Chapter 271: The Past

He patted Liu Hong’s cheek, a vicious glint in his eyes.

"Liu Hong, have you been taking my things back to your parents’ house? You’ve let my two sons get so skinny. I don’t give you things just so you can bite the hand that feeds you."

Panic flashed in Liu Hong’s eyes, but she quickly put on a pitiful look. "No, how would I dare, Brother Wa? I’m working very hard to raise our sons."

"Hmph. I don’t care what little schemes you’re plotting, but if you dare starve my sons again, I won’t let you off easy."

Liu Hong gave an awkward laugh and placed her hands on his chest. "I understand, Brother Wa. They’re our sons, after all. Why would I mistreat them?"

Seeing that the two of them were about to do something not suitable for children, Yun Jiao clutched her camera, quietly slipped away, and then called for her brothers to leave with her.

Once they were a safe distance away, Yun Xiaowu and the others’ eyes widened in excitement.

"Jiaojiao, did we just stumble upon a conspiracy?"

Their senses weren’t as sharp as Yun Jiao’s, so they hadn’t heard or seen things very clearly.

They only made out Liu Hong’s voice and that of an unfamiliar man.

Yun Jiao clutched her camera, her own heart pounding with excitement as she replayed their words in her mind.

"She said her two kids aren’t your uncle’s biological sons, Brother Qi. They belong to that other man."

"What?!"

Yun Xiaoqi was stunned.

"What’s going on, Jiaojiao? Tell us everything."

Yun Jiao picked out the most important parts and summarized what she had heard for them.

First, that man was planning to teach them kids a lesson, and Liu Hong was egging him on.

Yun Xiaowu spat. "Shameless!"

Yun Xiaoqi said, "I’m going to tell Mom! We’ll go beat them up!"

Yun Xiao Ba and Yun Xiaojiu clenched their fists, huffing in anger.

Second, that man wants to steal our family’s motorcycle.

Yun Xiaowu and his brothers scoffed. "Hmph, let them try. We’ll bring Big Black home and have him bite them."

Yun Xiaojiu added, "We have to tell Dad, too."

’That’s right,’ they thought. ’When we catch him, we’ll send him straight to the police station.’

Third, Brother Qi’s uncle is a total sucker. Not only was he cheated on, but the kids aren’t even his.

Yun Xiaoqi said, "We have to hurry back and tell Grandpa, Grandma, and Mom."

"Let’s go, let’s go! Hurry home!"

The brothers led Yun Jiao back to the Wang family’s house, only to freeze the moment they opened the door.

By the doorway, Wang Mei stood with a stick in her hand, glaring at them menacingly.

Father Wang and Mrs. Wang sighed in relief upon seeing them return.

Mrs. Wang rushed over, grabbed Yun Xiaoqi, and gave him a smack on the bottom.

"Where on earth did you rascals run off to? Do you have any idea how worried we were!"

Wang Mei picked up her stick and stalked over, her face grim. Just as they were about to get a beating, Yun Xiaowu and his brothers made a clever preemptive strike, dropping the bombshell.

Yun Xiaoqi blurted out, "Wang Daming and Wang Erming aren’t our uncle’s kids!"

The news hit the Wang family like a bomb, leaving them reeling.

"Wh-what did you say?!"

Father Wang staggered and had to grab the wall to steady himself. His voice trembled as he spoke.

Mrs. Wang looked as if she had been struck by lightning.

Wang Mei, however, recovered quickly, though the expression on her face was grim.

"What’s going on? Hurry up and tell me!"

’Even though I’m so disappointed in my older brother, he’s still my brother,’ she thought. ’He was always so good to me before he got married.’

Yun Xiaowu and his brothers stood obediently in a line and recounted the entire story—how they had run into those people in the reed marsh and what Yun Jiao had overheard.

When they heard that Liu Hong was having an affair, the members of the Wang family gritted their teeth audibly.

Wang Mei was so furious she wanted to run over and give that shameless bitch, Liu Hong, a vicious beating.

It wasn’t just because she had cheated on her brother, but because her disgusting behavior had been witnessed by children.

The mere thought that Yun Jiao might have seen something she shouldn’t have made Wang Mei want to kill Liu Hong.

Yun Jiao held up her camera. "Little Aunt, Jiaojiao took pictures. It’s evidence."

For a moment, Wang Mei didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

She asked with difficulty, "When you got there... they weren’t doing anything, were they?"

Yun Jiao tilted her head, blinked, and then said as if in sudden realization, "Little Aunt, are you asking if they were mating? They weren’t when we arrived. I led my brothers away right as they were about to start."

Wang Mei: "..."

Father Wang and Mrs. Wang: "..."

’Wait, what was that word she just used?’

After a moment of stunned silence from the three adults, Wang Mei let out a small sigh of relief. ’Thank goodness, they didn’t...’

’—like hell they didn’t!’

Radiating pure killing intent, Wang Mei stormed out of the kitchen with a cleaver. "I’m going to kill that shameless bitch!"

Yun Jiao and the Yun Xiaowu brothers: ???

’Little Aunt/Mom is so scary!’

"Stop!" Father Wang said. "Liu Hong might not even be back yet if you go now. Besides, your older brother won’t necessarily believe you."

Wang Mei’s eyes reddened at the thought of how utterly devoted her brother was to that bitch Liu Hong.

"How did he become like this? He was never like this before."

Mrs. Wang and Father Wang’s eyes were also red, and they looked ready to march over to Liu Hong’s and settle the score that very instant.

But Father Wang was more level-headed. He held back his wife and daughter, who were both ready to charge out the door.

"For this, Da Li has to see it with his own eyes and hear Liu Hong admit with her own ears that those two kids aren’t his!"

Father Wang sighed after he spoke, taking a long drag from his pipe with his brow tightly furrowed.

"Your brother... he just couldn’t hold his head high with the villagers whispering behind his back about him not having any children. He became obsessed with the idea of having a child."

Yun Jiao stared at them eagerly. ’There’s more to this story?’

’I’m curious. I want to know everything.’

’As for feeling any sympathy for her uncle, Yun Jiao didn’t have a good impression of him, so there was nothing to be sorry about.’

Perhaps triggered by the shock, Mrs. Wang began muttering "What a sin, what a sin," over and over before she started cursing—cursing Liu Hong, and cursing her own disappointing eldest son.

She was crying as she cursed, with Wang Mei trying to comfort her.

But from Mrs. Wang’s tirade, Yun Jiao, relying on her expert gossip-gathering skills, managed to piece together the backstory.

It turned out that Wang Dali had another wife before Liu Hong.

His first wife wasn’t as pretty as Liu Hong. Of course, Liu Hong was a little heavy now, but that was only because she’d lost her figure after childbirth. Even so, one could only describe her as being a bit on the plump side.

But that girl had been honest and hardworking, and both Father Wang and Mrs. Wang had been very fond of her.

But after three years of marriage to Wang Dali, they still had no children—not even a daughter.

In a rural village where continuing the family line was paramount, this was cause for scorn. Though the villagers never said anything to Wang Dali’s face, they whispered plenty behind his back.

They speculated about which of them was infertile and gossiped that his branch of the family was going to die out. Some even joked that he and his wife should adopt one of his younger brother’s children.

Wang Dali was a man who cared deeply about his reputation, and those words made him feel deeply ashamed. He urged his wife to see a doctor and try all sorts of folk remedies.

But a hospital check-up showed there was nothing wrong with his wife. Wang Dali, however, was a stubborn chauvinist. He refused to get checked himself, unwilling to even consider that the problem might be his.

Growing increasingly dissatisfied with his wife, he had an affair.

And the other woman was none other than Liu Hong, a widow from Houshan Village.