Madam Gu became more and more agitated as she spoke, portraying herself as a loving mother who neglected her own son and cuddled Xiao An to sleep every night.
If it weren't for the timing discrepancy, she would have said she breastfed the child.
Song Zhenping lowered his head and remained silent.
In fact, he never spoke again after arriving in Qili County and standing in the courtroom.
Xiao An glared hatefully at Xiao Gu Shi. She didn't even dare to go into the house. When did she start sleeping on the same kang (heated brick bed) with her second aunt? She was afraid she would have nightmares as soon as she lay down.
When Madam Gu said that she had carried Xiao An to town for medical treatment on a rainy night, Song Zhenping suddenly looked up and knelt on the ground.
"My lord, I have a grievance to voice!"
"Speak!" Jiang Feng had long since given up on listening to Xiao Gu's lies and directly agreed to Song Zhenping's appeal.
"When I was nine years old, my father died. At that time, my mother was about to give birth. She fainted when she heard the bad news. After she finally woke up, this woman and her mother-in-law came to our door and forced my mother to kneel and keep vigil for my father. They even hit her. My mother had a difficult childbirth and gave birth to my younger brother who was born prematurely."
They said my younger brother was a jinx and that they should throw him into the river to drown him... During the coldest days of winter, we didn't heat the kang (a heated brick bed). I held my younger brother in my arms to keep him warm. After a cold night, our eyebrows were covered in frost... For ten years, we didn't eat a hot meal every day, and beatings and scoldings were commonplace.
The second sister, Song Liyun, was sent to work in a restaurant at the age of seven, washing dishes, and her hands were completely soaked and rotten.
My second uncle takes all my wages every month; otherwise, my younger brother and I wouldn't have enough to eat for a month.
Song Zhenping, a man, knelt on the ground and spoke slowly.
He didn't cry, nor did he talk about how vicious his second uncle's family was; he just kept rambling on about small things.
Every word was written in blood, every sentence a tear, and the aunties and grandmas watching outside wept uncontrollably.
The more Madam Gu talked about how she had raised them, the more fake it seemed to them, but they couldn't quite put their finger on why.
Where can you find such a good person?
Even with a biological father, a stepmother can hardly treat everyone equally, let alone a stepmother or step-aunt who is not related by marriage.
If Madam Gu were to abandon her own child to care for someone else's, it would be as if the Holy Mother herself descended from Heaven.
If this were true, such a glorious event for the clan and family would not need to be boasted about; the local village head would report it to the government, erect a monument to commemorate the achievement, and make it a model for the surrounding area.
Many women have also raised children and experienced the hardships of dealing with a vicious and tormenting mother-in-law.
Moreover, they had already heard that this second uncle was mean and ungrateful, not only seizing the eldest son's family property and land, forcing the siblings to flee to Suijin Town to become military households, but also chasing after them to try and seize their family property.
Suijin Town is not far from Qili County. Now the town is recruiting workers to build houses, and many people from the county have gone to work there.
The news of the intruder being beaten out of the house, and the fact that Magistrate Jiang led a team to investigate the case, had already spread back to the city.
However, because the matter involved his employer, and Xue Zhuang and others had given instructions, the news had not yet spread to anyone except his family.
Now that Song Lao Er is going to sue the authorities, and things have blown up, he'll naturally come out.
Guan Laoliu jumped up and down in the crowd, cursing: "Hey, you wicked woman, you say you raised those two children and have the grace of raising them, but you've also taken a lot of their money!"
A house on seven acres of land, plus five taels of silver in compensation, is more than enough to hire an unrelated outsider.
The girl gets paid every month, so who's supporting whom? How dare you say you raised her!
Now everyone understands clearly that it's more accurate to say that three children are supporting the family than two.
A chorus of curses erupted outside the courtroom, and several rotten eggs suddenly flew in, hitting Madam Gu squarely on the head.
Little Gu had never experienced anything like this before. She wiped the thick, foul-smelling soup off her face and screamed in a panic, "This ungrateful wretch is talking nonsense! If it weren't for me, Ren Ci, taking him in, that little jinx would have died long ago!"
Her words once again stirred up public outrage: in court they called each other ingrates and jinxes, and who knows how they spoke ill of each other in private.
An emotionally charged woman tried to rush into the courtroom to beat up Xiao Gu, but was stopped by the bailiffs and could only jump up and down cursing.
Immediately, chaos erupted throughout the entire place.
Jiang Feng just watched coldly without saying a word to stop it. This was probably the most chaotic court hearing he had ever held since he became an official.
In the crowd, Young Master Lin's face was as black as the bottom of a pot; he couldn't understand where the problem lay!
Originally, he wanted Xiao Gu to say something to deceive people, but Xiao Gu had never done it before and didn't know what to say.
There was nothing he could do but say something random for Xiao Gu to memorize.
It has to be said, this woman was born to act.
These words were spoken with great emotion and were deeply moving; if he hadn't heard them with his own ears, he would have believed them.
But why can't I fool others?
Xiao An was in tears, sobbing uncontrollably.
Song Liyun stood straight and quiet, as if the commotion had nothing to do with her.
The original owner left Xiaoshi Village at the age of seven, and when she returned to the Song family, she died in less than a day. She only knew that the two brothers had a hard life, but she did not know the specific details.
Upon arriving in Broken Gold Town, those past events became scars, and no one mentioned them again.
So there are some things that Song Liyun is only hearing about for the first time now.
Her gaze fell on Song Lao Er.
As Song Lao Er looked around in fear and confusion, he suddenly sensed something was amiss. He turned around and met Song Liyun's gaze.
His eyes were cold and devoid of any human warmth, as if he were not looking at a living being, which made him shiver involuntarily.
The chaos subsided with a bang of the gavel, and Jiang Feng said in a deep voice, "Song Defu, you are the head of the family, yet you cannot treat your children and nephews well. Do you know you are wrong?"
Song Lao Er was panicking when he saw the magistrate scolding him. He habitually replied, "This humble citizen had no choice. My elder brother and his wife died so easily. They didn't care about anything, left no money, and even left the child for me to raise."
Ordinary people have to work outside to support their families and don't know about these small things at home.
With no money at home, elderly parents to care for, and young children to raise, and only enough to eat, there are always things that cannot be taken care of properly.
Daping, you're a man now. Do you know how many things a man who's responsible for his family has to take care of? He doesn't have the energy to worry about these trivial matters like eating, drinking, and relieving himself.
"Back then, your second uncle wronged you. If I had known you would resent me for a bowl of noodle soup, I would have starved to death to feed you, and my whole family would have frozen and starved to death to support you."
Song Lao Er was spoiled and pampered by Granny Gu since childhood. When will he admit that he made a mistake?
Even if there is fault, it's because the other party was at fault first. If the other party is not at fault, then the blame is shifted to others.
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