Chapter 18

After entering the warehouse, Lin Qingping immediately realized that these were clothes that had been piling up for an unknown amount of time. The stacks were indeed as high as mountains, and there was a faint, distinctive smell that only came from things left unattended for a long while.

“Sister-in-law, this Section Chief is a real scammer. These are all clothes from previous years.” Du Gen whispered to her.

Lin Qingping glanced at Du Gen, not expecting this fellow to actually be a bit clever.

“No problem, just follow me and pick them out.”

Fortunately, these clothes were bundled together, categorized and stacked quite neatly. Lin Qingping picked up a piece to examine the style. If she liked it, she had Du Gen carry off the entire bundle.

After making a full round, Lin Qingping had chosen probably several hundred pieces of clothing, dragging them all to the warehouse entrance. Then, in a whirlwind, she went off to find that Sales Section Chief.

Gu Youlian watched the whole scene, on the verge of a breakdown. She had thought that bringing her younger brother’s wife along would at most result in the purchase of one or two pieces to wear. But this—this was several hundred pieces at once! Even if she wore one piece a day without repeating, she wouldn’t be able to finish them all in a year!

Thinking of how this younger brother’s wife was the kind of person who would scrape from the Maternal Family, she immediately suspected that the woman planned to distribute dozens of pieces to each person. How could she be allowed to waste her younger brother’s money like this!

Gu Youlian immediately sat on those giant piles of clothes and began crying, forbidding Lin Qingping from making the purchase. Otherwise, she would send a telegram to her younger brother!

Lin Qingping had no time to deal with her right now and headed straight toward the office building.

Gu Youlian grabbed her sleeve and wouldn’t let her go, crying and shouting: “How much money could my younger brother possibly have! He’s just a salaried worker, and he’s been too frugal to spend anything—he gave it all to you! And now you want to squander it like this—I… I swear, even if I have to hang myself right here today, I won’t let you spend his money like this!”

Lin Qingping was getting a bit irritated. She flung her sleeve and said to Du Gen: “Control your wife!”

In her previous life, Lin Qingping had risen to become the president of a chain restaurant enterprise. She had long been accustomed to acting with decisive force and commanding authority in the business world. After being reborn, her speech naturally carried a sense of power.

When she barked at him, Du Gen was momentarily intimidated. Moreover, he vaguely guessed what Lin Qingping intended to do, and immediately pulled Gu Youlian away from her. He also shouted in a low voice: “Stop making a fuss!”

Gu Youlian had always obeyed Du Gen’s words. Though she was still seething inside, with Du Gen holding her down tightly, she had no choice. She didn’t even dare to wail aloud, afraid that Du Gen would scold her. Wiping her tears, she followed behind Lin Qingping, silently stewing with hatred in her heart.

She thought bitterly to herself: Lin Qingping better not think she could take all these hundreds of pieces of clothing back to the Maternal Family! If she dared, then she would definitely urge her younger brother to divorce her!

By that time, Lin Qingping had already returned to the Sales Section. The Section Chief’s surname was Fu.

“Section Chief Fu, you’re the Section Chief of a major clothing factory’s sales department, and this is how you treat the common people?” Lin Qingping wore a stern expression and took the initiative to confront him.

The Section Chief’s attitude was not very friendly either. “What kind of tone is that?”

Lin Qingping threw the clothes in her hands onto the ground. “Take a look for yourself! What kind of quality is this?”

The two garments on the floor were both moldy.

“Your so-called major factory—this is what you’re selling to us?” Lin Qingping spoke with righteous indignation. “Is it because you think we’re peasants, that we’ve never seen the world, and we’re easy to fool?”

“No! There’s no such thing…” With the moldy clothes lying there in plain sight, the Section Chief’s confidence weakened considerably.

“You’re clearly picking on us because we’re from the countryside, and we’re all women comrades—that’s why you think you can take advantage of us! Look for yourself, these are clothes from years ago!”

Lin Qingping scolded fiercely, her eyes even turning slightly red as she spoke.

Du Gen: ??? Women comrades? Then what does that make me?

Being pressed like that by Lin Qingping, the Section Chief felt a bit embarrassed and had no choice but to say: “Comrade, you’re asking for autumn and winter clothes, but this year’s batch hasn’t even been produced yet, has it? We only have last year’s stock.”

“These aren’t even from last year!” Lin Qingping argued with firm conviction.

“Well then, do you still want these clothes or not? Or would you rather wait for the new ones?” the Section Chief asked reluctantly.

“If we wait for the new ones, it’ll definitely be too late!” Lin Qingping pretended to hesitate for a long while, then made a painful decision. “We’ll still buy them. But you must give us a discount on the price!”

The Section Chief thought it over and waved his hand. “No problem.”

In the end, Lin Qingping managed to secure a price even lower than she had imagined. Wool winter coats were just one yuan apiece. The rest were even more absurdly cheap.

Lin Qingping took 500 pieces in total, in a variety of styles.

This, however, created a new problem—transportation.

The Section Chief, being helpful to the end, agreed to let them take one hundred pieces back first, and said he would figure out a way to get the remaining items delivered to their county later.

Lin Qingping was overjoyed and thanked the Section Chief gratefully.

The Section Chief chuckled helplessly: “I was just afraid you’d accuse me of bullying women comrades again.”

Du Gen: ??? He was such a big guy standing right there, and yet it was as if nobody had even seen him!

Transporting one hundred pieces of clothing among four people was not too difficult. Oddly enough, though Du Gen was lazy when it came to farm work, he was remarkably enthusiastic when following Lin Qingping to purchase clothes. He carried the most out of everyone.

The four of them, plus the hundred garments, made their way back by transferring between different vehicles. When they arrived at the town, they borrowed a flatbed cart. Taking turns pushing it, with Gu Youlian occasionally wailing along the way, they pushed the clothes all the way toward Gujia Village.

By the time they returned to the Gu Family home, most of the villagers had already turned off their lights and gone to bed.

The elderly couple of the Gu Family had as well. Hearing the commotion, they threw on their clothes and came out—only to be shocked by the sheer volume of garments they saw.

Gu Youlian pulled Liu Fen into the house to speak in private. She didn’t dare say anything in front of Lin Qingping, and Du Gen had been completely passive about the whole matter. She didn’t dare go against her own husband either. Once home, she told Liu Fen everything—that Lin Qingping had spent all the money buying 500 pieces of clothing.

The moment Liu Fen heard it, she broke down.

“Mom, what has possessed Chengzi! He’s given all the money to his wife to manage, and that wife is such a spendthrift! This isn’t someone who knows how to live a proper life!”

The more Gu Youlian thought about it, the more aggrieved she became, and she began to cry again.

Liu Fen was furious and stormed out. Seeing Lin Qingping, her second daughter, and Du Gen guarding that mountain of clothes, she grabbed a pair of scissors and shoved her way over.

She truly hated it! Her son’s hard-earned money—just like that, spent entirely by this wasteful woman. She had lived for so many decades and had never seen anyone spend money like this!

Liu Fen raised the scissors, intending to cut the clothes, and Lin Qingping panicked, shouting: “Mom, what are you doing!”

Only then did Liu Fen snap back to her senses. If she cut those clothes now, not only would the money be gone, but the clothes would be ruined too!

But then again, they were just countryside folk—what were they going to do with so many clothes?

Liu Fen was filled with despair. She slumped to the ground and began bawling, crying out to the ancestors of the Gu Family.

“How am I supposed to face Chengzi’s grandparents in the afterlife? How did we end up with such a wasteful daughter-in-law? Chengzi, what kind of judgment do you have? What kind of spell did you fall under?”

“Mom…” Lin Qingping tried to explain to Liu Fen.

But Liu Fen wasn’t listening at all. She called out for Gu Juncheng’s father.

“Old man! What are we going to do? How are we supposed to live from now on? You need to step in and send her back to the Lin Family! A daughter-in-law like this—our family can’t afford to keep her!”

Father-in-law Gu Dafu puffed on his tobacco pipe with a pa-da pa-da sound, sighing repeatedly.

Lin Qingping’s younger sister hadn’t said a word the entire time. She only listened to her older sister.

Whatever her sister told her to do, she did. Now she was scared too, and clung tightly to her.