The surroundings were pitch black, and Liu Cuirong could see nothing.
Bad luck struck. Dark clouds rolled across the night sky, and the rumble of distant thunder accompanied flashes of lightning that lit up the heavens.
It looked like it was going to rain…
"That little vixen, she runs faster than a rabbit. Just you wait until you get back, I'll deal with you!~"
Liu Cuirong was so angry she was hopping from foot to foot.
In the middle of the night, if Hu Xier hid in a haystack, Liu Cuirong wouldn't be able to find her.
"Rumble!~"
After a clap of thunder, a torrential downpour began, drenching Liu Cuirong like a drowned rat…
"Oh, why is it raining? Honestly!~"
Liu Cuirong kicked her heels and ran home, her stomach starting to ache.
Little Xi Tian had eaten half a sweet potato and could no longer stay awake. She fell onto the kang and drifted off to sleep…
Sleeping to the sound of rain was the most comfortable!
If no one called her, she could sleep until noon the next day.
"Mom, what did I say? That little vixen must have gone to meet her lover!~"
Liu Cuirong complained as she changed her clothes.
Otherwise, why would she run out in the middle of the night?
Half an hour's walk west of the village was a dense patch of woods…
If they fooled around there, they wouldn't have to worry about mosquitoes biting their bottoms raw.
Gu Shi frowned, "Go to sleep!~"
She knew what was going on.
It seemed Hu Xier had a short memory and thought that with all the recent troubles at home, no one was watching her anymore.
Jin Huaihua lay at the edge of the kang, her heart pounding…
If Xi'er truly wanted to get married, she could have just told Madam Gu. Why sneak out secretly?
This kind of thing was disgraceful, whether in the village or the county town.
Liu Cuirong changed into dry clothes and burrowed into the quilt, shivering. "I'm soaked to the bone, it's so cold!~"
The room was dark, and Old Man Yun and the others in the east room had also fallen asleep…
After an unknown amount of time, a dog bark was heard from the courtyard.
Hu Xier pushed open the courtyard gate and tiptoed in.
Xue Ling, lying lazily outside the doghouse, sniffed the air.
The scent seemed a bit off; there was a stranger's aura…
A dog's nose was the most sensitive. Even if Hu Xier rolled around in a pile of ashes, it could still distinguish the scent of others.
"Tsk, don't bark!~" Hu Xier patted Xue Ling's head.
"Woof, woof!" Xue Ling was extremely disgusted.
Don't touch my dog head with your dirty hands, okay?
Hu Xier ignored it and went straight back to her room…
Seeing Gu Shi and the others sleeping soundly on the kang, she sighed inwardly.
Fortunately, she hadn't been discovered.
Just as Hu Xier took off her shoes and was about to climb onto the kang, a stern question suddenly rang out from the room.
"Xier, where have you been?" Gu Shi sat up and casually lit the oil lamp.
Upon closer inspection, Gu Shi was stunned…
It had been raining heavily outside, yet Hu Xier's hair was dry, and there wasn't a single drop of water on her.
Hadn't she been rained on?
Gu Shi remembered she hadn't brought an umbrella when she went out.
Hu Xier's face paled, and she stammered an explanation, "Madam… Madam Gu, I… I just went to the outhouse!~"
"And you're lying?" Gu Shi roared.
If she had told the truth, she wouldn't have been this angry.
But at this critical juncture, she still refused to admit it, clearly showing she didn't respect her as the matriarch of the household.
"I, I, I… I really went to the outhouse!~" Hu Xier mumbled, her head bowed.
Liu Cuirong, half-asleep, heard her flimsy excuse and was furious. She couldn't sleep anymore and scrambled out of bed…
"Hu Xier, stop your nonsense here. I saw you sneaking into the woods with some wild man!~"
"If you dare to lie again, believe it or not, I'll skin you alive?"
As she scolded, Liu Cuirong noticed that Hu Xier was completely dry, not looking like she had been caught in the heavy rain.
She then rolled her eyes and asked, "Oh, so you didn't sneak into the woods with a wild man, but you did it in a carriage? It's so cramped in there, weren't you uncomfortable?"
A carriage could shield them from the wind and rain, so of course, they wouldn't get wet.
Gu Shi: "…"
What kind of lewd words were those?
Hu Xier tightly clasped her fingers, realizing this matter could no longer be hidden.
She needed to find an excuse to cover it up…
"Actually, actually, my cousin from Xinwang Village came to visit. Her family is facing hardship and wants to borrow some silver from me to pay for her child's education!~"
Hu Xier explained in a low voice.
"Pah, what cousin? When there was the rat plague a few years ago, didn't all your garlic-loving relatives starve to death?"
Liu Cuirong retorted loudly, "You little vixen, just because you're foolish doesn't mean everyone else is. Why don't you say your mother came back to life and asked you for money?"
Hu's mother-in-law had died of illness two years ago…
It was said that she had stolen a small chicken from a villager, and after eating it, she fell seriously ill and then kicked the bucket.
Later, Little Xi Tian analyzed it and thought that chicken probably had avian flu.
So Liu Cuirong often used this incident to mock Hu Xier…
"I, I'm not lying. If you don't believe me, I'll call my cousin over tomorrow for you to see!~"
Hu Xier looked wronged.
"Forget it!" Gu Shi pulled back the quilt and slowly lay down, saying indifferently, "Xier, if you don't want to stay in this house, I can return your deed of sale to you!~"
"From now on, you can do whatever you want, as long as you don't involve our Old Yun family!"
"This matter ends here. If you want to stay, be honest and well-behaved, and we won't make things difficult for you…"
"If you still dare to be fickle and go out to hook up with unsavory people, tarnishing the reputation of our Old Yun family, then the nature of the matter will be different!~"
"We signed a letter of guarantee, don't forget…"
Hu Xier responded unwillingly, "Got it!~"
Before she could find a suitable rich young master or a wealthy official or lord willing to spend money on her, she couldn't leave the Yun family.
She was so pretty; she could charm men to death with just her face.
Finding a rich man shouldn't be that difficult…
It was all Liu Cuirong's fault, that damned woman, who watched her so closely every day.
She didn't even have time to look for a new place.
Zhao Guihua was exhausted and slept soundly on the kang.
In two or three months, she would give birth. She wondered if this pregnancy was a boy or a girl.
Actually, it was obvious without even thinking about it. The Old Yun family only had Little Xi Tian as a daughter. They, the daughters-in-law, had no fate to give birth to daughters…
Even though her second sister-in-law was usually so boisterous, Zhao Guihua had seen through it long ago. The baby in her belly was definitely a boy.
If Gao Fengjuan became pregnant again in the future, she would definitely give birth to a boy.
This was fate!~
Little Xi Tian had a beautiful dream. She dreamt she had grown wings and was flying over Dashui Village, with a large group of plump little pigs following behind her…
The next morning, the Yun family was having breakfast.
Suddenly, a loud 'boom' echoed, and the entire room trembled slightly.