She won't clear her name; she'll throw away all the scum.

The room was stuffy and hot, and all I could hear were indistinct, babbling voices.

Grandma Xia woke up with a frown and saw her husband, who had been dead for a long time, sitting at the foot of the bed smoking.

She felt a sharp pain in her head, and her face also felt a burning sensation.

When Old Chen saw that she was awake, he stood up and said, "It's good that you're awake. You're a grandmother now, why are you still arguing with the younger generation?"

"Wenying didn't do it on purpose. I'll have her come and apologize to you, and then we'll let it go."

Grandma Xia was still confused and stared blankly as Old Chen went out.

A moment later, she saw her eldest daughter-in-law walk in reluctantly, frowning, as if it were all her fault.

Grandma Xia blinked, then remembered what time it was.

In her past life, because she transferred her job to her second son, her eldest daughter-in-law, Zhu Wenying, felt that her family was being taken advantage of and argued with her.

Zhu Wenying felt that they were the eldest children, and according to the current social trend, the eldest children would be responsible for taking care of the two elders in their old age. Why should the second children's family get a job for nothing?

At the time, she felt that she should give the job to the second son first, since it didn't look good for a grown man to be earning temporary wages. Besides, she had already privately compensated the eldest son for this matter, and everything was made clear at the time, so why was he unhappy now?

As a result, Zhu Wenying got so angry that she slapped herself, and she fainted on the spot from the slap.

Afterwards, Old Chen made his eldest daughter-in-law give a perfunctory apology, and then, as if to compensate her, made her do chores for her in-laws.

At that time, the Zhu family had just married the deputy factory director's daughter and were busy preparing for the wedding. Zhu Wenying couldn't bear to see her own mother overworked, so she pushed her mother-in-law out of the way.

Xia Yue'e was considered a capable person in this compound; everyone knew she was fierce. But for some reason, she was like a slave in front of her family, bowing and scraping, always ready to do whatever they asked. She agreed without daring to utter a word, and after two months of hard and tiring work at the Zhu family's house, she was still criticized by her mother-in-law for not being efficient enough.

Why doesn't she realize that since she arrived, she's been doing all the dirty and tiring work for the entire Zhu family? Those lazy old women in the Zhu family are all waiting for her to serve them like mistresses. How could she possibly manage all that?

After two months of hardship, she lost a lot of weight. When she returned, she was even verbally abused by her eldest daughter-in-law.

Thinking of this, Xia Yue'e smiled bitterly, wondering how she had been so easily bewitched back then. She was clear-headed and unafraid to curse when facing strangers, and she was also quite formidable when fighting those old women. How could she have been so completely manipulated by these bloodsuckers?

In this day and age, a daughter-in-law who hits her mother-in-law will be condemned. After Zhu Wenying calmed down after hitting her, she was a little flustered, but when she thought about her mother-in-law's previous behavior, she felt that it shouldn't be a big deal. Besides, she wasn't being unreasonable. It was obvious that the old woman was biased. How could she be blamed? She was the victim.

With this thought in mind, she felt more confident, and a hint of resentment appeared on her face.

"Mom, I'm sorry." Zhu Hongying's eyes darted around, her voice still carrying a hint of grievance.

"Mom, it's not Wenying's fault. Your job can sell for a thousand yuan, and you gave it to the second son, so I'm at a disadvantage. You only gave us two hundred yuan, why should we? I'm the eldest son." Chen Xiangdong pulled his wife behind him and looked at his mother reproachfully.

"Brother, how can you say that? It makes it sound like I got a huge advantage. When you married your sister-in-law, Mom gave you three watches and a radio plus a dowry of two hundred yuan. When I got married, Mom only gave me one hundred yuan. And over the years, the money Mom has secretly given you must be more than a thousand yuan, I know of!" Chen Xiangnan said indignantly. He felt he had been taken advantage of. Why did his brother get married so extravagantly, while he, his own son, only received one hundred yuan?

Chen Xiangdong visibly felt guilty, and opened his mouth but couldn't say a word.

Zhu Wenying immediately straightened her back and pointed at Chen Xiangnan, "Second brother, don't blame your sister-in-law for speaking harshly. After I received the betrothal gifts and other items, I left my family with only one hundred yuan. I brought the rest back with me. My family also gave me several quilts as part of my dowry. That's quite a lot of money, isn't it?"

"Take another look at your wife, what did she bring back?"

When Chen Xiangnan thought of his unlucky wife's family, he looked down on them even more. Even if everyone preferred sons to daughters at this time, there was no such thing as marrying into a family without a dowry and wearing tattered clothes, right?

"What about the subsidies your parents secretly give you?" Chen Xiangnan hadn't forgotten about that.

"Your parents must have been subsidizing you quite a bit behind the scenes, why aren't you saying that?"

Seeing that the group was arguing, if it were in her previous life, Xia Yue'e would have told them to stop arguing long ago, and she wouldn't have blamed Zhu Wenying for hitting her. Then Old Chen would have stepped in to be the good guy, and in the end, he would have suffered a loss himself, and the family would have remained peaceful on the surface.

But now, Xia Yue'e watched them argue as if it were a show. It turned out that by this time, the children in the family had already stopped respecting her. They weren't even dead yet, and they were already eyeing what she had.

They argued right in front of everyone, completely disregarding the presence of their elders. How come I never noticed this in my past life? These children didn't change after the family split up; their personalities had already gone astray long ago.

She was still thinking of being filial to them, hoping not to drive them to their deaths. Xia Yue'e felt a chill as she recalled that in her past life, she had been driven to her death, hadn't she?

Old Chen waited for a long time but didn't hear Xia's voice. He gestured to her with his eyes, but she seemed lost in thought, sometimes pouting and sometimes smiling, completely ignoring him.

Is she out of her mind?

Old Chen was startled. This wouldn't do; if she went mad, the house would be in chaos. He dared not wait any longer and spoke up to stop the farce.

"Alright, what kind of family is this, arguing like this? Shut up, can't you see your mother is still sick?" Old Chen said angrily, his face stern.

They stopped and all looked at Old Lady Xia on the bed.

Grandma Xia gave a self-deprecating laugh, continued to lie there, and remained silent.

Old Chen was exhausted. They used to be so in sync, so why was she like this today? It couldn't be that the children had broken her heart, could it?

However, it's not impossible. After all, it's unheard of for a daughter-in-law to hit her mother-in-law. Even if his wife has the best temper and doesn't hold grudges, she would still have some resentment in her heart.

So, Old Chen pretended to criticize his eldest daughter-in-law, but as the father-in-law, he couldn't say much. Seeing that Old Mrs. Xia had turned around, he assumed she had come to her senses as before, and immediately made the decision:

"The second son's job will remain the same, but since the eldest son's family feels they've been taken advantage of, I'll make the decision to have your mother help out your in-laws' mother. Your in-laws' mother is sick, and your family has a happy occasion coming up, so she's too busy to handle everything. Once your mother has found a job and is staying home with nothing to do, she can go and help out."