Wang Haihu and his brother were suddenly handcuffed by the police. They shouted and struggled, yelling, "We haven't broken any law, why are you arresting us..."
Standing nearby, Liu Cuilan was stunned, her mind going blank. Instinctively, she wanted to rush forward to plead their innocence.
But before she could even open her mouth, her wrist was firmly grasped by another officer, and cold handcuffs snapped shut with a click.
During their door-to-door investigation, many villagers had revealed that Liu Cuilan had an improper relationship with Baldy Zhang, and that she was also entangled with the Wang Haihu brothers.
Someone had even seen Baldy Zhang sneaking into Liu Cuilan's house on New Year's Eve.
After sorting through all the clues, the police initially determined this was a crime of passion, and Liu Cuilan along with the Wang Haihu brothers became the prime suspects.
Two officers came to the house for questioning according to procedure, just to keep them calm, while several other officers were already hiding behind the firewood pile in the yard.
When the questioning was finished and they got up to leave, the Wang Haihu brothers let their guard down completely. That's when the officers outside rushed in and arrested them on the spot.
The trio had thought that by killing Baldy Zhang and framing Zhou Zhijun, they'd be in the clear. They never imagined the police would zero in on them so quickly.
Soon after, police found Baldy Zhang's clothes in their haystack.
Under the bed, they found several hemp ropes identical to the one used to strangle Baldy Zhang.
With witnesses and physical evidence in hand, police immediately launched an intense interrogation of the three suspects.
A slap on the table from the police had the Wang Haihu brothers trembling with fear, and they confessed everything in full detail.
It turned out that on New Year's Eve, the brothers had gone out to play cards and didn't head home until past one in the morning.
Just as they reached the door of the main room, they heard a man's voice inside.
The voice was as familiar as could be—it was Baldy Zhang!
The two brothers had long been furious about Baldy Zhang pestering Liu Cuilan. They'd even warned him before, but he'd dared to come to their own house on New Year's Eve night to mess around with Liu Cuilan.
The brothers' eyes went red with rage. They kicked the wooden door open and caught Baldy Zhang right in bed.
"Damn you, Baldy Zhang! You dared come to our house!" Wang Haihu roared as he lunged forward, swinging a punch right at Baldy Zhang's face.
Startled, Baldy Zhang quickly dodged behind Liu Cuilan, and the punch landed square on her cheek. She winced in pain, a large bruise immediately forming on her face.
But Baldy Zhang wasn't frightened at all. Instead, he craned his neck and argued, "I helped her out plenty—she agreed to sleep with me of her own free will. What's it to you two? You're just sticking your noses where they don't belong!"
Baldy Zhang wasn't much of a man in bed, and Liu Cuilan had long been sick of him.
After taking that mistaken punch from Wang Haihu, she was even angrier. She turned and slapped Baldy Zhang hard across the face.
"Baldy Zhang, from now on we're even! If you dare keep bothering me, I'll go to the commune and report you for rape!"
Baldy Zhang got angry too and shot back with a stream of curses. "Liu Cuilan, you want to report me? I'm the one who should be reporting you!
Besides sleeping with me, you've also been with these two bastards—that's prostitution, a crime in itself! Good enough to get you shot!
Push me too far, and we'll all go down together. Nobody will come out of this clean!"
In that era, a woman like Liu Cuilan maintaining improper relationships with multiple men could indeed be deemed as committing the crime of "hooliganism."
If Baldy Zhang really did report them to the commune, none of them would escape punishment.
"Baldy Zhang, you wouldn't dare!" Liu Cuilan glared at him, eyes blazing with fury.
Seeing this, Wang Haihu grabbed Baldy Zhang's arm and started dragging him outside, intending to teach him a lesson.
Baldy Zhang hadn't even pulled his pants up yet and struggled, wrestling with Wang Haihu.
"I'll go to the commune first thing tomorrow and report all of you! Two brothers-in-law having an affair with their sister-in-law—ha! Shameless and corrupt to the bone!" Baldy Zhang shouted, spitting threats as he tried to break free.
Those words enraged Wang Hailong. His blood boiled, and he grabbed a hemp rope from under the bed, suddenly slipping it around Baldy Zhang's neck.
Wang Haihu, seeing this, went wild too. He lunged forward and grabbed the other end of the rope, both brothers pulling in opposite directions with all their might.
Before long, Baldy Zhang's struggling grew weaker and weaker until he finally went completely still.
It wasn't until Baldy Zhang slumped to the ground that the brothers snapped back to reality. Staring at the corpse, they shook uncontrollably with fear.
But the dead can't be brought back to life, and regret came too late.
In a panic, they found an old burlap sack, pulled it over Baldy Zhang's head, and under the cover of darkness, secretly carried the body to throw it into the reeds near East Ditch.
They had planned to frame Zhou Zhijun for the crime, but hadn't expected the police to be so fast, arresting them in less than two days.
In the end, both Wang Haihu brothers were convicted of intentional homicide—one sentenced to death and the other to life imprisonment.
The case all stemmed from Liu Cuilan. Not only did she fail to report the crime, but she also participated in disposing of the body and harboring the criminals, so she was lawfully sentenced to six years in prison.
This murder case that happened on New Year's Eve spread across the entire Qingshan Commune within days.
Wangjia Village became the most infamous production brigade in the commune—but for all the wrong reasons.
Liu Cuilan always loved stirring up trouble and spreading gossip, claiming Zhou Zhijun and Li Chun Tao were having an affair. Little did anyone know, she herself was the biggest "broken shoe" of all.
This matter completely overshadowed the festive New Year mood. People in the village couldn't chat for ten words without bringing up the case.
Beyond the initial shock, most feelings were those of schadenfreude.
"Liu Cuilan, that shrew—always meddling in everyone's business and spreading rumors. With her around, the village never had a moment of peace! She got exactly what she deserved!"
"The Wang Haihu brothers and Baldy Zhang—none of them were any good. Always stealing chickens and dogs. They got off easy compared to what they deserved!"
"With the dead dead and the arrested arrested, at last Wangjia Village can have some peace!"
"What a disgrace they've brought upon Wangjia Village!"
...
Most villagers applauded the outcome, but Zhou Zhaodi, the sisters, and Huang Meili were seething inside.
With Liu Cuilan arrested, there was no one left to meddle in the affairs of Zhou Zhijun and Li Chun Tao, so the two of them could now live a calm and stable life together.
These few people were bitter about it but had no way to change things; they could only grind their teeth in private.
Wang Xiaohong and her brother felt ashamed because of what Liu Cuilan had done. They didn't dare go out during the whole New Year period, not even to visit relatives.
And Wang Jieshi lay in bed, his heart as dead as ashes.
His mother had been arrested, and Zhou Zhijun and Li Chun Tao could now be together peacefully—how could he accept that?
But he was a paralyzed man, unable to do anything. What could he do but swallow his resentment?
Wang Lanhua also heard about Liu Cuilan's matter. In private, she cursed Liu Cuilan for being a fool-mouthed woman, but in front of Li Dazhuang, she placed all the blame squarely on Li Chun Tao.
"If it weren't for Li Chun Tao sneaking around with that Zhou Zhijun, Wang Haichao never would have been arrested! And if Wang Haichao hadn't been arrested, none of this would have happened at home!"
Li Dazhuang knew Wang Lanhua was furious and didn't dare argue with her. He could only say in a low voice, "It's already over and done with. There's no use dwelling on it. You should try to let it go."
"Let it go? All because of your shameless sister—easy for you to say!
"She ruined our family and drove us to ruin! You're just saying that because it's not your pain!"
Li Dazhuang saw her getting angry and shut his mouth, not daring to say another word.
He looked up at the child in Wang Lanhua's arms, and his gaze inadvertently fell on the silver ring she was wearing on her hand.
That ring was given to him by his grandmother on her deathbed, who had told him to give it to Chun Tao, saying it was a keepsake left by Chun Tao's birth mother.
His grandmother had also wanted to tell him who Chun Tao's birth mother was, but before she could say the words, she breathed her last.
From childhood to adulthood, his grandmother had never revealed a single word about it, and no one in the village had ever said Chun Tao wasn't a child of the Li family.
Her dying words left him completely baffled.
His grandmother's body lay at home for three days before being buried in a hasty funeral.
He had planned to bring the ring to Chun Tao after the New Year, but before he could deliver it, Wang Lanhua saw it and snatched it away to wear on her own hand.
"This ring belongs to Chun Tao. Grandma specifically instructed me to give it to her on her deathbed, saying it was left by her birth mother," Li Dazhuang explained.
But Wang Lanhua sneered, rolled her eyes, and said, "Li Dazhuang, Li Dazhuang, you're just a pig with mush for brains!
This ring is obviously the old woman's. She favored that shameless granddaughter of hers, so she made up this story to trick you, and you actually believe it?
I'm telling you, this ring is mine, and that's final! It's a piece of the Li family property—why should it go to a married-off daughter like her!"
Li Dazhuang knew in his heart that his grandmother truly doted on Chun Tao, but she doted on her grandson even more, otherwise she wouldn't have had Chun Tao swapped as a bride for him.
So he believed his grandmother's words one hundred percent—this ring was definitely not as simple as Wang Lanhua made it out to be.
But who exactly was Chun Tao's birth mother? In this world, it was probably only his grandmother who knew.
"Lanhua, this kind of thing—how could Grandma just make it up..." Li Dazhuang tried to reason with her again.
Wang Lanhua glared at him, cutting him off harshly, "How do you know she didn't make it up?
Anyway, the ring is in my hand now, so it's mine! Nobody's taking it away!"
