Shen Yuchu looked at Shen Chunfen, who didn't move. Lin Xuan didn't move either.
"What? Want a divorce and you still won't settle the accounts? What are you waiting for?"
Lin Xuan blinked as he looked at Shen Yuchu before him; she was acting completely like a stranger.
Shen Chunfen said, "Shen Yuchu, you... you must be joking, right?"
"Who jokes about money? Let's go, right now!" Shen Yuchu said, turning her gaze back to Shen Chunfen. "Show me that fierce attitude you always use to lecture me, don't be such a coward!"
Shen Chunfen glanced at Lin Xuan. "Let's not go. Who knows what kind of trouble Shen Yuchu is brewing again."
Shen Yuchu walked over to the telephone, picked it up directly, and called Lin Hui.
The call was answered by Lin Hui's mother-in-law, Madam Wu. After all, she was the wife of the canned food factory director. "Shen Chunfen, let me tell you, if anything happens to my oldest grandson—"
"Old witch, it's me, Shen Yuchu. You tell my oldest sister to come right over and collect one thousand yuan, and you come too. If you're late, you won't get a cent."
"..."
Beep, beep, beep—
A busy tone came from the receiver. Holding the phone, Lin Hui's mother-in-law was completely dumbfounded.
"Collect one thousand yuan?"
Lin Hui hadn't actually gone to the hospital; she was still at home. The reason she said those things earlier was simply to get money from her maiden family.
She had made a trip back to her family home and returned empty-handed. If her husband came back later, he would definitely scold her for being useless.
Therefore, Lin Hui would do anything to squeeze something out of her maiden family. If she couldn't get some goods back, she had to desperately get some money back.
Otherwise, Lin Hui's husband Wu Cai was not an easy man to deal with; he beat people whenever he got drunk.
Lin Hui was terrified of being beaten. The whole incident started because she had given her younger brother one thousand yuan for his bride price.
To the Wu family, that thousand yuan was no small sum.
Now that Shen Yuchu had made the call, Lin Hui and her mother-in-law exchanged glances and decided to go over and see what was really going on.
Shen Yuchu waited right there for Lin Hui to arrive.
What kind of person was Lü Chunhuan?
Shen Yuchu had already turned it over in her mind. The way she had treated the original owner before was clearly just about squeezing every drop of utility out of her daughter.
So, there was no need to keep ties with such a mother. She would be as ruthless as it took!
Lin Xuan walked over. "Shen Yuchu, have you really decided to go to your family's place to take back the bride price?"
"Nonsense, that money belongs to us. It's what we deserve."
Lin Xuan knew his mother-in-law's temper, what she looked like, and her obnoxious, overbearing demeanor.
Back in the day, that mother-in-law of his had forced him to marry Shen Yuchu using those exact tactics.
At the time, if he refused to marry her, she threatened to report him all the way to his military academy, refusing to let the matter go.
Although he knew very well that he hadn't done anything wrong, it happened to be graduation season. With Lü Chunhuan making such a scene, it certainly wouldn't have looked good.
Shen Yuchu closed her eyes like a grandmaster chanting a spell!
Before long, Lin Hui holding her child, along with her mother-in-law Madam Wu, both arrived.
When you're going to pick a fight, having backup makes things so much better!
Shen Yuchu looked at Lin Hui; there were no traces of an IV drip on her hands, and neither was there any on her child—they had simply changed their clothes.
Naturally, Shen Yuchu didn't want to bicker with them.
"Let's go. To my family's village, Dalüzhuang Village."
Lin Xuan clicked his tongue. "Actually, I came home today to fill out my family background form and then report to Regiment Headquarters, not to go to..."
"Cut the crap, it won't take up much of your time."
"I still need to find the village party secretary."
Shen Yuchu asked, "Are you going to drive or not? If you aren't, I will!"
Lin Xuan didn't want to get dragged into a shouting match. He had come home to fill out his family background form and submit a report to Regiment Headquarters—a routine report promoting military-civilian unity and supporting the armed forces.
He hadn't come home to fight! Yet the moment he got back, before he could even stand firmly on his own two feet, Shen Yuchu was dragging him off to his mother-in-law's house to pick a fight.
Seeing that he wouldn't budge, Shen Yuchu got into the car herself. As a Ph.D. graduate who had studied abroad and a time-traveler to boot, could she really not drive?
Once inside, Shen Yuchu started the engine directly, executed a slick U-turn, and said, "Come on, get in!"
This domineering move completely stunned Shen Chunfen, Lin Hui, Madam Wu, and Lin Xuan.
She...
Shen Yuchu knew how to drive?
In this era, let alone in rural areas where cars were scarce, finding a woman in the village who could drive was practically unheard of!
With one hand resting on the steering wheel, Shen Yuchu asked, "Do you want your money or not?"
Shen Chunfen was momentarily dazed. This time, when she spoke to Shen Yuchu, she didn't use her usual tone. She leaned in closer and said in an extremely gentle voice, "Well... Yuchu..."
Just listen to that!
She didn't even use her last name when speaking now.
"Are... are we really going to your mother's place to demand money?"
Shen Yuchu's eyelids twitched. Wasn't this woman shouting day in and day out that she hadn't taken a single cent of the bride price? And now they were actually going to get the money?
What's this? Her mother-in-law was turning coward now?
"Oh~ Mom, look at what you're saying. Didn't you claim my family didn't give a single cent of dowry and instead embezzled the bride price for yourself? Right now, we aren't even asking for dowry items. We are going back to demand the bride price your Lin family originally gave. We are fully justified. It's a legitimate reason, so what's wrong with you? What are you afraid of?"
Shen Chunfen had just been pinned to the ground and beaten by Shen Yuchu earlier; at this moment, she still had bits of grass stuck in her hair, and her hairstyle was rather messy.
She looked pleadingly at Shen Yuchu. "Well... how about we go in a couple of days? Today... today it's almost getting dark."
"Mom, my dear mother-in-law. What does collecting debts have to do with whether it's day or night? When it's time to collect, you collect. Grab that firewood stick you used to hit me with and get in the car!"
Shen Chunfen: "..."
She didn't even know how to open the door, and suddenly being asked to ride in a car made her feel rather awkward.
"Um... Mom should go change her clothes first, lest she dirty the car seats."
"It's fine, get in!"
"I'd better change!" At this point, Shen Chunfen was acting as cowardly as they come. As she headed back inside, she even pulled Lin Xuan along with her, whispering something to him the whole way.
After quite a while, there was still no sign of her changing clothes. Furthermore, Lin Hui and her mother-in-law Madam Wu had both come out and gotten into the car together.
The three of them, plus a small child, sat in a row in the back seat, not uttering a single word.
This time, Lin Xuan came along too. He opened the car door and said to Shen Yuchu, "Get in the passenger seat."
"What for?"
"I'm driving!"
"Who do you think you're looking down on?"
Standing at one meter eighty-nine, Lin Xuan pressed one hand against the door frame and ordered, "Get out!"
"You go sit in the passenger seat."
"Shen Yuchu, I'm going to count to three. Get in the passenger seat."
"Mr. Lin Xuan, I'm going to count to six, and you go sit in the passenger seat, OK?" Shen Yuchu raised her voice a few decibels.
Lin Xuan: "..." Is she starting to throw around foreign phrases now?