Chapter 1: Marrying a Vegetable

The Liu family's old residence.

"Hahahaha, a hillbilly and a vegetable, they're quite the match."

"Keep your voice down. No matter what, Liu Yue is the Liu family's only daughter. Be careful she doesn't recover one day and take revenge on you."

"What's there to fear? She's been lying in bed for six months. If she could get up, she would have already."

"Still, this Shen Mo is quite the talent, being able to pull off marrying a vegetable."

"I heard that the reason Shen Mo married the vegetable Liu Yue is because the Shen family gave him five percent of their shares plus two hundred million, and the Liu family gave him five percent of their shares plus three hundred million."

"Oh, so it's a marriage for money. Well, it's no wonder; no one in our circle is willing to marry a vegetable. Even Shen Mo's eldest brother, who was Liu Yue's childhood sweetheart, didn't marry her."

"This Shen Mo and Liu Yue are actually quite a match. The ending isn't bad either: Liu Yue is a vegetable, and Shen Mo is a good-for-nothing young master who returned from the countryside with no hope of inheriting the family fortune."

"They really are a match. After all, Liu Yue did Shen Mo a favor."

"A favor?"

"Liu Yue's original marriage partner was the Shen family's eldest son, but Liu Yue suddenly became a vegetable. How could the eldest son marry her? It would have become a joke. That's why the Shen family brought the good-for-nothing young master Shen Mo back from the countryside overnight."

"So that's how it is. All things considered, Shen Mo actually came out ahead."

As the groom, Shen Mo sat in a corner, eating silently. Listening to the unbridled mockery and gossip at the banquet, he was in quite a good mood.

If he could, Shen Mo would want to post on his social media right now and shout, "God, I really am your favorite grandson! You've treated me well—to think such a good thing as marrying a rich, beautiful vegetable could happen to me."

Shen Mo grew up in the countryside with his grandmother.

Aside from seeing his biological father, Shen Yilong, during holidays when he brought the whole family back to pay respects, he had never seen him at any other time.

Even though his father clearly had a fortune of hundreds of billions, he only gave Shen Mo basic living expenses every year and never bothered with anything else.

So, Shen Mo had known since he was a child that the Shen family fortune had nothing to do with him.

It was only because Shen Mo's grandmother favored boys over girls and doted on her little grandson that she left all the money she had saved to Shen Mo when she passed away when he was fifteen.

Shen Mo understood his father's blatant disdain for him.

After all, he was born because his mother had stolen his father's sperm. In other words, Shen Yilong never intended to have him.

Shen Yilong had a childhood sweetheart he loved, his wife Zhu Kailan, with whom he built his career. They were very much in love and had three children together.

That year, Shen Mo's mother, Liu Mei, was working as a cleaner at a five-star hotel when she encountered Shen Yilong and Zhu Kailan, who were staying there.

The day after Shen Yilong and Zhu Kailan checked out, Liu Mei went to clean the room and found a "sterility-preventing bag" in the trash can.

On a whim, Liu Mei used a syringe to inject it into herself.

Even Shen Mo felt it was absurd when his grandmother told him, and at the same time, he marveled at his own luck.

After giving birth to Shen Mo, Liu Mei went to Shen Yilong to demand money, but the result was that Shen Yilong sent her straight to prison.

Facing Shen Mo, Shen Yilong softened just a little and sent him back to the countryside, to his mother's home.

Perhaps intelligence is innate, or perhaps it was because Liu Mei's injection had been stored too long and its activity was too poor, but Shen Mo did not inherit Shen Yilong's high IQ. Even after working hard, he only managed to attend an ordinary middle school, an ordinary high school, and an ordinary vocational college. Aside from learning a decent stir-frying technique from his grandmother, he hadn't learned anything else.

Near graduation, Shen Mo's only dream was to go home, reopen his grandmother's closed barbecue shop, and be a small boss with the tens of millions his grandmother had left him.

But Shen Mo never expected that just as he was about to put this plan into action after graduation, Shen Yilong sought him out and told him he had arranged a marriage for him.

Shen Mo refused without even thinking. Are you kidding me? A father who hadn't shown me any fatherly love for twenty-two years suddenly appears and tells me he's arranged a marriage with a rich, beautiful woman? This definitely has problems, okay?

Facing the refusal, Shen Yilong didn't get angry and simply stated the sequence of events.

Liu Yue was six years older than Shen Mo, twenty-eight this year, the eldest daughter of the Liu family, and the Liu family's original heir. She and the Shen family's eldest son, Shen Mo's brother Shen Jiayun, were childhood sweethearts, and they were the ones who were supposed to marry.

However, six months ago, Liu Yue had an accident and became a vegetable.

Naturally, the Shen family was unwilling to marry Liu Yue anymore.

How could their own group heir marry a vegetable?

Liu Yue's father knew this too and didn't intend to force it.

However, a wicked situation arose. Liu Yue's grandfather, for reasons unknown in his later years, had set up a marriage fund for Liu Yue. This fund contained eighty billion in cash that Liu Yue's grandfather had accumulated over his lifetime, as well as eighteen percent of the shares of the Liu Group.

This money could only be accessed if Liu Yue married into the Shen family.

The person in charge of managing this fund was an old brother of Liu Yue's grandfather, the particularly loyal kind.

Liu Yue's father felt a sharp pain in his liver immediately.

He discussed with Shen Yilong whether the Shen family could take a loss and he would come back and share some money with the Shen family.

Shen Yilong refused decisively. Are you kidding? His Shen family was a group with hundreds of billions in assets. If they married Liu Yue and took the money, and then Liu Yue died a few years later, what if someone spread rumors that the Shen family's young master couldn't stand the loneliness and caused Liu Yue's death?

If such rumors spread, the Shen family would definitely suffer.

Even if the wealthy families didn't believe it, if the common people believed this joke, and then, under the manipulation of competitors, a public opinion attack occurred, the Shen family would also be in a lot of trouble.

Therefore, Shen Yilong refused.

Liu Yue's father, Liu Xinhua, also got anxious. What was to be done?

Finally, it was Shen Yilong's daughter, Shen Jiajia, who mentioned Shen Mo.

After hearing this, Shen Mo agreed immediately. He was willing to be this tool. However, he wanted money and shares.

Liu Xinhua and Shen Yilong didn't stall either. Each gave Shen Mo five percent of their respective group's shares, scraped together five hundred million for Shen Mo as a dowry and bride price, and transferred several properties to Shen Mo.

Of course, after this marriage alliance, the Liu family also took the remaining money in the fund.

To compensate Shen Yilong, the Liu family also gave up several projects. Except for Liu Yue, who was lying in bed and had lost the wealth her grandfather left her, Shen Mo, Liu Xinhua, and Shen Yilong all made a killing.

With a joyful mood, Shen Mo strolled toward his wedding chamber after the wedding banquet ended.

The wedding chamber was given to him by Liu Xinhua; it was Liu Yue's private villa, with two nannies, Wang Ma and Li Sao, who had both watched Liu Yue grow up and were the kind who would absolutely never bully her.

When Shen Mo returned to the villa, Wang Ma and Li Sao were chatting in the living room. Seeing Shen Mo, they respectfully called him "Gu Ye" (Son-in-law).

"Gu Ye, would you like to eat something more? We saved dinner for you."

Shen Mo waved his hand, saying no need, and went straight upstairs.

He had to see his sleeping beauty wife.

Wang Ma and Li Sao exchanged a look and hurried to follow.

Who knew what kind of personality this Gu Ye had? They couldn't let him do anything bad to their young miss.

The novels they had read told them that there were many perverts in this world.

On the second floor of the villa, in the largest, sunniest, and best room, Liu Yue lay on the bed like a sleeping beauty.

Perhaps because she hadn't moved for six months, Liu Yue's body was a bit thin, and her muscles had atrophied somewhat.

Even though Wang Ma and Li Sao massaged her every day, it was ultimately not as good as exercise.

Shen Mo stood by the bed, looking at Liu Yue with pity.

This was the second time he had seen Liu Yue. The first time was two years ago, when he had just been admitted to vocational college, and since his grandmother back home had passed away and he had nothing to do, he stayed in Jinghai City to work.

At that time, Shen Mo was a bar waiter, and Liu Yue was a customer.

There was no "love at first sight" story between them.

After all, a young miss would never fall for someone selling drinks in a bar.

"What a pity. She's so beautiful, yet she became a vegetable."

"Wang Ma, Li Sao, do you think there's a possibility she was framed?"

Shen Mo couldn't help but tease.

But he really felt Liu Yue was beautiful. Even though her muscles were starting to atrophy and the collagen in her face was starting to sink, one could still feel her beauty.

Wang Ma and Li Sao, who had followed him in, exchanged a look, both seeing the same thought in each other's eyes.

Could it be that this Gu Ye was like the ones in the novels, specifically here to save the young miss?

In an instant, a series of stories flashed through their minds: secret crushes between poor boys and overbearing young misses, "I am willing to be a live-in son-in-law for you," and so on.

Therefore, Wang Ma couldn't help but say with sparkling eyes, "Gu Ye, do you have a secret crush on our young miss? Is this marriage actually because you knew someone was harming her and you came specifically to find out the truth?"

Wang Ma and Li Sao were about to be moved to tears.

Shen Mo rolled his eyes and said speechlessly, "You two should read fewer novels. I'm just an ordinary person who grew up in a small county. Aside from knowing how to cook a few home-style dishes, I don't know anything."

Hearing this, Wang Ma became even more excited, slapping her thigh and saying, "Gu Ye, that's exactly it! The novels all say that people like you, from small counties or the countryside, usually meet one or two reclusive masters and then learn a set of world-shaking skills."

Li Sao immediately added excitedly, "And then, because you were learning those world-shaking skills, you neglected your studies and only ended up in a vocational college, but you still embarked on a path of acting cool and slapping faces."

The two exchanged a look and, to Shen Mo's shocked expression, shouted, "So you must be here to save the young miss! Hurry up and use your magical world-shaking skills!"

Taking a deep breath, Shen Mo stared with dead-fish eyes and spat out two words: "Mental illness."

Wang Ma and Li Sao were embarrassed.

Waving his hand, Shen Mo turned and walked out: "You two, you really should read fewer novels."

【Save Liu Yue? I hope she never wakes up in her life.】

【Only if she doesn't wake up can I take the money and go out to have fun.】

【With the scale of the Liu and Shen groups, my shares alone can pay out quite a bit of money every year, plus the interest on the five hundred million in cash, I can go clubbing every day and drink one bowl of soy milk while pouring out another.】

【So, Liu Yue, just lie there peacefully. I want to be handsome and alone.】

In the vast white dream, Liu Yue suddenly heard a voice.

Who are you? Where are you?

Can you take me out? Can you save me?

While Shen Mo walked out, he thought to himself.

【Tsk tsk, speaking of which, since I'm married to Liu Yue, can I spend from her card too?】

【I remember that before Liu Yue became a vegetable, she was the president of the Liu Group. I heard she invested in quite a few industries herself. She's super rich.】

【Tsk tsk, I'll ask my father-in-law later where Liu Yue's money went. I have to guard it for my wife.】

【Oh my, the more I think about it, the better it gets. I can completely save my own money and spend Liu Yue's instead.】

【Using my vegetable wife's money to get a foot massage and a spa treatment—just thinking about it feels great.】

【So, those people don't understand the benefits of a vegetable wife.】

New author, new book, seeking favorites and recommendations.

(End of chapter)