An Accidental Military Marriage

Seeing Jin Yulan enter the room, Jiang Qing couldn’t hide the irritation in her eyes.

"Mom."

Jin Yulan plopped down on the bed and asked about the job. "Did you see Moli? What did she say?"

Jiang Qing had missed the last bus back to town, so she had walked all the way back from the city.

It was already nighttime when she got home, and the Zhang Family had all gone to bed.

She didn’t want to disturb the Zhang Family, so she quietly cooked a bowl of noodles, wolfed them down, and went back to her room.

After such a long and tiring day, she was exhausted. She had wanted to get a good night’s rest and tell the Zhang Family about her own family’s situation in the morning.

But Jin Yulan couldn’t wait and had rushed over, eager for news.

"Mom, you were all tricked by Jiang Moli. The whole job arrangement thing was a complete lie. Jiang Moli even managed to lose the Jiang family’s house. Uncle Jiang and my mom are now living with others, relying on their charity."

Watching Jin Yulan’s expression shift from utter disbelief to disappointment, Jiang Qing felt a strange sense of satisfaction.

For the past several days, Jin Yulan had been nagging her from morning till night.

She was either praising Jiang Moli’s good fortune or telling Jiang Qing to think about her husband and brother-in-law and go apologize to Jiang Moli.

More annoying than a fly.

’Good,’ she thought. ’All those hopes were just smoke and mirrors. Jin Yulan probably won’t be able to sleep tonight.’

And indeed, Jin Yulan was too upset to sleep.

At first, when she heard Jiang Moli was going to arrange jobs for relatives, she was just envious and jealous. She hadn’t dared to think such good fortune could fall upon her family.

But after constantly harping on her daughter-in-law about it day after day, she had ended up brainwashing herself first.

She started to think it wasn’t that difficult. Perhaps if she just sucked up to Jiang Moli a little more, her second son could really land an "iron rice bowl."

Now that her hopes were suddenly dashed, how could she not be upset?

But then a thought occurred to her, and she didn’t feel so bad anymore: the Jiang family had lost their house.

’It just goes to show that my son was right not to marry Jiang Moli!’

The Zhang Family couldn’t handle a shit-stirrer like Jiang Moli.

「Early the next morning.」

As soon as Jiang Qing got out of bed and stepped out of her room, she saw Jin Yulan gathered with a few other village women outside the main gate, gossiping animatedly.

She could guess with her toes that they were definitely spreading gossip about the Jiang family.

The women in the village were more diligent than bees. Before the sun was high in the sky, the story of Jiang Moli’s "glorious achievements" had spread throughout the entire village.

Originally, the villagers had been very envious that Jiang Moli had married up, to a military officer.

They became especially green with envy when they heard she was going to arrange jobs for her family’s relatives.

They were all hoping Jiang Moli would return to the village one day so they could try to curry favor and bask in her reflected glory.

Now that the truth was out, all the villagers’ envy for the Jiang family had turned into ridicule and schadenfreude.

"And here I thought she’d turned over a new leaf and genuinely wanted to help her relatives. Turns out she’s just a big-shot braggart who’s full of hot air!"

"She’s really something else. Already married off, and she still brings disaster down on her old man."

"I don’t know what sins Jiang Dahai committed in his past life to have such a little debt collector for a daughter."

As everyone condemned and cursed her, Disdain Value points flooded into Jiang Moli’s account like snowflakes.

In a single day, Jiang Moli had collected over 300 Disdain Value points, and her mission progress was about to cross the 4,000 mark.

As the saying goes, good news never leaves the house, but bad news travels a thousand miles.

The news quickly spread to the neighboring town’s Red Star Village.

Once they heard the job arrangements had fallen through, all the creditors who had lent money to the three Ruan brothers rushed to their door to demand repayment.

In these times, every family was tightening their belts to get by, wishing they could split every penny in two.

If they hadn’t thought the Ruan Family was about to strike it rich, they never would have been willing to lend out their money.

...

When Jiang Dahai came out of the factory, he didn’t look too happy to see the three Ruan brothers.

"I’m still at work. If you have something to say, say it quickly."

Ruan Fuguo said anxiously, "Dahai, I had no other choice but to come find you. The money we paid you back before, we borrowed it all from people in the village. Now that everyone knows Xue Wen’s job fell through, they’re all crowding our house demanding their money back."

Ruan Fuqiang added, "We discussed it and decided to do what you suggested before. You give us back the money, and we’ll let this whole job business go. We’ll never bring it up again."

Ruan Fushun: "Right, right."

Jiang Dahai looked at the three brothers. "It might be over for you, but what about my house? Did I just lose it for nothing? I’ll stick to what I said before: if you can get the factory to give the house back, I won’t pursue this any further."

Ruan Fuguo shot back, "Dahai, you can’t blame us entirely for the house, can you? It was Moli who first tricked us relatives with this job offer. Are you telling me that you, as her father, knew nothing about it?"

Jiang Dahai was speechless.

He did, in fact, know about Jiang Moli using the job offers to trick their relatives into paying back their debts. He couldn’t lie and say he was ignorant with a straight face.

Seeing him fall silent, Ruan Fuqiang immediately adopted the posture of a shameless rogue:

"Fine, if you won’t handle this, we’ll go find Moli. If not her, then we’ll find her father-in-law. I refuse to believe there’s nowhere in this world to find justice."

...

"Tell them to wait right there. I’m on my way!"

Hanging up the phone, Jiang Moli stood up and went to the entryway to change her shoes. "Mom, I’m heading out."

Seeing her rush to leave right after the call, An Hui had a bad feeling. "What happened?"

"It’s nothing. My uncles came into the city to find my dad. I’m going to go check it out."

An Hui frowned. "Why are they here again? What is it this time?"

"I know, right? I won’t be back for lunch."

After Jiang Moli left, Ma Hongmei couldn’t help but fret to An Hui, "I hope Xiao Jiang doesn’t get into another fight with her uncles. The last time they fought, her family lost their house. If she causes a scene this time, let’s hope she doesn’t get her father’s job into trouble."

Ma Hongmei’s words left An Hui feeling uneasy, so she picked up the phone and called Lu Deyao.

"We should learn from our in-law. He’s not even worried about his daughter causing trouble for him, so why should we be? Anyway, that’s just Xiao Jiang’s personality. As long as she’s not murdering people, setting fires, or breaking the law, just let her be."

After being comforted by Lu Deyao, An Hui actually felt he had a point, so she stopped worrying about Jiang Moli.

Hearing Lu Deyao’s thoughts, Ma Hongmei couldn’t help but recall what An Hui’s standards for her daughter-in-law, Jiang Moli, were when she first married into the family:

’As long as she behaves, doesn’t cause trouble, and doesn’t go around smashing things at home, I’ll be satisfied.’

How much time had passed since then? And now the standards had dropped to "as long as she’s not murdering people, setting fires, or breaking the law."

It just goes to show you, a person’s bottom line can truly be pushed lower and lower.

...

After leaving the Military District Courtyard, Jiang Moli walked toward the bus stop.

On the way, she came across a man pulling a cycle rickshaw.

Perhaps seeing how fair-skinned and beautiful she was, he eagerly tried to solicit her business: "Comrade, need a ride?"

"Only if it’s free."

The driver’s smile vanished.

’Her ideas are even prettier than her face,’ he thought. ’Wants a ride without paying.’

The driver started to pedal away, but Jiang Moli called out to him, "How much to the machinery factory?"

The driver’s smile returned. "Two mao. Getting in?"

"Nope, just asking the price."

’Hey, you must have a lot of free time on your hands!’

[Disdain Value +1, 10,000 yuan credited.]

Hearing the notification that Disdain Value had been credited, Jiang Moli turned and hopped onto the rickshaw. "Let’s go. To the machinery factory."

The driver: "..."

...

When they arrived at the machinery factory, Jiang Dahai first pulled Jiang Moli aside and explained the Ruan family’s situation to her.

"If they don’t get their money today, your uncles probably won’t leave."

"Don’t worry, I’ll handle it."

Jiang Dahai stared at her. "How are you going to handle it?"