751 Cancel the Marriage Plans
“I see that everyone has been looking quite down recently. What’s the matter?” Qiao Mei sized up everyone and asked.
Auntie Wang sighed and said, “Sigh… Qiao Mei, you don’t have to earn work points in the village, so you don’t know how chaotic it has been for the past two days. We don’t know what’s wrong with Wang Qin. After she returned to the village, she said that she was sick and stayed at home every day. There is still a lot of work waiting for her in the village office. If this goes on, our family won’t have any food.”
“She is probably traumatized. In the middle of the night, Qiao Fu would kick up a fuss and say that he deserves to die. He even talks about begging the Great Immortal to spare his life. He would say all kinds of nonsense, making my dog bark along too,” Auntie Zhou said with dark circles under her eyes.
Everyone pointed at Auntie Zhou and laughed loudly. Auntie Zhou was actually younger than all the other women present. Her husband was 14 years older than her! Auntie Zhou paid a lot of attention to maintaining her health and she also looked very exquisite every day.
She even did manicures! Of course, it was not the modern type of manicure. It was a method passed down from ancient times. This involved collecting the petals of the balsam flowers, mashing up the petals into a paste and then using leaves to wrap the paste on the nails. After a while, the nails would become dyed with color and it would last for a period of time, making them look especially beautiful.
Auntie Zhou was the only person in the entire village who could get her hands on balsam flowers. Every once in a while, she would go to the county city to buy some. It was something she was willing to splurge on.
“Qiao Mei, were you at the scene? Did you see how Qiao Fu got smashed?” Auntie Dong asked curiously.
She was such a curious person that she had naturally gone to the scene to take a look, but no matter how she looked around, it did not seem like it was a murder attempt that had been planned for a long time. It really looked like an accident. Could it be that Qiao Fu had really offended a Great Immortal in the mountains and that was how he got into such a situation?
“I didn’t see anything. I went down the mountain to get my things and when I got back, I saw that my grandfather was injured,” Qiao Mei said aggrievedly.
Everyone glared at Auntie Dong reproachfully. Qiao Mei had seemed quite happy initially, but Auntie Dong had to bring up that matter and affect Qiao Mei’s mood.
Originally, the most popular person in the village was Qiao Qiang, followed by Zhao Liang. The person whom everyone was afraid of was Qiao Zhuang. However, Qiao Mei was now the most popular person and no one else could get in line for that title.
She was a role model for all the girls in the village and the boys used her as a benchmark for their future wives. Every family liked Qiao Mei. In fact, comparatively, Qiao Qiang and Zhao Liang had never given any substantial benefits to everyone.
Not only did Qiao Mei help everyone to get rich, but she also voluntarily went to the canteen to cook during the autumn harvest so that everyone could keep up the strength to work. Every year, everyone would be so tired from the autumn harvest that it was like they had lost a layer of skin. This year, however, everyone had gained a lot of weight. This was all thanks to Qiao Mei.
Not only did she cook for everyone, but she also slaughtered three geese and shared them so that everyone had additional nourishment.
They definitely liked such a good girl. If anything should happen to Qiao Mei’s family, they would definitely do their best to help her.
As they chatted, the sky soon darkened and everyone went back to cook. Qiao Mei also got busy.
At Qiao Zhuang’s family, on the other hand, the mood was heavy. The entire family sat together but had nothing to say as they ate quietly.
“Qiao Liang, set aside your marriage plans for now. Your eldest brother is sick and our family has no money to help you get married,” Qiao Zhuang said.
Qiao Liang immediately threw down his chopsticks and became unhappy. Why should he bear the costs for Qiao Fu’s sins? He had already made an agreement with that family to marry the girl soon. If he changed his mind at the last minute, she definitely would not want to be with him anymore.
“No, I’ve already said that this matter can’t be changed,” Qiao Liang said stubbornly.
When Qiao Zhuang heard this, he was so angry that he threw his chopsticks at Qiao Liang and slapped him hard in the face. He said angrily, “Your eldest brother is already in such a state! You still want to get married! Which is more important, your eldest brother’s life or getting a wife! As if she can run away!”
All the family members were stubborn people. Qiao Liang stood up and shouted at Qiao Zhuang, “No! Back then, you were the one who insisted that eldest brother harm Uncle’s family. Now, you’ve gone for wool and come home shorn. Why should I bear the responsibility for your mistakes! If I don’t marry her now, what if she marries someone else!”
“So be it! You can marry any other woman! If you don’t want to listen to me, then you can get lost! We’re the ones paying for your betrothal gifts! How dare you shout at us!” Qiao Zhuang said angrily.