“Renting the village head’s mule cart: 20 wen.”
“City entrance head tax: 2 wen per person, total 4 wen.”
“Consultation fee: 20 wen, medicine: 3 taels of silver.”
“Paper and inkstick: 110 wen.”
“Iron pot: 1 tael and 1 qian.”
“Lunch: lamb offal noodles 10 wen, vegetarian noodles 5 wen, total 15 wen.”
After dinner that night, Jiang Chun sat cross-legged on the kang [炕 kang – a heated brick bed], pulled out her coin pouch, and started counting on her fingers to do the accounts.
She had to count on her fingers—no calculator, no abacus, no pen or paper—and with all the miscellaneous spending, trying to calculate it in her head was a no-go.
She counted on her fingers for a good while before finally figuring it out: “Altogether today, we spent 4 taels of silver, and 269 wen in copper coins.”
She raised her eyes to look at Song Shi’an, who was sitting on the floor bedding in front of the kang, and bragged about herself: “Raising you is really too costly. Luckily I have a kind heart—if it were someone else, who would be willing to spend this much silver to nurse your body back to health? They would’ve swept you out the door long ago!”
Song Shi’an was currently using a rusty pair of scissors, struggling to trim a calligraphy brush.
He had noticed this brush earlier. Who knows where it came from—just left carelessly on the windowsill.
The brush shaft was covered in dust, and the brush tip hairs were scattered and messy.
But with a bit of fixing, it could still be used. That’s why today, at the bookshop, he only bought paper and an inkstick, and didn’t buy a brush.
Jiang Chun’s endless chatter, he heard every word.
And he admitted, she was absolutely right.
Aside from her, who had her own motives to take advantage of him, who else would be willing to spend dozens of taels of silver to help a zhuìxù [赘婿 – a son-in-law who marries into the wife’s family, often with lower status] nurse his body?
After all, when Jiang He bought him back then, it only cost 10 taels of silver.
But he wouldn’t take this advantage for free. The bride price and the money spent on his recovery—he would pay them all back to Jiang He double in the future.
Seeing that he didn’t speak, Jiang Chun, worried he wouldn’t remember her kindness, nagged another line.
“Even though I’m the wife-lord [妻主 qīzhǔ – in matriarchal or gender-flipped settings, the female in a dominant marital role], it’s only natural to spend money on my husband. But you still have to remember how good I’ve been to you. When you become successful in the future, don’t forget your roots, okay?
Using you scholars’ words, this is what you call ‘The wife of coarse grains and poor soup must not be cast out of the hall’ [糟糠之妻不下堂 – meaning: a wife who stood by you through hard times should not be discarded once you rise in status].”
A mocking smile appeared at the corner of Song Shi’an’s lips.
Seems like those years being an official’s wife in his previous life weren’t wasted. This pig-slaughtering woman who couldn’t recognize a single character could actually recite the full phrase from the Four Histories.
He placed the trimmed brush into the wooden box that held his paper and ink, then turned his back to Jiang Chun and lay down, slowly pulling up the blanket.
Jiang Chun: “……”
Not bothering to pay attention to her, huh?
She’s the stubborn type—like a donkey, only works if you go along with her.
The more he ignored her, the more excited she became, the more she wanted to tease him.
Jiang Chun gave a cough and raised her voice:
“Dear husband, these days the weather gets colder with each passing day. Your body is already weak—it’s not good for you to keep sleeping on the floor bedding. Why not come up onto the kang to sleep?”
Song Shi’an, upon hearing this, immediately furrowed his brows.
What sort of evil idea is she scheming up again?
Could it be that the moment he gets on the kang, she’ll dive into his blanket and consummate the marriage with him?
A licentious woman like her who can even flirt with street-side butchers—she clearly doesn’t know what propriety, righteousness, integrity, or shame are. She was absolutely capable of doing such shameless things.
He decisively refused: “No need.”
Jiang Chun immediately yelled: “What do you mean ‘no need’? If you catch cold and fall sick, will the treatment and medicine be free? You think my household’s money is blown in by the wind? Be smart and climb up yourself, or else I’ll…”
She jumped swiftly down to the floor, cracking her knuckles loudly as she did so, grinning menacingly as she threatened: “Or else I’ll personally carry you up myself!”
Song Shi’an: “……”
This licentious woman, as expected, had that kind of idea!
He was so angry it affected his heart and lungs—he started coughing violently, choking and sputtering as he said with hatred between coughs:
“I—cough—my body is weak, can’t—cough—can’t consummate with you—cough.”
“Ah?” Jiang Chun had a face full of question marks upon hearing this.
A moment later, she suddenly burst out laughing with a “puchi” sound: “Hahaha…”
She laughed so hard she bent over backward, even tears came out of her eyes.
Seeing her like that, how could Song Shi’an not realize that he had completely misunderstood?
He was instantly so embarrassed he couldn’t take it. Even the tips of his ears turned red, and he coughed even harder.
Jiang Chun, seeing him cough like he was tearing out his lungs, worried he’d end up spitting blood just like in the original novel, quickly ran over to pat his back.
Song Shi’an took quite a while to calm down before his coughing gradually eased.
Jiang Chun ran to the kitchen, lifted the lid of the big iron pot, scooped out a bowl of still-warm water, and brought it back to feed him.
Song Shi’an originally wanted to take the bowl and drink by himself, but his hands were trembling so badly he couldn’t hold the heavy, rough pottery bowl. He had no choice but to drink a few sips while she held it.
After feeding him the water, Jiang Chun didn’t bother asking for his opinion—she simply picked him up, blanket and all, and placed him on the kang.
After thinking for a bit, she even gathered up her own blanket, giving him the side of the kang closer to the stove opening.
She moved herself to the far end.
Song Shi’an curled up inside the blanket, silently watching her busily move bedding and prepare the kang. His heart was filled with complicated emotions.
He felt like everything in front of him was unreal.
But the warm kang bed was no illusion—his icy hands and feet were slowly regaining warmth.
Jiang Chun knew this man was someone who overthinks things—after all, he was a character she personally wrote. No one knew him better than she did.
So just before sleeping, she mumbled a line:
“Don’t worry, until your body is fully recovered, I don’t plan to consummate the marriage.”
Consummating could mean getting pregnant, and this body was only seventeen years old—she definitely didn’t want to become a kid’s mother so soon.
Upon hearing this, Song Shi’an immediately felt much more at ease.
If this licentious woman had any redeeming quality, it was that her word was as firm as a nail—one mouthful of spit, one nail [一口唾沫一个钉 – idiom meaning “a promise is a promise”].
In her past life, when she said she wouldn’t consummate the marriage with him, she really didn’t consummate the marriage with him. Even when he held a top-rank official post, she still never consummated the marriage with him.
However, he was still too quick to feel relieved—after all, this Jiang Chun was not the Jiang Chun of before.
Of course, that’s a matter for later.
••
Yesterday, Jiang Chun had taken Song Shi’an to wander around the county town for a whole day. The pig slaughtering and meat selling work was all handled by Jiang He alone. Jiang Chun felt a bit guilty about that, so the next morning at the start of the yin hour [寅初 – around 3–5 a.m.], she got up to slaughter pigs.
But Jiang He was a diligent one by nature—he had gotten up even earlier than Jiang Chun.
By the time Jiang Chun arrived, he had already brought down a big fat pig, the hot water was boiled and ready, and he was just about to start removing the bristles.
Jiang Chun pouted: “Dad, why are you getting up that early? Why not lie down and sleep a bit more?”
Jiang He smiled honestly: “Dad went to bed early last night. Once the yin hour arrived, I couldn’t sleep anymore. Lying there tossing and turning was just uncomfortable. Might as well get up and work, move the hands and feet a bit.”
The father-daughter pair worked together, and in just half an hour, they finished processing a big fat pig.
Jiang Chun was just about to go push the wheelbarrow when she was stopped by Jiang He.
He pulled out a large slab of meat he had cut off earlier, and said to Jiang Chun:
“Today Dad will watch the stall. You take your husband Song to your eldest aunt’s house, bring this piece of meat along. Then buy some pastries in town, and also get your uncle a jar of wine.”
Seeing his daughter pull a bitter melon face, clearly reluctant, he coaxed her in a warm voice:
“It’s time to let your eldest aunt meet your husband Song.”
A shangmen nuxu [上门女婿 – son-in-law who joins the wife’s household] held low status. Unless a family was truly desperate, they wouldn’t willingly let their own son become one.
In their Qizhou Prefecture, families who took in a shangmen nuxu didn’t even host wedding banquets—so as not to give the son-in-law any face and let him get ideas above his station.
So Jiang Chun’s eldest aunt, Jiang Xi, who only returned to her mother’s family during holidays, had still never met Song Shi’an, this nephew-in-law.
Jiang Chun reluctantly said: “Alright then, I’ll listen to Dad.”
Although the novel was written by Jiang Chun herself, the story was told from the female lead Zhong Wenjin’s perspective. Song Shi’an, being the older brother of the male lead Song Shirui, appeared later in the plot—by then the Song family had already been rehabilitated.
Song Shi’an’s time as a zhuixu in the Jiang family only showed up in a few flashbacks. A relative like Aunt Jiang who didn’t visit often didn’t even get a chance to appear in the memories.
But once a book becomes its own world, many things already transcend the original author’s control.
Even background characters who never appear—passerby A—are full of blood and flesh, with their own complete life storylines, real people in their own right.
Jiang Xi, the eldest aunt, was truly both pitiful and hateful. The original host didn’t like her, and neither did Jiang Chun.
But there are some relatives you can’t simply avoid just because you dislike them—especially since Jiang Xi had once shown kindness to their main family branch.
So Jiang Chun could only follow Jiang He’s instructions and bring Song Shi’an along to visit relatives in town.
But that sickly ghost Song Shi’an—if he walked for 30 minutes to town, he might just lose his little life altogether.
So she could only go back to the lizheng’s [里正 – village head] household and rent a mule cart again.
And twenty wen just flapped its wings and flew away.
Life is not easy—Chun Chun sighs.