"No, absolutely not." Hong Xiaoduo refused immediately and firmly before the other party could finish speaking.
Seeing that she could control his bastard son, he wants me to be his daughter-in-law and marry that scoundrel? What is he thinking? That kind of trash, I'd want to kick him off the planet just by looking at him!
Seeing Hong Xiaoduo's firm refusal, Jiang An's face flushed red, and he quickly said, "I was too presumptuous. Taking on a disciple is a serious matter. With my son's character, how could any master possibly take him as a disciple?"
Huh? Taking on disciples?
After hearing this clearly, Hong Xiaoduo felt a little embarrassed. Why couldn't she calmly wait for the other person to finish speaking? That way, she wouldn't have misunderstood.
Even if he was telling me to marry his good-for-nothing son, I wouldn't agree. No amount of persuasion or coercion will work! What was I so afraid of that I refused so hastily just now? Honestly!
“Master Jiang, what you say is true. When a proper master takes on a disciple, the first thing he considers is the disciple’s character, and only then his talent.”
Someone like your son would probably only be accepted by some unorthodox sect, but that would contradict your original intention.
"I'm not the kind of person who speaks bluntly, but I don't want to use nice words just to please you, Mr. Jiang," Hong Xiaoduo said truthfully.
Jiang An nodded, sighed, slumped his shoulders, leaned back in his chair, and murmured, "Is there really no other way?"
Looking at his expression, Hong Xiaoduo thought for a moment and said, "Actually, it's not like there's no way at all."
Upon hearing this, Jiang An immediately sat up straight and looked at Hong Xiaoduo expectantly: "What method do you have, young lady?"
"You have sons in your family, why don't they need to serve in the military? Send him to the army camp to experience hardship. The military camp has strict discipline, and if he dares to misbehave, he will only be punished with a beating. Even if he can't endure the hardship and wants to escape, I've heard that in the military camp, several people are grouped together and they remember each other's names. If one of them escapes, the others will be punished as a result. So they will supervise each other, so escaping is not so easy."
Furthermore, those who did not desert before battle or after entering the battlefield, if captured, would not be executed but exiled three thousand miles away to do hard labor.
"Of course, this is just a suggestion. Mr. Jiang, you only have one son. If you can't bear to see him suffer, then just pretend I didn't say anything." Hong Xiaoduo genuinely wanted to help this poor father.
Jiang An smiled bitterly upon hearing this: "Young lady, you don't know, it's not that I haven't thought about doing this, but Madam Pang felt sorry for him and knelt down crying to beg me, saying that the child would be more sensible when he was older, and if he went to the military camp, with his personality, he might die there."
Madam Pang? She, as a concubine, is certainly quite devoted to this son!
Hong Xiaoduo looked at Jiang An and asked him, "May I ask, Mr. Jiang, what is your parents' attitude towards this grandson? Do they spoil him?"
"No, that's not it. I have six brothers, and I'm the fifth oldest. Besides me, the other five all have many children. So, my parents also dislike this good-for-nothing."
I think that's why they chose to spend their retirement years at their second brother's house, which is the furthest from this town.
It's been about ten years. I wanted to invite them to stay with me for a while so I could fulfill my filial duty, but they refused. They made it clear that if I had the filial piety, I would visit them when I had time, but they would never come to my house. They said that seeing that bastard would shorten their lives.
The two elders said they didn't expect him to be particularly ambitious; they just wanted him to be a decent, law-abiding citizen.
After saying that, Jiang An sighed again. He had lost count of how many times he had sighed since he sat down in the courtyard!
Hearing this, Hong Xiaoduo wondered to herself again, "These elders of the Jiang family are quite wise!"
I only had a brief encounter with this Mr. Jiang and thought he was a very upright person. How did he end up with such a crooked bamboo shoot?
Hong Xiaoduo didn't know if it was out of strong curiosity, a sense of justice, or sympathy, but she immediately made a decision to verify whether the bastard kneeling outside was really Master Jiang's biological son.
After serving Mr. Jiang tea, they chatted casually again, and before long, they learned the address of Madam Pang's family home and the name of the son she left with her family: Pang Dayong, who took his mother's surname after being divorced.
They chatted for about half an hour. When Feiyan came to refill the water for the third time, wanting to brew another pot of tea, Jiang An got up and said goodbye.
Hong Xiaoduo got up to see him off, deliberately lagging behind by a step, and nimbly plucked a hair from Jiang An's head.
Feiyan, who was standing nearby, was shocked and widened her eyes. She instinctively covered her mouth, not understanding why she would suddenly pull someone's hair. She didn't seem like she was playing a prank.
Perhaps Jiang An was preoccupied with something, so he didn't even notice when a hair was plucked from his head.
When Hong Xiaoduo was seeing someone off through the courtyard, Quan Jinghuai nodded to Jiang An as a greeting, but he didn't seem inclined to see him off as well.
However, he and the seven children were very curious about what Hong Xiaoduo and this person had talked about in the living room that took so long. They had already skewered the meat skewers.
And the other person was someone they had just met, yet they had so much to talk about?
And what was that expression on Fei Yan's face later?
Fei Yan was still curious about what she had just witnessed and did not notice the curious looks that Quan Jinghuai and the others were giving her. She followed Hong Xiaoduo to see the guests off to the courtyard gate.
Outside the courtyard gate, Jiang Baicheng, still kneeling but somewhat swaying, finally saw his father come out, and tears welled up in his eyes.
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