FID – Chapter 604

Chapter 604: Staring Directly

Xue Qinglian snatched the water pouch from his hand and took a few big gulps. He sneered, “Oh, please. What did you do? You were just sitting there watching us water the plants, and you’re acting like you did all the work. If no one knew better, they’d think you did a whole lot of work. You’re really just giving yourself too much credit.”

“I’m Wanjin. Do I need to flatter myself?” Qian Wanjin said shamelessly, as two of the men nearby simultaneously grabbed clumps of dirt and threw them at him.

They had seen shameless people before, but never anyone this crass.

To dodge the attack, Qian Wanjin started jumping around the loquat orchard like a monkey, and after a moment, he suddenly looked toward the entrance of the loquat orchard. He turned to the two men chasing him and said, “Stop, stop, stop. Quick, look over there. Is that our Xiao Shi coming? Oh my, she’s even carrying your child bride on her back!”

Liu Zhiqiu and Xue Qinglian both turned toward the entrance and indeed saw a group of women walking towards them.

At the front was Shi Xianrou, with Liu Muqiu on her back. Liu Yusheng was walking beside her, and behind them were two unfamiliar young girls, dressed up extravagantly, their necks stretched as they peeked toward them.

“Lucky Nannan, what are you doing here?”

Liu Yusheng said, “My maternal family came to visit, and they brought two young girls out. We didn’t know where to take them, so we just came up the mountain to take a look.”

“Your maternal grandmother’s family?” Liu Zhiqiu frowned. He didn’t have a good impression of Nannan’s maternal family.

If it weren’t for that family stretching their hands too far, Big Brother and Nannan wouldn’t have stopped visiting them for years.

Their relationship had long since become distant.

Now, with the flood disaster barely behind them, that family coming to their door surely didn’t mean anything good.

Moreover, they even brought two young girls to his house, which made Liu Zhiqiu’s frown deepen.

He just had a feeling—the people coming to his house today must have something wrong with their heads.

Otherwise, how could they do something so foolish?

“Brother Zhi-Zhi-Zhiqiu, hurry up and put your clothes on!” Suddenly, a soft voice stammered.

Liu Zhiqiu raised an eyebrow and looked at the woman just set down by Shi Xianrou. She was now blushing deeply, her eyes flickering and darting away, yet constantly glancing at him. Her expression—too shy to look but wanting to—was quite amusing.

He reached out to take the clothes hanging on the tree branch and quickly put them on before looking back at her. “Liu Muqiu, you’re drooling.”

The woman hurriedly wiped her mouth with her sleeve, and after realizing what happened, she stood there frozen, her whole body going red, as if she was about to burst into flames.

“Hahahahaha!” Qian Wanjin and Shi Xianrou and the others were dying of laughter, so much that they squatted down to the ground, holding their bellies.

Every time Liu Muqiu came near Liu Zhiqiu, she would do something foolish.

She couldn’t show any of her usual sharpness, and that contrast was just too funny.

Yang Shuqing and Yang Shuyu, who were walking behind, were also blushing, their faces completely red.

Just now, they had also seen Liu Zhiqiu without his shirt.

The strong, smooth lines of his body, the graceful curves, the bulging muscles, and the sweat running down his sun-kissed skin—all combined into a scene that made the girls feel shy, but also made their hearts race.

So, this was Liu Zhiqiu.

Just as their Aunt had said, he was exceptionally handsome.

With sun-kissed skin and a tall build.

His physique was strong but not overly bulky.

He looked just right.

He was the kind of man who could attract anyone.

No wonder their aunt had told them before they came to behave well—many women wanted to marry Liu Zhiqiu.

At first, they thought that she was exaggerating and assumed that the women who wanted to marry into the Liu family were mainly interested in the family’s wealth and status.

But after meeting him in person, they understood—aside from those external factors, Liu Zhiqiu himself was far more outstanding than many other men.

The Yang sisters were staring at Liu Zhiqiu intently, and everyone around noticed.

Liu Yusheng rubbed her temples. If they didn’t tone it down a bit, the ‘little white lotus’ would definitely start turning black.

If Liu Muqiu was just shy enough to nearly smoke earlier, now she was angry enough to feel like black smoke was coming out of her.

“Since you’ve come up, why not take a look around? There’s not much to see here—besides the loquat forest, there’s only the medicinal herb field. There aren’t any scenic spots to enjoy,” Liu Zhiqiu said to the girls. He picked up the hoe by his feet and went back into the herb field to finish plowing the remaining land.

Although it was their Nannan who had brought them, he wasn’t about to entertain them himself.

Instead of watching these delicate girls twist and act coy, it was better to focus on working the land.

Seeing Liu Zhiqiu start working, Liu Muqiu immediately followed him. She skillfully took out a small hammer from behind the pile of earth and squatted behind him, pounding the soil blocks one by one.

Her natural posture made the people around her stare in awe.

Qian Wanjin muttered, “There’s something going on here. How did she know there was a small iron hammer behind the pile of soil? I didn’t even know about it!”

“You don’t know anything. All you do is squat by and watch the excitement,” Xue Qinglian mocked him, climbing onto a branch of the nearby loquat tree. He lay back with his legs dangling, arms crossed, closed his eyes, and started to nap.

“Hey, Xue Qinglian, are you really going to sleep here? Are you showing off your skills?”

“Showing off my skills? Show off, my ass! I didn’t sleep all night. If you hadn’t dragged me out, I wouldn’t even have left my room today.” Xue Qinglian sighed. He was now staying in the big courtyard, but he was still unable to sleep. He regretted it.

Why the hell was he stuck here? He should have left earlier.

Being unable to sleep went against the principles of health preservation. That was sure to shorten his life!

The two were bickering over here, but Liu Yusheng wasn’t idle either. She started inspecting the loquat trees.

Since her return, she hadn’t come up the mountain yet. The flood had caused quite a lot of damage to the orchard, and many of the loquat trees’ root systems had decayed. If they couldn’t recover in time, it would be hard to harvest many fruits this year.

Shi Xianrou, on the other hand, stayed by Qian Wanjin’s side, following her husband wherever he went, accompanying him the entire time.

For a moment, no one paid attention to the Yang sisters who had just arrived.

The two stood there awkwardly, feeling as though they were being excluded, unable to blend into the atmosphere of the group.

Although everyone was doing their own thing, it was as if they were all connected on a web, working harmoniously together. But they were left outside of that web, not included in it.

The two sisters exchanged glances, looked at Liu Yusheng and then at Liu Zhiqiu, before walking together towards the medicinal herb field. They tried to follow Liu Muqiu’s example and help with the plowing.

Unfortunately, they didn’t have any tools and couldn’t be of any help, so they could only squat beside the field and watch.

“Muqiu, why don’t I do it instead? Your health isn’t great, and if you squat for too long, you might faint again. These tasks are what I’m used to, I can do them quickly, and it won’t delay Zhiqiu’s work.” After waiting for a moment, Yang Shuqing approached Liu Muqiu and tried to take the small hammer from her, but Liu Muqiu dodged it.