novelraw Chapter 288 Intentionally Letting Them Die
Chapter 288 Intentionally Letting Them Die
Chapter 288 Intentionally Letting Them Die
Gu Tang took a closer look, but didn't recognize him or find him familiar, so she remained silent.
Gu Ping'an and Agou followed Gu Tang's example, first greeting their third uncle, and then the clan elders.
As for the mother and daughter, Gu Ping'an knew who they were, but since his second sister hadn't spoken to them, he remained silent.
Chief Gu met Ah Gou yesterday and nodded to him.
This is the first time the elders have met Ah Gou, but they had heard Chief Gu mention him before.
Upon seeing the person in person, the solemn expression on his face eased. He nodded to Ah Gou and asked Ah Gou if he could adapt to life in the village. After receiving an affirmative answer, he continued to watch the busy crowd in the wind and snow.
Gu Tang was quite curious, so she went up to her third uncle and asked what was going on.
The house has collapsed, and there's no point in digging it out now, especially since it's freezing cold and we can't rebuild it right away.
Third Uncle paused, unsure whether he should bring this up in public.
He glanced at the mother and daughter in the corner and saw that they were staring at him. The old man frowned and felt displeased.
Displeased, he simply told the truth.
"Your father and his men aren't digging up houses, they're digging up people."
"Poach people?" Gu Tang was stunned for a moment, but quickly understood what he meant.
"You mean... there are still people trapped under the house that collapsed under the weight of the snow?"
Third Uncle nodded, his face grave: "Your Aunt Guan and her daughter Da Ni were trapped underneath. The mother and daughter had always slept in the west wing, and when the house collapsed, they were buried underneath."
Gu Tang gasped, "When did it collapse? How long ago? Are my aunts... dead or alive?"
It would have been fine if they hadn't mentioned when it collapsed, but the mere mention of it reignited the anger that had just subsided in Uncle San.
He looked at the mother and daughter with a sneer: "The whole family says they don't know when it collapsed. Your father said that you can tell just by looking at the thickness of the snow on it. He guessed it collapsed in the middle of last night."
"The collapse of this house must have made a lot of noise, how could the whole family not know?"
Unless... he's deliberately pretending not to know.
Gu Tang glanced at the mother and daughter and was surprised to find that they had been staring at Ah Gou intently.
Especially that girl, her eyes were full of spring!
Oh open!
Is she interested in Ah Gou?
No, right now someone in your family is trapped under the rubble, their life hanging in the balance, and you two, mother and daughter, don't even show a trace of worry on your faces. You even have the mind to look at men right now.
You should at least pretend to be sad!
Wow! What an odd couple!
"Yes, the collapse of the house was quite a commotion." Third Uncle smirked, his eyes cold.
"Tell me, how come no one heard such a loud noise? It was only when your father and the others passed by this morning and saw that the house had collapsed that they helped to rescue people."
save people?
It seems there's no way to save them.
If it really is as her father said, that it collapsed in the middle of the night last night, then Aunt Guan and her daughter definitely wouldn't survive!
Gu Tang wanted to ask more questions, but Gu Ping'an pulled her aside and whispered in her ear about the family.
This family also belongs to the Gu clan. The head of the family is named Gu Baoshan, who is married to a woman surnamed Guan. They have a daughter named Gu Dani, who is thirteen years old this year.
Gu Baoshan lost his father a few years ago, and now he only has his mother, Jiang, who is in her early fifties, and his sixteen-year-old sister, Gu Chuntao.
Jiang looked down on Guan, especially after learning that Guan had injured her body giving birth to Gu Dani. She despised her even more and began to consider divorcing her and marrying someone else.
But for some reason, Chiang Kai-shek did not take any action for a long time, only occasionally making veiled criticisms of the matter to outsiders.
But every time someone urged Jiang to divorce her daughter-in-law, Jiang would stammer and dodge, as if she was worried about something.
The villagers speculated that Jiang's reluctance to divorce her daughter-in-law was probably related to Guan's premature birth.
When Guan was pregnant with Gu Dani, she gave birth prematurely at eight months. On the day of the premature birth, only Gu Chuntao and Guan, her sister-in-law, were at home.
As for the cause of the premature birth, it was said that Ms. Guan accidentally fell.
Strangely enough, after Guan Shi finished her postpartum confinement, she cursed people at home every day, as if she had changed her personality and was very fierce!
What's even stranger is that Jiang and Gu Chuntao, who always wanted to outdo Guan, didn't dare to utter a single word and let Guan scold them for a whole month.
Since then, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, and the sisters-in-law, have become like strangers.
Despite Jiang's outbursts about divorcing her daughter-in-law, she actually kept these words to herself, afraid that Guan would overhear.
Because of these inconsistencies, the villagers speculated that Guan's premature birth was caused by Gu Chuntao.
Now that the house where Guan and her daughter lived has collapsed, Jiang and Gu Chuntao probably wish the mother and daughter would be crushed to death.
Even if they weren't crushed to death, a mother and daughter trapped underneath would freeze to death in the middle of the night.
At this moment, the Jiang mother and daughter probably assumed that the Guan mother and daughter were already dead, which is why they looked relaxed and without any worry.
The sound of wind and snow masked Gu Ping'an's whispers. In addition, Jiang Shi and Gu Chuntao were focused on A Gou and did not know that Gu Ping'an was cricketing them not far away.
After hearing all this, Gu Tang noticed something was amiss: "Where's Gu Baoshan? Where did he go? Shouldn't he be sharing a room with Jiang Shi?"
The son and daughter-in-law live in the same room. If the room collapses, even if Jiang Shi is unwilling, she will have to call for help to save them.
"I don't know. I guess she didn't sleep in this room, otherwise Madam Jiang would be frantic with worry!"
Gu Tang pouted. She only knows to panic when it's her own child's turn?
So, in her eyes, someone else's child isn't even a person?
"Sister Tang."
A voice came from behind her, a sweet "Tang sister", which made Gu Tang shudder.
Looking back, it was Gu Chuntao.
She swayed her hips as she walked this way, and her gait seemed a bit odd.
Gu Ping'an took the opportunity to whisper in Gu Tang's ear, "Ignore her! She's too ambitious and has already broken off two engagements! Her reputation is ruined!"
Nobody in the village paid her any attention, and she even pushed girls her own age off the mountain several times! She's both stupid and vicious!
Oh open!
This girl is only sixteen, yet she's already so ruthless?
Gu Tang silently took two steps back and moved closer to Ah Gou.
Although the girl was calling her name, her eyes were constantly giving Ah Gou flirty looks.
Gu Tang didn't want to deal with her, so she wanted to shift the blame to Ah Gou and let him deal with her instead!
"Tang, why haven't I seen you out playing lately?" Gu Chuntao stopped in front of Gu Tang, looked at Gu Tang's fair face, her eyes flickered, and she actually reached out to touch Gu Tang's face.
"It hasn't been that long since we last met, and Tang's daughter has grown into such a beautiful young lady! I'll have my mother find you a good match!"
Gu Chuntao had long fingernails, and for some reason, she shaped them into sharp triangles!
Good heavens, those sharp fingernails stretched out like the claws of that female ghost!
Is this touching my face?
Gu Tang strongly suspected that she was planning to take the opportunity to scratch her own face, and then apologize, saying it wasn't intentional. To avoid conflict, Gu Tang took two steps back, dodging Gu Chuntao's claws.
Seeing this, Gu Chuntao was still unwilling to give up. She took two steps forward and still stretched out her claws in front of Gu Tang: "Why are you hiding, you little brat?"
"Snapped!"
A crisp sound landed on the back of Gu Chuntao's hand, and her fair skin quickly turned red.
Immediately afterward, Gu Chuntao clutched her hand and cried out in pain, "Ah!!!"
Her delicate face was contorted with pain, which shows just how much it hurt.
Gu Tang blinked, looked at Gu Chuntao's miserable state, and then at Agou who had attacked her.
I didn't know what to say for a while.
Hearing Gu Chuntao's screams, Jiang rushed over: "Tao'er! What happened? What's wrong with you?!"
"Mother! He hit me!" Gu Chuntao's face twitched in pain as she raised her hand for Jiang Shi to see. At this moment, all she could think about was complaining, and all her previous little schemes had vanished.
The back of my hand, which was just red, is now swollen, turning red and purple, and looks quite frightening!
Gu Tang secretly gave Ah Gou a thumbs up.
Great!
There's not much flesh on the back of a person's hand, so a slap could swell up Gu Chuntao's hand; that's incredibly powerful!
"How did you get hurt like this?" Madam Jiang asked with a pained expression, then turned to Ah Gou with a dark face and demanded an explanation: "Young master, my daughter came to talk to Lian Shan's daughter, why did you hit her?!"
After questioning Ah Gou, Madam Jiang turned and glared at Gu Tang: "You wicked girl! You watched your sister Chun Tao get beaten and didn't even try to protect her!"
No wonder everyone in the village says you were the one who persuaded your father to divorce your mother. Your heart isn't just bad, it's incredibly vicious!
Hearing this, Uncle San, who was not far away, immediately frowned and walked towards Gu Tang with his cane.
Faced with Jiang's unreasonable demands, Gu Tang raised an eyebrow and said, "You think you're so great?"
good good!
Let's have a good discussion about this!
Gu Tang put her hands on her hips and immediately started spewing, "Pah! This is like a dung beetle sneezing—spraying filth everywhere! When it comes to toxicity, who can be more toxic than you and your daughter? How did my Aunt Guan have a premature birth? God saw it all!"
Let that filthy, wicked woman be infamous! Let her be despised for the rest of her life, and never be able to get married even if she's desperate for a man!
You old hag had better start praying to the gods right now. If your son brings out two corpses later, I'll pay for it! I'll let all the aunties and grandmas in the village spread the word about it in every village!
I'll make sure no man in your family can find a wife! No woman can get married! I'll make sure your family line ends in extinction! I'll make sure you're cursed by the ancestors of the Gu family after you die!
Marrying an unvirtuous wife ruins three generations! You yourself are a worthless person! And the sons and daughters you raised are no better either—one abandoned his wife and daughter, and the other poisoned his own sister-in-law!
Bah! They're a filthy, stinking bunch themselves, yet they have the nerve to complain about others being smelly!
Gu Tang's outburst stunned everyone present.
The crowd looked on with a mixture of curiosity and shock; it was truly the first time they had ever seen Gu Tang lose her temper in public, and everyone turned to look at them.
Third Uncle stopped, unsure whether he should continue this way.
When Gu Tang exposed these things in public, Jiang was so angry that she trembled all over, while Gu Chuntao turned pale.
"You little whore! How dare you speak ill of my family like this!" Jiang was blinded by rage and rushed towards Gu Tang without regard for anything else, wanting to fight her.
Gu Tang hadn't fought in a long time, and now he was in high spirits, preparing to kick Jiang Shi in the knee.
Before she could even make a move, a long, faster leg shot towards Jiang Shi and instantly knocked her to the ground!
Behind Jiang was Gu Chuntao. When she fell, the mother and daughter tumbled together, rolled over the eaves, and fell into a snowdrift outside.
Gu Tang was very dissatisfied and turned to glare at A Gou, because those long legs just now belonged to A Gou.
"Who told you to make a move? I haven't even started fighting yet, and you kicked her like that. She definitely won't want to fight me anymore!"
Ah Gou immediately admitted his mistake: "It was my fault. Next time, I will definitely wait for you to make the first move before I make my move."
That's more like it!
The Jiang mother and daughter had already climbed out of the snowdrift. Gu Tang asked them loudly, "Are we still fighting? It's a deal! We won't stop until there's blood, and no one can stop us halfway through!"
Jiang shuddered. Gu Tang was blocking her way under the eaves, and she didn't dare to move closer. She could only tremble and burst into tears.
"Oh my God—"
Just as she was about to burst into tears, a commotion suddenly erupted from the collapsed west wing.
"We've found someone!"
"Hurry! Get the rope, tie it up, and pull the person out!"
"W-Can I pull this?"
"They're frozen solid! They're not going to survive, they can be expelled..."
They're frozen solid, they won't survive...
These words reached everyone's ears, and all eyes turned to the west wing. No one paid any attention to Gu Tang's farce anymore, and the atmosphere instantly became tense.
Only the Jiang mother and daughter showed a hint of joy on their faces, but quickly concealed it.
No matter how fast she tried to cover it up, it was no use; Ah Gou and Gu Tang still saw it.
Gu Tang knew that Ah Gou could sense the aura of death, and asked in a low voice, "How is he? Is there any hope?"
“It’s hopeless. They’re lifeless, just deathly.” Ah Gou shook his head, glanced at the west wing, and added, “The mother and daughter are the same; neither of them has any life left.”
Gu Tang paused, then sighed: "The joy on the faces of that mother and daughter just now is proof that Aunt Guan and her daughter were indeed indirectly killed by them."
Knowing full well that the mother and daughter were trapped under the collapsed house, they stubbornly refused to rescue them, delaying until they were discovered. This is truly a tragedy!
She gave the Jiang mother and daughter a cold glance. This family already had a bad reputation, and now this has happened. Just wait and see, they'll suffer in the future!
The two bodies were carried under the eaves, one after the other, their bodies covered in ice and snow.
Aunt Guan was in her twenties, while Gu Dani looked only about ten years old. But Gu Ping'an said that Gu Dani was thirteen this year, and the reason she was so short was because she didn't have enough to eat every day.
Gu Tang noticed that Aunt Guan was also very thin and frail.
Just then, a man of medium height took off his hat and the scarf covering his face, and rushed towards the mother and daughter while crying.
"This is..." Gu Tang had a guess in her mind.
Sure enough, Gu Pingan whispered in her ear, "Gu Baoshan."
Gu Baoshan was crying with snot and tears streaming down his face. If someone who didn't know the truth saw it, they would think he was a very affectionate person.
Exhausted and limp, Gu Lianshan was furious when he saw him like this: "The walls of your west wing are cracked on three out of four sides. It shouldn't be inhabited anymore, especially not in this snowy weather."
You're quite shrewd, moving into the main room to live with your own mother, leaving them in the west wing. Just you wait, when Guan's family comes, they'll ransack your house!