Liu Yu finally could not hold it in any longer and snapped, "The moment I came back, all I heard was you complaining. Are you trying to keep me from entering this home?"
Madam Liu froze, then suddenly raised her voice and shouted, "Was I wrong? You're a grown man..."
Liu Yu took a deep breath, suppressed the urge to argue, turned, and left.
It would have been better if he had stayed. The moment he left, Madam Liu became even more convinced that she was in the right. She made a scene inside the house, loudly berating Liu Yu for being useless, so loudly that even the neighbors could hear.
Liu Yu walked out with his head lowered, squatted by the entrance, took out his tobacco pipe, and silently smoked his dry tobacco.
Liu Shi's voice drifted out from inside the house in broken fragments.
A carriage passed before the house, but after going a few steps, it suddenly stopped.
Hearing the sound, Liu Yu turned his head and saw a familiar person stepping down from the carriage.
"Uncle Liu, it has been many days. I heard your great name has spread far and wide again?" A man in his thirties, dressed in a dark-blue Academy Student's robe, walked over with a smile.
Liu Yu gave a muffled snort. "What kind of whirlwind was this, to blow Scholar Rong all the way here?"
Scholar Rong did not get angry. Smiling, he said, "Uncle Liu, you have seen those officials. They do not take you seriously at all. If I were county magistrate, I would certainly make you a workshop master. But look at you now. Look at this house you live in—it has been so many years, yet it still has not been rebuilt."
"If you have something to