Chapter 59: Ji Chunhua Wants to Divorce

When the villagers heard this, they all lowered their heads and turned to leave.

Li Erxia and her son were stunned. The villagers they had relied on all left without a word, not a single one stayed.

Mother and son looked fearfully at Hu Zhaodi and her group.

Zhang Gousheng looked at his two daughters and tried to play the emotional card. “My Daughter, I’m your father! Can you really bear to see your father beaten to death? If they kill me and your grandmother, you’ll never see us again!”

The second girl, still young, became a little worried when she heard that she might never see her father and grandmother again, but her concern was fleeting.

The big girl, on the other hand, was different. She was more sensible. Since she was four years old, she had worked alongside Ji Chunhua in the fields and had always protected the second girl, trying to shield her as much as possible from their father and grandmother’s abuse.

But Zhang Gousheng and Li Erxia never spared the children when they beat Ji Chunhua. The second girl was not very close to her father or grandmother either.

With a face full of resentment, the big girl spoke, “Are you really our father? I always thought my sister and I were just picked up by you. Every time you beat Mother, we suffered too. Did you ever treat me like a daughter then?”

The second girl chimed in, “I don’t want a father or grandmother. I just want Mother.”

Zhang Gousheng’s eyes widened in fury, “You two ungrateful little wretches! I’ve raised you all these years, and this is how you repay me? Damn daughters, nothing but trouble!”

Hu Zhaodi intervened, her tone sharp, “Your wife is a woman too. Is she also trouble, ungrateful? You’re not born of a woman, are you? You must’ve crawled out of your father’s belly. You despise women so much? Then divorce Chunhua, leave the kids with her, sign the divorce papers, and never speak to her again.”

Zhang Gousheng yelled, “No! I won’t divorce her! She married into the Zhang family, and now she wants a divorce? She can forget it!”

Hu Zhaodi coldly shot him a glance. “You don’t get to decide. You can refuse the divorce, but if my sister Chunhua is widowed, the result will be the same.”

“You—you dare kill someone? Murder means you’ll pay with your life!” Zhang Gousheng spat, trembling with anger.

“Who said anything about killing? There are many ways to die. For example, you could starve to death, or maybe fall into the latrine in the middle of the night and drown. Or you could go into the mountains and be eaten by wild animals. None of that has anything to do with me,” Hu Zhaodi said with a cold smile.

Zhang Gousheng’s hair stood on end. If it were just Hu Zhaodi, a young girl, he might not have cared. But with five other men standing behind her, he couldn’t afford to act so arrogantly.

He looked at Ji Chunhua, his tone softening. “Chunhua, we’ve been married for so many years, and the kids are already big. Are you really going to divorce me? You need to think this through. If you divorce me, I’ll be able to find a young girl, but you’ll be stuck with two kids. Who’s going to want you? Plus, you’re just a woman. How will you take care of two kids?”

Ji Chunhua’s eyes were filled with hesitation.

She had to admit that what Zhang Gousheng said was true. After a divorce, she wouldn’t be able to support two children on her own.

It was considered shameful for a married daughter to return to her parents’ home. Once she did, she would be looked down upon for the rest of her life.

Moreover, her brother and two younger brothers were not wealthy, and her parents were old. How could they support three more mouths?

At this moment, Ji Chunhua was wavering.

She didn’t want to burden her family!

“I…” Ji Chunhua started to speak, but Hu Zhaodi interrupted her.

“Ha! You still think Zhang Gousheng is a prize, huh? You really believe some young girl will want him? You don’t even look at yourself—how old are you now? Can you offer a bride price?”

Zhang Gousheng’s face turned pale at Hu Zhaodi’s sharp remarks, his anger flaring once again, but he was caught between a rock and a hard place.

“Oi! With your mother’s sharp tongue and bitter ways, what young girl would be blind enough to want you?”

Hu Zhaodi continued, “So what if my sister Chunhua gets a divorce? She has her family behind her, with the county magistrate’s nephew and Wu Yinghai backing her. Who would dare point a finger at her? If she goes back to her family, we’re happy to support her and the two children. You have no say in this.”

Ji Chunhua’s older brother spoke up, “That’s right, Chunhua. Listen to Zhaodi. Just divorce him. Big Brother is happy to take care of you and the children.”

Ji Chunhua’s third and fifth brothers also chimed in, “That’s right, sis. Listen to Zhaodi and divorce this scoundrel.”

Han Dongsheng shrugged. “It doesn’t matter if this scoundrel refuses to divorce. I’ll go to my little uncle tomorrow and have him help my sister Chunhua. My little uncle is the county magistrate.”

Wow! Han Dongsheng even pulled in the county magistrate.

With a big grin, Han Dongsheng continued, “And Chunhua doesn’t have to worry about starving after leaving this scoundrel. You can come work at my Fumanlou, and I’ll pay you wages.”

When Ji Chunhua heard this, her hesitation disappeared in an instant.

Her older brother and two younger brothers trusted Zhaodi so much, and she wanted to take a chance.

So what if she never remarried?

As long as she could support herself and her two children, why bother with another marriage and suffer a lifetime of humiliation?

The beating she had taken earlier had only injured her; it wasn’t life-threatening.

But what about the future?

She was only 26 and still wanted to see her daughters grow up, get married, and have children.

Having made up her mind, Ji Chunhua raised her head, her face filled with determination. “Zhang Gousheng, I want a divorce!”

Zhang Gousheng staggered back a few steps, his face filled with shock. “Chunhua, are you really so heartless? Don’t you care about all the years we’ve been together?”

Ji Chunhua sneered, “Years of marriage? Is that the same as the wounds on me and the two children? Or the time when we had to squeeze into the firewood shed on cold winter nights, shivering?”

“Zhang Gousheng, I was just 17 when I married you. In nine years, I gave birth to five daughters. Why did only two survive? Even a tiger won’t eat its own cubs! These are your daughters, born alive after nine months of pregnancy! They’re your flesh and blood!”

Zhang Gousheng staggered again, retreating two more steps, his face ashen.

Li Erxia, standing nearby, could no longer hold back. She glared at Ji Chunhua and sneered, “So what if three of the girls died? I smothered them all. Who told you, you worthless woman, to be so careless with your pregnancies, giving birth to so many daughters but no son?”

“How could we feed so many with the little grain we harvest every year? If we didn’t get rid of them, would you rather let our whole family starve? The Zhang family can’t afford to raise all these useless daughters!”

“If it weren’t for the fact that these two daughters can still bring in a bride price, I would’ve killed them long ago.”

Upon hearing this, Ji Chunhua was stunned. So her other two daughters had also been killed by her mother-in-law. Her vision blurred, and she nearly collapsed to the ground.

Fortunately, Hu Zhaodi was quick enough to catch her.

She patted Ji Chunhua’s hand in comfort, waiting for her to regain her balance before quickly striding up to Li Erxia.

“Slap! Slap! Slap!”

Hu Zhaodi gave Li Erxia several hard slaps across the face, one after another.

Zhang Gousheng rushed over, attempting to save his mother, but Hu Zhaodi swiftly spun around and landed an uppercut to his chin.

As Zhang Gousheng staggered backward, Hu Zhaodi quickly pressed her middle and index fingers together, using the little internal strength she had left to strike Zhang Gousheng’s Guanyuan acupoint with all her might.