Divorced woman with child travels through time

"It's over..." Xiao Lingzi cried out in panic. Almost frantically, she squeezed through the crowded throng toward Chen's Teahouse, not even bothering with Xiao Kezi. She was thin, strong, and agile, and she reached Chen's Teahouse in the short time it takes to burn an incense stick.

"Boss! Boss! Something terrible has happened!" Xiao Lingzi shouted desperately. Wang Erniu was talking to a regular customer upstairs when he overheard them. He quickly opened the door and came out, asking, "What's wrong? What happened?"

Xiaolin was so anxious that her eyes were filled with tears. Her lips moved but she couldn't speak. She looked at him anxiously.

Wang Erniu suddenly realized what was happening, braced himself against the railing, used the edge for leverage, and leaped down from the second floor. The diners below cheered, "Wow, Mr. Wang, what amazing skills! Impressive!"

Wang Erniu forced a smile, clasped his hands in a fist and said, "You flatter me, you're too kind!" As he spoke, he immediately walked over to Xiaolingzi and asked in a low voice, "What's wrong?"

Chu Yi and Da Zhuang also noticed something was wrong and looked at her anxiously.

Without saying a word, Xiaolingzi grabbed his hand and whispered as they walked, "Master, we were just walking on the road when a carriage came up behind us and knocked Chen Niangzi unconscious and dragged her into the carriage. We need to hurry, the carriage is still on the road." Xiaolingzi said while crying.

"Let's go!" Wang Erniu didn't hesitate and grabbed the people and rushed out. Chu Yi and Da Zhuang exchanged a glance, and Chu Yi followed. Da Zhuang went back inside and told Wang Hanyang and Hu Chengxin about the situation. The two of them quickly followed.

"That's it!" Xiaoling pointed to the carriage in the distance.

Wang Erniu let go of her hand and quickly squeezed through. When he got there, he lifted the curtain and saw a woman sitting inside with a maid. There was no one else there.

The woman asked in a terrified tone, "What are you doing? Who are you?"

Wang Erniu's face was ashen. He didn't say a word, quickly looked around at the decorations inside the carriage, then flipped over the cushions and backrests on the carriage, and then patted the sides of the carriage a few times. The carriage shook violently, shaking out a lot of dust.

"There's no hidden compartment inside!" Wang Erniu went outside again. Under the strange gazes of the coachman and the others, he looked down at the underside of the carriage and patted it again. "Strange, there's no hidden compartment under the carriage either. Where is the person?"

"Who are you? Who are you? What do you want?" The woman angrily emerged and roared at Wang Erniu.

As they were talking, Wang Hanyang led the two of them over.

Wang Erniu suppressed his raging anger and said expressionlessly, "My wife has gone missing. Someone saw her being dragged into this carriage."

The woman was frightened by his fierce expression and took a step back, saying, "I don't know either. Go ask the coachman. This carriage I just rented hasn't even gone far yet." With that, she climbed back into the carriage, not wanting to cause any trouble.

Wang Erniu grabbed a rickshaw driver who was watching the commotion and said, "Tell me, what's going on?"

The coachman pleaded in terror, "Hero, spare my life... Hero, spare my life... I just dropped two men off at the street ahead, and then they left. I didn't know anything about them. As for the woman, I... I didn't know. I was driving the carriage up ahead, and I didn't see her either..."

Chu Yi stared blankly at them. What were they talking about? What happened? What was going on? How could her godmother have suddenly disappeared?

Only Wang Erniu reacted quickly, grabbing the driver by the collar and asking, "Then tell me, where did you put those two just now?"

"Look, it's just ahead." The coachman pointed ahead. Looking around, it was just a little bit in front of the rouge shop, and across the street was Zhong's Grain Shop.

Wang Erniu released the driver and rushed straight into the grain shop. This shop was too suspicious; they hadn't found a reason to buy sugar cane back then, and they were wondering why.

"Call your boss out?" Wang Erniu walked up and called out to the waiter inside.

The waiter lifted his eyelids, glanced at Lazy Sheep, and said, "Our boss isn't here!" Wang Erniu then led several big men straight in, checking everything—jars, cabinets, opening each room one by one.

"Hey, what are you doing?" the waiter shouted, seemingly trying to stop them, but he didn't actually make a move to stop them.

"We're looking for someone, where's your boss?" Wang Hanyang said fiercely, clearly not someone to be trifled with.

"I don't know, I just started working here, and the boss went out." The worker looked completely innocent.

"How long have you been gone?" Wang Hanyang pressed.

"I don't know, he's the boss, how can I tell him what to do? Anyway, there's no one here when I come here." The waiter still answered innocently, which made Wang Hanyang so angry that he almost fell over backward.

The group searched the grain shop inside and out several times, but couldn't find anything. The shop assistant stood by and watched, seemingly unconcerned, letting them search as they pleased.

"Second Brother, what do we do now?" Wang Hanyang asked anxiously to Wang Erniu, whose face was ashen.

"Let's go back first." Wang Erniu led his men out of the shop. Once outside, he whispered to Wang Hanyang, "Find a place to keep an eye on this place and see if anything unusual happens. If the boss comes over, send someone to notify me."

"Okay!" Wang Hanyang replied and left.

Wang Erniu instructed Chu Yi to take Xiao Lingzi back and look for Xiao Ke while he was at it. Then he turned around and rode his horse to Linxia County.

At Zui Xiang Lou, Wang Erniu didn't need to announce his arrival; he rushed up to the third floor in a few strides. Qi Laoda was in his study looking at the account books. Seeing him, he looked surprised, "Second Brother, what's wrong?"

Without wasting words, Wang Erniu went straight to the point, "Your sister-in-law has been kidnapped. Can you help me see what kind of dirty tricks have been going on lately? Is there anything targeting our Chen's restaurant?"

Boss Qi nodded. "Okay, I'll get back to you in an hour."

"Okay, brother, thanks a lot!" Wang Erniu patted him on the shoulder.

"Second Brother, you're too kind. As brothers, we don't need to say that," Qi Laoda said with a smile.

"Alright, I'll be going then." Wang Erniu turned and left, returning to Chen's shop. Sitting in his room, he kept thinking about what had happened. Without a doubt, it was Zhong's people who had kidnapped her. The main question now was, where exactly were they hiding Chen Wenfang? They had already searched everything in the open, so they could only look for her secretly.

Downstairs, Lü Xiong and Li Xiaoguang had already returned with the children. As soon as Chen Xuanyu got back, he took his things upstairs to show off to his mother, "Mom! Mom... I brought you hazelnut cake. It's a new dessert, you've definitely never tried it before..."

As soon as he opened the door, he saw Wang Erniu sitting at the table with a gloomy expression, seemingly lost in thought. He asked curiously, "Dad, where's Mom?"

Wang Erniu forced a smile and said, "Your mother went to visit some neighbors. You go back to Wangjiazhuang with Uncle Xiaoguang and the others. Tell Sister-in-law Nie to prepare dinner, and I'll bring your mother back for dinner later."

"Okay, okay." Chen Xuanyu, without suspecting anything, happily ran downstairs again.