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Ye Caiping sneered coldly. “What you’re saying… do you really think you’re so irresistible that I’m still thinking about you?”
Li Zhiyuan’s expression changed. What did she mean by that?
What “thinking about” him? She always had been!
But the deep disgust in her eyes seemed genuine.
Li Zhiyuan was momentarily stunned. Could it be that she truly didn’t care about him anymore?
Impossible! Absolutely impossible!
Hmph, he didn’t believe she could let him go!
Fine, let her pretend!
“What do you want from me? Spit it out if you’ve got something to say!” Ye Caiping, knowing full well the purpose of his visit, chose to tease him time and again.
Li Zhiyuan choked for a moment, unsure how to address such a matter. “Let’s go inside and talk.”
“What’s so urgent that it can’t be said in front of everyone? Why does it have to be inside?”
“Right!” Old Woman Zhao, who was perched up in the tree, chimed in energetically, adding fuel to the fire.
Li Zhiyuan’s face shifted between pale and flushed. If he didn’t go inside, how could he explain himself?
“Quit being so timid. I’ll do you a favor and speak for you,” Ye Jin’er said, stepping forward with a cold laugh. “Everyone knows that my mother was divorced by him.”
“Since we’re already separated, let’s part ways amicably and not interfere with each other anymore.”
“But today, when we were selling spicy soup in the county, he walked over with a few lackeys and suddenly demanded the recipe, trying to curry favor with his lackeys.”
“We didn’t want to give it to him and explained why. My mother and he have nothing to do with each other anymore, yet he still had the nerve to ask for the recipe that my mother had developed!”
“Luckily, those lackeys of his are reasonable. Not only did they not help him, but they also gave him a piece of their minds.”
Ye Jin’er babbled on, and before Li Zhiyuan could stop her, she had already spilled the entire story.
Soon, Li Zhiyuan found himself on the receiving end of a wave of disdainful glances from the county folk.
“How shameless! And he calls himself a scholar!” Zhuzi’s wife mocked.
“After doing such a shameless thing, if it were me, I’d find a crack in the ground to hide in! How is he still swaggering over here?” Tie Niu’s wife looked at him with the eyes of someone staring at a bizarre specimen.
Ye Jin’er: “He said he wants to find my mother and have her teach us a lesson!”
Ye Huan’er: chuckles “He actually thinks my mother would teach us a lesson for him!”
The villagers were dumbfounded. What kind of twisted logic was that?
Li Jiaojiao and her brother were getting increasingly embarrassed under the mockingly pitying gazes of the villagers.
Li Jiaojiao whispered urgently: “Father, didn’t you say you had a way to make her clear things up? What’s the plan? Hurry up and tell us!”
Li Zhiyuan was caught off guard. His “plan” was… to talk it out in private!
But he never expected that Ye Shi would refuse to go inside.
“Want to know?” Ye Caiping glanced at Li Jiaojiao.
“What your father calls a ‘good plan’ is actually him trying to manipulate me! He thinks I’m still hung up on him. He believes that as soon as he makes a move, I’ll be so enchanted by him that I’ll not only give him the formula willingly, but even go to the academy to clear his name and help restore his reputation!”
The villagers were stunned. He actually thought like that?
Li Zhiyuan’s face turned pale. How did she know?
No—so what if she knew? Ye Shi was exactly the kind of person who would think like that!
She scoffed at the thought, “Why wouldn’t I act like this…?”
Ye Caiping read his mind, her eyes locking onto Li Zhiyuan.
“You think I’m still lingering over you, huh? You come barging in here, and your only hope is that I’m somehow still holding on to you? Ridiculous!”
Her face darkened as she continued with a chilling tone:
“You’re greedy and shameless, reaping the consequences of your own actions. It’s no surprise your former disciples are mocking you, you deserve it.”
Li Zhiyuan’s face turned beet red, how could this be happening…
Du Shi, her voice rising behind her, shouted out in anger: “In the end, what you want is to use my little sister’s feelings for your own gain, right? You’ve already cast her aside, remarried, and yet, a grown man like you still wants to manipulate and deceive your abandoned ex-wife into giving you another chance! How low can you go?”
The villagers were stunned, their faces full of disdain.
“Caiping has already suffered enough being cast aside, and now he’s doing this? Is he trying to strip her of everything, down to the very bones?”
“Pah, still calling himself a scholar? To me, he looks more like a beast!”
“Don’t insult beasts! At least they eat with some decency and spit out the bones. This one doesn’t even leave the scraps behind!”
Li Zhiyuan was left feeling dizzy, utterly humiliated and furious. He wanted to disappear, to die in that moment, but of course, that wasn’t possible.
It shouldn’t be like this—this wasn’t how it was supposed to go…
Li Zhiyuan desperately tried to salvage his dignity, saying, “Ye Shi… don’t slander me. I came here to… to have you properly teach those two unruly daughters a lesson! As for the matter in the county, I only asked them for the recipe…”
He couldn’t help but feel despair when he remembered the county incident. If he failed to get what he wanted today, he might as well not return to the academy.
“And that recipe has my share in it! The spicy soup recipe was something we both worked on together… It’s only right that I come and ask for it, right?” Li Zhiyuan had completely lost all shame, twisting things to his advantage.
Ye Caipíng couldn’t help but laugh, her tone mocking. “Oh, since we worked on it together, you should already know it, then just go ahead and give your classmates for the recipe. Why cause trouble for my daughter in the county?”
Li Zhiyuan was stunned into silence.
The villagers’ contemptuous gazes only grew stronger. “Do you think we’re fools? Just because you say you have a share, that means you really do?”
“Well, I have a share too, because I live next door!” Old Woman Zhao, from the tree, sneered.
She was so tempted by the spicy soup recipe, she was practically rolling on the ground in hunger. But even though she was this desperate, she had more sense than to claim a share for herself.
It was unbelievable—this scholar was even more shameless than her!
“Shameless! Get out of Qinghe Village!” A lump of mud hit Li Zhiyuan square in the face, thrown by Ye Xing, who had taken the lead.
With Ye Xing setting the example, several other children quickly followed suit, picking up mud and hurling it at Li Zhiyuan.
“Shameless! Now that you see others making money, you come to steal their recipe!”
“Shameless! You divorced our Ye family’s aunt, married a new wife, and still want to deceive us!”
“Shameless…”
Li Zhiyuan was hit by a barrage of mud, howling in rage, and was about to lose control.
But then, a furious shout rang out: “Move aside!”
With a loud “splash,” a bucket of foul-smelling manure was suddenly dumped over him, drenching him from head to toe. The stench spread instantly, choking him and causing the surrounding crowd to recoil in disgust.
The villagers quickly jumped back a few steps, but the ones at the front still got splattered with the foul-smelling liquid on their shoes. They couldn’t help but curse:
“Daquan, you… hahaha!”
But as they cursed, they couldn’t help but laugh again, because Li Zhiyuan’s fate was just too satisfying.
Li Zhiyuan was drenched from head to toe, his face smeared with unmentionable substances. He dropped to his knees, retching violently.
“Ugh… ugh…” He began to gag and heaved, unable to stop himself.
Ye Caiping and Ye Jin’er, along with the others, all gasped in surprise, turning to look at Ye Daquan.
Ye Daquan was still holding the stinky bucket, and when he noticed Ye Caiping looking over, afraid of being scolded, he scratched his head and chuckled awkwardly:
“I… I saw he didn’t look too energetic, so I thought I’d pour something on him to wake him up a bit…”
Ye Caiping and the rest of the Ye family exchanged glances before bursting into uncontrollable laughter.
She had planned to give Li Zhiyuan a good beating, but now… well, it was too dirty!
“Father! Father… are you alright?”
Everyone had stepped back, staying at a distance, even Li Zimo had retreated about ten feet away.
But, to everyone’s surprise, Li Jiaojiao, the delicate young girl, didn’t mind the filth. She rushed forward and began patting Li Zhiyuan’s back with a gentle, caring expression.