Chapter 75
After the story was written, Fu Wenyu asked Liu Changmiao out.
Liu Changmiao didn't expect him to finish it so quickly, and excitedly picked it up to read.
The story "I Dig Wild Vegetables in My Hometown, My Husband Married a Noblewoman in Beijing" is different from the previous stories written by Fu Wenyu. The biggest difference is that the protagonist this time is a woman, her name is Zhenniang. Zhenniang has been loved by her parents since she was a child. She is a very kind and good girl. Her father is a cloth merchant. After Zhenniang came of age, her parents carefully selected her and married her to a poor scholar named Bu Shiren in Lin County.
Bu Shiren is very talented, but also unkind.
The reason why he wanted to marry Zhenniang was for her dowry. From the beginning, this scholar Bu planned to use Zhenniang's dowry to support his studies for the imperial examination, and when he succeeded in the imperial examination in the future, he would kill the donkey.
Of course, the beginning of the storybook cannot be written like this. No reader would like a male protagonist with a vicious mind. Therefore, Fu Wenyu not only cannot write Bu Shiren's true face, but also has to write him very well, very well, and shape his image, so that he is not only a good son-in-law, but also a good husband.
Before the engagement, he was positive and promised Zhenniang's parents that he would treat Zhenniang well.
After the engagement, he wrote love poems to Zhenniang and bought small things for her.
After the marriage, he was gentle and considerate.
So Liu Changmiao frowned while reading.
Because of the needs of the plot, in this storybook written by Fu Wenyu, Zhenniang and Bu Shiren had a beautiful and harmonious life after they got married.
It was as if there were only two of them in the world.
This plot includes "You play the flute and I talk about the piano", "You read and I grind ink", "You write the first couplet, I write the second couplet", "Red sleeves add fragrance, occasionally look up inadvertently, the two shyly smile", and "Lantern Festival, holding a lantern together, guessing a lantern riddle at the same time", Bu Shiren also placed a lantern with the words "May Zhenniang be safe and happy" written on the riverside, etc.
Among the several plots describing the relationship between the two, there are elder sister Liu Changmiao, Liu Changlian's personal maid provided, and there are also some written by Fu Wenyu based on some classic ancient puppet dramas seen in the previous life.
The overall writing is very warm and beautiful.
After seeing Bu Shiren put a lantern with the words "May Zhenniang be safe and happy", Liu Changmiao could no longer help but look up and asked: "Mr. Fu, if you write like this, my elder sister will not wake up after reading it."
Because guessing lantern riddles and placing lanterns were told to them by his elder sister's personal maid. Of course, the maid didn't say it in detail, but simply said that "the son-in-law and the girl guessed a lantern riddle at the same time on the Lantern Festival" and "the son-in-law wrote on the lantern that he wished the girl a lifetime of peace and happiness".
So the sentences in the storybook, such as "the small window, she is dressing up", "the lights are dim, but not as good as her smile", "just relieved from the brows, but on the heart", etc., were all added by Fu Wenyu when he wrote the storybook.
Although Liu Changmiao had not yet married and had no feelings for his four deceased fiancées, and had never even met some of them, he had read many storybooks, including some stories about scholars and ladies, and could more or less guess what his eldest sister felt after reading them.
But Fu Wenyu responded calmly, "You will know if you continue to read."
So Liu Changmiao lowered his head and continued to read, and then he saw that Zhenniang's situation was slowly changing.
Less than three months after the marriage, Mr. Bu's widowed mother asked Zhenniang if she was pregnant, saying, "My son is already over 20, and everyone of his age has a son or a daughter." Six months after the marriage, she was impatient and began to frequently invite doctors for Zhenniang, boiling bowls of medicine for her to drink. A year after the marriage, not only did all the relatives and friends know that Zhenniang had not yet had any happy news, but Mr. Bu also began to curse her blatantly.
Moreover, in the Bu family, not only did Mr. Bu make things difficult everywhere, but Mr. Bu's sister was also not a good person.
Ms. Bu was only two years younger than Zhenniang, and it was almost time for her to talk about others. She coveted Zhenniang's dowry very much, so she came to ask for it from time to time. If Zhenniang didn't give it, she would go to Mr. Bu to exaggerate and let Zhenniang be scolded. If Zhenniang gave it, she would come again in a few days.
Today, she likes a velvet flower, tomorrow she likes a hairpin, and the day after tomorrow, a piece of cloth...
At this time, Mr. Bu always comforted Zhenniang, saying, "Don't worry, we will have children." But he never spoke for Zhenniang in front of Bu's mother, but only asked her to be "filial" and said that it was not easy for his mother to raise him. He only said to his sister, "She is still young, don't bother with her."
If Zhenniang said anything more, he would put on an unhappy look, saying that they were just some toys, and his younger sister rarely liked them, so he would give them to her. When he succeeded in the imperial examination in the future, he would buy Zhenniang a hundred times more.
Tell her not to be petty.
As time went on, Zhenniang became anxious and worried.
Her status in the Bu family became lower and lower, and she began to respond to all the requests of the Bu family, and a lot of her dowry was taken away by the three of them. But money flowed out like water, and her situation did not improve.
In the third year after Zhenniang and Bu Xiucai got married, Bu Xiucai's sister married into a good family with the dowry she got from Zhenniang. Bu Xiucai hired a teacher with the money he got from Zhenniang and passed the imperial examination. When Bu's mother saw that Zhenniang still had no good news, she simply brought her niece over.
This "niece" was not a good person either.
Then Zhenniang encountered a series of difficulties. For example, the 'niece' wore old clothes today, so Bu's mother asked Zhenniang how she treated guests; the 'niece' wanted to eat bird's nest, so Bu's mother asked Zhenniang to stew it herself; finally, the aunt and niece conspired together to drive away Zhenniang's biggest helper, the maid who was also loyal to her.
As for the big and small chores at home, there is no doubt that all of them were pushed to Zhenniang.
Of course, it is not known whether it is fortunate or unfortunate. During this period, although the 'niece' repeatedly showed her courtesy to Bu Shiren, he rejected them all. Bu Shiren also said that he and Zhenniang were 'a couple for life' and would not accept two different women.
At this time, Zhenniang, who had been blinded by 'love', felt as sweet as eating honey when she heard such words, and even became happy to please Bu Shiren's most valued mother.
Seeing this, Liu Changmiao suddenly slammed the table and said angrily: "It's too abominable, it's really too abominable. Zhenniang is such a good woman, how dare the Bu family treat her like this!"
"And are Zhenniang's parents blind?"
"Why let her be bullied!"
In fact, Zhenniang's family would certainly not ignore her, but the number of times a married woman returns to her parents' home is not very many, and every time Zhenniang only reports good news but not bad news, so her parents did not find anything wrong.
Even if they found that Bu's mother was an evil mother-in-law and Bu's younger sister was difficult to deal with, her parents just subconsciously thought that evil mothers-in-law were common, and there were many difficult younger sisters-in-law, but the most important thing was the son-in-law's future.
And because Zhenniang had not been pregnant, and the son-in-law had clearly stated that he would not take concubines, the Bu family was afraid that there would be no descendants, so Zhenniang's parents always felt insecure when facing the Bu family.
Combined with these several items, it became like in the storybook.
Liu Changmiao, who had seen it from the beginning to the present, of course understood this truth, but he was just angry in his heart.
He wanted to rush into the storybook and beat up the Bu family, especially Bu Shiren. He asked him why he only said it verbally and never really protected Zhenniang once.
Unfortunately, things would not go as he wished.
So next, Fu Wenyu enjoyed a wonderful "face-changing".
When Zhenniang was bullied, Liu Changmiao was indignant.
When Bu Shiren only comforted her verbally, Liu Changmiao said "Pooh, Pooh, Pooh".
When Bu Shiren, who had become a juren, took the money funded by his wife's family to study at the Imperial College in the capital, and left Zhenniang in his hometown to fulfill his filial piety and serve Bu's mother, Liu Changmiao cursed "the despicable villain will not die well".
When Zhenniang was robbed of all her money and had no close servants around her, she was driven to the most remote house, starving and cold, without food or water, and could only secretly go out through the side door to dig wild vegetables. Liu Changmiao's face was extremely gloomy and he said nothing.
When the news came that Bu Shiren had passed the imperial examination...