Chapter 31

Wu Mother’s eyes shifted uncomfortably: “That money… wasn’t it taken by Yu Li?”

Wu Guohua was somewhat in disbelief: “She took over three hundred, but what about the remaining five hundred?”

Wu Mother hesitated for a moment before answering: “The rest is gone, it’s all spent. You should go ask Yu Li for the money back. If you get that three hundred, it should be enough for your wedding. She threatened that if I didn’t give it to her, she’d make a scene at your military unit, so I gave it to her. But that money was yours—why should I give it to her?”

Wu Guohua looked at her in disbelief: “Spent? Mom, how did you spend it? Living in the city, you wouldn’t even spend fifty yuan in a year! How could five hundred be gone so quickly?”

Wu Mother remained silent, just staring at Wu Tong.

Wu Tong quickly tried to leave.

Wu Guohua grabbed her: “Sis, did you take that money?”

This made Wu Tong angry: “Why would I touch your money? If you’re so bold, go ask Yu Li for it! Didn’t I already tell you? She has the money!”

By now, Wu Guohua understood the situation.

He looked at his sister’s appearance, and a suffocating feeling arose in his chest!

But before Wu Guohua could say anything, Wu Mother no longer tried to hide it.

“Don’t overthink it! After your sister’s divorce, she had to dress well to find someone else. She’s not in good health after being bitten by a snake, and I can’t stand up without falling over. I’ve thought it over; you go ask Yu Li to give the money back so you can use it for your wedding! Then, your sister and I will go with the army!”

Wu Guohua froze, his expression complicated: “You’re going too… But Xia Yuying might not agree.”

Wu Mother widened her eyes and angrily scolded: “Not agree? Why wouldn’t she agree? I live with my son, and as a daughter-in-law, she should take care of me!”

Wu Tong also chimed in: “Guohua, Mom and I have gone through so much for your sake! Is it right to just leave us behind?”

The mother and daughter kept chattering, and it gave Wu Guohua a headache.

His injuries hurt even more!

For some reason, the more this happened, the more he wanted to see Yu Li again.

In the past, when they had rare moments alone, Yu Li was always quiet.

Back then, he found it boring.

Now, he realized just how rare and peaceful that feeling had been!

That night, Wu Guohua couldn’t sleep.

He knew he was in the wrong. The money was used to shut Yu Li up so she wouldn’t expose his engagement back home while he was involved with Xia Yuying.

If this were to be exposed, he knew he couldn’t get away with it.

But he still couldn’t accept that Yu Li was with Lu Guanshan.

Luckily, fate seemed to favor him, and Lu Guanshan might not survive.

Suddenly, Wu Guohua sat up. If Yu Li knew Lu Guanshan was in critical condition, would she regret it?

Would she want to marry him after all?

The whole night, Wu Guohua found that his mind was filled with thoughts of Yu Li.

Yu Li, on the other hand, didn’t care about Wu Guohua at all.

She had embroidered a pair of pillowcases.

Nowadays, young girls often embroider pillowcases before their wedding and bring them to the groom’s family. The patterns, with mandarin ducks playing in the water, were somewhat embarrassing to look at.

Yu Li folded the pillowcases neatly and put them in her bag. In addition, Chen Ailan had made a new set of clothes for Lu Guanshan. Since it was already August and summer was almost over, she had made autumn clothes for him.

There were also two pairs of cloth shoes, which Yu Li packed into her bag as well.

She also had to bring her own clothes, because it would be a waste of money to buy new ones once they arrived at the military station.

While she was packing, patients arrived to see her, and Yu Li quickly went outside to attend to them.

One patient after another, and she didn’t finish until mealtime.

She remembered that today her older brother and mom had boiled a large pot of porridge to sell to the canal workers. There was so much stuff to deal with, and it seemed like it would be a hassle to clean up afterward.

Yu Li quickly closed the door, not even bothering to eat, and ran over to help.

She didn’t expect that, despite her stall usually being very busy, today there were hardly any customers!

Yu Tuanjie and Chen Ailan stood silently beside the stall. The food was ready, but there were no customers.

Not far away, there was another stall crowded with people.

A familiar voice was shouting: “Hey, come and see, come and try! Our sesame cakes and mixed soup are cheap and delicious! They can’t be compared to those dishonest vendors! You can eat with peace of mind, come buy!”

It was clearly Gao Xuelian!

Yu Li froze for a moment and quickly asked, “Big brother, mom, what’s going on?”

Yu Tuanjie remained silent.

Chen Ailan sighed in frustration: “Today was supposed to be fine, but I don’t know why Gao Xuelian decided to bring out her cart and start selling food. She never cooked before, and her cooking skills were mediocre, but for some reason, all the workers rushed over to buy from her. And they kept looking at us with strange eyes.”

Yu Li immediately realized that Gao Xuelian must have used some underhanded tactics!

She quickly grabbed Yu Tuanjie: “Big brother, didn’t you also work as a canal worker here before? Can you ask around and see what’s going on? Did someone spread something behind our backs?”

Yu Tuanjie thought for a moment and agreed. He went over and asked two people he knew.

“Why aren’t you guys coming to eat at my stall today? Is the food not good anymore or what?”

The two men felt a bit awkward, but since Yu Tuanjie asked directly, they responded.

“Someone’s been saying… your kitchen has a lot of mice, and dead mice are often found in the pots. They also said the reason your sesame cakes taste so good is that you’ve been adding rat meat… I don’t know who spread this, but it’s really disgusting. Then a new stall came up next door, so we decided to eat there instead. Yu Tuanjie, don’t be mad, but that’s just how it is…”

Such rumors were the most disgusting!

It was hard to refute, but it made people instantly feel sick.

Yu Li had heard of similar malicious competition in business, especially in the food industry, in her previous life!

No matter how good the business was, it couldn’t withstand such rumors.

Yu Tuanjie immediately guessed that it was Gao Xuelian who had spread these rumors to compete, and he clenched his fist, ready to overturn Gao Xuelian’s stall!

Yu Li stopped him: “Big brother, if you overturn her stall, it won’t explain that our food is fine. Instead of doing that, we should fight fire with fire!”

She whispered a few ideas to Yu Tuanjie and Chen Ailan and quickly came up with a plan.

She immediately spent some money hiring a young man to buy a bowl of mixed soup from Gao Xuelian.

Then, she threw a random insect into the soup, and the young man loudly shouted, “Boss! There’s a bug in this soup! How can we eat this?! This is disgusting!”

Gao Xuelian, full of energy, was overjoyed!

Ever since she divorced Yu Tuanjie, life had been tough for her.

Her sister-in-law, Ma Yufen, had made a huge scene, beating her up whenever they met, and almost cracked Gao Xuelian’s head open!

In a fit of rage, Gao Daliang shouted that he wanted a divorce!

Gao Xuelian thought that if her brother and sister-in-law really divorced, she could live comfortably at her parents’ house with her stool.

But Ma Yufen, this relentless woman, had angrily threatened them: “In this life, I’ll only be widowed, never divorced! You two shameless people will spend your lives serving me! Otherwise, I won’t spare you!”

According to Ma Yufen, after the divorce, Gao Xuelian and Gao Daliang would have to serve her at all times and spend all their earnings on her, or she wouldn’t allow them to live well.

Gao Xuelian had no choice but to endure, as she had no place to go!

Seeing Yu Tuanjie’s business doing so well, she was tempted and immediately used her savings to buy ingredients, making mixed soup and sesame cakes to sell. Knowing her cooking wasn’t as good as the Yu family’s, Gao Xuelian came up with a brilliant idea.

She spread a rumor beforehand, claiming she knew the Yu family’s kitchen was filthy, with many dead mice in the pots!

Sure enough, people found it disgusting and stopped buying food from Yu Tuanjie’s stall.

A crowd of people came to buy from her instead.

Watching the money being handed to her, Gao Xuelian was overjoyed!

But who would have thought, suddenly someone shouted that there was a bug in her food!

Gao Xuelian immediately cursed: “You’re talking nonsense! There’s no bug in my food!”