Chapter 3: Conscience Not Yet Lost

When it came to her husband’s younger sister, Li shi couldn’t help feeling a little sour. She glanced at the two children standing in front of her, their heads bowed.

The boy was her own son, Gu Changwen, six years old—the eldest grandson of the Gu family. The girl, Han Hui, was five years old, the eldest daughter of her younger sister-in-law, Gu Caihe.

Li shi was already nearly three months pregnant. Even so, she still had to take care of her sister-in-law’s child. That alone made her resent Gu Caihe a little. But her husband doted on his younger sister, and Li shi dared not challenge his authority.

“From now on, you are not to provoke your little aunt or uncle. Do you hear me?”

Personally, Li shi didn’t dislike her mother-in-law Yan Fengru.
But as Gu Qingshan’s wife, she knew that since Yan Fengru had her own son, their relationship was naturally opposed. That brat Gu Qingbai would one day compete with her husband for the family property.

Still, Li shi wasn’t heartless. She just hoped the family would be divided soon, so that her husband’s stepmother wouldn’t drag him or her children down. If her own children could stay away from those unlucky ones, that would be best.

But unfortunately, every time something happened to those two, it always seemed to involve her own children…

“Mother, it’s all Sister’s fault. She said she wanted loquats and insisted Little Aunt climb the tree to pick them. I said I’d go, but she wouldn’t let me.”

Li shi’s heart skipped a beat. “Still daring to spout nonsense! Your little aunt clearly climbed up because she was greedy herself!” she scolded, glaring at Han Hui. The little girl immediately burst into tears in fright.

What could a five- or six-year-old know? Most of what they said came from what they heard at home from their elders.

Since she was little, Han Hui had heard her mother, Gu Caihe, badmouthing her step-grandmother, calling her little uncle Gu Qingbai a scoundrel trying to steal the family property from her real uncle. She said her little aunt Gu Yuzhu was a sickly money-drainer who’d be better off dead.

After years of this kind of talk, these impressions became deeply rooted in Han Hui’s memory.

She heard her grandmother once say that a fool in the village had become stupid after falling from a tree. So she thought, if her mother hated Little Aunt that much, wouldn’t it be good if Little Aunt fell from a tree and became a fool too?

Last time at the pond, something similar happened. Han Hui had heard adults say there were water ghosts in the pond who dragged children down and turned them into substitutes, never to return. If her little uncle got dragged away, then he wouldn’t be around to fight over the inheritance anymore.

Children didn’t know right from wrong. Their thoughts were simple and blunt. Han Hui didn’t even understand what “water ghost,” “substitute,” or “inheritance fight” meant.

“Crying, crying, all you do is cry! Stop it already!”

Han Hui was startled and cried even louder. Li shi was so angry her belly started to hurt. “You little debtor! I must’ve owed you something in a past life. Take your sister outside!”

“Wait—don’t go bumping into your grandma or step-grandma on the way out. If they ask, just say your little aunt and uncle were greedy. Understand?”

Even if she was unwilling, Li shi had no choice but to teach the children.

As her sister-in-law, she knew Gu Caihe’s temperament very well.

Whenever Gu Caihe came home, she’d stir up trouble—probably afraid Li shi wasn’t fully on her and her brother’s side.

But in truth, Li shi thought Gu Caihe was overthinking it. She had already married Gu Qingshan and was about to have a second child. She knew her husband didn’t get along with his stepmother—how could she possibly take the stepmother’s side?

Even if not for herself, she had to think of her own son, didn’t she?

Still, that didn’t stop Li shi from being annoyed with Gu Caihe.

She figured she needed to find a way to send her son off to school soon, and separate him from Han Hui. That girl was wicked for her age, just like her mother—full of scheming thoughts—and Li shi didn’t want her son to be dragged down too.

“I understand.”

Gu Changwen obediently nodded. Li shi turned to look at Han Hui, who was still sobbing but gave a timid nod under her fearful gaze.

Worried the kids would forget her warnings, Li shi threatened them: if their grandma or step-grandmother found out they were the ones who hurt their little aunt and uncle, they’d be strung up and beaten until their skin split open—and then kicked out of the house!

To make sure they were scared enough, she had to exaggerate a little.

Little did she know, this only deepened the children’s bad impression of Yan Fengru.

Sure enough, the two were frightened into obediently agreeing. Only then did Li shi feel at ease.

After sending the children out to play, she went into the house and took a chicken egg from the red lacquered chest, along with a paper-wrapped bundle of brown sugar. These were things her mother had given her—the egg was to nourish her, and the brown sugar was for her postpartum recovery.

A mother pities her own child. Knowing that her daughter’s mother-in-law was a stepmother, Li shi’s mother had worried her daughter wouldn’t even have brown sugar to eat after giving birth, so she secretly asked her son to send a packet over early for her to hide away.

It had been the same when Gu Changwen was born.

Back at her own home, Li shi had been pampered. When she found out the Gu family was run by a stepmother, her mother had been reluctant to agree to the match. Even biological mothers-in-law could be difficult—how much worse would a stepmother be?

But Li shi had secretly taken a liking to Gu Qingshan. He was tall, strong, and not bad-looking. It was said he looked out for his full-blooded younger sister and had a sense of responsibility. For a woman, marriage was a lifelong matter—she just couldn’t risk marrying someone unreliable. That’s how the match was settled.

Stifling her reluctance, she took the egg and went into the kitchen to boil a bowl of egg-and-brown-sugar soup to deliver to her husband’s little sister.

The Gu family had yet to divide households, and since they all lived under the same roof, Li shi didn’t want to provoke her stepmother-in-law.

Besides, since Han Hui always played with her son, the stepmother-in-law might even think she had taught the girl such things.

She figured she’d do this one good deed out of conscience. After all, the little girl was only five, her arms thin as twigs. Just thinking about it made her feel sorry.

Just as Yan Fengru brought a bowl of congee into her daughter’s room, Li shi followed with the egg-and-sugar soup.

Gu Yuzhu had been hungry for days. The moment she smelled something fragrant, she couldn’t help swallowing saliva in embarrassment.

Yan Fengru didn’t even look at her stepdaughter-in-law, pretending she didn’t exist.

Having once been a high-ranking maid, Yan Fengru couldn’t read people like a fortune teller, but she was still more perceptive than the average village woman. She could tell exactly what kind of person her stepdaughter-in-law was—no malicious intent, perhaps, but certainly full of petty calculations.

After all, that man wasn’t her biological son. Their positions were inherently at odds.

And the truth was, both her own children had gotten into trouble while with Gu Changwen and Han Hui. Those two brats were sharp and sly for their age. They couldn’t be completely innocent.

It was bound to blow up eventually, so she didn’t feel the need to be nice.

“Sweet girl, Mommy made you porridge. Eat it while it’s hot. The doctor said our little Pearl should only eat soft rice porridge for a few days. Once the medicine kicks in and your headache goes away, Mommy will kill a chicken for you, take you to town for meat buns, and buy you candied hawthorns!”

As she spoke, she carefully cooled a spoonful of porridge and fed it to Gu Yuzhu.

The girl hadn’t eaten for days and was so hungry her chest felt hollow. Even plain rice porridge tasted incredibly delicious and comforting.

Gu Yuzhu quickly ate half the bowl in one go.