"If it weren't for you, Hongjun would never have developed such a grudge against that wretch Qiao Qingqing! It's you—you jinx, you husband-killer—who ruined Hongjun! You have no shame; instead of sleeping in your own bed, you had to entice Hongjun to a guesthouse to open a room. That is why our family has ended up in this state! If you don't pay back the money, then even if the King of Heaven himself came down, you aren't getting a divorce, and you aren't escaping us!"
Feng Guiying had reached the end of her rope; her son was her only hope. With her son gone, who was she supposed to pretend to be a kind person for? It was all meaningless—everything she did was meaningless now. Knowing there was nothing she could do to Qiao Qingqing, she set her sights on Shi Lanlan, who had lost her protector. She had to make Shi Lanlan pay the price.
Seeing this, the villagers began to urge Shi Lanlan to comply. Fifty yuan was not a small sum; no family could stand by and watch that amount of money disappear. Besides, Feng Guiying was right about one thing: if Qiao Qingqing hadn't "played the hero" to save Shi Lanlan by hitting Zhou Hongjun, the two of them likely never would have become enemies. Outsiders were unaware of Qiao Qingqing’s personal history or the mortal grudge she had harbored against Zhou Hongjun in a past life. Therefore, logically, it appeared that Qiao Qingqing had intervened simply because she was standing up for Shi Lanlan, just as she had claimed.
Chapter 149