"What a joke!" An Jing scoffed coldly, "Every day you wish for my husband’s death, and now that you can’t survive, you come begging for my husband’s support... Hehua, your shamelessness knows no bounds."
Hehua’s face flushed red instantly.
"Hehua, there’s no such thing as a free lunch," An Jing continued, "When my husband was sent to the battlefield by your family, he already repaid the debt of being born to your mother-in-law. He owes your family nothing. I haven’t held a grudge against you for wishing my husband dead, but you come here with your child, expecting my husband to support you — that’s just too ugly to watch!"
Hehua felt utterly ashamed. She also knew that she should not have come to find Xiao Changyi, but she was at her wit’s end—she longed for her son to survive.
Suddenly, with a thud, Hehua knelt before An Jing and Xiao Changyi. Not just her, she also pulled along her four-year-old Xiao Douzi to kneel, then began to plead, "Elder brother, sister-in-law, please, please help us. Douzi and I truly cannot survive anymore."
An Jing immediately sneered, "Where can’t you survive? I see those two fields of yours are still there. Even if you don’t sell them all, selling one field would be enough to feed both of you for several years."
Hehua became agitated, "Those two fields are for planting crops, we can’t sell them. If we sell, we will have nothing to eat in the future."
An Jing immediately laughed coldly, "So, you have the gall to come begging from us with an outstretched hand?"
Hehua’s face turned even redder, then she burst into tears and sobbed, "Selling them would indeed feed us for a few years, but what about after that? When we have no fields to farm, what should we do then? Wouldn’t we still starve to death?"
An Jing sneered again, "You can’t even take care of the present, yet you worry about the future... Hehua, can’t you distinguish between what’s urgent and important?"
Hehua didn’t say a word, just kept crying and crying.
An Jing said irritably, "Even if you cry to death in front of us, we won’t help you. The day your family sent my husband to the battlefield, he had nothing to do with your family anymore!"
It’s better to rely on oneself than on others. By selling a field, when the child grows up to help with work, both able-bodied, would they still fear starvation then? Hehua is truly foolish.
Yet Hehua still refused to sell the fields. Instead, she pushed Xiao Douzi forward while crying, "If you won’t help me, I won’t blame you, but could you please take Douzi in? Let Douzi become your son. After all, you can’t have children, and sooner or later you will want to adopt a child to raise. It’s better to take in my Douzi, your nephew."
Without the burden of a child, she could still survive.
As long as her child was adopted by them, both she and her Xiao Douzi could survive.
But the fields must absolutely not be sold.
Upon hearing this, An Jing’s face immediately darkened, "You’d rather keep the fields to plant crops than sell them to feed your son? You even think of giving your son up for adoption to us? Ha, do you think we even want to? Hehua, let me tell you today, if I can’t bear children, then my husband and I will remain childless for life. We will never adopt another’s child to be ours!"
"Why must you be ... why must you all be ..." Hehua cried bitterly, "My Douzi is really good, very obedient. If you adopt him as your son, when he grows up, he will undoubtedly be filial and look after you in your old age. My Douzi is so good, why won’t you accept him..."