Chapter 644 - 646: Aren’t You My Wife?
Jiang Yichun found the meal both blissfully joyful and painfully miserable. The joy came from being able to share a meal with his family. The misery, however, was due to the unbearable taste of the food.
Yet, to appease his child’s mother, he forced himself to finish the meal. Not only did he down three large bowls of bone soup, but he also drank an entire pot of tea after the meal.
After dinner, Bai Ruozhu stood up, announcing she was taking Dengdeng back to their room to rest. Jiang Yichun also rose, implying his intention to accompany them. Bai Ruozhu shot him a stern look, saying, "Didn’t you hear us? We’re resting. Don’t disturb us!"
Jiang Yichun revealed an embarrassed expression, "I’ve been traveling and working all night. Don’t I also need to rest? Aren’t you my wife?"
The room was on the verge of laughter, especially since Bai Ruozhu’s face had turned as red as a tomato. They had never seen Ruozhu like this before. Particularly Bai Zehao, who was often bullied by his younger sister. His laughter nearly reached his ears, thinking how fortunate he was to return in time for such a spectacular moment.
With her face flushed, Bai Ruozhu snapped at him, "I’m still considering a divorce. Stop bothering me!"
Having said that, she stormed off with Dengdeng to their room. As she entered, she locked the door behind her. She had to breastfeed the baby after dinner. Why on earth would he want to join? Besides, her anger wasn’t so easily quelled.
Saddened by his father’s absence, Dengdeng pouted and stared at the direction of the door. Even reaching out his little arm and crying for his father to carry him.
This upset Bai Ruozhu even more. After enduring the laborious childbirth, the daily breastfeeding, and raising him through all the dirty work, Dengdeng shifted his attention to his father so quickly it was as if he’d forgotten all about her.
Such an ungrateful little thing!
Bricing with anger, Bai Ruozhu sat on the bed and started breastfeeding Dengdeng. Fortunately, Dengdeng was a real foodie. Once he began feeding, he would think of nothing else. Perhaps due to the excitement of the morning, Dengdeng fell asleep shortly after getting fed.
She gently placed the sleeping Dengdeng on the bed. Initially, she planned to rest alongside him, but her restless mind prevented her from falling asleep, prompting her to decide to check the shop.
Just as she stood up, a knock came from outside. The visitor turned out to be Xu Huilin.
"I’m here to see my junior brother." Xu Huilin seemed quite anxious. Leaving this message, he hurried into the room. The sight of Jiang Yichun without his mask startled him, "Why did you casually remove your mask?"
Jiang Yichun’s gaze turned a bit somber, "I remembered everything. The Bai family were the ones who saved me back then. I married Ruozhu and Dengdeng is my son."
Xu Huilin’s mouth formed a perfect ’O’. "What? You are the Chang Sheng you were looking for?"
Jiang Yichun’s lips twitched, firmly believing that Senior Fox did it on purpose!
Seeing his reaction, Xu Huilin couldn’t help but laugh out loud, "Haha, finding yourself. I didn’t know you’re capable of such a thing. What on earth happened?"
"I’ll explain to you some other day. Just don’t disclose this matter, especially to our junior sister." Jiang Yichun looked earnestly serious.
Xu Huilin’s eyes widened slightly, as if he had sensed something.
"Let’s talk while we walk. The master knows you’re here and he has important matters to discuss."
Jiang Yichun was extremely reluctant to leave at this moment. But would he rather have his master come to fetch him in person? He had no choice but to greet Bai Yihong and his wife, and then softly spoke at Bai Ruozhu’s door, "Ruozhu, I’m going back to see my master. I’ll be back later."
"Just stay at the Wu Residence. Don’t come here anymore." Bai Ruozhu replied coldly, although she kept her voice low so as not to wake up Dengdeng.
"This is my home. Why wouldn’t I come back?" Jiang Yichun retaliated defiantly.
"You..." Bai Ruozhu restrained herself from arguing with him, afraid that he might say something like "Aren’t you my wife?" again.
Since he had an urgent matter to attend to, Jiang Yichun put on his mask and left with Xu Huilin. After a while, Bai Ruozhu also came out of the room, asked her mother to help watch over Dengdeng, and rode in a horse carriage to the Hot Spring Mansion with Guizhi.
On the way, Bai Ruozhu looked at Fang Guizhi and asked, "Guizhi, if you decide to go to the Hot Spring Mansion, you may not be able to come back often at the beginning, especially when it’s busy, are you willing?"
Fang Guizhi nodded, "You can entrust this matter to me with confidence, I am already very happy. What does it matter if I can’t return home every day? Once things stabilize, can’t I also return at night and leave early in the morning?"
"I just worry that you’ll overwork yourself." Bai Ruozhu patted Fang Guizhi’s hand and said.
"It’s not hard work, I’m very pleased to be a female shopkeeper." Guizhi’s smile was particularly sweet; she really wanted to be a female shopkeeper.
The two women, chattering and laughing, soon arrived at the Hot Spring Mansion. The size of the mansion had more than doubled, and since the land deed also included the neighboring lands, Bai Ruozhu felt it was not too wasteful.
The hot spring water in the mansion was led into eight small rooms, and there were also six rooms of varying sizes on the other side, dedicated to beauty treatments for guests. Bai Ruozhu drew up the plans and had carpenters custom make some beauty beds. Two beds were placed in the smaller rooms and three to four beds in the larger rooms to cater to different needs of guests.
Now the Hot Spring Mansion was fully equipped and ready. All that remained was for the staff to start work and it would be open for business on the 18th of the Lunar calendar.
At this point, a guard came to report, "Miss, there’s an old man outside who wants to see you, he says his name is Shougu."
It was Elder Shougu! Bai Ruozhu hurriedly said, "I’ll go to meet him in person, you all continue with your work."
Upon hearing this, Fang Guizhi also went to check on the items in the hot spring rooms.
Bai Ruozhu quickly went out and sure enough, it was Elder Shougu whom she hadn’t seen in days. Since Jiang Yichun had to go to the Capital, Elder Shougu left as well, but not before giving Jiang Yichun something, saying that he could use it to get the poisonous insect out of his body after the Spell of Forgetfulness was lifted.
Since then, Bai Ruozhu had been busy expanding the Hot Spring Mansion and had not seen Elder Shougu, but she never expected that he would return today.
She hurriedly bowed to him, saying, "Ruozhu pays her respects to the elder. Please come in and sit."
Elder Shougu, laughing heartily, walked into the mansion, saying, "No need to sit, I have to rush to save an old friend in another place, so I came to ask you for two things."
"Please feel free to ask for what you need, elder. If I can help, I certainly will," Bai Ruozhu replied.
"First, I need a bit of hot spring water from your mansion to help nourish a poisonous insect," Elder Shougu said.
Bai Ruozhu hurriedly nodded. This small request could have been met by sneaking in and taking what was needed. The fact that Shougu had made sure to ask indicated his politeness.
"Second, I need that scar-removing ointment you have," Elder Shougu added.
Bai Ruozhu didn’t know how he knew about the ointment, but luckily she had a small box left. She nodded and said, "I still have a small box, I’ll give it to you."
Elder Shougu was very pleased with Bai Ruozhu’s generosity, saying, "I’m old enough that I can’t just take something from you for nothing. I urgently need that medicine and don’t have time to make it myself, so I’ll trade you for it."
With that, he handed Bai Ruozhu a jade bottle. The entire bottle was made of fine green jade, and the contents within were likely even more precious, right?