"If you say anything bad about Huo Xiaolong again, I'll hit you!"
Sun Zixi watched a group of young girls chatting away in his backyard, and grew increasingly dissatisfied. He picked up a small wooden stick and flicked one of the girls' bottoms.
Why do you have to criticize them? So what if their family owns a brothel? They have money, brains, and skills. Why can't they hang out with them?
Just because you're from the capital doesn't mean we have to give way to you.
"Oh my, this is the young lady from the Beining County Prefect's family? I knew etiquette when I was this age."
"You look like a gentleman! Your whole family are gentlemen!"
Sun Zixi was unhappy, so she hit him again with the stick, then grabbed her brother and ran away.
She said that these girls from the capital were annoying, always hanging around each other and chattering away, it was driving her crazy.
Cen Ang brought the Fengyuelou group back to Beining. This time, they came to fulfill their promise to the Prefect's wife that they would open a branch of Fengyuelou here.
Of course, the other ladies were fine; they even attended the opening of the brothel. However, recently, several cousins from the Sun family came to visit and expressed their dissatisfaction with the ladies of Beining going to brothels every day.
Where would you find a wealthy lady who frequents brothels every day? Look at this banquet today, the group is talking about Huo Xiaolong.
"I remember Zixi wasn't like this before. She must have been spending too much time with that brothel girl."
“I think so too. Zixi was such a well-behaved girl before.”
Blue skies and green willows—now the Sun family is using ice transported from Pingyang County, making the summer days much more pleasant for the Prefect's wife. Seeing her daughter running towards her brother, holding a small branch in her hand, the woman opened her arms and embraced them, asking…
"What's wrong? Why are you running so fast?"
The little girl pouted and said
"Mother, can you please get rid of Father's cousins? They're so annoying, they talk bad about Long'er every day."
Huo Xiaolong, who was eating iced soup with Hou Xiangxiang, immediately looked up at Sun Zixi when he heard that something was going on with him.
What did they say about me?
The little girl frowned and said...
"Anyway, it wasn't anything nice to say."
The Prefect's wife was somewhat flustered, after all, Huo Xiaolong's two mothers were sitting right next to her. She stood up, bowed to He Yi and Cen Ang, and said...
"The child is just being childish, I hope the two ladies won't take it to heart."
What else can we do? Should we punish them in front of outsiders? We have no choice but to appease the people in front of us first.
The three little bundles of joy huddled together, their little heads huddled together, chattering away.
"What exactly did they say about me?"
"Yeah, yeah, hurry up and say it, don't just say half of it!"
"They said that since Long'er grew up in a brothel, she would definitely be just as disreputable as the other women there."
"..."
"..."
Huo Xiaolong was a little unsure what to say. He could accept being like others, but being like his sisters wasn't out of the question either.
As for whether it's serious or not, it's definitely quite serious. They joke around every day, and when they get together, they're so talkative that they can go to any lengths.
The little dumpling swallowed twice.
"That's not necessarily a bad thing."
"Do you know they're talking badly about you?!"
Sun Zixi propped up the little broken stick she had picked up in the back garden again. She was even angrier than Huo Xiaolong when he was being scolded, while the person in question didn't seem to care.
"Tell me about it, it's not like I'll lose a piece of meat."
Before the Xiongnu invaded, there were many people who spoke ill of their brothel, saying things like "the first floor is full of vixens" and "they're good at swindling money."
Perhaps the people in the capital haven't read Uncle Zhao's account of his battles, or perhaps they have but don't take it seriously.
"I want to get rid of them."
Sun Zixi looked at Hou Xiangxiang expectantly as she said this. She wanted the former prefect's daughter to give her some advice. Then she saw the eldest daughter of the Hou family peeling peaches like Huo Xiaolong.
"Hurry up!"
"Use this little stick of yours to chase them all out!"
"..."
Why should we have any hope for Hou Xiangxiang? She's not exactly a smart person to begin with.
A scream came from the back garden, and Sun Ziyang ran in, looking exactly like his sister had just come in.
"Brother, didn't I just drag you in? What have you been doing?" Sun Zixi asked.
"I'm going to avenge you a few times."
At some point, while the three girls were chatting together, Sun Ziyang ran out, took the small snake he had gotten from Miao Cuifang, and placed it next to the group of girls.
“Their hair is standing on end!” Sun Ziyang said.
"Bro, can you get something more sophisticated?"
"Why aren't they leaving yet?"
Do you even know what they're here for?
"What are you doing?" Sun Ziyang asked.
"They've come to arrange marriages between you and your children."
Sun Ziyang, whose baby fat hadn't yet faded, stared wide-eyed as he spoke.
"They're older than me!"
“He’s only three or four years older,” Sun Zixi said.
“I don’t like people older than me!” Sun Ziyang said incredulously.
"It's not up to you whether you like it or not, it's up to your father."
"Then I'll release a few more snakes, and everyone should leave quickly."
Upon hearing this, Huo Xiaolong stopped causing trouble, put down the peach in his hand, looked at Sun Zixi seriously, and said...
"Your brother is only eight years old."
"yes."
"Your brother is only eight years old, and you're already arranging a marriage for him?"
Sun Zixi sighed and said
“My father is now a prefect. If he doesn’t make any mistakes, he can only be promoted. I don’t know how many people in my family want to send their daughters to my family.”
"No," Huo Xiaolong said, waving his hand.
"It's not about a childhood betrothal, nor is it about whether or not we're engaged."
"What's that?" Sun Zixi asked.
"Are those girls all your cousins?"
"yes."
Huo Xiaolong swallowed the last bite of peach in his mouth and said very seriously to the little girl in front of him.
"People who are close relatives within five generations cannot marry, otherwise their children may be mentally challenged."
"ah?"
These words surprised Hou Xiangxiang. Nowadays, it's common to see cousins getting married all the time.
"Ah! Really!" the little dumpling said seriously.
"If you don't believe me, go ask Grandpa Gu!" she continued.
“My master is unmarried, so he probably doesn’t know about this,” Hou Xiangxiang said.
"Then...I'll talk to Father about it later."
The two little girls nodded in agreement.
No wonder there are so many mentally challenged children out there. Huo Xiaolong only realized after arriving in Beining that almost every family had a mentally challenged child, either with intellectual disabilities or congenital physical impairments.
It's just that wealthy families kept it a secret so no one else knew, and since they had many children, there was bound to be one normal child among them.
That's outrageous.
She wanted to say something to Cen Ang, but she was too embarrassed to speak because there were so many people around.
Let's wait and talk about it when we get home tonight.
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