Divorce with three kids? I'll build a house and eat meat, driving my in-laws crazy.

Chapter 20 Mother? Is it on fire?
Taking advantage of a moment when no one was looking, Li Ruru smacked Chen Bingxiao in the stomach with her elbow.

Chen Bingxiao was a withered old man, and the impact made him clutch his stomach in pain, almost unable to catch his breath.

Li Ruru brandished the pipe in her hand. "Old Chen, I bought this with my dowry money, and now I don't want you to use it!"

Chen Bingxiao's hand clenched weakly in the air; that was the pipe he had been smoking for over a decade.

"you……"

Li Ruru turned around and handed the pipe to Lü Da, "Uncle Da, this is for you! If you don't mind, wash it when you get home. It's made of copper, so it'll definitely work well."

Lu Da looked at the pipe in his hand. It was golden in color and had beautiful patterns carved on it. It was obviously not a cheap product.

The best cigarette holders on the market are made of jade, followed by those made of copper.

He loves smoking, but he's never been willing to buy a good one.

Lü Da happily took the pipe, saying, "I don't mind."

Suddenly remembering something, he asked, "By the way, where do you and the children plan to live in the future?"

Li Ruru hadn't really thought about this issue yet; all she wanted to do today was get a divorce as soon as possible and leave this place of trouble.

For her, living on the street was better than living in Chen Jiaqiang's house.

"Uncle Da, are there any empty houses in the village?" Li Ruru asked tentatively.

My parents' home is too far away to go back to, but staying in Chenjia Village wouldn't be a bad option.

Lu Da held his pipe with obvious delight, and after a long while, he finally looked up and said, "There's an empty house at the end of the village, but..."

When the end of the village was mentioned, everyone sighed in unison.

"How can anyone live in that place? Even ghosts wouldn't dare to live there."

Even beggars passing by would run away with joy.

Pan Dayan patted Li Ruru on the back, "Little sister, if you don't mind, you can stay at my house for now."

Li Ruru looked embarrassed. Putting aside the fact that she didn't want to live a life of dependence on others, she felt disgusted just seeing the Chen family every day.

"Aunt Pan, you've already helped me so much today, I can't trouble you any further."

She quickly said to the village head, "Uncle Da, no matter what the house is like, I'll stay there for now."

When onlookers saw that she wouldn't listen to their advice, they all felt that their good intentions had been taken for granted.

“Aunt Li, why are you so stubborn? You’re still young and don’t know what happened there.”

"A family of three died in that house. We women have a lot of yin energy, so we are prone to attracting unclean things."

"There's a wicked guy living next door to that house; that kid steals, kills, and does all sorts of evil."

"Even if you don't think about yourself, you should at least think about the three girls, right?"

Li Ruru said, "I appreciate everyone's kindness, but right now my daughter and I need a place to stay."

She did consider going to the county town to find an inn to stay for a few days, but that was not a long-term solution.

She prefers the idyllic life in the countryside to the hustle and bustle of the county town.

Seeing that she had made up her mind, Lü Da instructed, "Alright, then you can stay there for now. Be careful and fix the doors and windows regularly."

Li Ruru nodded. She hadn't done anything wrong, so she wasn't afraid of ghosts coming to her door.

Besides, having a place to stay is great; what ghost could be more terrifying than a poor ghost?

Wang Tieniu and Wang Tiezhu helped Li Ruru drive the oxcart, while Pan Dayan supported the cart from behind, looking worried.

Seeing that Li Ruru had finally left the Chen family, Granny Zhao breathed a long sigh of relief.

"Great, that little bitch is finally gone."

Feng Yuzhu chimed in, "Mother, you'll be able to hold your grandson again in a few days."

"Yes, yes, yes, a golden grandson. Sanbao, you'd better hurry up and marry Junniang into the family."

Chen Sanbao immediately nodded and ran in the direction Zhang Junniang had left.

Wang Shuixia felt annoyed watching Feng Yuzhu and her mother-in-law chatting and laughing.

My second sister-in-law had been pretending to be dead, but now that they've all driven Li Ruru away, she's back to making her presence known, shamelessly flattering her mother-in-law.

Wang Shuixia rolled her eyes. "Second sister-in-law, we haven't eaten yet this morning. Do you want us to starve to death?"

Feng Yuzhu's face immediately fell. "Why should I cook? What do you do?" Usually, Li Ruru and the three maids are the ones who cook, and none of them want to take on this task right now.

Zhao raised her voice, "How dare you! Are you expecting your mother-in-law to do it herself?"

……

Li Ruru and her group arrived at the end of the village and saw a house in the distance that was almost swallowed up by weeds.

Pan Dayan sighed and directed her two sons to cut grass with sickles.

Soon, a vacant lot was cleared out in front of the door.

Li Ruru used the key given to her by the village head to unlock the rusty lock and struggled to push open the dilapidated door.

The two Wang boys cut out a path in the yard so that people could walk on it.

Daya looked at the grass on both sides of the yard, which was taller than her, and her little face scrunched up.

Er Ya tugged at her hand, "Big sister, let's go help Mother tidy up."

They say there's no place like home, even if it's a golden or silver nest. This place may be dilapidated, but it's still better than being homeless and wandering the streets.

Sanya, being sensible, squatted down and started pulling up the weeds on the ground.

Li Ruru looked at the yard full of weeds and asked worriedly, "Aunt Pan, can we just burn all this weeds?"

Pan Dayan immediately denied it, saying, "Look, the grass has grown to the corners of the wall; I'm afraid it will burn the house down."

Li Ruru stuck out her tongue. Okay, then we can only get to work first.

The group first cut down the tall weeds that were a person taller than themselves, and the oxcart finally entered the yard.

The courtyard is quite large, with three or four rooms, but unfortunately, several of the rooms don't have roof tiles, so they're uninhabitable.

Fortunately, there was still one main house that we could make do with, and we moved all our belongings in there.

After tidying up briefly, the sun was already high in the sky.

Li Ruru quickly said to Pan Dayan, "Auntie, thank you so much for today. I'll invite you over for dinner another day when I've finished preparing."

Pan Dayan nodded, "Okay, then we'll head back first."

She hadn't planned to eat here; she was certain that Li Ruru wouldn't be able to stand it for more than a few days.

She believed that the most important thing right now was to find Li Ruru a man as soon as possible.

Once you get married, you'll have everything.

Although marrying into the family might mean serving the man's entire family, at least you'll have a place to live, and you can live a more peaceful life.

As soon as Pan Dayan left, Li Ruru leaned against the half-full bag of brown rice to rest.

Today was such a tiring day. I went to sell konjac tofu early in the morning, and when I got home I had to deal with the Chen family's difficult behavior.

I finally got a divorce, and now I have to clean the house.

Life was tough, but thankfully she had three adorable girls by her side.

Daya said, "Mother, there's a stream behind the house. I just filled a basin with water."

Er Ya stretched out her little hand to shield Li Ruru from the sun, "Mom, it's too hot here, be careful not to get heatstroke."

Even though she's so small, Sanya is still diligently pulling weeds.

"Come on, let's go inside."

After tidying up quickly, I lay down on the bed.

The bed was ready-made, with straw mats and wheat straw underneath.

The three girls snuggled up next to Li Ruru and drifted off to sleep.

Daya opened her eyes in her sleep and suddenly felt that something was wrong.

Upon closer inspection, a thick plume of smoke was billowing from outside the house.

"Mother, Mother, where are you?"

"Mom, there's a fire!"

Da Ya screamed and quickly woke up her two younger sisters. The three of them hurriedly ran into the yard.

(End of this chapter)