Translator: SJade, Editor: Dj22031
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Seeing the people from the old house, Ye Ning’s already heavy heart became even heavier, to the point where she had difficulty breathing.
“What are you doing here?” Ye Ning’s tone was cold and she didn’t show any dignity at all. “If anything happens, let grandpa come forward on his own. What qualifications do you have to question me?”
“You…I am your grandma.” Her Step-grandma’s whole body was shaking with anger.
“I have told you countless times that my grandma has died a long time ago. My dad has never called you mom. We call you grandma just to save grandpa’s face, but it does not really mean that we will recognize you as grandma. Our two families have separated long ago. It was written clearly in black and white. My dad doesn’t want anything from my grandpa, and he won’t need to be raised by my dad when he gets old. He followed Ye Qinghe willingly. You were also present at the time. Both you and Ye Qinghe placed your fingerprints. To sum up, there is no difference even if the relationship is broken.”
Ye Ning announced Ye Qingshan’s death at that time. As a result, the aunt next door came, and third uncle came, and even the second uncle who didn’t move around much came. Even the father, old man Ye, was nowhere to be seen. It gave her chills just to think about it.
“It doesn’t matter if you don’t recognize me as grandma. After all, I’m not your biological grandma, but you can’t deny your grandfather. He is your biological grandfather, right? Do you know that your grandfather knows that you went behind him to find your third uncle, and he is so angry that he has been lying on the bed since then. What does breaking up the relationship mean? Ye Ning, since you are still a worker, you should know can dividing the family be the same as breaking up the relationship? But your grandfather didn’t just follow Qinghe, right? Until he lives, and you have to be filial to him during the New Year and festivals. Now that your father is gone, and your grandfather is a white haired person sending away a black haired person[1], you should be even more filial.”
Originally, the step-grandma didn’t plan to come over to make trouble for herself, but Fang Ming was right, Ye Qingshan died on the construction site. There must be some compensation, if not ten thousand, it must at least be eight thousand. Counting the money from selling the land, Ye Ning, this stinky girl, had a lot of money. No wonder she had the confidence to support her younger brother and sister. The old man was Ye Qingshan’s Dad, he also had a share in this money. Why should this stinky girl Ye Ning take it all away?
“It is the duty of children to be filial to the elderly. Now that my father is dead and grandpa has children, it is not us three grandchildren’s turn to be filial unless…” Ye Ning looked at them with a sneer, “If Ye Fangming and Ye Qinghe is dead, I’ll take the old man over without saying a word.”
“What did you say, you stinky girl?” When the step-grandmother heard her cursing her two sons, she couldn’t stand it anymore and said with a fierce look on her face: “I am here today. I have to tear you apart.”
Seeing that she was about to rush over, Ye Lan rushed out with a broom, hit her with the broom, and knocked her to the ground.
“Hey! Help, I’ve been beaten to death. This unfilial girl is going to beat this old lady to death.” The step-grandma was wailing on the ground.
Ye Ning picked up the hatchet in the yard and said, “Wang Chunxiang, a broom can’t kill someone, but a hatchet can. Anyway, you’re slandering us for killing people. Why don’t you let me prove this?”
Wang Chunxiang suddenly felt like a chicken being strangled by the neck. She couldn’t even make a sound. It was because Ye Ning’s eyes were so indifferent now, as if she were looking at a dead person. She was so scared that she broke into a cold sweat.
“Don’t think that I don’t know what your plans are. Our two families have separated a long time ago. Nothing in my house belongs to you. I still say the same thing, do you want us to take care of you in old age? Okay, we will only if Ye Fangming and Ye Qinghe’s families are dead.” Ye Ning glanced at the quail-like little aunt next to her, “My dad’s funeral will be in two days. You and you, whoever dares to make my dad uneasy, I will make you uneasy.”
At first, his grandfather was afraid that his stepmother would bully Ye Qingshan, so when he was seriously ill, he let Ye Qingshan and Old Ye separate their families. It was made very clear that Ye Qingshan did not want a penny or a thing from Old Ye, and he would not need to provide for Old Ye’s old age in the future. In the past, Ye Qingshan was very young, it was always a matter of course. Now that Ye Qingshan was gone, these people bullied them and tried to take advantage of them. Ye Ning knew very well that they were vampires. Once they fell weak, they would take advantage of them and suck them dry. As long as their blood was gone, just put an end to the matter.
Ye Lan and Ye An took out their hatchets and stood behind their sister, supporting their sister with practical actions.
“You…your parents taught you well. I have learned a lot.” Wang Chunxiang got up and pulled her daughter-in-law away.
“Sister, are you okay?” Ye Lan was worried that people from the old house would come and make noise during the funeral.
“Don’t worry, we’ll invite our uncle over early tomorrow morning. I’ll see then if that family dares to come.” Ye Ning hummed.
Her great-uncle had five brothers. Counting himself, it was six people. Each brother had two to five sons, and the sons had another two to five sons. There were nearly forty young men, and they came to your door. At the previous stop, most of them were frightened, so her uncle had a strong voice in Xiangshe Village and was never afraid when going out.
The reason why the people in the old house were so peaceful before was because of the pressure from their uncle. But in the past two years, his health was not as good as before, and the money in Ye Ning’s hand was too tempting, so Wang Chunxiang dared to come to the door.
Before dawn, the three siblings ate a little and went to Xiangshe Village to find their aunt and uncle.
“Sister, why don’t you stop here?” They walked about five miles, mostly uphill. Ye Lan saw that Ye Ning was out of breath.
“It’s okay. The three of us have to invite our uncle together to show our sincerity. The people in the old house are after the money we have and won’t let it go. They are all elders and naturally have an advantage. I don’t want them to disturb Dad. To ensure peace, we must invite our uncle over. With the old man in charge, Wang Chunxiang and the others will not dare to mess around.”
After walking for more than two hours, they finally climbed over two mountains. Ye Ning let out a long sigh of relief.
“Are we there yet?”
“Not yet. We’ll be there in just one kilometre along this path.” Ye Lan said without blushing or out of breath.
This place had beautiful mountains and clear waters. It was really nice to travel there, but it was too remote. It was also not convenient to buy things while living here.
“Is there electricity here?” Ye Ning looked around and saw that there seemed to be no wires.
“No, not even a supply and marketing store. They usually go down the mountain to buy necessities every two or three months.”
In fact, they just bought salt and couldn’t afford anything else.
“Sister, don’t go to Xiangshe Village. This place is good.”
Xiangshe Village was located in a remote area and had inconvenient transportation. Precisely because of the inconvenience of transportation, nothing could happen here. In the past, when everyone was hungry, only the people in Xiangshe Village had enough to eat. Because of the mountains, they could still catch some game every now and then, otherwise her uncle would not have asked her aunt to marry back to the village.
After walking for another ten minutes, they finally saw the crowds. There were more than a dozen large courtyards beside a large pond. These courtyards were really big. If you look carefully, there were at least six rooms in one courtyard.
“A house here has such a big yard? That’s really rich.” Ye Ning sighed.
“No, there are several families in this courtyard. Sister, look at the highest courtyard. Our aunt lives there. There are five families in the same hall. They are all relatives.” That’s how it was in the countryside, a village counting them up, they were all relatives.
“What about our uncle?”
“The whole courtyard by the water belongs to our uncle. There are six rooms in it. Our uncle lives in one room, and the other five rooms belong to his five sons.”
Ye Lan came with Ye Qingshan to visit relatives every Chinese New Year, and was very familiar with this place, unlike Ye Ning, who had never been here once because she was too lazy to walk.
“Should we go to our aunt’s house first or our uncle’s house first?” Ye Lan asked as she stood at the intersection.
Ye Ning thought for a moment, “Let’s go to our aunt’s house first, and then ask our aunt to take us to find our uncle.”
After all, it would be better for her aunt to take them there since there was a generation gap.
The three of them came to their aunt’s house. Two old ladies were sitting on the threshold of the door, sewing clothes. When they saw Ye Ning and the others, they asked, “Whose relatives are they? How come I haven’t seen them before?”
“Grandma, I’m here to see my aunt, her name is Ye Qingmei.” Ye Ning said quickly.
“A neice from Qingmei’s family?” Grandma looked at the three Ye family siblings. She didn’t expect that the thick and strong Ye Qingmei could have such a beautiful niece. She didn’t know if she was married. “Wait a minute, I’ll call her for you.”
Grandma put down her things, walked a little further up the side road, and shouted at the corner, “Qingmei, Qingmei, your niece is here to see you.”
“Who did Second Aunt say has come to see me?” Ye Qingmei was digging the ground when she heard her second aunt shouting and turned to ask her husband who was immersed in work.
“It sounds like she’s your niece.”
“Then it’s probably Xiao Lan. Why is she here? Could it be that the old witch bullied the siblings?” When Ye Qingmei thought of this, she dropped her hoe and hurried down the mountain.
“Wait for me. You will have to suffer the consequences alone. I will go with you.”
Xiangshe Village was remote. The people in the village were used to being self-sufficient and rarely went down the mountain. In the past month or two, there had been a lot of work in the fields, so there was no one going down the mountain, thus Ye Qingmei didn’t even know about Ye Qingshan’s death.
Ye Qingmei and her husband rushed down the mountain and saw the three children from her brother’s family coming. They were anxious, “Xiao Ning, why are you here too? Is that old witch bullying you? Don’t be afraid, aunt will support you.”
Ye Lan, as soon as she saw her aunt, she burst into tears, “Aunt, my dad…is dead.”
The aunt opened her eyes wide and said angrily: “How can you talk like this kid? Your dad went out to work to make money, didn’t he? Why are you still talking and cursing him?”
Ye Ning choked, “My dad…is really gone. He went out to work with the people in the village. He found work in a mining factory because of the low wages at the construction site, but after going into the mine, he never came back up, and no body was found. We plan to build a tomb for Dad. We must give him a home. The date has been set, July 16th. We came here today to tell you, and ask our uncle for help. You know what the people in the old house are like. I don’t want him to be uneasy now that my father is gone. With our uncle watching over us, those monsters won’t dare to mess around.”
Ye Qingmei collapsed on the ground, murmuring in disbelief, “It’s impossible, how is it possible? We were sitting together to eat during the Chinese New Year, and we even talked about him going out to work to make money, why is he gone? He… Qingshan was only in his early 40s, in his prime, why is he gone? Find out clearly, do they have the same name? Your dad is so young, how could he die?”
The grandmother next to her was stunned when she heard the news. They all knew Ye Qingshan who would come to help his sister Ye Qingmei during the busy farming season. He was here during the Chinese New Year, so how did he die?
Ye An burst into tears. He still couldn’t believe it. Ye Ning and Ye Lan were the first to recover. After all, they had known the news for several months, and the saddest time had passed.
“Auntie, I’ve already found someone to prepare Dad’s coffin, and I’ve also asked Master Wu to choose the cemetery. I’ll ask a few uncles to pull the stones up today, and set up the mourning hall tomorrow. We are young and don’t know anything, so we need your help.”
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[1] A parent sending away their child.