Old Mrs. Song is reborn; get out of here, you scumbag husband and illegitimate child!

In the evening, the setting sun looked as if it had been soaked in blood, its redness blinding.

The ward door was pushed open, and Wang Zhihe led Song Nan in hurriedly.

Song Nan caught sight of a figure huddled on the hospital bed by the window, and he slammed on the brakes, his eyes nearly popping out of their sockets.

The woman on the bed had half her hair shaved off, leaving a clump of dry, yellow hair stuck to her scalp. Her face was wrinkled like a dried orange peel, with patches of blue and purple.

"This...this is Sister Erhua?"

Song Nan pointed at the bed, his voice cracking, and turned to look at Song Xianglan.

"Third Aunt, are you sure you're not mistaken? This person looks three times older than me, and older than you too."

Song Xianglan did not speak.

He simply used a damp cotton swab to moisten Erhua's lips.

The fire in Song Nan's chest suddenly exploded, and he kicked the bedside table, which made a loud "bang".

"Those bastards from the Nie family."

Song Nan gritted his teeth, veins bulging on his neck, "He looks respectable all the time, but he'd sell his own sister."

We'll still sell it to that old bastard.

"I'm going to the police station right now and making that old bastard spill all the beans about those middlemen. I'm going to go to the Nie family and break their legs."

Wang Zhihe grabbed the furious Song Nan and hugged him tightly.

"This is a hospital, don't make a fuss. Besides, just because someone says he's the older brother doesn't mean he really is."

Erhua was dazed and confused.

His eyes were half-open and half-closed, staring blankly at the ceiling, like a soulless puppet.

The other patients and their families in the ward had already heard about Erhua's situation.

No one complained about Song Nan's noise at this moment; everyone was sighing and complaining.

The short-haired woman in the next bed, Hou Xiaoyue, was eating a tomato.

She yelled at her husband, who was sitting on the edge of the bed peeling an apple:

"Old Wang, is this something a human being would do? How can there still be such cannibalistic places in this modern society?"

If this isn't severely punished, which family's daughter will dare to go out in the future?

The man called Lao Wang is actually Wang Peng. He works at the county government, wears a Zhongshan suit, and has a deeply furrowed brow.

He handed the peeled apple to his wife.

Lower your voice:

"In these remote and impoverished areas, clan power is paramount. Forget about buying and selling women; even passing truck drivers have to rely on luck to get out of there unscathed. It's ignorant and uncivilized."

"Does being uncivilized justify lawlessness?"

Hou Xiaoyue glared at her, "You're a cadre, are you just going to stand by and do nothing?"

Wang Peng folded the fruit knife and put it in his pocket. He glanced at Erhua's pitiful state on the next bed and felt a tightness in his chest.

It's no use him interfering in this kind of thing.

He stood up, patted the wrinkles on his pants, and said, "Alright, stop yelling. I'll make a call to check the situation and see if I can get a word in."

……

The police station.

The atmosphere was so oppressive it was suffocating.

Outside the interrogation room, Zhou Fang, Song Fei, and several others were ordered to squat on the ground.

Since both sides were injured, the people from Zhangjiazhuang insisted it was a fight between them. Since no one had been killed yet, the police at the station tried to smooth things over and detained everyone.

Huang Ronghua took the phone from Zhou Fang and ran outside to make a long-distance call to Haishi.

On the other end of the phone.

When An Xiyang heard that Song Xianglan was injured, Zhou Fang and the others had been arrested, and Erhua had been abused so badly, she cried on the phone.

"Don't cry, I'll call and ask you to come up with a solution."

Huang Ronghua stamped his feet in anxiety, "Zhou Fang and the others have been detained, and those local bullies are going to turn around and bite us."

"Hurry up and have your uncle, who's an official or someone, make a call here to intimidate us, otherwise we're definitely going to suffer the consequences!"

Anxi Yang hung up the phone.

She wiped away her tears and asked for leave to rush back to her parents' home.

The An family is a truly prestigious and wealthy family.

Although we suffered hardships in the past few years.

An's father was sent to the countryside, but the old man was tough and managed to pull through.

Last year, he was not only reinstated to his original position, but his ancestral home, which had been confiscated, was also returned. His former subordinates are now all holding important positions.

Mr. An was wearing his reading glasses and reading the newspaper.

When his daughter tearfully recounted what had happened, his old face instantly turned as black as the bottom of a pot.

He slammed the newspaper on the table.

"This is outrageous!" Father An took off his glasses. "They even dare to lock up, abuse, and sell women for money? They even dare to beat up the victims' families? What kind of banditry is this?"

He found out that it was Pingcheng.

After thinking for a moment, I picked up the phone and dialed a number.

The call goes directly to the mayor's office in Pingcheng.

"Comrade Hua, it's me." An's father's tone was polite, but the imposing aura he exuded could be transmitted through the telephone line.

"I don't have anything else to say, I just want to ask whether our women comrades are still half the sky?"

How can you openly discuss such feudal remnants as buying and selling people to have children in your Pingcheng territory?

My son-in-law went to rescue someone and was almost beaten to death in front of the police station. Your local police officers called it a mutual fight? Does this socialist rule of law have to cater to local clan and factional whims?

On the other end of the phone.

The mayor of Pingcheng broke out in a cold sweat and repeatedly apologized.

I hung up the phone.

The mayor called the secretary-general in and berated him.

Tell him to call the police station immediately.

……

Police station.

Zhou Fang's legs went numb from squatting, and her heart felt ice-cold.

Song Fei and Liu Yukun lowered their heads, their anger rising only to be extinguished by a bucket of water.

Inside the mediation room.

The village chief of Zhangjiazhuang arrived, accompanied by a middle-aged man wearing gold-rimmed glasses.

This man looks very refined.

The words that came out of his mouth were all poison.

"Officer, how can this be called human trafficking?"

The bespectacled man adjusted his glasses and said slowly, "We did give a bride price."

That was a huge sum of one hundred yuan, and the woman's family took the money but didn't give her any dowry. However, it was still a de facto marriage, and the essence of the marriage shouldn't be denied just because they weren't legally married.

Song Fei, listening from the side, felt his veins throbbing:

"Bullshit! That's human trafficking. That money goes to the traffickers!"

"Mind your manners."

The bespectacled man glanced at Song Fei, a hint of sarcasm playing on his lips.

"As for the woman's injuries, that's because she herself didn't uphold the virtues of womanhood."

She was having extramarital affairs at home, accepting money and food from other men; this constitutes prostitution.

As a husband, Old Zhang was impotent and couldn't tolerate such a dirty thing, which is why he took action.

Which man can tolerate his wife cheating on him? You can't turn around and make us men take the blame just because you're women.

"Fuck your grandpa."

Song Fei could no longer hold back and raised his fist to charge forward.

Several police officers immediately rushed over and restrained Song Fei.

"What are you doing? Sit down! This is a police station, not a place for you to cause trouble."

"Listen to this, this is the quality of outsiders."

Village Chief Zhang exhaled a smoke ring, looking completely smug. "Officer, we are the victims."

The old woman struck us, the common people, on the head first; we were acting in self-defense.

If this matter isn't handled fairly, our entire village of several thousand people will come to the police station tomorrow to demand an explanation.

A naked threat.

The police officers in charge of mediating exchanged glances but remained silent.

These clan-based villages are the most difficult to manage.

If things really escalate, it will become a mass incident, and nobody wants to take responsibility.

One of the older police officers frowned and looked at Song Fei: "Comrade, this is not a place where you can do whatever you want. You need evidence, don't shout things without evidence."

Obviously.

They're going to protect their own.

The short-haired policewoman who had conducted the injury assessment on Erhua earlier walked in, holding the blue folder in her hand. She had been listening at the door the whole time, and now her face was ashen, and her chest was heaving violently.

The bespectacled man was still rambling on and on:

"That woman was a slut to begin with, Old Zhang was just doing justice for God..."

"Snapped!"

A crisp sound.

The blue folder slammed into the bespectacled man's face, the plastic clips knocking his gold-rimmed glasses off and leaving a red mark on his face.

Everyone in the room was stunned.

The policewoman pointed at the man with glasses, her hand trembling.

"Your dried-up corpse mouth is so full of filth, are you going to die tomorrow and have to finish speaking today?"

She was a victim who was imprisoned for two years, and you're telling me she was a prostitute? Are you even human?

The bespectacled man covered his face.

I was stunned for two seconds before I realized what was happening.

Just as he was about to call out.

Village Chief Zhang squinted as he stood up, staring at the policewoman:

"Girl, you're so young. Such a fiery temper; be careful, you'll have a tough time later."

This is a society governed by the rule of law; the police cannot beat people without cause. We have people from our village in the city; don't try to bully ordinary people just because you're wearing those uniforms.

His eyes had a sinister look about them.

It exudes the menacing aura of a seasoned veteran.

"I may not be old, but I have plenty of morals. I'm the complete opposite of you beasts in human skin." The policewoman slammed her folder on the table, staring directly into Village Chief Zhang's murky eyes. "If I were dressed like this without any conscience, I might as well be stripped naked and fed to the dogs."