The temperamental white moonlight is back, and the entire Marquis's family obediently calls him

On their way to the main courtyard that evening, the siblings discovered that a plot of land next to the small garden, which was originally intended to be dug to make a fish pond, was being filled in by the servants.

Upon entering the courtyard, they saw Lu Mingzhao with his sleeves rolled up high, squatting in the yard tending to the vegetable seedlings, his hands covered in mud.

Hearing footsteps, Lu Mingzhao turned around, smiling brightly: "Come on, what do you think of these seedlings I picked?"

"...What are you doing?"

Zhou Shixu seemed to have seen a ghost.

Zhou Ming'an's eyes were extremely complex.

At noon, her sister-in-law went to see her and said that her mother had broken off the engagement.

She checked it several times, still unable to believe it.

She made a fuss for a month but couldn't get her mother to give in. How could her mother suddenly change her mind?

Liu Muqiu assured her repeatedly that the engagement had indeed been successfully annulled.

Zhou Ming'an stared blankly out the window.

After a long while, he came to his senses and threw himself into his sister-in-law's arms, bursting into tears.

She doesn't need to marry Feng Liang anymore, she really doesn't need to!

Seeing her like this, Liu Muqiu couldn't help but recall the heartbreaking experience of arranging a marriage for her back then. She couldn't help but feel a sense of sympathy for her and secretly wiped away her tears as well.

After the two cried for a while, Liu Muqiu gently comforted them, saying, "It's sad for a young lady, but a girl still has to get married eventually. This marriage is off, and there will be another one sooner or later."

"A young lady needs to think about herself."

Upon hearing this, Zhou Ming'an was overcome with grief.

"Sister-in-law, what should I do for myself? Marriage has always been arranged by parents. Although my father is on my side, he is thousands of miles away, how can he make decisions for me? And my mother dislikes me so much..."

Who would have thought that a young lady from a noble family would live such a difficult life?

Zhou Ming'an had never understood why his mother disliked him since he was a child.

She thought it was because she wasn't good enough, so she humbled herself and tried to please her mother, but all she got in return was her mother's disgusted glare.

Even if she wore an extra hairpin, her mother would scold her for being pretentious and seductive, wondering who she was trying to seduce by dressing up so extravagantly.

Gradually, her pleas to her mother turned into resentment.

She stopped trying to please everyone and started to oppose her mother.

However, she faced increasingly severe suppression from her mother.

She also cried and asked her mother what she had done wrong.

Her mother just sneered at her: "I've seen plenty of little girls like you, always scheming and trying to win favor. I can't teach you to be like that."

"I just hope that you will marry a man who can keep you in check and temper your temper."

That's why her mother married her off to Feng Liang, who had killed someone.

She cried and made a scene when she found out, but her mother would only smile smugly whenever she saw her like that.

I don't know what's gotten into my mother, suddenly agreeing to call off the engagement. I'm afraid that after this, there will be even more terrible marriages waiting for her.

What should she do? What can she do?

Liu Muqiu hugged An'an with heartache: "I know you're suffering, but you're smart enough to have noticed that the old lady has indeed been acting differently these past few days."

"On the way back today, I saw that Chen family young master who was talking about you. The old lady ordered the second master to go down and beat him up again, and also cleared the young lady's name."

"No matter how much the old lady acted or faked things in the past, she had never done such a thing before."

Zhou Ming'an rubbed his teary eyes and looked up at his sister-in-law: "So, what does my sister-in-law mean...?"

"It's not just me, it's also your elder brother's idea—why don't you take this opportunity to try and get closer to the old lady, whether it's true or not, at least give it a try. If the old lady really changes her mind, you'll have more options in the future. What do you think, young lady?"

The thought of having to please her mother again made Zhou Ming'an feel nauseous.

But she also knew that her sister-in-law was telling the truth.

Right now, her marriage depends entirely on her mother. Even if she is unwilling, she can only try her best for that sliver of hope.

How could Liu Muqiu not know the humiliation in her heart? Seeing her nod, Liu Muqiu felt even more heartache and said gently, "At the very least, you have to keep a respectable appearance. There's no need to try to please her. Just don't go against the old lady like before."

"When the Marquis returns, he will stand up for the young lady."

Zhou Ming'an nodded silently.

If only her father could take her away, she would rather never marry and go to the Northwest with him.

But she could only keep these thoughts to herself.

She didn't want to put her father in a difficult position, nor did she want her sister-in-law to worry.

By evening, she had mentally prepared herself, changed her clothes, and nervously went to the main courtyard.

Upon entering the door, Zhou Ming'an was completely stunned to see his mother dressed as a peasant woman.

She had heard her older brother mention that she was born in the countryside.

Not long after her birth, her father distinguished himself in the military and was granted the title of Marquis Zhongjing, after which the family moved to the capital.

Although she suffered mental oppression from her mother from childhood to adulthood, she never suffered any material hardship because of her father.

Whenever he went out to a banquet, he would always be with noble ladies, whether it was admiring flowers in a garden or enjoying a flowing stream, and the word "elegance" was always a key element.

She had never seen Lu Mingzhao dressed like this before.

"What are you standing there for? Come and take a look."

Lu Mingzhao waved enthusiastically to them.

Zhou Shili was the first to come to his senses and step forward, squatting down beside his mother to carefully examine the vegetable seedlings in her hand.

After a long pause, he looked up and met his mother's eager gaze, and said earnestly, "I don't understand."

The brother and sister, craning their necks, were speechless.

Lu Mingzhao laughed and said, "That's right, you were only five years old then, how could you remember?"

Lu Mingzhao picked up two vegetable seedlings and began to teach his eldest son to identify them.

One taught meticulously, and the other listened attentively.

Halfway through the conversation, Zhou Shili even rolled up his sleeves and planted seedlings himself.

Zhou Shixu and Zhou Ming'an stood not far away, glancing at each other every now and then, their expressions indescribable.

It wasn't until dinner was served that the two got up to wash their hands, and they even made a promise to water the plants together the next morning.

"You were too young back then, you probably all forgot, but I'm good at farming. Before your father was away, I could support you two brothers all by myself."

"Later, when I got pregnant with An'an, I couldn't farm anymore, so I wrote to your father and asked him to do more work and send more money back. I never expected that he would actually succeed."

Lu Mingzhao became more and more emotional as he spoke, looking up and around: "Such a big Marquis's mansion... I wonder how much he had to work hard to earn it."

Zhou Shili thought his mother was expressing her gratitude for how good life was now, but she was actually lamenting his father's hard work.

He couldn't help but recall how, before his mother returned, the woman who had possessed his body had squandered the Marquis's mansion's money.

He tried to dissuade her, but the woman laughed at him for being petty.

"What's money? If it's all gone, let Zhou Ningchuan find a way to earn it back. Anyway, he can earn it back with one military merit."

It turns out that only family members truly understand how hard you've worked.

Thinking of this, Zhou Shili recalled another matter and couldn't help but laugh: "Father once said that if Mother knew that she had become the Lady of the Marquis and had such a large piece of land, she would be overjoyed and would be eager to start farming."

The others were completely confused, but Lu Mingzhao grinned.

Her ancestors for three generations were all from the countryside. Although farming was hard work, she was used to this down-to-earth hardship.

Even now that she's made a fortune, she still feels more grounded in some places.

"I wish I could plant things in all those empty spaces so I wouldn't have to go out to buy vegetables. I heard from Zhao Mama that the daily purchase of fruits and vegetables in the mansion costs a considerable amount of money."

Liu Muqiu said softly, "We do own some farmland, but it's far away, so we can't send things over very often."

"Since that's the case..." Zhou Shili pondered for a moment, "then why don't we buy a few more plots of land?"

"Let's buy some land nearby and plant it all with grain. Then the household won't need to buy anything anymore; we can just eat rice, noodles, and vegetables that we grow ourselves. What do you think, Mother?"

Lu Mingzhao's eyes lit up: "Is this easy to handle?"

Zhou Shili smiled and said, "It's nothing. As long as Mother wants it, I can do it."

Lu Mingzhao nodded repeatedly: "Okay, then I'll leave it to you."

Zhou Shixu, sitting across from him, was biting his chopsticks, his mind racing with calculations.

He rarely looked into the family's account books and didn't know how much silver a piece of land cost, but it certainly wouldn't be less.

When my mother said she wanted to farm, my eldest brother immediately bought several plots of land.

My brother has been so generous lately, doesn't that mean...?

He couldn't help but tentatively ask, "Brother, I took a fancy to that horse the other day..."

"Don't ask," Zhou Shili interrupted his younger brother with a smile.

Weekly sequence: ...

Waaah, my brother is treating me differently!!