Chapter 4Grandma's Soup for the Villain's Soul

If I hadn't known the original plot, I would have really believed his nonsense.

I was still planning how to go to Caleb's house to investigate.

Who knew something would happen that night.

Not long after Caleb returned from my place, his mother held a knife, wanting to die with him.

The woman's shrill screams echoed in the late night, drawing everyone out with lanterns.

I hurried over too and saw the emaciated woman holding a rusty kitchen knife in the ice and snow.

Her hair was disheveled, eyes sunken, but burning with terrifying madness.

She slapped Caleb hard while cursing heartbreakingly.

"You went to copy books for others again! I said no, don't you understand!"

"Righteousness is often found in dog butchers; scholars are the most heartless!"

"If you want to be like your heartless father, why don't you die with me right now!"

The boy knelt straight in the snow, neither blocking nor dodging, letting her slaps fall on him.

As if even if that knife fell, he would willingly accept it.

I always thought he was physically weak and couldn't fight back, so he submitted.

Now I finally knew, it wasn't that he couldn't, but that he wouldn't.

I could see that this woman was terminally ill.

She wouldn't live long.

After she died, Caleb would still take the path of the imperial examination.

But he was not as heartless as his biological father. Instead, his infatuation with the female lead was frightening.

Perhaps his paranoia was also due to his mother.

I suddenly took a deep breath of cold air, pushed through the crowd, and stepped forward.

Under everyone's astonished gaze, I raised my hand and gave this crazy woman a solid slap.

"That's enough. If you want to die, die yourself. Don't drag your son."

"The grace of birth is not as great as the grace of raising. Caleb didn't beg you to give birth to him, and you have no right to control his life and death."

Caleb's mother was even frailer than Caleb. I slapped her, and she staggered two steps.

The kitchen knife in her hand also fell with a clang.

It was Caleb who seemed to be struck by lightning, instantly coming to his senses.

He lunged forward to hug his mother, looking up at me pleadingly, his eyes full of tears.

"Granny, don't hit my mom."

"She's not a bad person. She's just sick; her mind isn't clear."

"It's all my fault. I made her angry, that's why she's like this."

I looked calmly at the mother and son in the snow, and my previous doubts were answered.

I suddenly let out an untimely laugh.

"Caleb, oh Caleb, there should be a place for you in the Twenty-Four Filial Exemplars."

He didn't understand what I meant, looking blank, just hugging his mother tightly.

Small, pitiful, and helpless.

Neighbors pointed at them, with pity and ridicule.

I picked up the mother and son, one in each hand.

Surprisingly light, as if lifting two shells hollowed out by suffering.

"Let's talk inside. No need to let others see the joke."

Then I said to the crowd:

"Everyone go back. I'll watch over these two tonight. I guarantee no one will die, and we won't disturb you."