Chapter 472 - 462: A Difficult Buddha

Liu Fang gritted her teeth at the thought. ’Is this my fault? What does it have to do with me? He was clearly exhausted, but he was the one who insisted. My mother-in-law was the one desperate for a grandson. What did any of that have to do with me!’

But in the end, her mother-in-law placed all the blame on her. She called Liu Fang a jinx, claimed she had seduced her son and cursed him to death. From then on, the curses were endless, and when her mother-in-law got angry, she would even resort to violence.

She endured it. She had nowhere to go besides the You family’s home. She served her mother-in-law, thinking, ’She won’t live for many more years anyway. At least I can earn a good reputation out of this.’

But to her surprise, after You Ping died, a few men in the village started making advances on her. The moment their wives saw it, they would curse her out, treating her like a homewrecker. ’But I never had any intention of doing anything,’ she thought. ’They’re the ones who act like shrews, unable to control their own husbands. How can they dump all the blame on me?’

That You Erbaihua was a beast. He wanted their house, and he wanted her. She would rather die than be with him.

It was then that Lin Shan appeared. He had You Erbaihua thrown in prison, which was tantamount to saving her. Seeing her hardship, Lin Shan also left her money to get by. She was truly grateful and felt he was a genuinely good official. At that time, she had no other intentions.

Later, her mother-in-law threw hot soup on her. As she lay sick in bed, half-dead, it was Lin Shan and another person who carried her to a car and rushed her to the hospital.

When she woke up and saw Lin Shan, she cried silently. A wave of bitterness washed over her. ’I haven’t done anything wrong, so why does everyone treat me this way? Why is my life so hard?’

Lin Shan arranged for someone to look after her and her child. He would visit when he had free time, comforting and encouraging her to face life bravely. In those moments, she felt the man before her was so gentle, so kind, and so understanding. He was simply wonderful. ’This man,’ she thought, ’was sent by heaven to rescue me.’

At the time, she assumed Lin Shan had other intentions toward her. Right before she was discharged from the hospital, she told him that he had saved her life and that she wanted to repay him. She said she was willing to do anything he asked.

She still remembered his response. He had smiled and told her, "The greatest repayment you can give me is to live a good life, take good care of your child and your mother-in-law, and make a good future for yourself."

It was only then that she realized Lin Shan truly harbored no ulterior motives. She asked around and learned that he helped many people—the widowed and childless elderly, families on the brink of collapse, and others. She wasn’t the only one.

But this only deepened the impression Lin Shan left on her heart. In the dead of night, her mind could no longer accommodate anyone else. All she thought about was Lin Shan.

Later, after her mother-in-law died, the villagers bullied her and tried to drive her to death’s door. Once again, it was Lin Shan who sent people to help and save her. From that moment, she was completely set on him. She decided Lin Shan was the man she would depend on for the rest of her life.

But Lin Shan had no such feelings for her. When people started spreading gossip about the two of them, she was both terrified and thrilled, wondering if the rumors might one day come true. She never imagined, however, that Lin Shan’s superiors would launch an investigation and even question her about it.

She couldn’t bring harm to Lin Shan, so she told the investigators that there was nothing between them—which was the truth. The only thing was, in her own mind, she already considered herself Lin Shan’s woman.

When Lin Shan was transferred back to the city, she could no longer see him. Her heart felt empty.

Back in the village, men began trying to sneak into her house in the middle of the night. If she hadn’t hidden a weapon in her room, she feared she would have been violated. Despite this, the villagers still accused her of being a seductress, a whore, and dragged her name through the mud. Women would stand outside her door all day, screaming curses. Hardly anyone dared to even speak to her. And through it all, she endured.

Then, a few days ago, it snowed and her house was damaged. She took it as a sign. ’It’s the will of heaven,’ she thought. ’Even the gods can’t bear to watch this anymore; they want me to leave. If I stay in the village, I’ll really be violated one of these days, and people will still be the ones to curse me for it. I’ll have no way to go on.’ She made up her mind to find Lin Shan and never look back. She was sure he was a soft-hearted man.

’I’ll stay with the Lin Family. I can work for them. For now, I’m not asking for anything to happen with Lin Shan; I just need to stay here. His wife is bound to treat me poorly, and I’ll endure it. I’ll just keep enduring it. The meaner she is, the more pitiful I’ll seem. Then Lin Shan will feel sorry for me. Over time, he’s sure to think his wife is intolerant. When that time comes, I’ll just lean into his arms and cry, making him understand all the grievances I’ve suffered. I refuse to believe his heart won’t be moved.’

’If one day isn’t enough, I’ll wait two. If two days aren’t enough, then half a year. If half a year isn’t enough, then one year, two years... I can endure. I can wait. I’ll wait for his heart to soften toward me. When that happens, Lin Shan will be mine. Even if I don’t have a formal title, as long as he lets me depend on him, I’ll accept it.’

’Of course, if he eventually divorces his wife and marries me, that would be for the best. Then I could be with him legitimately and truly be his woman. Chun Ya could take the surname Lin and have a father. I could even bear him a son, and we could all live happily ever after.’

This was the entirety of Liu Fang’s plan. She was an obstinate person, and the years of hardship had taught her, above all else, how to endure. Now that she had set her sights on Lin Shan, she would follow this path to the bitter end and stop at nothing.

This was the story she was telling Chen Fengjiao and Gu’er. But if Lin Shan himself were to ask, she would kneel before him and swear she had no ulterior motives. She would claim she only wanted to repay his kindness and would beg him to let her and her daughter stay. She would offer to work as a maid, asking only that the Lin Family give her a roof over her head and enough food to raise her child.

Then she would tell him what was happening in the village. He surely wouldn’t send her back then. After all, if other men really did violate her and something happened, any subsequent investigation from his superiors would be difficult for him to explain.

If the Lin Family still adamantly refused, she would just sit downstairs outside their building. In this freezing weather, Lin Shan would never let her freeze to death. He couldn’t send her back to the village, and he couldn’t let her die on the streets. If they tried to place her somewhere else, she would go on a hunger strike. She was confident that, in the end, Lin Shan would have to let her stay with the Lin Family. And as long as she could stay, it was only a matter of time before she won him over.

Gu’er watched Liu Fang, whose gaze was shifty and uncertain. Although Gu’er couldn’t grasp the full extent of Liu Fang’s thoughts, she could get the general gist.

’Honestly, this is a real mess,’ Gu’er thought. ’We can’t just drag her back to her village. I know what village people can be like. There are always one or two scoundrels who get their kicks from bullying others and taking advantage of them. A pretty widow with just a daughter is the perfect target. They really would sneak into her house in the middle of the night. If something happened to her and she managed to pin the blame on Lin Shan, things would get very complicated.’

’We can’t hit her. Scolding is useless. We can’t send her away, we can’t throw her out, and we absolutely can’t let her stay. Nothing works. The woman is completely impervious to reason. What am I supposed to do? Why is this saint so difficult to get rid of?’

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Author’s Note: Thanks to reader 876839286 for the monthly pass! All updates are now posted. I’ve come down with a cold. It’s currently twenty-four degrees below zero Celsius (-11°F) in the Northeast. My daily trip to pick up my child takes over an hour, and sometimes I have to wait outside for a good while. I ended up catching a cold in the freezing weather. My head is killing me, so I’m going to get some rest.