His scheming aunt

Ye Huan's dad heard the voices and went out of the courtyard to greet them. Ye Huan heard a car parking, followed by a shrill voice. "Oh my~~ whose two new cars are these? Why are they parked here?"

Ye Huan knew that the scheming had begun the moment his aunt stepped out of the car.

Ye Dafa knew it too, but he wasn't afraid of any of that. His son had bought them with money he'd earned himself. Scheme all you wanted-could you actually rob his son?

"Xiao Huan bought them. He saw how hard I worked delivering vegetables every day, so he bought me a pickup too."

"Uncle, has Xiao Huan struck it rich? This pickup must cost at least two hundred thousand, right? You could buy two of my cars with that. That Wrangler must be even more expensive, right?"

"He's doing all right. He came back with a bit more money to spare this time, and he cares about his old dad, haha. Come inside. Time to eat. We've just been waiting for you." Ye Dafa didn't know what else to say.

"He didn't sell Grandpa's treasures, did he? That wouldn't be right."

"What a load of bullshit. I'm still alive!" Ye Wuju suddenly roared, startling Li Zichuan so badly that he froze, then edged behind his wife.

"Dad, Zichuan was only asking. You have so many treasures. It would be such a shame if Xiao Huan sold them." Ye Huan's aunt came inside and walked over to Ye Wuju as she spoke.

"You didn't call it a shame when I sold tiger bones to buy your family a house. It broke my heart, and I didn't hear a single nice word from you. Now you think it's your place to talk?" Hearing them criticize his grandson made the old man angry.

Ye Huan was rather speechless too. He said nothing and left it to his grandpa. His grandpa was still around; it wasn't his place to speak.

He walked over. "Hi, cousin-in-law. Mimi, come here. Let Uncle hold you." He reached out and took the little girl from his cousin-in-law's arms, then went to play with Jingjing.

The two little girls were about the same age, with Jingjing a few months older, and they soon grew comfortable playing together.

After Ye Huan took her child, his cousin-in-law smacked Li Zichuan. "Was it your place to speak?" Li Zichuan ducked his head, not daring to say anything.

Seeing that the old man was genuinely angry, Ye Huan's aunt didn't dare say any more and hurriedly changed the subject. She actually understood it all. Ye Huan was the Ye family's direct-line son and grandson. She had never really intended to compete with her nephew; it was just her nature to try to pick up a little something for herself along the way.

She knew Ye Huan's place in the old man's heart, so she had always followed the principle that a thief never left empty-handed: take whatever she could get her hands on and ask for whatever she could.

Besides, so far, her family had benefited far more than her younger brother's had.

"Come sit down. Time to eat." Ye Huan's mother didn't join the conversation, nor was it her place to speak. In any case, the old man had said long ago that no one could take the treasures meant for her son.

None of them knew that, apart from the liquor, all the old man's treasures had already been safely settled in Ye Huan's space.

"Jingjing, Mimi, come eat." Ye Huan put the two children into high chairs, making exactly ten people.

"Whose little girl is this? Aren't you calling her parent over to eat?" His aunt was at it again. She had moved out of the village many years ago and genuinely didn't know Jingjing. In the past, Jingjing and her family wouldn't come to Ye Huan's grandpa's house for holidays or New Year celebrations either.

Ye Huan's mom explained, "Bai Jie's daughter. Bai Jie helps me with the vegetable plots now, so we eat together. She doesn't have time to cook either."

"Oh, why did you suddenly decide to come back and grow vegetables? Didn't you used to say there was no money in it?"

"It was all Xiao Huan's doing. He had a perfectly good job, but he just up and quit. He insisted on coming home to grow some sort of organic vegetables, and then he called his dad and me back to farm with him," Ye Huan's mom said.

"How much can growing vegetables earn? It's dirty, exhausting work." Before Ye Huan's aunt could finish, the bang of the old man's liquor cup startled her.

"How long have you been living in the city? You already think you're a cut above everyone else? Looking down on vegetable farming now, are you? Without farmers growing vegetables, you'd have trouble finding even shit to eat in the city."

"Dad, Damei didn't mean it like that. She's just worried Dafa and the others will wear themselves out." His uncle-in-law hurriedly spoke up to put out the fire.

"You're useless too. If your wife won't behave, can't you give her a beating? Just looking at you makes me angry." The old man lost his temper.

Everyone fell silent. Holding back his laughter, Ye Huan gave Jingjing and Mimi a big chicken drumstick each. Holding in a laugh was painful.

"I heard you lost your job. What are your plans?" the old man asked.

"I..."

"What do you mean, 'I'? You're in your late fifties. Haven't you given it any thought yourself?" The old man kept up his barrage.

"Damei said I should work as a security guard in the residential complex. I'll be retiring in a few years."

The old man was about to flare up again when Ye Huan decided that was enough and said, "Grandpa, don't scare Mimi."

"Oh, oh, oh. Be good, Mimi. Your grandpa and grandma are a pair of muddleheads. You must never learn from them." Sure enough, the old man's whole expression changed.

"Great-Grandpa, Grandpa and Grandma are good people..." the little girl said in her soft, childish voice.

"Even a child has more sense than you." With that, the old man stopped talking and drank.

"Xiao Huan, are these the organic vegetables you developed? They taste pretty good. You could take some to sell in the big cities. People there care about their quality of life. You should have no problem selling them for seven or eight yuan a jin." After eating for a while, his aunt spoke again.

"Mm, I won't bother. I couldn't manage all that work. Someone in the county town has already contracted to buy all our vegetables," Ye Huan said with a smile.

"Vegetable dealers are bound to squeeze your prices as hard as they can. Look, you've called both your parents home and hired someone to work for you too. Even if a dealer has contracted to buy your vegetables, what's the point if they only pay you a yuan or so a jin?"

"Mm, it's fine. As long as it's better than working a job." Ye Huan smiled without explaining.

"You can't calculate it like that. Look, you have to count wages for all three of you, right? And you've hired someone, so you must pay fifty or sixty a day, right? That's nearly two thousand a month. Add in the three of you, and unless you're making thirty or forty thousand in net profit, you'd be better off working in the city," his aunt said.

"When your parents worked over in Zhe Province, they at least had five thousand a month in wages. You can't just think of yourself."

"Mm, it's more than that. Besides, you can't hire anyone for fifty or sixty a day now. I pay Sister-in-law Bai five thousand a month. But I really haven't been paying my parents. How about it, Mom, Dad? Shall I pay you ten thousand a month?" Ye Huan asked his parents with a smile.

"Oh, get out of here..." Ye Dafa thought, Am I the idiot, or are you? Ten thousand a month? How do you have the nerve to say that? I'm making nearly twenty thousand a day now.

"Dafa, that's quite a lot. You two can't just fool around with Xiao Huan. Taking twenty thousand a month and putting it away would be good. Surely that's better than leaving it in his hands." His aunt was rather surprised. Was growing vegetables this profitable now?

"Big Sister, don't listen to his nonsense. A restaurant in the county town has contracted to buy all our vegetables. All Dafa has to do is deliver the vegetables we've picked every morning. It's not hard work." Ye Huan's mom finally couldn't take it anymore. This father-and-son pair was about to team up and start pulling the wool over someone's eyes again.