Chapter 275: You've really handled this matter absurdly, Mother!

Li Long had just stepped out of the courtyard when he saw Gu Bo Yuan carrying an iron shovel, walking back toward the house next door.

He was somewhat surprised to see Li Long and asked with a smile:

"Little Long, what brings you here? Did you catch something again and bring it over for me?"

It was clear that Gu Bo Yuan was in a pretty good mood.

His mood was indeed quite good; he had just taken a turn around the fields, and the crops were growing well. This year could be considered a harvest year.

"Gu Shu, something big has happened." Li Long pulled Gu Bo Yuan into the courtyard and said anxiously:

"People from my home have arrived—don't get angry about this, just listen to me explain slowly."

"Why would I get angry? Relatives from your home came?" Gu Bo Yuan listened, confused by the lack of context. "That's a good thing, isn't it? No, wait, aren't your father and mother here? Who came this time?"

Li Long gave a bitter smile and said:

"It's like this. Around the New Year, when my brother sent a telegram home, he told my father and mother to come over, saying I had made money and was doing well.

At the time, my mother mentioned something about me marrying a girl from back home, but I didn't pay it any mind. Who knew that while she was back home, she had praised me, and someone there became interested in a marriage alliance..."

"Slow down, I don't understand—just tell me what happened?" Gu Bo Yuan actually understood a little; he felt a bit angry, but Li Long's attitude was relatively satisfactory, so he wanted to clarify things before resolving them.

"Someone from back home has come looking for me, apparently saying my mother introduced them." Li Long said bluntly. "Now they've run off to my house.

I was afraid you would misunderstand, so I came to explain to you first, Gu Shu. This is a misunderstanding. Xiaoxia and I are already engaged; that person was just someone my mother mentioned, I never expected them to actually show up..."

Gu Bo Yuan let out a long breath and fell silent for a moment.

What a farce!

But he also knew that Li Long was innocent; in later generations, this would be called being a "stray bullet."

Li Long's heart was in his throat. If this future father-in-law got angry, things would be hard to handle later. It was a misunderstanding, and it would be fine once cleared up.

But Li Long knew that woman was not to be trifled with. To have such schemes, she must be strong-willed. If things weren't smoothed over here, and that woman caused a scene by dragging his mother into it, even if the matter calmed down eventually, it would be fine for him, but Gu Xiaoxia's reputation in the team would suffer.

It would be inevitable for people to point fingers at her later.

While Gu Bo Yuan was silent, over in the Li family courtyard, Li Qing Xia, Du Chunfang, and Tao Daqiang were still stunned, not understanding why Li Long had suddenly run off.

The girl looked into the courtyard and saw Du Chunfang sitting there chopping pig feed, while Li Qing Xia and a young man were working on a net. She immediately guessed that the young man must be Li Long, so she went up and grabbed the man's arm:

"You must be Li Long, right? I'm your intended, Qiuping. I've come to find you..."

Tao Daqiang was completely bewildered. After a moment of shock, he began to struggle violently:

"Let go of me! I'm not Brother Long! Brother Long's intended is Xiaoxia! Who are you?"

He hadn't heard the noise outside earlier and didn't know what was going on.

Li Qing Xia and Du Chunfang's hearing wasn't as good as Li Long's, but when the girl grabbed Tao Daqiang, the two old people understood.

Outside the courtyard, the crowd burst into loud laughter, but someone with an agenda immediately shouted loudly:

"He's not Li Long, he's Tao Daqiang! Li Long isn't in the courtyard..."

"That's not right, Li Long just came back, could he be in the house?"

"Exactly, I saw Li Long ride his bike back too—Li Long, come out! Your intended is here..."

"Li Long, come out! Your wife from back home is here!"

There was quite a bit of heckling. The girl realized what was happening, blushed, and let go of Tao Daqiang. Still unwilling to give up, she stepped forward to push the door open.

"Who are you? What do you think you're doing?" A sudden shout made the girl pull her hand back instantly.

Li Jianguo had returned.

Li Jianguo and Liang Wenyu had been at the threshing floor, not far from the house. When the crowd arrived at their gate, the two of them quickly noticed and hurried home.

Even now, Li Jianguo didn't understand what had happened, but he could tell the girl had ill intentions.

After Li Jianguo shouted at the girl, he pushed through the crowd and walked in, followed by Liang Wenyu. Her expression was gloomy; having others, especially women she wasn't familiar with, watch her family make a fool of themselves was not a good thing for anyone.

"Who are you, and why have you run to our house?" Li Jianguo asked directly. The other party was a young woman; if it were before, Li Jianguo wouldn't have used such a fierce tone, but since she had run into their courtyard with such a large crowd and was trying to open their door, she was an unwelcome guest.

There was no need to be polite.

Du Qiuping's eyes rolled, and a look of grievance immediately appeared on her face as she looked at Du Chunfang:

"Great-Aunt, you tell them! I'm Little Long's intended! You and my mother agreed on this, so why are you denying me now? I traveled such a long way, almost got abducted into a mountain gully, and the journey was so hard. I thought I was home when I got here, so why are you being so fierce to me?"

Great-Aunt?

Du Chunfang looked at her carefully and asked:

"Are you Cuifeng's little Ping?"

"Yes, yes, Great-Aunt, I thought you didn't recognize me."

"Then you came in so fiercely, I thought a female demon had entered the courtyard—"

"Hahahaha!"

"A female demon!"

"Isn't that a tiger..." The people at the gate roared with laughter.

They didn't care who lost or who gained; as long as there was a show to watch, it was fine.

"Great-Aunt, why are you saying that about me?" Du Qiuping was immediately displeased. "What did I do wrong, tell me?"

"You grabbed Daqiang the moment you walked in. I thought you were Daqiang's intended, coming to force a marriage... You looked so quiet and gentle back home, why are you like this now?" Although Du Chunfang didn't speak much usually, her logic was very clear at this moment.

"That... I thought he was Little Long, didn't I?"

"Then shouldn't you have greeted me first when you came in? At least let people know that we people of Du Village are reasonable and polite?"

Du Qiuping stopped talking. The reason she grabbed Daqiang's arm was that she wanted to entangle him and create a *fait accompli*—after all, on the road, those aunts and older women had already chattered that Li Long had an intended here and was already engaged. If Li Long were an ordinary young man, she would have given up, as he was already married, but having heard how capable Li Long was and how wealthy the Li family was, how could she give up easily?

No matter what, she had to cause a scene, otherwise, how could she justify the hardship of traveling thousands of miles?

"Besides, I only mentioned it to your mother at the time, and you said yourself that this bitter place in Xinjiang, hearing that it was all desert and Gobi, meant you wouldn't come. Didn't that settle the matter? How did it become that I agreed with your mother? Your mother also said at the time that you wouldn't marry far away, and that you should just marry a local worker."

Only then did Du Chunfang reveal the truth. At this moment, whether it was the onlookers or the Li family, everyone understood.

Du Qiuping naturally didn't want everyone to understand. If everyone understood, how could she leverage the momentum of so many people?

Moreover, the reason she dared to run to Xinjiang so recklessly was that she heard the two Li brothers had sent a lot of money to Li Qing Xia and Du Chunfang, and since the couple hadn't returned after so many days, they must be living well here.

Of course, there was another reason: her mother at home was forcing her to marry an old widower. Although he was a worker, he had a teenage son. Could she marry him?

That was why she hardened her heart and ran here.

She never expected that after inquiring in the village, she would find out the Li family was so wealthy!

How could she not hold on tight?

So, as soon as Du Chunfang finished speaking, she immediately retorted:

"Great-Aunt, that's not how it is. My mother told me that you and she had agreed that Little Long and I were intendeds. Otherwise, how could I have run so far to find him?"

Anyway, Du Qiuping's mother wasn't here; it was all talk, she could say whatever she wanted.

Du Chunfang was immediately dissatisfied:

"Little Ping, how can you talk nonsense? You told me yourself at the time that you wouldn't come to such a far place as Xinjiang, where you'd be bullied without your maiden family to look after you. That matter was settled then. Now you're saying this again, aren't you afraid of being struck by lightning?"

!

"I'm not afraid!" Du Qiuping thought, *I've already run this far, what else is there to fear? *

The people at the gate sensed something wrong and burst into laughter.

Du Qiuping reacted immediately and added:

"I haven't done anything wrong, so I'm not afraid!"

"I understand." Li Jianguo saw that this was a difficult girl to deal with. He said with a grim face:

"The matter you're talking about was between my mother and your mother. Little Long wasn't there, so it doesn't count. Little Long is engaged now and has an intended. You should go home."

"That won't do, I want an explanation!" Although Du Qiuping knew this would be the result, she wasn't panicked at all. She sat on the ground, slapped her thighs, and wailed with a crying tone:

"You're all bullying me—I don't want to live anymore! Why am I so bitter..."

The onlookers had never seen such a scene and were a bit stunned.

"Shut up!" Li Qing Xia could no longer watch. "If you howl again, I'll have the militia drag you off and bury you in a ditch!"

Of course, this was just to scare her. He knew it was Li Long's mother who had caused this with a single sentence. Although it wasn't a matter of who was right or wrong, the root was there, and he didn't want Li Jianguo's family to be laughed at by the team.

Du Qiuping didn't buy it and continued to slap her thighs and wail:

"Let me die, that'll be the end of it! Ah—"

Liang Wenyu couldn't watch anymore. Li Qing Xia and Du Chunfang were elders and couldn't take action. Li Jianguo was a man and couldn't take action against a young woman. But she didn't care; this woman had nothing to do with her. Daring to wail in her house—did she think she had no fighting power?

Liang Wenyu stepped forward, grabbed Du Qiuping by the collar, and lifted her up. Du Qiuping stopped wailing instantly and struggled desperately. She was also someone who had done farm work and considered her fighting power quite good. But she underestimated Liang Wenyu's strength. A Northern Xinjiang woman of Liang Wenyu's age was someone who had dug large canals, opened dry ditches, and carried sacks of grain alongside men. She dragged her outside with one hand, saying as she did:

"I don't care who you are, our house won't tolerate a wailing creature like you! If you want to wail, go outside and wail!"

Just at this moment, someone on the periphery suddenly said:

"Li Long is back!"

Only then did everyone realize that the protagonist of the story had been absent the whole time. Where had he gone?

Over there, Gu Bo Yuan was silent for a long while before asking:

"Then how do you plan to resolve this?"

"Resolve it? That's very simple." Li Long understood from Gu Bo Yuan's words that he had accepted this misunderstanding, and said: "Gu Shu, I'll go over with you and explain clearly to that woman that I have an intended, that we are in a free-love relationship, and that Xiaoxia and I are engaged—one step away from being a legal couple.

If she continues to cause trouble, that's disrupting a marriage, which is against the law. The best thing is to let her retreat in the face of difficulty—at worst, I'll pay for her train ticket back, and let her go home."

"Fine, let's go." Gu Bo Yuan knew this was the best method. Li Long was full of sincerity and came to find him immediately, not letting him misunderstand, and of course, there was the implication of using him to prevent Xiaoxia from misunderstanding. This showed that Li Long cared very much about his and Xiaoxia's attitude.

That was enough.

When the two arrived at the Li house, Gu Bo Yuan was startled. There were at least twenty people gathered at the Li gate, some standing on tiptoes looking inside, wailing inside the courtyard, and Liang Wenyu's reprimands.

Then someone saw Gu Bo Yuan and Li Long coming together.

Those with a keen eye knew immediately that this matter wouldn't escalate.

Since the Gu family had appeared with Li Long, it meant they had already talked it over, and this misunderstanding definitely wouldn't cause trouble.

The crowd squeezed out a path, letting Li Long and Gu Bo Yuan enter the courtyard.

Liang Wenyu let go, leaving Du Qiuping sitting on the ground.

Since Li Long had appeared, it was better for the principal to resolve this matter.

Du Qiuping panted heavily. She had learned the fighting power of Northern Xinjiang women and dared not underestimate them again. She also knew that throwing a tantrum was useless; there were people who could deal with her.

It would be better to take advantage of the situation and ask for some benefits.

However, when she saw Li Long, she immediately wanted to change her mind. Mainly because Li Long was handsome and had a good temperament. Like that Tao Daqiang from earlier, he was tall, but he was more handsome and clever.

Finding a man like this was something she could only dream of!

"Xiaoxia's father, this matter is our fault." Li Qing Xia saw Gu Bo Yuan come over and immediately came to admit his mistake. "Jianguo's mother mentioned it to this girl's mother back home—at the time, we didn't know about Xiaoxia, and she didn't want to marry here, and her family didn't agree, so the matter passed. I never expected her to come looking for us... I'm sorry to you both!"

"I understand, I understand." Gu Bo Yuan nodded. The Li family's attitude made him quite satisfied. Although this matter had been blown out of proportion and many people were watching the show, for them to take the initiative to apologize in such a large setting and lower their posture like this was not easy.

"It's good that this is cleared up." Gu Bo Yuan didn't look at Du Qiuping once the whole time. "I know this is a misunderstanding, and I will tell Xiaoxia later. Li Long also said that although he didn't cause this, it started because of him, so he asked me to come and clear things up. You talk, I'll just watch."

Du Qiuping suddenly scrambled up and rushed toward Li Long. Judging by her posture, she was still prepared to grab Li Long and not let go.

Li Long was cunning; he had been paying attention all along. As soon as Du Qiuping made a move, he darted behind Liang Wenyu.

At this time, it wasn't convenient for a man to act, and only Liang Wenyu could suppress this person.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 276 =====