With the two fools wandering around going nowhere, several days passed.
Li BaoGui had kept the flowers in his room until they wilted, and then he had to discard them. Su WuLi never took BaiBai back to his original place, so he built something similar to a wooden dog house and let the goat live there.
On the other hand, Li Huan was the happiest of the three. His family was no longer gloomy, his father played with him more and treated his mother well.
Everything seemed to be going well. From Su Jian's point of view, their marital relationship had progressed a little, and progressing a little was better than no progress at all. Li BaoGui no longer seemed to hesitate to call him husband, and Su WuLi could sleep perfectly well next to him without having strange thoughts.
But everything had to go wrong at a certain point.
After Madam Mo heard the maid's words about Li BaoGui and the couple's strange behavior, she could not sit idly by.
One morning, after breakfast, Su WuLi was running after BaiBai together with Li Huan. Li BaoGui was laughing watching the two of them, but Su WuLi wasn't laughing because he wasn't playing at all!
"Ungrateful animal, if you break it, won't your conscience hurt?"
However, how would a little goat harbor an evil conscience or intentions? BaiBai kept running back and forth.
What was it that she was not supposed to break? A love letter.
Although the original Su WuLi was a despicable person he still had some acquaintances, one of them was an old man who lived near his parcel. That old man helped Su Jian, who was trapped in an originally illiterate body, to write a letter with impeccable penmanship.
But in the end, it had ended up chewed and moistened, a disgrace.
Madam Mo crossed the opening in the wall and put a foot in the courtyard, followed by maid Hua Zhang. Her eyebrows furrowed as soon as she entered, there were not supposed to be goats in that part of the residence. Once the family of three noticed them, the warm and homely atmosphere vanished.
BaiBai slowed down and ran towards the house Su WuLi had built for her, as if it knew it was not supposed to show itself freely. However, the goat did not let go of the letter.
Su WuLi stood firm and greeted her respectfully.
"Mother."
"Laolao." Li Huan also saluted.
Li BaoGui stood in his place, he was surprised. Seeing her in physical form was not similar to seeing her in the memories of original Li BaoGui.
[In my past life, would my mother have looked like this?]
Madam Mo did not respond to Su WuLi's greeting, she only approached Li Huan as he walked and patted his head.
"My dear grandson, why don't you go play outside? The afternoon won't be so cold, and it doesn't look like it's going to rain. Go find your friends."
"This Huan'er is going then." Li Huan walked to the opening in the wall and looked back, delivering a sympathetic look to his father. "Yifu could you come with me?"
Su Jian was on the verge of tears. He thought, [What a filial son the heavens have gifted me with! His heart is full of pity for his father. He is my precious son, my flesh and blood].
"Dad will catch up with you in a second, wait for me outside." Su WuLi promised.
Li Huan left the courtyard then.
Madam Mo didn't want her son-in-law, so she kept walking until she met Li BaoGui head-on. He greeted.
"Mother."
Even though he was already a grown man, Madam Mo looked him up and down and then stretched her hands toward the other's face. She cupped her son's cheeks with her hands, feeling them soft as usual.
"There is color in your face now. After two years, you're finally getting better."
"My husband has taken care of me."
Li BaoGui's mother heard those words and snorted, glancing sidelong at Su WuLi, who was quietly slipping away to the kitchen.
"Mother, come with me, let's drink some tea."
Li BaoGui went to the small reception room in his courtyard, and Hua Zhang walked quietly to the kitchen to prepare tea. Upon entering, she and Su WuLi looked at each other without saying anything and each set about their duty.
Su WuLi decociated medicine for her enemy-husband, sent it along with the tea with Hua Zhang's cooperation. When he was alone he put away the things he had used, and came across the strange ingredient again right where he left it.
He still didn't know what it was and what its usefulness was, so he left it there again.
Then he ran out into the street. He did not want to see Madam Mo. Madam Mo despised him deeply.
Hua Zhang poured the tea into Madam Mo's cup, and let Li BaoGui finish drinking his medicine before serving him. Then she stood in the corner, silent and attentive to any words.
Madam Mo, Mo CaiWei, took a sip of the tea to cool her throat, and smiled at her son.
"So, that goat is Huan'er's pet?"
"He like she so much, that's why I've asked my husband to let she stay at home for a while."
"At this rate, you're going to end up spoiling Huan'er." said Madam Mo.
"He's my only son."
With those words, the room fell silent. Mo CaiWei took another sip of tea and decided to show his true intentions.
"Now that you have improved once again, tell me, Gui'er, what do you plan to do?"
"I don't understand what mother is referring to."
Mo CaiWei rearranged herself in her chair, her bearing was elegant and serious.
"Gui'er, I have raised you properly. You have learned and followed the three obediences and the four virtues, and you have never ashamed yourself." As she spoke, Lady Mo sounded dejected. "When you turned fifteen there were so many matchmakers at the door of our home... Ah, so many good men wanted to marry you. Your father even thought you could marry in the palace if he sent you to the capital."
Li Yan knew what Madam Mo was getting at. Li BaoGui inherited several similar memories.
"Mother..."
"My little son, did you not think of us? Of all men, you chose an orphan peasant. Your father let you marry even so just because you are the pearl in the palm of his hand, but..."
Li Yan thought, [Dear Madam... I don't know you, I haven't thought about you.]
However, Li Yan could understand the frustration of that cheap mother. Seeing her beautiful son marry a poor, dismal peasant must have been difficult. From Madam Mo's point of view, Li BaoGui and Su WuLi were like a dragon and a pig.
Mo CaiWei held her own chest, looking at her son with pleading eyes.
"Although it's been two years of marriage, you haven't given birth to any children. Gui'er, you can still take back your words and find a new husband."
Naturally, Li Huan did not count as a son of Su WuLi and Li BaoGui, he was just an adopted child within the Li family.
"Mother, I am fine. I do not wish to marry once more."
"Please, my son, think it over. Don't make your mother suffer. There are still good men in the county, Mo Liu hasn't married yet. Lu Ran is younger than you by a few years, but that won't be a problem. Even the Chu family is well."
"I won't go back on my words. I love my husband, no one else." Li BaoGui noticed that his cheap mother looked like she was about to cry. "I am not suffering mother. The way my husband has treated me hasn't been right, but it's going to change from now on."
"How are you so sure of that?"
"I am. My husband has already started to change, Huan'er is very happy too."
Mo CaiWei was not too convinced; however, she wiped the moisture from her eyes with her handkerchief.
"...Mother, if things don't go well, my husband and I will divorce as soon as possible, you don't have to worry. And, if all goes well, I will give you some grandchildren." Li BaoGui assured.
"Before, you were so determined to stay with him no matter what, you even said you would stay by his side all your life. Now have you thought about the option of divorce? My little son has finally woken up. Was Jiang Shui?"
Li BaoGui hadn't spoken to his mother in a long time, so he never mentioned anything to her about that time he went to Jiang Shui's temple. The news had spreading fast.
"She has enlightened me." Li BaoGui replied with a calm smile.
Outside, children from different households were playing in the street, among them was Li Huan. In fact, there were also other children from the Li residence, after all, they were a considerably large family.
Su WuLi was sitting on a large rock at the side of the street, watching the children play cuju. From one moment to the next, Su Jian could see the leather ball rapidly approaching him, but he was not intimidated. He showed his skills learned during his school days and stopped the ball with one of his hands.
The children found it surprising, but none of them came closer. Li Huan was the one who walked to his father and received the ball back. Su WuLi said:
"Be careful. If they hit someone you're going to get in trouble yourself."
To the children of the county, Su WuLi was a grim and frightening man, two fingers were enough to count the times they had seen him smile; and not a genuine and cheerful smile, but a half smile full of sarcasm. That was the first time they had seen him smile like a normal human, like a father to his child.
The children just needed a reason and then they would forget the fear, and a large part of them ended up coming around. From one moment to the next, Su WuLi was surrounded by children who looked at him as if he were a qilin.
[Children, I am neither wise nor benevolent. I will not grant you any wishes. I am only a sad man in the body of a mean man.]
"Gufu is happy today." The boy who spoke belonged to the Li family, he was Li XuDan's second younger brother.
"I am, I am."
Su Jian did not expect what he heard after he gave his answer.
"Have you received favor from my dear shushu this morning?"
The children around him laughed. Su Jian thought, [What's wrong with this generation!]
"That's none of your business." Su WuLi was sad and embarrassed. He wished he could answer that answer with a yes, but he could not.
"Oh, then it is true that gufu and shushu have not consummated their marriage."
"Not even after two years?" another of the children asked.
"That's why I haven't had siblings." Li Huan concluded, his voice and expression those of someone who had just been struck by knowledge.
Su WuLi noticed that there were mocking smiles on those little faces. A grown man would not stoop to arguing with children, but Su Jian was still young at heart.
"You brat, where did you learn such things? Just so you know, my marriage was consummated!"
"The maidservants said that gufu and shushu no longer slept in the same room." replied the boy.
[This brat, this brat is the one who really looks like Che -damn witch- XuDan! How dare he air his uncles' marital problems on the street!]
"Yimu is sick anyway, yifu must let him rest." Li Huan looked at Su WuLi. "Isn't that right, yifu?"
[Li Huan, I'm sorry. This father of yours hasn't touched your mother in two years. I have let you down.]
Su WuLi couldn't give an affirmative answer, and those infernal brats sneered a second time.
"Gufu and shushu haven't even kissed!" the boy scoffed.
Why did Su Jian feel like he was in elementary school again, but now suffering bullying? Anyway, he wouldn't let a brat with his hair tied in two ugly and round braids bother him.
He was going to beat him with a stick and then let him with the olders.
He got up to execute his plan, however, Li XuDan came out of the Li residence and called her brother. The boy taunted Su WuLi one last time before running away.
Inside himself, Su Jian cursed the eighteen generations of that brat's family. He would never forgive him, they could no longer live under the same sky!
• • • • • • • • • • •
1. Laolao.
Maternal grandmother.
2. Cuju.
A game from ancient China, very similar to soccer.
3. Qilin.
Also known as Kylin, Kirin or the Chinese unicorn. Qilin is sometimes translated as 'unicorn', but is different from Western unicorns. They are known for their great wisdom, nobility, benevolence and magical powers.