Chapter 28: Valuable Treasures

The new bride wasn’t married, and their house was raided. The whole family was dragged through the streets with wooden boards hung around their necks by iron wires.

It was truly miserable.

Since then, every family around them took this as a cautionary tale. Take Tan Aizhi for example; she liked to keep her home neat and clean. A while ago, she noticed that the portrait in the living room had become old and yellowed and no longer looked nice, so she went out and bought a new one to replace it.

But she didn’t dare throw the old one away. She carefully stored it, afraid that if she wasn’t careful, it might bring some trouble.

Song Baili said: “This incident is quite suspicious. I suspect it’s an enemy agent trying to stir up some trouble. I’ve already reported it to the public security department. You all need to be mindful of your words and actions at all times, so as not to let criminals take advantage of the situation.”

Song Xilan quickly nodded: “Mhm.”

She suddenly remembered this might be an important plot point. Maybe the bullet comments could spoil something for her, so she quickly released the bullet comments in her mind.

[Song’s dad is so cautious. When Jiang Jingru was scheming before, I honestly feared they’d just casually sell their treasure away!]

[That portrait is the first fortune the female lead uses to develop her career in the original plot, no wonder Jiang Jingru would want it!]

[Actually, now that Song Xilan isn’t going down that path anymore, she doesn’t need the money. Giving it to Jiang Jingru, who needs it for her business, doesn’t sound so bad!]

[What kind of saintly hypocrite says that? You’re not starting a business anyway, and there are plenty of young people outside who want to start one but don’t have money. Why don’t you do something good and donate all your family savings for someone else to start a business?!]

Seeing Jiang Jingru’s name, Song Xilan immediately became alert. Did her family really have some treasure? And did this treasure have something to do with the portrait?

“Mom and Dad, do we have any valuable treasures hidden in our house?”

Tan Aizhi replied: “Our treasure is you.”

“Ah, I’m not talking about that. I mean something really valuable, something that could be sold for a lot of money.”

Tan Aizhi patted her forehead: “You’re not running a fever, why are you acting so silly? Our family doesn’t have any treasures!”

“What about the portrait of the great person? Besides the one on the wall, the one you replaced before—do we have any others?”

Tan Aizhi scratched her head: “I don’t think so!”

Suddenly, Song Baili spoke up: “I do remember, Baili, you have one. It’s not that big, about the size of a book,” he said while measuring with his hands, “It’s in a frame, and an old professor gave it to you when you were young.”

Tan Aizhi: “Right, you always said you felt sorry for the old janitor at your school. You would sneak food from home to give to him. Later, when he was leaving, he gave you a frame. Do you remember?”

Hearing her parents talk about it, Song Xilan remembered. It was when she was in elementary school. A strange old man had come to clean the school’s toilets. He had a strange hairstyle, and it was said he had been sent from the capital to be reeducated through labor. No one knew why he was working at their school. The kids were both afraid and curious about him.

Some mischievous kids would purposely provoke him, and though he usually ignored them, if he got angry, he’d chase them with his dirty broom.

At that time, Song Xilan was soft-spoken and often bullied. Once, when she was going to the bathroom, a few bad girls cornered her and bullied her.

It was that strange old man who shouted loudly from outside the bathroom and scared the bad girls away. He silently followed Song Xilan, who was crying, all the way home, only leaving after she entered her dormitory.

Song Xilan told her parents about this after she got home.

Song Baili was furious and went to the school the next day to report the incident to the teacher. In front of the whole class, he said that if anyone dared to bully his daughter again, he would not care whether they were children or not; he would teach them a lesson.

As for Tan Aizhi, she sighed with compassion and told Song Xilan that the old man wasn’t a bad person; he was just a poor soul. She advised Song Xilan not to follow the bad kids and throw stones or spit at him.

Song Xilan said that the old man often squatted by the faucet next to the bathroom, eating dry steamed buns with cold water. So she secretly took some food from home and brought it to him, making sure no one noticed.

The old man ate food from Song Xilan for several years and didn’t starve.

In the year that Song Xilan graduated from elementary school, it was said that the old man was exonerated and would leave. Before leaving, he gave her a frame with a portrait of a great person inside.

Song Xilan brought it home to show her parents. The couple looked at it, seeing that it wasn’t something valuable and there were no issues of principle, so they let her keep it.

At first, Song Xilan had placed the frame on the table for several years. Later, when she was tidying up, somehow it got packed away. It had been so many years without being taken out, and if it weren’t for this mention, she would have completely forgotten about it.

Thinking of this, Song Xilan quickly went to her room, rummaging through boxes. After a while, she finally found the dusty frame in a box containing her middle school textbooks.

“Mom, earlier you mentioned that the person who collects portraits said the longer the time, the better, and that it would be even better if it was framed. Do you think they’re after this one?”

Tan Aizhi looked at Song Baili in confusion: “Could it be that coincidental?”

Song Baili said, “Some of the people who were sent here in the past were quite capable. It wouldn’t be strange if they secretly had some valuable items.”

“But that old man was so poor he was almost starving. What valuable things could he have? And if he really had something valuable, why would he just give it to Blue Blue, a child, without saying anything? What if the child didn’t understand and threw it away?”

“This thing might have been hard to bring out back then, and it wasn’t convenient for others to know about it, so it was hidden inside the portrait of the great person. That’s why we didn’t easily throw it away.”

Tan Aizhi had been carefully holding the frame in her hands, but after hearing this, it felt like she was holding a hot potato—she didn’t know whether to keep it or throw it away. “What should we do now? Has someone discovered we have this thing? Could it cause trouble for us?”

Song Xilan knew that Jiang Jingru was probably after this item, so she wasn’t overly worried, but she was still quite curious, eagerly looking at her dad.

Song Baili stayed relatively calm. He checked the door lock, then pulled all the curtains in the house shut. “Let’s first see what it actually is before deciding.”

The family gathered around the dining table, sitting in a slightly sneaky manner, heads close together. Song Baili held a screwdriver in his hand: “Should I open it?”

Tan Aizhi and Song Xilan both nodded seriously: “Open it!