vstars Chapter 228 Father Lu Gets Scolded by His Daughter-in-Law During the New Year
Chapter 228 Father Lu Gets Scolded by His Daughter-in-Law During the New Year
Li Guaizi jumped up, rubbing his eyes in disbelief, thinking he must have seen wrong or misread things.
In that brief moment of distraction, the trap in the snowdrift had vanished. The jumping cat on it was gone too. He raised his gun and looked up at the sky. What he saw ignited his fury, and he cursed, "Those damn bastards from Eagle Village really are stealing!"
As darkness fell, Li Guaizi, seeing the sky growing increasingly dark, knew this wasn't a solution and decided to return to the village to discuss the matter. He put on his wild boar-skin skis and went back to the family village, first heading to Li Ju'an's old house.
Song Lanhua recognized Li Guaizi. She was carrying a jug of soy sauce, which Li Xiaogang had just brought. Song Lanhua poked her head out from the kitchen and called out, "Li Paotou, our Ju An hasn't come back yet. Maybe he went to the Lu family's for a free meal."
Iron Hammer had returned early and was now comfortably lying by the kang (a heated brick bed), squinting his eyes and warming himself by the fire.
If it's someone else's hunter who hasn't returned home late at night, his family will worry. If the hunting dog returns but the hunter hasn't, the family will worry even more.
But Tiechui, a member of Li Ju'an's dog gang, was carefree. Whenever Li Ju'an led the gang back to the village, Tiechui would insist on going home first to warm himself by the fire and beg Song Lanhua for some cornbread. So as long as Tiechui went back to his house and settled down, his mother and sister would be at ease, knowing that Li Ju'an had already returned to the village and was visiting other people's homes.
Li Guaizi responded, reached into his coat, patted it, but found nothing of value to keep. He turned and left, embarrassed.
He went to the Lu family home to find Li Ju'an. As soon as he entered the Lu family home, he heard Lu's mother standing there with her hands on her hips, yelling at Lu's father.
It turned out that a relative's child had been mischievous during a visit and tore down the door paintings that had been put up at the end of the year. Mr. Lu's attitude was, "So what if they're torn down? The New Year is almost over." But Mrs. Lu felt that tearing down the door paintings was unlucky and insisted that they be put back up, so she asked Mr. Lu to go to the corner store to see if they had any.
Mr. Lu muttered to himself, "Where would a small shop have such a thing? And after all these years, would they still have any left over from the New Year pictures?" Mrs. Lu glared at him, "Hurry up and go buy some." He had no choice but to turn around and run to the small shop.
He ran into Li Guaizi as he was leaving the house. Thinking that Li Guaizi had come to visit him, he said somewhat awkwardly, "Old Li, come in and sit down first. I'll ask you to play mahjong later."
Li Guaizi was in a hurry to find Li Ju'an, so he went into the Lu family's house and sat for a while. As soon as he entered the house, he saw a huge deer antler hanging on the wall of the hall, which looked very imposing. Lu's mother put on a smile and warmly invited him to sit down and have some tea: "Li Paotou is looking for those children, they will be back in a while."
Li Guaizi thought about it and realized it made sense, so he sat down at the Lu family home to wait for Li Ju'an and the Lu brothers to return.
Not long after, Mr. Lu returned with the door paintings, but when he got home and compared them, he realized he hadn't bought enough. His nephews had been mischievous and torn almost all of the door paintings, so he had only bought one. His wife said impatiently, "I told you to stop the kids, but you wouldn't. You just spoil those little rascals. What kind of uncle are you? Go buy three more before the store closes."
Mr. Lu was unhappy but had no choice. He turned around and saw from a distance that Lu Wenqian was still playing on the river with several boys from the Sun family. It was getting late, and he was afraid that Lu Wenqian was in danger, so he called the children and headed straight for the convenience store.
When he returned home, he discovered a new problem with the three door paintings he had bought. This time, the paintings were too small and looked out of place on the door.
Li Guaizi looked up. He didn't want to see the Lu family couple's domestic affairs, but since he was sitting there drinking tea, he couldn't sit still.
Lu's mother jokingly scolded her husband for being unreliable, saying he couldn't even buy a door painting. Lu's father quickly shifted the blame to the child, saying it was Wenqian who chose it. Lu Wenqian was quite aggrieved, grumbling that she didn't know anything about it. This time, Lu's father hurriedly went to the convenience store and bought a large door painting, thinking that would be enough.
He was smugly carrying the door painting home when he suddenly slapped his forehead, realizing he was out of glue. Before his wife could throw a tantrum, he rushed to the convenience store and bought some more glue.
After all the commotion at the Lu family's house, the door painting was finally repaired, and the aroma of a sumptuous meal filled the kitchen. The Lu family invited Li Guaizi and his companions to have dinner together. The Lu family patriarch found it strange that the two Lu brothers hadn't returned for so long. Li's slippery dog, however, had returned first.
Suddenly, a dog barked at the gate of the courtyard. It was Li Ju'an, who had arrived at the Lu family's house first, dragging a dog sled.
As soon as Li Guaizi saw Li Ju'an and his group arrive, he immediately stood up. Lu Zhiqiang's face was bruised and swollen, clearly from a fight. Li Ju'an also had a bruise on his face, while Lu Jinyang's face was clean.
The Lu family understood without them saying a word, guessing that the two had some argument about dividing the hunting spoils and ended up fighting.
As soon as Lu Zhiqiang entered the room, he shouted angrily, "Tomorrow at dawn, I'm going to beat up Li Dong again. That bastard is a scoundrel who stole our things and won't admit it. He's a complete scoundrel."
When the Lu family heard this, they wondered how they had gotten involved with that elderly person receiving government assistance during such a festive holiday.
When Li Ju'an saw Li Guaizi approaching empty-handed, he asked him, "Where's the cat?"
Li Guaizi pulled three people aside and told them to go to another room to talk: "Jumping Cat has been stolen."
"What!"
The three men's eyes widened in disbelief. They had just been criticizing Li Dong because Li Dong had found charred iron wire, steel cable, and two bent clamps. Li Ju'an had learned his clamp-making technique from Old Qin, the "King of Clamps" from Changbai Mountain. Lu Jinyang had learned from him and made so many clamps. So, just by looking at the way the wire was twisted, it was clear that these were the clamps Li Ju'an had rushed to finish.
The clamps are there, the wire rope is there, the leather is there—what excuses can Li Dong possibly have?
Li Guaizi shook his head, took a sip of hot tea, and said, "This matter is very strange. It's definitely not Li Dong who stole it, but how Li Dong got these gadgets later is anyone's guess."
Li Ju'an slapped his forehead and then went to Li Dong's house again. The Lu brothers hurriedly followed him, determined not to let this matter rest.