Ch 17: The Farmer Ger in the Apocalypse

Old Lady Shen was fuming! Ever since Li Jiaofeng entered the house, she hadn’t had a single peaceful day!

As soon as Miao Shi was driven out, Shen Zhigao had been in a frantic rush to bring Widow Li into the house. But unlike Miao Shi, Widow Li wasn’t someone who could be easily pushed around. Even though she wasn’t a first-time bride and was already pregnant, she insisted on doing things properly—demanding a feng shui master to pick an auspicious wedding date, along with a proper matchmaker, bride price, and wedding feast, all of which had to be in place before she agreed to marry.

To Old Lady Shen, a woman who had secretly gotten pregnant by another man, shamelessly entangling herself with him, should have just moved in quietly. The fact that the Shen family was even willing to feed her and take her in was already a great mercy—how dare she demand a wedding feast!

But Widow Li was bold enough to ask for anything, and if things didn’t go her way, she’d threaten to abort the child. The bride price was set at a staggering six taels and six coins—almost as much as marrying a young, untouched maiden from the village!

Old Lady Shen had outright refused at first. But with Miao Shi already gone and Shen Zhigao completely under Widow Li’s control—wailing and threatening to die if he didn’t marry her—what could she do? She couldn’t bear to see her son remain single for life. So, she pinched her nose and accepted her misfortune, bargaining the bride price down to five taels. They found Old Lady Shen’s younger sister to act as the matchmaker and held a simple wedding with three banquet tables in their courtyard.

The compensation given to Miao Shi had already been painful enough for Old Lady Shen. The Miao brothers had taken away their newly harvested peanuts and stored grain, and with autumn harvest approaching, they had no choice but to borrow food from relatives since heavy labor without food was impossible.

With Shen Qing gone—the strongest laborer in the family—even Old Man Shen, who hadn’t worked the fields in years, and Shen Zhiwei’s fulang had to go out and toil. Even so, they still couldn’t finish harvesting before the autumn rains hit, and they lost about a fifth of their crops.

After repaying the borrowed grain, the family was left with nothing but their rations for next year. Now, with this additional wedding expense, the Shen family was truly struggling!

But that wasn’t the end of it. Ever since Miao Shi and Shen Qing left, there was suddenly so much extra work in the house! No one cooked meals anymore, no one washed clothes, no one fed the chickens, and no one cleaned the pigsty. Over the years, both Old Lady Shen and Shen Zhiwei’s fulang had grown accustomed to laziness, and now that they had to start doing chores again, their whole bodies ached from the effort!

And after Li Jiaofeng moved in, not only did she refuse to help with the work, but she spent all day cradling her pregnant belly, complaining about pain here and discomfort there, demanding to be taken care of!

Old Lady Shen was also convinced that Li Jiaofeng was doing it on purpose—deliberately making her suffer to establish dominance as the new mistress of the house. Otherwise, why would she refuse to let Shen Zhiwei’s fulang, Zhao Shi, take care of her, saying that as a ger, it was inappropriate? And when they sent Shen Zhiwei’s young daughter instead, she said children were too clumsy to be trusted around her.

No, she insisted that only Old Lady Shen herself could serve her!

Right now, from the courtyard, Li Jiaofeng’s repeated calls of “Mother” echoed, making Old Lady Shen’s head throb.

With a stiff expression, Old Lady Shen walked to the east wing’s door and snapped, “Enough already, Eldest daughter-in-law! Can’t you just stay quiet for a while? There’s so much work to do, and I don’t have time to wait on you all day!”

Anyone else would have been intimidated into silence by such a scolding from their mother-in-law. But if Li Jiaofeng was the type to be afraid, she wouldn’t have married into the Shen family in the first place! She simply rubbed her rounded belly and smiled.

“Mother, it’s not me troubling you—it’s your grandson in here, kicking up a fuss! I heard people outside shouting about buying meat. Did a butcher come to the village?”

Sometimes, if the county’s butcher shops had leftover meat in the evening, they’d either bring it to nearby villages to sell at a discount or sell it to peddlers who made a business out of reselling it. But it didn’t happen often, and Lantang Village was close enough to the county that such opportunities were rare.

Li Jiaofeng licked her lips. “We should buy some. It’s been so long since we had meat. Your grandson needs proper nourishment to grow big and strong.”

Old Lady Shen’s forehead twitched. “Meat, meat, meat—how are you not dead from gluttony yet? What kind of greedy daughter-in-law are you? It’s only been a month since you married in, and you’ve already had meat three times! You get an egg every day! What more do you want? Who else gets to eat this well when they’re pregnant? Do you think no one else in the world has ever carried a child before?”

Still grinning, Li Jiaofeng stroked her sharp belly. “It’s not that I want to eat meat—it’s the baby demanding it! Before I married in, I had my own money and could afford to eat meat regularly. But ever since moving in, I haven’t had any. Of course, the baby is making a fuss!”

She wasn’t lying. Her previous husband had left her some money, and with Shen Zhigao frequently slipping her gifts, she had been living quite comfortably. Her life had been far easier than it was now under Old Lady Shen’s watchful eye. If it weren’t for the fact that her first husband hadn’t left her with a child, forcing her to plan for the future, she would have preferred staying on her own.

The more she thought about it, the more annoyed she felt. When Shen Zhigao was courting her, he was so generous—now that they were married, she couldn’t even get a decent meal!

Old Lady Shen grew even angrier. “If you hadn’t demanded such a hefty bride price, we might actually have some spare money to buy meat! Don’t you have your own money? If you want it so bad, go buy it yourself!” Then she sneered. “But it’s not a butcher—Qing Ge’er killed a wild boar. Even if you had money, Qing Ge’er wouldn’t sell to you!”

Li Jiaofeng’s eyes widened. “Who?”

She had heard that Shen Qing was strong—Shen Zhigao had complained about him more than once, saying that he was far too independent for a ger. But she never expected him to be this capable. Her opinion of him rose slightly, but then her eyes flickered with calculation.

She quickly smiled. “Mother, you’re being foolish. Qing Ge’er is still family, even if he moved out with his mother. You’re still his grandmother, and my baby is his little brother. Why should we have to pay for meat? Shouldn’t he be offering some as a gesture of filial piety?”

Old Lady Shen snorted, giving her no response, but deep down, she was tempted by the idea.

Meanwhile, Shen Qing had no idea that the Shen family was already eyeing his wild boar. Before the buyers arrived, he took a hatchet and chopped off a front leg and a hind leg.

“I’ll do it! You shouldn’t move around too much—you’ll reopen your wound,” Miao Shi hurriedly stopped him.

“It’s fine, Mother. My left arm is injured, not my right. You might struggle with chopping the legs off, so I’ll just do this part, and you can handle the rest.” With a few swift strikes, he cleanly removed both legs. “I’ll take the larger hind leg to Uncle’s house tomorrow, and I’ll bring the front leg to the village chief later.”

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