Song Jingchen came out and saw the two unfamiliar faces in the courtyard.
He looked at Shen Yijia. “Come in with me.”
Shen Yijia nodded and followed Song Jingchen into Madam Li’s house.
Sister Huan looked at Shen Yijia and Lin Shao before following them into the house.
Madam Li was doing embroidery while Brother Hao sat at the side practicing his calligraphy.
She did not know that their household was about to expand. Seeing the two of them enter, Madam Li was quite curious. “Sister Jia is back? What happened?”
Shen Yijia scratched her head.
Song Jingchen looked at Shen Yijia. “Tell me, what happened?”
With Shen Yijia’s brain, Song Jingchen couldn’t help but worry that she had been deceived.
Shen Yijia lowered her head and twisted her fingers as she explained the situation.
However, she didn’t mention the underground arena. After all, she had just promised Song Jingchen that she wouldn’t go.
She only mentioned what she had encountered in the dilapidated temple on the way back. “They were too pitiful, so I brought them back.”
Song Jingchen glanced at Shen Yijia suspiciously. He’d always had the feeling that she wasn’t a kind person.
It was as if you could hear Shen Yijia thinking. “No, I’m genuinely being kind this time, although I made the decision on the spur of the moment.”
Madam Li also looked hesitant when she heard that. She also felt that the two kids were pitiful, but their own family wasn’t that well off. Was it really okay to raise two more people?
“Mother, those two siblings are so pitiful. Let’s keep them. I can eat less in the future.” Sister Huan said. After all, Sister Huan was still young and didn’t consider the full picture. She didn’t know that raising two more people was different from raising Tuan Zi.
Although Brother Hao didn’t say anything, he clearly had the same intention as Sister Huan.
Shen Yijia looked down at her fingers and said guiltily, “If you don’t agree…”
Song Jingchen interrupted her. “They can say. If you want to help them, we can let them stay with us.”
Strictly speaking, Shen Yijia was providing for this family. If she could provide for their family, why couldn’t she provide for two more people? He had no reason to refuse.
Just in case, Song Jingchen called the two of them to his room alone.
Shen Yijia looked at the closed door and wrinkled her nose. She unloaded the carriage.
In the room, Song Jingchen sat behind the desk without a word.
The siblings held hands nervously and stood at the side. Although Lin Shao had always acted like an adult, he was still a child who had just turned 12. He was quickly overwhelmed by the atmosphere in the room.
He pulled Lin Miaomiao and they both knelt down. He said in a trembling voice, “As long as you let us stay, I can give you our family’s secret recipe.”
Song Jingchen raised his eyebrows. It seemed that things were not simple.
It turned out that the Lin family used to make and sell incense powder. They had a secret recipe passed down from their ancestors.
The incense that was produced was different from the powders that other businesses produced, so business had always been good.
However, Father Lin also knew that having a treasured secret recipe would make them a target. He had always been very careful and only ran a small shop for more than ten years.
The Lin family was low-key and careful.
Unexpectedly, he was still targeted by the town’s tyrant, Feng Laoliu. Father Lin would rather close the shop and stop making incense than hand it over to outsiders.
However, how could those people let him off so easily? This led to the tragic death of the Lin couple and the fate of the siblings.
Lin Shao blamed his father and hated that secret recipe.
If not for that secret recipe or Mr. Lin handing over the items, their family would still be fine.
But that was his father. Now he was gone. What else could he do?
He was not stupid. He knew that Feng Laoliu had let the siblings live because he wanted to get something from them. He was waiting for them to hand it over when they were desperate.