She Is Such A Jerk, And Yet She’s The One Crying! - Chapter 11

At the beginning of summer, the weather was always unpredictable. First came several cold snaps, followed closely by several bouts of torrential rain. The accumulated water was deep enough to wash away the crops in the fields.

The crops hadn’t grown very tall yet; having endured both the frost and the rainstorms, the people of Wusang Town were distressed beyond measure.

Qiang Ning noticed that the medical clinic had been very crowded lately. There were people falling ill from worry, those who had contracted “dampness” due to the cold and gloomy rain, and others suffering from fevers caused by the chill.

Lin Dongruan mentioned that such patients might pass their illnesses on to others, so when she went to the clinic, she began to deliberately avoid bringing Qiang Ning along.

Initially, Qiang Ning was happy to have her freedom, living without restraint every day with no one to watch over her. However, after only a few days of guarding an empty house, she suddenly found it very dull. She hadn’t been under anyone’s control for so many years, and finally, she had met a Lin Dongruan—only to find herself annoyed and wanting to avoid her after such a short time.

Now that she was idle again, she began to miss the feeling of having someone care for her.

If she could follow Lin Dongruan to the clinic, she would be able to watch the other woman wearing her face veil while treating patients. Lin Dongruan would look up from time to time to cast her gaze upon her, her heart always harboring concern for Qiang Ning’s safety.

Qiang Ning missed her so much it felt like an itch she couldn’t scratch, so she eventually braved the rain to go see her at the clinic.

There were many patients at the clinic, and Lin Dongruan was so busy she couldn’t possibly find a spare moment to speak with her.

Qiang Ning sat on the stairs leading to the upper floor, her chin resting in her hand, watching the crowd in their haste while she remained as if she had nothing to do with it.

The suffering of the mortal world had nothing to do with her.

While she was lost in a daze, she noticed a mother and daughter arrive at the clinic entrance. The little girl was holding her mother’s hand, looking cautiously into the clinic.

Amidst the hustle and bustle, someone asked:

“Oh, it’s Zhou Xingeng’s wife. Has Old Zhou still not come home recently?”

Qiang Ning froze. She remembered—Zhou Xingeng was the butcher who had come to her door that day demanding money, and he had already been quietly dealt with by her subordinates.

“Him? He doesn’t care about us mother and daughter. He went off somewhere on his own and won’t even come home to check on us. Ruoruo’s illness can’t go without medicine, yet that cursed man hasn’t brought a single penny home.” The woman holding her daughter looked exhausted and bitter; her hair had already turned half-white from worry, and even her smile carried the hardships of being worn down by daily chores. “When Gengzi was here, I always resented him for hitting me. Now that he’s gone, the pillar of the house feels like it has collapsed.”

“Old Zhou actually hit his wife?” someone in the crowd asked in confusion. “I used to go to his stall to buy meat every day; Old Zhou always spoke of you two, I never would have thought he was the type to hit his wife.”

The woman gave a bitter smile. “Blame me, blame me for being frail and letting Ruoruo inherit a weak constitution. Old Zhou really loved his daughter; whenever he thought about it, he couldn’t control his temper and would argue with me.”

So the little girl was named Ruoruo. Qiang Ning looked down and happened to lock eyes with the curious little girl.

The little girl smiled happily at her.

Qiang Ning could not bring herself to smile, because her subordinates had killed the girl’s cheap father.

“Old Zhou was a pitiful man too. Before he started the slaughtering business, the family was so poor they couldn’t even put food on the table. It wasn’t easy for him to start earning money as a butcher, only for his daughter to be diagnosed with this expensive illness.” Someone asked the woman, “Could it be… Old Zhou saw that even with the money he earned he couldn’t save anything, so he just abandoned you two and ran off?”

The woman grew somewhat agitated. She raised her voice in protest: “He wouldn’t! He loved Ruoruo the most! Even if he didn’t care for me, he had his daughter in his heart!”

“…Really, why are you getting upset? If he had his daughter in his heart, why hasn’t he come home to look even once after all this time?”

The woman clutched her hair in frustration. “I don’t know, I don’t know! But he definitely didn’t just abandon Ruoruo.”

On this point, Qiang Ning really wanted to provide proof for her.

That butcher certainly hadn’t abandoned his wife and daughter; the truth was that he was buried in some gods-forsaken corner. Out in the wilderness, it would take quite a while just to find him.

“Mother, don’t be angry. Daddy went to make the big money; he will still come home.” The innocent little girl tugged on her mother’s sleeve, trying to calm her down. “Mother, you always said Daddy went to borrow money for Ruoruo, tell them—Daddy didn’t leave without a reason.”

The woman only covered her face and sobbed uncontrollably.

The ground floor was noisy with human voices, but Qiang Ning suddenly felt a chill on the upper floor.

“Is it raining outside? Song Luo, go close the clinic doors,” Qiang Ning instructed the shopkeeper, then stood up and walked down toward Lin Dongruan.

It was very noisy downstairs. Qiang Ning silently approached Lin Dongruan and helped her tie the white face veil a bit higher.

“A-Ning?” Lin Dongruan finally found a moment to notice her. “Why did you come? Didn’t I say not to come to the clinic lately?”

Qiang Ning: “There was no one at home, staying there was boring.”

Qiang Ning thought for a moment and added, “It’s not because I missed you.”

“Follow this prescription, boil it daily… In addition, you must pay attention to your diet…”

Lin Dongruan did not answer Qiang Ning’s words, but immediately went back to instructing the patient.

Qiang Ning stood behind Lin Dongruan for a while, feeling a sense of grievance from being neglected. At that moment, another large wave of new patients surged in, quickly crowding her so much she almost had no place to stand. She reached out to hold Lin Dongruan’s shoulder, suddenly feeling very unhappy.

In Lin Dongruan’s eyes, there were only these commoners as insignificant as grass; she didn’t even give a bit of attention to Qiang Ning. Not wanting to be squeezed in the crowd, Qiang Ning could only retreat silently.

Qiang Ning glanced back at the crowd with displeasure, then took out a handkerchief to wipe her hands. She thought to herself that when they returned tonight, she must boil water for Lin Dongruan to bathe; it felt quite unlucky to have been brushed against by those people.

“Sister-in-law Zhou, the rain has been heavy these past few days, and it seems some corpses have been washed down from the mountain. People are saying they need to report it to the authorities.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“I’m just saying, maybe you should go see if Brother Zhou is among them. They say there’s a section of an arm with a burn scar on it. Didn’t Brother Zhou burn his arm that year when he was scalding pig head meat?”

Qiang Ning froze. Hearing the idle gossip by her ear, she suddenly thought of something.

“A bunch of useless trash. Where did you bury those people? Didn’t I say to handle it cleanly?” Qiang Ning quickly found an empty spot and summoned her subordinates to reprimand them. “The corpses washed down from the mountain couldn’t possibly be those ones, could they?”

“Replying to Your Highness, it was too dark that night. When we were processing them, we didn’t notice a specific mark on one arm. According to our usual methods, such obvious features shouldn’t have been left behind.” The subordinate explained, “We specifically dismembered the torsos and buried them deep underground. We didn’t expect the rain to be so heavy recently, causing a landslide that washed that section directly onto the road below.”

“Go check the situation now. If few people have noticed this matter, destroy the evidence as quickly as possible. Do not let the matter spread to the point where everyone knows. As long as you handle it quietly, what was just said will be treated as a rumor.” Qiang Ning, with a somber expression, pointed to another person. This person was a fourth-rank palace official who had served as a Master of Books; having followed her to this place, their loyalty was rare. “Take my Golden Camel Seal and go see the situation. If the situation becomes hard to control, go straight to the County Magistrate. He will know what to do once he sees the seal.”

The Master of Books said, “A County Magistrate in such a small place might not recognize Your Highness’s seal. What if he leaks the matter and alerts those above us?”

“Go to Sanqi Prefecture to find Jiang Weilan and have him send someone to inform the County Magistrate to suppress the matter for me,” Qiang Ning said. “In short, do not alert the Emperor, and certainly do not let them know that I came here to chase after Lin Dongruan.”

The subordinates took their orders, and Qiang Ning finally felt at ease. She let out a sigh of relief and began to walk out.

What she didn’t see was that in a corner not far behind her, a woman carrying a jute basket was kneeling on the ground, covering her mouth tightly.

“Mother, Mom, what’s wrong with you…”

Ruoruo shook her mother’s hands, not understanding why she had suddenly become so grief-stricken.

They had only gone home to fetch a jute cover to shield them from the rain and had stopped by the corner to shake off the mud that had gathered on it. They never expected to hear the conversation that had just taken place, nor did she expect her mother to be struck so hard by it.

“It was her who ordered people to kill your father. It was her.”

The woman was furious. Because she was so agitated, the bloodshot veins in her eyes looked as if they were about to burst. She gripped her daughter’s arm, repeating neurotically over and over, “It was her who killed your father. Mother is going to avenge your father.”

The little girl asked her in confusion, “But how could that sister beat my daddy? Mother, you’re lying.”

“No, you don’t understand, it’s her.” The woman was already going mad. She couldn’t explain the poisonous hearts of these nobles to a naive child; she just repeatedly told her to remember that face. “Ruoruo, if Mother gets taken away, you must hide. If you see her in the future, run away quickly.”

Ruoruo looked at her mother in a daze. “Mother, what are you going to do?”

The woman gritted her teeth and whispered something, but didn’t let the girl hear it.

When Qiang Ning returned to the clinic, there weren’t many people left. The weather was bad today, and hearing that corpses had been washed down outside, everyone had dispersed after seeing the doctor and getting their medicine. Some went home to recover, while others said they were going to the scene to see where the corpses came from.

“Sister, are you finished? It’s cold today, I want to eat the wonton soup from that shop on the west side…”

Qiang Ning spoke with a relaxed expression, but halfway through, she suddenly noticed Lin Dongruan’s face in front of her change drastically. The way the woman looked at her was so tense, as if something very frightening had happened.

“I want you to pay for a life with your own!”

The woman from earlier had somehow found an herb-cutting knife. Before Qiang Ning could even react, she swung it down toward the back of Qiang Ning’s neck.

In the emergency, the Princess’s shadow guard, who had been hiding in the dark, used a hidden projectile to strike the woman’s shoulder and knee. Just as the woman raised her hand, her limbs went weak, and the strike went wide.

Qiang Ning felt a gust of wind at her back and immediately dodged in alarm, running toward Lin Dongruan with lingering fear.

“Sister-in-law Zhou, what are you doing?”

Lin Dongruan was also filled with worry. She checked Qiang Ning over and then pulled her behind her, shielding her.

“Has my A-Ning offended you in some way?”

Qiang Ning wasn’t particularly frightened, but having been caught off guard by such a crazy person’s sneak attack, her heart condition flared up instantly. For a moment, she clutched her chest, unable to catch her breath.

The woman was nearly driven to madness by rage. “Physician Lin, hand her over! She is no good thing!”

“Sister, my heart hurts.” Even though she realized the situation was unfavorable and her lies were about to be exposed, Qiang Ning was rendered powerless by her physical discomfort. She held onto Lin Dongruan’s forearm, crouching down painfully. “It hurts so much.”