Chapter 57.1 - Someone is making trouble

Chapter 57.1 – Someone is making trouble

After Jiang Zhen beat Liu Heitou up that day, some people in Hexi felt very happy, but a group of people led by the Jiang family’s second uncle were very worried that Liu Heitou would come to Hexi to find trouble with them. Later, there was no sign of Liu Heitou, and he didn’t show up to make trouble, so everyone was relieved. Nobody expected to see Liu Heitou at this moment.

Liu Heitou came to Jiang Zhen’s door when he was getting married. Was he looking for trouble? Who were these people around him?

The people of Hexi got scared. Liu Heitou looked at these people with pity, and the corners of his mouth curled up slightly. He did come to make trouble for Jiang Zhen. It was a great shame for him to be beaten up by Jiang Zhen that day, and he was never a man who let go of his grudges, so he naturally thought about taking revenge on Jiang Zhen. But at that time, he had some scruples.

When Jiang Zhen beat him up that day, he saw the goods that Jiang Zhen put aside. There were many good things among those goods that he couldn’t buy in the county town even if he wanted . . .

Jiang Zhen was brave enough to fight him, and he was good at martial arts and could get a hold of so many good things. There was definitely something going on . . . Under such circumstances, Liu Heitou naturally did not dare to lay hands on Jiang Zhen hastily. For days, he investigated Jiang Zhen’s affairs. In the past few days, it took a lot of effort to find something about the other person, and he needed to ask people one by one. However, Jiang Zhen was a native of Hexi. Apart from going out twice in the recent months, he had never left the area before. Liu Heitou soon learned about his ventures. Although he didn’t know where he had gone on those two trips, there was no doubt that Jiang Zhen had no background for him to be afraid of.

At this time, Liu Heitou also thought of the words he had spoken when he was unable to kidnap He Qiusheng, saying that he still wanted to collect the debt from the He family. Back then, he said that to save face and also because he wanted to test Jiang Zhen. And it turned out . . . Jiang Zhen really didn’t have much of a background. Otherwise, how could he have saved the ger and still let him continue asking for the repayment of the debt? He must have known that the He family were by no means able to pay it back.

Acting that way, it seemed like Liu Heitou didn’t pay attention to Jiang Zhen. Jiang Zhen’s skills were very good, and it looked like he had seen a bit of blood . . . so Liu Heitou did not dare to target him rashly. However, he had plenty of ways to deal with him. This Jiang Zhen was about to get married, and the mother of the ger he was going to marry was from their Lijia Village.

Within Lijia, Liu Heitou could cover the sky with one hand. He didn’t harm people from his village for no reason, so the people in Lijia listened to him. And so, he could call Zhao Liu’s family to come and go along with him.

Jiang Zhen led Zhao Jinge into the new house. Zhao Liu also went in, but Zhao Fugui was greeting guests outside. Seeing these people, Zhao Fugui’s face immediately changed. “What are you doing here?”

Zhao Fugui extremely disliked Zhao Liu’s family because these people had never been kind to Zhao Liu. Zhao Liu was the eldest daughter of the family and had two younger brothers and one younger sister.

Lijia villagers thought their daughters would marry out sooner or later, so they were just really helping their future partners raise them. Generally speaking, they were not very kind to their daughters, but Zhao Liu’s parents were especially bad to her. Although the degree of mistreatment was not as bad as that of old lady Jiang to Eldest Jiang, still, they scolded and beat Zhao Liu up. It was just that many women in the countryside led such a life that Zhao Liu didn’t think this was wrong.

In the blink of an eye, Zhao Liu was old enough to get married. At that time, her parents told her about her marriage and wanted to marry her off to a bachelor in his late thirties. Of course, there was a reason why this old bachelor couldn’t get a wife even in his thirties, and that was because he was very poor. His family only owned 2 mu of dryland that couldn’t grow anything, so no one wanted to marry him because of his poverty. However, he didn’t go hungry; he went to work for a big family in the county town as a servant. After working like this for more than ten years, he was able to save fifty to sixty silver.

This old bachelor had been thinking about having a wife for more than twenty years. So when he finally had the money, he didn’t want to buy land but wanted to buy himself a wife. With his situation, anyone who cared about their daughter was unwilling to marry her to him. But some people only looked at the bride price. Zhao Liu’s parents planned to sell her for fifty silver, and the men haggled it down to 40 silver.

At that time, Zhao Liu was only fifteen or sixteen years old, and naturally, she didn’t want to marry a man who could be her father, but her parents didn’t listen to her at all. Fortunately, Zhao Fugui soon appeared.

Zhao Fugui was the Zhao family’s only son. Although the Liu family asked for many gifts, the Zhao family borrowed some money from others and prepared forty silver.

Zhao Liu’s parents did not want to be accused of being harsh to their daughter, so they finally agreed to marry Zhao Liu to Zhao Fugui but only after accepting the bride price. When Zhao Liu got married, she didn’t even receive a quilt from them. The new clothes were sent by Zhao Fugui, but even these were robbed and sold by them. Zhao Liu came to the Zhao family in her old clothes.

Zhao Liu’s parents went a little too far away, and Zhao Liu was a bit angry in her heart. But they were still her parents, so she didn’t completely cut off contact. Later, Zhao Liu’s life was very good and Zhao Fugui was good to her. She let go of her resentment and got along better with her family.

At some point, Zhao Liu’s second younger brother wanted to marry, and her parents wanted to borrow twenty silver from her. Zhao Liu was unwilling, but her parents kept pestering, cursing, and swearing that they would pay it back in the future. After discussing it with Zhao Fugui, Zhao Liu lent them ten silver. But as it turned out, the Liu family never paid it back, but that was nothing. The relationship between the two families got worse and worse, and at that time, something happened to the Zhao family.

After Zhao Liu’s eldest son, Zhao Jinhu, drowned, Zhao Liu jumped into the river to look for him. She searched madly for two hours before Zhao Jinhu was found. By that time, Zhao Jinhu had long ceased breathing. Zhao Fugui also jumped in the water to search for him. Learning that his son was dead, he was tired and sad and didn’t pay attention to Zhao Liu’s health.

Zhao Jinhu was unmarried and was still a child, so his funeral was very simple. After Zhao Fugui finished it, he discovered that Zhao Liu was burning up and nobody knew for how long.

After Zhao Jinhu’s accident, Zhao Liu’s family didn’t come to see them even once. When Zhao Liu fell ill and Zhao Fugui needed money to let her see a doctor, they unexpectedly refused to return the money and even drove Zhao Fugui out.

Zhao Liu’s illness was very dangerous. She coughed incessantly and even coughed up some blood. After that, she stayed in bed for nearly a year, and the life of the Zhao family got worse and worse. During that period, Zhao Liu’s family never appeared in front of them.

After Zhao Liu recovered from her illness, she was still in poor health. From then on, she never went to visit her family’s house again. However, she asked Zhao Jinge to deliver some homegrown dishes every year for the Spring Festival. She was doing it for the others to see and also to embarrass the Liu family.

The least valuable thing in the countryside were vegetables from the field. The daughter who married out, lived so badly that she could only send her own vegetables for the Spring Festival . . . She was so pitiful, yet the Liu family still refused to pay their debt . . .

It had to be said that Zhao Liu doing this had made the Liu family lose a lot of face, but it was a pity that the Liu family were shameless and didn’t care much.