The Green Lotus Peasant Girl

Mrs. Xu wasn’t stupid. She immediately understood what her daughter meant, and the smile at the corner of her mouth turned cold. "Her mother has the same identity as me. She normally contacts me a lot, and is quite close to me, so I didn’t expect her to do this kind of thing behind my back. Rest assured, I understand."

After speaking, she handed the purse to her again and said, "Keep it. I still have some money in there."

"I can't delay too long. When I came here, I said I would return in an hour. I’m relieved to see you are doing well. If you need anything, go to the Zhangs’ house to find me." Then, just as she was about to leave, she saw a small pond outside and smiled. "Give me one of your fish."

The moment Li Qinghe was about to go fishing, Bin'er came out of the backyard. He was intrigued by this and squatted at the side of the pond to watch her fish, "Is it fun to raise fish?"

"I think it's fun," Li Qinghe said. "Would you like to try?"

Bin'er became interested, took the net, and opened it, and all of a sudden, three fish of different sizes appeared. Li Qinghe handed him a bucket and said, "I'll give you all of them."

From the time Mrs. Xu had entered the door to the time she left, less than half an hour had passed. Li Qinghe personally sent the mother and son to the Zhous’ house and watched them get on the carriage.

At the side, Zhang Haiyao wrapped a scarf around her head with a proud face. "My mother said, after the full moon celebration is over, she’ll let me go back and live for a month."

"That’s good," Li Qinghe responded casually, uninterested in the topic.

"By the way, they brought a lot of snacks. You can taste some later. They’re very valuable." She said, turning around, entering the door, and quickly bringing out a small packet of snacks. "It's not much, I need to share some with Mother."

Li Qinghe glanced at it, but didn't reach out to pick it up and smiled. "You need to replenish your body right now, keep them for yourself."

After speaking, she asked, "Earlier, you said you’ll need fish for the full moon celebration, so how many fish will you need? I'll sell them to you at the same price I sell to restaurants, which is 12 cents. Tell me now so we can fish them out earlier."

Zhang Haiyao stiffened. "Can't you sell them a little cheaper?"

Li Qinghe calmly said, "When the time comes, we can give you a few dozen cents’ discount after weighing." Wanting her to sell half and give another half as a gift is impossible.

"Then… I don't want them," Zhang Haiyao tentatively said. "I'll buy more meat, it's the same."

Li Qinghe agreed. "It's okay." When the villagers held feasts, except for her and the Yang family, no one would buy a whole fish.

"The child is crying." Mrs. Zhou shouted over there.

Zhang Haiyao sighed and lowered her voice. "I must tell you that ever since she found out that the child’s a daughter, Mother has not really been happy and rarely hugs her. She makes me soup and sends half of it to Second Sister-In-Law. I see that she means that she is looking forward to Second Sister-In-Law giving birth to a son."

It was pointless discussing this; Li Qinghe didn’t like hearing it. The child was theirs, it was good that the grandmother could love her. However, even if the grandmother didn’t like her, shouldn't she still live her life? Seeing the little girl every day would only lead to guilt.

In addition, Mrs. Zhou had been considerate and had taken good care of her. Even after their families split, she still killed a chicken and stewed it for her. She sent half of the soup to Li Qingmiao because she was in her last trimester and about to give birth. What's wrong with drinking some soup?

It was well known that many old women preferred sons to daughters in the village. If their daughter-in-law gave birth to a daughter, let alone stewed chicken, they wouldn’t even give an egg, and that would be when their families weren't even separated. How could Mrs. Zhou be counted if she preferred sons over daughters?

So it depended on what one thought.

Mrs. Zhou heard no movement there, so she again shouted, "The child is hungry."

Zhang Haiyao shook her head and got up. "Coming."

Li Qinghe didn't stay for long. The main reason she had gone there was to ask about the fish. Since she didn’t want them, there was no need to fish and she could also save them.

It was soon the day of the full moon celebration. In the village, few people were attending the full moon celebration. Women and men who were not married generally didn’t attend, so there weren’t many people there or helping, mostly close neighbors and relatives.

Li Qinghe naturally had to go, and everything went quite smoothly. It was worth mentioning that on the day of Zhang Haiyao's full moon feast, a carriage came from the town and sent a whole chicken, a whole duck, and half a pig, along with two cloths. It was a big deal in the entire Wang Village, including the town. People praised the Zhang family for their generosity and love for their daughter, and Zhang Haiyao was modest but her smile was remarkable.

It was already April after the full moon feast. There was usually nothing to do in the field except to pull weeds. Li Qinghe looked at the sweet potato seedlings and began digging the ground cellars.

Li Fu moved back home after staying with them for about four or five days.

There were only the two of them digging the cellar.

Zhou Chengkang was actually a very hard worker. He rarely refused Li Qinghe's proposals. He started digging near the pigsty and worked very fast. He dug a large cellar in four or five days.

All the soil dug up was picked up and dumped in the vegetable field, forming a large pile outside the backyard wall. The soil was brought back and forth by the two of them. When Li Qinghe gathered up a load to go out with, she saw Yang Lanrou, who was smiling, and Zhou Chengkang saying something.

As she slowly walked out, Zhou Chengkang over there saw her and rushed over to help her.

Li Qinghe squeezed his shoulders and asked, "Miss Yang is here, is there something wrong?"

In Yang Lanrou's hand was a plate with three buns. "I've been making buns for the past two days, and now I made too much. The village is too far away, and only your house is located near me, so I brought it here for you to taste. The weather is too hot, and if you don’t eat it, it’ll go bad soon."

"No," Zhou Chengkang poured mud into the vegetable field. "Miss Yang, you are very kind. Unfortunately, we can't eat buns and if you give them to us, they will go bad, so it’ll be a waste."

Li Qinghe felt a little more at ease. To be honest, she had seen Yang Lanrou and Xu Changjue a lot in her past life. Even now, she was inevitably reminded of them, and she felt a little uncomfortable, especially given Yang Lanrou's soft-spoken character. Her smile was exactly the same as when she had smiled at Xu Changjie in her previous life.

The difference was that Xu Changjie had never refused her. Whether it was her requests or the gifts she gave, he had accepted it all with a smile. Initially, she thought she had been too stingy, but now it seemed they were still neighbors who hadn’t helped each other.

"You’re being too polite. We’ll be neighbors in the future, and we need to interact more." Yang Lanrou handed the buns to Li Qinghe. "Take them and try them."

"We don't eat buns at all." Li Qinghe looked at the buns in front of her and smiled. "If you don't mind, Rhubarb should like them."

Take it and feed it to the dogs!

The look on Yang Lanrou's face changed and she forced a smile. "Anyway, they’re for you."

"Rhubarb!" Zhou Chengkang shouted toward the front yard as he took the plate.

Little Rhubarb scurried over, causing Yang Lanrou to take a few steps back. Zhou Chengkang really placed all the buns on the ground, and then returned the plate to her. "Many thanks, Little Rhubarb loves it."

The smile on Yang Lanrou's face stiffened. Holding the plate in her hands, she turned around and quickly walked away, feeling like she was running away.

Zhou Chengkang saw that she looked bad and smiled curtly. "Madam, what's for lunch?"

Li Qinghe smiled. "Some buns."

Zhou Chengkang blinked, and said seriously, "What buns, I don’t like eating buns. I'll cook you noodles, okay?"

She really hadn’t expected that Yang Lanrou would’ve come over to deliver some buns. When the Yang family had moved here, she had only gone there to help, purely to prevent villagers from gossiping. Anyhow, she didn't intend to have a deep friendship with the Yang family. It was indeed a bit heartbreaking for Zhou Chengakng to feed them to Rhubarb, but it also cut off the possibility of further contact with the Yang family. People who wanted to keep some face wouldn’t come to their door again.

At noon, the two ate noodles. It wasn’t easy for people to eat noodles at this time. Making noodles would take them half an hour since they had to knead and cut up the noodles.

Fortunately, the two of them weren’t busy these days. Zhou Chengkang suggested, "Why don't we go hunting in the mountains? At this time last year, the harvest was good."

Not to mention, last year Zhou Chengkang had gone up the mountain for half a month and earned a full five taels of silver. Neither of them were flamboyant people, so no one knew about it.

From the next day on, the two went to the mountains together. However, since there was a lot of work at home, they would leave late and return early. Even though they didn't hunt much, they cut a lot of firewood. In any case, they had no time to idle.

Because of this, Yu Yan didn't visit them too much.

Yu Yan was the best-looking among the unmarried girls in the village, since she had been embroidering since she was young, had never been exposed to the sun, and had never done any heavy work. Third Aunt refused to let her work in this village as well. It was mainly because she could earn more money from embroidery, had good skin, and had smooth and delicate hands.

Earning three or four taels a month was not a problem. It would provide enough for the family's livelihood if one married her.

However, this girl had a high vision. Seeing that she was getting older and didn’t want to go home, the third aunt simply proposed marriage to her, but she was rejected without exception.

Initially, they weren’t biologically mother and daughter. However, they had tried to get to know each other. Third Aunt didn't want to force her and ruin their relationship, so she let her go.

Li Qinghe knew that Yu Yan liked good-looking people, and Yu Yan was also good-looking and could embroider, so she wasn't concerned about marriage at all, and didn't urge her to get married, but she never imagined that someone would want to marry Yu Yan and come to her.

Another day in the late afternoon, she and Zhou Chengkang came back from the mountain and met Mrs. You.

The most vivid memory Mrs. You had left behind was the time she brought Qian Laiman to the door to see each other and after that, the dispute between her and Qian Laiwen when Old Man Qian had died. Other than that, they were really unfamiliar with one another.

Mrs. You smiled. "Qinghe, are you going back now?"

Li Qinghe nodded hello and was originally about to pass by, but upon hearing this, she nodded again. "It's getting late, I have to go feed the fish."

Then she saw Mrs. You approach her and say, "I have something to tell you."

After saying that, she turned around and followed her down the mountain. It surprised Li Qinghe that she had come to find her on purpose, and she heard Mrs. You tentatively say, "I heard you and the Yu girl have a good friendship, often embroidering and talking together?"

Her meaning was evident from her words. No one would ask about a girl from another family for no reason. Upon thinking for a moment, Li Qinghe instantly understood her intentions.

Qian Laixing, Qian Laiman's older brother, had returned from the county seat recently. He was supposed to take the county test in March, but fell on the way and his arm was swollen. It was simply a bad year for him, and the villagers talked a lot about him.

"I’m not going to keep it from you; Laixing's master said that he would be at the top of the list this year. But who could have predicted that this would happen?" Mrs. You sighed. "This year, he’ll be nineteen and if we don't discuss marriage, it’ll be too late."

She asked first about Yu Yan, then praised her son and said that he should get married, so she really did want to discuss marriage.