In a small farmhouse in Yangliu village.
Madam Yang Zhou, with a face marked by the passing of more than fifty years, sat at the edge of the kang bed. Her right hand gently caressed the waxy yellow cheeks of her granddaughter, who lay quietly on the kang bed with her eyes tightly shut, murmuring softly, "Jiujiu, you've been asleep for two days and nights. Please open your eyes and look at granny."
Doctor Li said Jiujiu had injured her brain and if she didn't wake up today, she would leave this world forever.
"Mother."
The Yang family's second daughter-in-law, Liu Xiuyun, pale and sickly, with a basin of water in her arms, walked in. She glanced at her niece on the kang, tears shimmering in her eyes. She placed the basin on the nearby table, wrung out a cloth from it, and approached the edge of the kang, "Mother, I'll wipe Jiujiu's face and body. Jiujiu loves to be clean, and after sleeping for so long, she'll be uncomfortable."
"Let me do it. You're not well either, go and rest," Madam Yang Zhou took the cloth from her daughter-in-law's hands.
"I'm fine, I'll stay here with Jiujiu," Liu Xiuyun sat down on the other side of the kang.
As she gently wiped her granddaughter's face and body, Madam Yang Zhou's voice choked up, "Granny knows, Jiujiu has always been the kindest and most filial good child, you won't let your granny send off a younger life with white hair, will you?"
Those soft calls of prayer were heart-wrenching for Liu Xiuyun, she turned her head, biting her lips, stifling the cries in her throat, as silent tears streamed down her face.
The head of the Yang family had three sons and eight grandsons, but only this one girl. Although she became simple-minded due to a high fever when she was young, she was still well-behaved and filial, the treasure of the entire family. If Jiujiu were to pass away like this, it would be like gouging out the hearts of the whole family.
"Granny, second aunt, Aunty Zhuzi is here."
The Fourth Son of the Yang family, Yang Chengyou, about thirteen or fourteen years old, skinny with a yellowish pallor and wearing torn clothes, walked in, followed by the bedraggled figure of the wife of their neighbor Yang Changsheng, mother of Zhuzi, carrying a somewhat damaged bamboo basket in her crooked left arm.
"She's here," Madam Yang Zhou and her daughter-in-law hurriedly wiped their tears away as Liu Xiuyun rose to greet Aunty Zhuzi.
"Auntie, sister Xiuyun, has Jiujiu woken up?" Seeing them shake their heads, Aunty Zhuzi's face filled with more guilt, "It's all Zhuzi's fault, not knowing any better, causing Jiujiu to fall from the tree. Zhuzi's father has already given Zhuzi a severe beating, and he said, if, if Jiujiu doesn't wake up, he'll let Zhuzi give her life for Jiujiu's, and not let Jiujiu be alone!" With those words, she knelt down with a thud.
It's not that she didn't feel the pain for her young son, but Jiujiu, endearing from a young age, was always kind to their family, always thinking of them whenever there were delicacies.
This time, Zhuzi, the Seventh Son of the Yang family, Yang Cheng'an, and the Eighth, Yang Chengbin, took Jiujiu out to play, and they even encouraged her to climb a tree to look for bird's eggs. Unfortunately, as Jiujiu was coming down, Zhuzi suddenly shouted, causing Jiujiu to fall to the ground, hitting her head and falling unconscious.
Thinking Jiujiu was dead, the three boys cried out in fear, and the people nearby in the village, realizing something was amiss, came over and discovered the accident. They quickly carried Jiujiu back home. Doctor Li said her injuries were severe, and if she didn't wake up within three days, there would be no hope.
Jiujiu was the cherished treasure of the Yang family. If she were gone, it would not only damage the harmony between the two families, but her own heart would also ache as if cut by a knife; therefore, when Zhuzi's father said that Zhuzi must give his life in recompense, although she was pained, she did not object.
To take a life is to owe a life, a principle as unyielding as the heavens and the earth.
"Sister-in-law, what are you doing? Get up quickly!" Liu Xiuyun hurried to help Aunty Zhuzi up.
Madam Yang Zhou also urged, "It's not Zhuzi's fault. It's just that Cheng'an and Chengbin didn't take good care of Jiujiu. Tell Changsheng when you go back not to beat Zhuzi anymore, and not to mention anything about giving a life. Otherwise, I, an old woman, won't spare him!"