Ying Zi choked and continued, “Lin Yuelan, I admit that I shouldn’t have accidentally drained your field. I thought I was draining my cousin’s field. My intention was to drain my cousin’s field and not yours.”
Ying Zi’s cousin was her eldest uncle’s son. The son’s field was coincidentally next to Lin Yuelan’s field, and they shared the same drain. This was an understandable mistake. However, Ying Zi forgot about one common knowledge. Water in the field wouldn’t drain out in a matter of minutes. It would take a long time for the water to slowly push out through the muddy drain. Therefore, one had more than enough time to realize that one had made a mistake draining the wrong field.
When Lin Yuelan heard Ying Zi’s explanation, she looked at Ying Zi with a faint smile and simply said, “really?”
Ying Zi thought that Lin Yuelan believed her explanation. She was overjoyed and quickly replied, “Yes, of course!”
Someone in the crowd burst out laughing.
She said loudly, “Ying Zi, are you really that dumb? You have a lot of time to tell if you got the right field or not. Don’t tell me you can’t even differentiate between the two fields. Plus, why would you go around draining people’s fields?” That was impossible because Lin Yuelan’s field was treated with ash. The amateur mistake Ying Zi claimed she had made was simply impossible.
Panic flashed across Ying Zi and Gu Sanniang’s eyes. They clasped their hands tightly together, showing their nervousness. ‘Crap!’
Lin Yuelan’s expression suddenly changed. With a solemn and cold expression, she said loudly, “I was wondering why the water in my family’s fields had been drained. I checked and noticed the water had been drained to Lin Changmao’s field. I was planning to pull up all of his seeds later today as revenge.
“However, I didn’t expect that someone would come bearing the truth. She came to admit that she was the culprit instead. This is just great!”
After saying this, Lin Yuelan’s eyes turned sharp. She looked at Ying Zi and Gu Sanniang and asked sharply, “so, is that why you’re kneeling in front of my house so early in the morning? To admit that you’ve done this on purpose?”
Being questioned so sharply, the skin on the mother and daughter’s faces turned white, red, and then blue.
This was because the mother and daughter were embarrassed and angry.
They had never thought that Lin Yuelan would be so cunning. She had turned what Ying Zi claimed was an accident into a malicious act.
These two were very different.
In the countryside, the fields were the lifeblood of the farmers.
It was the farming season. If there was no water in the field, the seeds would dry up and die. Then what would the farmers harvest?
If this was not done intentionally, it could still be forgiven. But if this was intentional, how was this different from trying to starve an entire family to death?
The truth was clear. Ying Zi, this obedient, sensible, and smart child, had deliberately drained another person’s field, cutting off their livelihood.
At that instant, everyone looked at Ying Zi with a strange look.
Ying Zi also saw the looks in everyone’s eyes, and she suddenly panicked.
Seeing this, Gu Sanniang immediately admitted, “Yuelan, this is my fault. I deliberately drained your field so that your seeds would die. It has nothing to do with my daughter. I did it for revenge. Yes, revenge. I did it to take revenge on you for making me stay in Mount Da Ao for a night. I was scared and uneasy for the whole night. Now that I think about it, I’m trembling all over, and I feel very uneasy. So, I want to take revenge on you. However,” the more Gu Sanniang explained, the more convicted she sounded, “You are too terrifying to deal with in person. I don’t know how to take revenge on you. One day, when I passed by your family’s field, I immediately had an idea of how to take revenge on you. I will drain your field dry. I didn’t expect that…”
The crowd nodded. Gu Sanniang’s explanation made sense.