Lin Shuyue’s report was published and instantly caused a sensation in Pengcheng.

Liming Real Estate! Who in the entire Pengcheng didn’t know about them? The amount of money they donated at every charity event made ordinary people envious.

Plus, they were often featured in newspapers for their good deeds, how well they treated their employees, and how generous they were to the residents who were being relocated. Which ordinary person in Pengcheng didn’t hope that Liming Real Estate would come to demolish their house?

But now, the boss of Liming Real Estate was actually a murderer! And his wife was his accomplice! To silence the witnesses, they even drove a car and crashed into a family of four! They had also had the family monitored for ten long years!

And former Public Security Bureau Director Yang Baozong had also been arrested! Someone had reported him for smuggling!

Heavens! Heavens! Heavens!

On the streets and in the alleys, countless people were holding newspapers and discussing this matter with those around them. The same was true online. Pengcheng had a local forum where people usually posted about interesting things happening around them. Everyone could discuss and comment there.

Before today, most of the posts on this forum were about internet addiction schools, and each post had a high level of engagement. But today, things were different. The Liming Real Estate matter was simply too shocking!

But that wasn’t the most surprising thing. The most surprising thing was that a netizen posted that their family ran a shop in front of the Public Security Bureau, and from the time the newspaper was published this morning until now, several groups of people had already come to the Public Security Bureau.

Lin Shuyue’s interest was immediately piqued when she saw this post. She sent a message to He Yuling’s QQ account. He Yuling quickly replied. Lin Shuyue chuckled, got up, turned off her computer, grabbed her camera, and went out.

Huang Qiang had already gone out with great enthusiasm. Today, he wanted to walk the streets of Pengcheng and photograph the various aspects of life in the city.

Lin Shuyue went straight to the Public Security Bureau.

Just like last time, there were already many reporters with long lenses and cameras standing at the entrance of the Public Security Bureau. But this time, they were no longer pointing their microphones at the silent police officers like before.

They just stood at the entrance and waited. When a petitioning member of the public came out, they would rush up to interview them.

Among these people were victims of Yang Baozong’s smuggling case, victims of Yang Hao’an’s case, and even people involved in Deng Ling’s affairs.

The Southern Evening News reporter in front of Lin Shuyue was interviewing a father and son. The father had a limp and was leaning on crutches. The son was only a little over ten years old, and very thin. He supported his father and cried as his father spoke.

“Five years ago, Yang Hao’an and his people came to our village to inspect. They said a road was going to be built through our village. They wanted to measure our village’s land and check the terrain.”

“My wife cooked delicious food, so the village chief asked my wife to help cook. Yang Hao’an was also there. After eating and drinking, he went crazy from the alcohol and defiled my wife. My wife couldn’t bear this humiliation. After telling me about it when she got back, she hanged herself when I wasn’t paying attention.” The man with the crutches said, tears and snot flowing down his face.

Their village was very remote, and even the smallest things would spread throughout the village. Although it was already the 21st century, the people in their village still placed great importance on a woman’s chastity.

Even if a woman in someone’s family dressed a little brightly or spoke a few extra words to a man, she would be maliciously speculated about. Yang Hao’an had directly defiled his wife in the village chief’s house. Before his wife even reached home, the news had spread throughout the entire village.

His wife was beautiful and had a good figure. She had already been maliciously gossiped about by the village busybodies. With so many witnesses to this incident, how could those people not talk? The man with the crutches wanted to report it to the police, but his wife stopped him. He went to Yang Hao’an to settle the score. Yang Hao’an was punched twice by him, but he was quickly grabbed by his subordinates, and Yang Hao’an directly smashed his leg with a hoe.

Before he was even carried home, his wife had hanged herself.

He and his wife had been childhood sweethearts and had supported each other until now. From having nothing at the beginning, they had built a two-story house, and their son was about to go to high school. Their life was visibly getting better. How could they have suffered such a disaster?

He went to the police station to report it. The police station went back with him to take a look, but the people in their village all said that nothing had happened. They said his wife had committed suicide because life was too hard.

After the police station’s investigation, they didn’t file a case. He wanted to come to the city to report it, but the elders in the village stopped him. They earnestly persuaded him not to.

Because Yang Hao’an was the big boss building the highway. As long as the highway passed through their village, they would receive a land compensation payment, which was a large sum of money. Everyone was poor, so who wouldn’t want it?

Besides, Yang Hao’an hadn’t left his family without any compensation, hadn’t he given them 20,000 yuan?

The man with the crutches didn’t want a single cent of that 20,000 yuan. His wife was priceless. What the man with the crutches wanted was justice.

Now, this justice had finally arrived.

The reporters wrote furiously. This was another big news story! Yang Hao’an had caused another family to be ruined! If this were published, it would be another major headline! They had already thought of the title: The Mask of Yang Hao’an!

When it involved a relationship between a man and a woman, especially when the man was a famous figure in Pengcheng, a well-written report would definitely sell out!

Lin Shuyue was also listening from the side.

But her thoughts were different from those reporters who were only thinking about how to write to grab people’s attention. Her mind was focused on the wife of the man with the crutches, who chose to commit suicide because she couldn’t face the rumors.

This world was so unfair. For example, Yang Hao’an, the reason he killed Liang Haihui was because Liang Haihui struggled when he was forcing her to do that kind of thing, which angered him.

His crime of murder was unforgivable, but in the Pengcheng forum, there was a group of people who felt that apart from the murder, having more women wasn’t a big crime. What he committed was just a mistake that all men make.

They even felt that Yang Hao’an’s crime wasn’t as big as that of his wife, Deng Ling. In those people’s mouths, Deng Ling was pathologically jealous and malicious. The reputation of the innocent victim Liang Haihui wasn’t any better in their mouths either.

They felt that Liang Haihui must have been showing off her charms in front of Yang Hao’an, that she must have taken the initiative to seduce him before Yang Hao’an laid his hands on her.

And among those who made these remarks, there were not a few women!

This world was putting shackles on women, and men were building cages for women. A portion of women, to allow more women to break free from these shackles and escape this cage, fought fearlessly like moths flying into a flame.

Over the past century, they had finally cracked these shackles and poked holes in the cage, allowing women to breathe freely in the sunlight.

But there was also a portion of women whose spirits were highly aligned with men. They tirelessly wanted to make the women who had finally gained some freedom put those shackles back on and return to that cage, continuing to be appendages of men and becoming a “thing” of men!

Those people were harsh on women but wouldn’t raise the requirements for men.

It was like a line Lin Shuyue had once seen in the movie A Mother’s Revenge ^[1]T/N: It is a 1993 TV movie about a mother whose daughter is sexually assaulted by a school janitor; when the legal system fails, she takes matters into her own hands by shooting the assailant in court: “I spent twenty years teaching my daughter how to protect herself, but you didn’t spend even a second teaching your son not to harm others.”

Lin Shuyue wanted to use this as a starting point to write a report.

Lin Shuyue wanted to use this report to tell those unfortunate girls who had been hurt that it wasn’t their fault; they were not at fault at all. The fault lay with those men with ulterior motives!

They had been hurt, but they had to live bravely and look forward. This wasn’t a big deal!

Lin Shuyue returned to the newspaper office, wrote this report, and sent it to Wang Mingzheng.

Wang Mingzheng opened the report in front of him. After thinking it over again and again, he took out his phone and made a call. “Good afternoon, Sister Su, how have you been lately?”

After a brief chat, Wang Mingzheng hung up the phone and forwarded Lin Shuyue’s report to another person’s email address.

When Lin Shuyue got home from work in the evening, she received a call from Wang Mingzheng while she was eating. “Xiao Lin, remember to watch ‘Speaking of the World’ on the Life Channel at six-thirty tonight.”

Lin Shuyue didn’t understand why, but she still had to listen to what her boss said. She carried her rice bowl to the living room, turned on the TV. Lou Fengqin and Zeng Xiaoyi also came in with their rice bowls when they saw this.

They turned on the TV at a very opportune time. It was only a few minutes before six-thirty. As soon as the channel was tuned to the Life Channel, the prelude music of the “Speaking of the World” program entered their ears.

Lou Fengqin was amused when she saw it. “You want to watch ‘Speaking of the World’? This program is well-made. Your sister and I used to like watching this program very much.”

Zeng Xiaoyi also said, “My mom also likes to watch it.”

Lin Shuyue didn’t know this. Since transmigrating, she rarely watched TV. When she did watch the news, it was usually Pengcheng Television, the provincial station, or CCTV. She had never really watched the programs on Pengcheng Life Channel.

While they were talking, the camera moved from a high angle to a low angle. Two women appeared in the studio. They used standard Mandarin to tell the people of Pengcheng about the recent events in the city. They would even talk about the price increase and decrease of meat. The main focus was on daily life.

Lin Shuyue watched and felt that this program was very well-made. The news presented in the program was very down-to-earth. No wonder Lou Fengqin also liked to watch it.

The entire program was only half an hour long. Lin Shuyue watched it comfortably, hardly taking her eyes off the TV.

When there was only one minute left in the program, one of the two hosts, named Bai Yan, said, “Today, our program team received an article in our mailbox. This article is from Lin Shuyue, a reporter from Pengcheng Metropolis Daily.”

“Yes, the theme of this article is [Ancient and Modern Women in Shackles and Trapped in Cages].”

Lin Shuyue even forgot to eat her rice. Lou Fengqin looked at Lin Shuyue in great surprise, and Zeng Xiaoyi also looked at Lin Shuyue with admiration.

The hosts on TV continued to speak. Their closing remarks read out the most central sentence in Lin Shuyue’s article: “This world is putting shackles on women…..like a thing!”

In their closing remarks, the two hosts called on all viewers in front of the television to not only teach girls to protect themselves but also to teach men not to harm others. They further called on some female compatriots to be more tolerant and empathetic when men belittled women or when women were harmed.