Age of Legends

Chapter 10: Saying One Words, But Acting Honestly
Parted with Lao Wang and Xiao Wang.

Zhang Chen returned to the compound and stood downstairs of his house. He looked up and saw the lights in the windows on the second floor, and hesitated.

There were still bruises on his arms from the beatings from Huang Huifen, and in his pocket was the 50 yuan he had borrowed from Shen Nuoyi (he actually had 37 yuan left).

Today was a strange day, and he was really afraid that if he walked up from here, he would return to the empty old house and lose everything.

Taking a deep breath, Zhang Chen went up the stairs, took out the key, inserted it into the keyhole, and turned the door to open.

When I pushed the door open, the first thing that caught my eye was my own living room. On the sofa in the living room were two people sitting, Huang Huifen and another woman who was about fifty years old.

The woman had drooping eyebrows and wore a rather elegant green woolen coat. Her slightly protruding jaw made her face look a bit sharp. At this moment, she was staring at Zhang Chen who had come in with slanted eyebrows and eyes, and she didn't forget to say, "You're back!"

Her father Zhang Zhonghua was washing things in the kitchen. Huang Huifen said in a cold voice, "Call me cousin!"

Yes, when Zhang Chen pushed the door open and entered the house, time did not reverse. Instead, he greeted his eldest cousin Liu Shuzhen.

Liu Shuzhen is the manager of the Sugar and Wine Department Store. Among Huang Huifen's generation, her family is the most privileged. Zhang Chen's uncle-in-law is the chairman of the company's trade union. Naturally, she is very successful in this era. In the big family, Liu Shuzhen's family are the ones who make the decisions, and they always sit in the upper seat and make decisions.

But in fact, Liu Shuzhen and her husband are people who have mastered office politics to perfection. Basically, because of her authority, she would ask him to mediate and intervene in the trivial matters in her brothers and sisters' families. Little did she know that this was also the source of most family discords.

Liu Shuzhen has mastered the art of checks and balances. How can her importance be highlighted if there are no conflicts among the people around her?
So every time she seems to be speaking for you, but in fact, she can always stir up conflicts in other people's families with just one or two words, causing the flames to never be extinguished. Even if they are temporarily covered up, they are always buried, causing unrest in the family, and thus making the family more dependent on her, thus forming a means of controlling the people around them.

When Zhang Chen saw her appear here, his heart skipped a beat. He seemed to remember this incident.

Sure enough, in the space between Huang Huifen and Liu Shuzhen, the letter from Zhuang Yanyue was placed neatly.

No wonder Zhang Zhonghua is hiding in the kitchen now, it turns out that the family needs to solve a problem.

Liu Shuzhen's voice came from this time, "Look at you, I came here today to find the junior high school review materials your sister gave you. The kid from the Lin family in our unit just started junior high school, so I said I would give him the junior high school study materials your sister gave you that you didn't want...but then your mother found the love letter from your bookcase. I even told your mother that your son has grown up and made a lot of progress, but this is normal. It's normal for him to have friends at this time and take detours. It affects his studies, but he can correct it later."

Look...what are you talking about!
Every sentence is for your own good, and every sentence has a preset stance!

Finding a love letter is like playing with friends, playing with friends is like taking a detour, taking a detour affects learning, and you must correct it later. As for how to correct it, isn't the clothes drying rack next to your mother the whip of truth and the hammer of justice? Congratulations, you can answer all the questions!

This is indeed the result of decades of office struggles experienced by managers of state-owned enterprises. Zhang Chen was taken advantage of.

This huge feeling of oppression.

Liu Shuzhen pinched Zhuang Yanyue's letter again and said, "Oh, I'm afraid you also wrote a letter today."

Damn it.

Zhang Chen was stunned because he saw Huang Huifen coming over. "Give me the schoolbag!"

Huang Huifen snatched the schoolbag away without any explanation, and then returned it to Liu Shuzhen. Her mother actually opened her bag with Liu Shuzhen and searched inside.

And the English test paper was pulled out.

Liu Shuzhen glanced at the score and said, "53 points! Oh, I'm not saying this, Zhang Chen, you did too badly. Your sister has never gotten such a low score. Yude is a good school, so you must be the last in your class!"

Zhang Chen stared at her with eyes wide open.

"See, I told you, having a boyfriend or girlfriend will affect your grades!"

almost.

Huang Huifen's anger had been aroused. Although they did not find the love letter from Zhang Chen that they imagined, this test paper was enough to presume Zhang Chen guilty.

And if Liu Shuzhen hadn't happened to compare her with her cousin, Huang Huifen probably wouldn't have been so angry.

Since childhood, Liu Shuzhen would always use her cousin's excellence to flatter Zhang Chen in order to boost her cousin's self-confidence and self-esteem in the family and put Zhang Chen at the bottom.

Zhang Chen stared at Huang Huifen with no words to say, and could only utter, "Mom..."

"You're going to piss me off to death. Why are you so troublesome? Look at your cousin. She's in her third year of high school and her English score has never been less than 120! She's going to take the entrance exam to Rongcheng University! What about you? What can you afford to take the entrance exam to? It's good enough if you can get into the School of Architecture!" Rongcheng University is one of the top ten universities in the country. This year, it has integrated several top-notch schools and is the most famous in the province. The School of Architecture is a third-tier university with a tuition fee. Of course, with Zhang Chen's current grades, he may not even be able to get in.

Yes, so Liu Shuzhen added, "I'm afraid Jianyuan is annoyed!"

Huang Huifen could no longer bear it. Her anxiety disorder immediately came back, and she became so angry that she raised her hand and started hitting him.

All of a sudden there was chaos again, but fortunately Zhang Zhonghua came out in time to mediate.

Although he was also disappointed with Zhang Chen, he also knew that with Liu Shuzhen around, it would be easy for Huang Huifen to be seduced. At this time, he had to persuade his wife not to be too harsh on his son.

Unfortunately, Zhang Chen still got beaten several times.

Liu Shuzhen tried to stop him, "Alright, alright, stop hitting the kid. What's the point of hitting her all the time? You should convince her with reason! You should learn from your sister and get into a good university, so that your parents will be proud! Alright, alright, I'm here to take his sister's book today. Zhang Zhonghua, what about that watermelon..."

"Oh yes, you said you want to eat watermelon. Why don't you take it back and eat it." Zhang Zhonghua immediately took out the watermelon that he had bought from the soaking basin.

Liu Shuzhen left contentedly with her watermelon and books, and at the end she said, "Alright, alright, talk to him nicely, don't hit him anymore, you're still hitting me when I'm grown up."

Zhang Chen is speechless. Wasn’t this all instigated by you?

You pull the knife out, say sorry, and then stab it back. Is that polite?
Thinking back now, there was often unrest in the family with my cousin, including the quarrels between Huang Huifen and Zhang Zhonghua, or many financial matters later on. It was all Liu Shuzhen who instigated everything and took great advantage of her.

This is a parasitic tree that needs you to live a bad life so that it can depend on you and grow well.

This is truly a threat.

"Okay! Tell me what's going on!" Fortunately, Huang Huifen finally decided to listen to Zhang Chen's explanation and accepted his advice. She put down the clothes hanger that allowed Zhang Chen to get the "Long-lost Mother's Whip" achievement today.

Zhang Chen finally explained the whole story.

Now Zhang Zhonghua and Huang Huifen were stunned.

What follows is a classic question and answer session.

"You...you said it was a letter written by someone else and you rejected it? Is that true?"

"Really? If you don't believe me, ask XXX."

"Okay, you two are still the same! Forget it, just take care of yourself! But you got that low score! What do you say?"

"I'll do well on the test next time!"

"You did well in the exam, just say it with your mouth! Forget it, forget it, I've said it so many times, your dad and I don't believe it anymore! Hurry up and eat something, finish your homework and go to bed!"

"Hey, you better be more careful!"

The parents sighed and looked at the English test paper, thinking that their son was such a waste!

"At least there's one good thing." Zhang Chen walked into the room, and Zhang Zhonghua murmured, "There are still girls who like him."

"Humph! What's the use of that! If you can't get into a good university, you won't be able to find a good job after graduation. If you like someone, you can make a living! At that time, people only like people with ability!"

Zhang Chen behind the door felt that his mind and body were both painful and tired, but listening to the conversation between the two in the living room, he couldn't tell how he felt complicated.

You just said you didn't believe it, but now you're discussing it again.

He says one thing but does another!
======
Thanks to Herenyangshanxue and wingofgod for the rewards!
Thanks to Oral Gymnastics, Listening to the Ears, Wanghu, Book Friend 20230618124859420, Gu Ben Wuyuan丶, uyoaix and other brothers and sisters for their rewards

I saw everyone's comments about wanting more updates. Actually, I also want to update more, but it's not that easy. First of all, there are many minor changes and careful work in the beginning. The smooth reading process is often due to a lot of hard work behind the scenes. And the starting point of the new book period is 4,000 words a day, which just meets the requirements of the new book. Now I can only say that I will keep the rhythm and update more after the book is put on the shelves.

(End of this chapter)