"It's been so long since you last visited. What have you been busy with lately?" As if suddenly remembering something, he didn’t even wait for Zhao Ger to answer and hurriedly asked, "I just got back from the fields and heard someone say Ma Wen went looking for you?"
Zhao Ger hadn’t expected the news to spread so quickly. He nodded. "Yes."
Uncle Liu didn’t know the details between him and Ma Wen, but Zhao Ger had spent over a decade with the Ma family. He worried Zhao Ger might still have feelings for Ma Wen.
Back then, Ma Wen had even fought with his parents, Ma Dazhuang and his wife, over Zhao Ger. He had shouted in the yard that he would marry no one but Zhao Ger, and those words had spread throughout Xiaohe Village.
Now that he was back, trouble was likely brewing.
"Did he ask you to go back with him?"
There was no reason to hide it. Zhao Ger nodded again. "Yes."
Uncle Liu pulled his stool closer and patted Zhao Ger’s hand. "Don’t be foolish. Do you know about the time Ma Dazhuang and his wife went back on their word and tried to get the village chief to take you back?"
"I know."
"But do you know why it didn’t happen?"
Zhao Ger frowned slightly.
Ma Dazhuang and his wife doted on their only son, Ma Wen. Before leaving, Ma Wen had told them that once he returned from this trip, he wanted to get married. Their change of heart was likely because they feared Ma Wen would resent them if he came back to find Zhao Ger gone.
But Uncle Liu said, "After you left, no one did the chores at their house—the yard wasn’t swept, the pigs weren’t fed, meals weren’t cooked. It was a mess. Ma Laosan came up with the terrible idea of taking you back just to make you work for them again!" This was something a neighbor of the Ma family had overheard and later shared with him.
Zhao Ger hadn’t expected this. Fang Zichen hadn’t mentioned it when he returned.
"Whether Ma Wen truly likes you or not, I won’t comment. But in the village, this is how it is—if the conditions are passable, you marry. At first, no one has feelings. But you know exactly what that family is like."
Uncle Liu continued, "Even if he genuinely cares for you, what does it matter? The moment he’s gone, that whole family will chew you to the bone. And that man, whatever Ma Dazhuang and his wife say, he obeys without question. Call it filial piety if you want, but honestly, he’s just spineless. Don’t make a mistake."
In the village, families rarely split up unless under exceptional circumstances. Most lived together as one big household.
A wife marrying into such a family had a hard life—not only serving the parents-in-law but also the uncles, aunts, and everyone else.
With elders around, they couldn’t refuse when the elders ordered them to work.
And Zhao Ger wasn’t even a proper fulang in their eyes, that family had treated him like a slave.
Now that he had escaped that hellhole, Uncle Liu worried his youth might make him vulnerable to sweet talk, luring him back into the fire.
Though many village women gossiped behind his back, saying Fang Zichen wasn’t much better—penniless, with no land to his name—and that living with him couldn’t be much better than the Ma family, at least he wasn’t beaten or scolded.
But Uncle Liu didn’t see it that way.
He had witnessed Ma Dazhuang beating Zhao Ger firsthand—thick wooden sticks striking him over and over, as if trying to kill him.
Uncle Liu, getting on in years, couldn’t help but pity Zhao Ger, seeing how hardworking he was yet how harsh his life had been.
"That Fang boy must treat you decently, right? Your uncle told me he even beat up Liu Laizi for you last time. Seems he cares about you."
Guaizai sat quietly nearby, peeling peanuts. The half-dried peanuts were tough, and his small hands struggled with some. He bit open the stubborn ones but didn’t eat them—just tucked them into his pocket.
He was still thin, but his new clothes fit well, and his little face had filled out slightly, no longer as gaunt as before when he followed Zhao Ger up the mountains and through the fields, dressed in rags and skinny as a monkey.
Zhao Ger glanced at him, his expression softening.
"I won’t go back. I’m living well now. My husband cares for me and Guaizai. This time, he even gave me money to buy eggs for us to eat."
"Ah, so that’s why you came!" Uncle Liu chuckled. "We’ve got plenty of eggs at home, no need to talk about buying. Let me get them for you." He stood up immediately, but Zhao Ger quickly said, "I’d like to buy twenty."
"Huh?" Uncle Liu paused. "What do you need so many for?"
Zhao Ger hesitated, too embarrassed to say Fang Zichen thought he was too bony and uncomfortable to lie on. Instead, he replied, "My husband wants Guaizai and me to nourish ourselves."
"Your man has a good heart," Uncle Liu remarked approvingly.
Most men only cared about continuing the family line. If he wanted Zhao Ger to regain health, it might just be for bearing children. But to remember Guaizai, a stepson, when the family had nothing—that showed genuine care.
Uncle Liu picked out twenty freshly laid eggs and placed them in the basket Zhao Ger had brought. Selling to villagers was cheaper, two copper coins for three eggs.
As soon as Zhao Ger stepped out the door, Uncle Liu’s daughter-in-law muttered sarcastically, "Dad, you’re so generous—picking the biggest ones and selling them for two copper coins per three eggs. How noble."
Uncle Liu knew how to handle her. Calmly, he said, "Should I call Zhao Ger back and let you take them to town to sell? If you can’t get one copper coin per egg, don’t bother coming home."
The daughter-in-law immediately shut up.
With no festivals or busy farming season, who would buy eggs at such a price?
Uncle Liu shot her a glare but said nothing more.
This daughter-in-law wasn’t wicked, just sharp-tongued and stingy.
But poverty did that. If the family had money, who would haggle over every copper?
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