After cursing the heavens one hundred and eighty times, Quynh took thirty-two long, deep breaths. Finally, she was willing to concede a little:
"Fine, I can be your wife, but from now on, without my consent, you are not allowed to touch me! Otherwise, I'll die right in front of you!"
Dai stubbornly shook his head: "No way, no way. If you're my wife, I have to hold you when I sleep."
The two of them were like a game of tug-of-war, one pulling, the other resisting. They went on like this until it was pitch black outside, still without reaching any conclusion.
Finally, Quynh understood: ideals are grand, but reality is harsh. If she didn't face the facts, they would probably be stuck in this deadlock forever!
Originally, Quynh had thought that this big oaf just needed a wife. If he just gave her a year, she would definitely marry a beautiful wife for him.
Yet this male buffalo would rather die than agree to a year without a wife. That stubborn look on his face was the very incarnation of Bao Gong!
After one thousand eight hundred rounds of exchanges and compromises, the two finally reached an agreement: One, they could have marital relations three times a month, but only with Quynh's consent, and for the next half a month, it was off-limits for health reasons. Two, within one year, if Quynh earned sixty quan to get him a wife, he would let her leave and provide her with identification papers.
After the discussion, Quynh, in truth, still wanted to kill someone!
It's just that she knew, with her current abilities, let alone killing someone, even committing suicide would be limited to hanging herself. Drowning herself in the river was not an option!
Why?
She knew how to swim!
She was afraid that if she jumped into the river and didn't drown, it would be even more embarrassing.
Seeing that his goal of keeping his wife had been achieved, Dai said cheerfully: "Wife, let's go eat."
Quynh didn't understand why this big oaf was so happy, but she still had to eat. She couldn't stand being a hungry ghost!
The two went into the kitchen. Dai's house didn't have high-end things like oil lamps; they just burned pine branches gathered from the mountain. When burned, these branches, aside from producing a lot of smoke and dropping embers, were quite bright.
Quynh sat at the rickety table waiting for Dai to serve the rice and food. Seeing that it was pheasant soup again, she couldn't help but grumble:
"How come there aren't any vegetables? We eat meat every meal. I'm not a carnivore. People who don't eat vegetables have to be careful of constipation!"
Hearing her muttering, Dai was stunned. Was there really someone in this world who didn't like to eat meat?
He knew that for families in the village who didn't know how to hunt, it was hard to have meat even three times a month! Why did his little wife only like to eat vegetables?
But seeing Quynh eat her meal with gusto, Dai was very happy. He thought to himself: as long as his wife stayed, three times a month was still three times. It was far better than the twenty-five years he'd lived with zero times!
Moreover, he calculated, as long as he treated his wife well from now on, she wouldn't have the heart to leave him!
Quynh would never have guessed that this seemingly honest oaf could be so cunning. The reason she had backed down this far was that she knew she was completely incapable of swaying this man. What if she truly refused?
The final outcome would be the same as last night: she would be forced by him!
Second, she proposed this condition to control the timing and prevent herself from getting pregnant!
Quynh was not a naive girl. In her past life, she had dated two or three young men, but they had all broken up because she didn't want to have children.
Now, having fallen into this backward world, she heard that countless women of this era died in childbirth. She didn't want to end up in a situation where the mother was sacrificed to save the child.
Third, Quynh was comforting herself: just consider it a change in taste, from young, handsome men to flirting with this old oaf!
After dinner, they took a short walk to aid digestion, and Dai led her to the riverbank to wash up.
When the two returned to the courtyard, they could hear the buzzing of mosquitoes everywhere. Quynh said in annoyance: "What's all the noise? You want to drink my blood, I'll take your life!"
Dai, who was closing the gate, froze. Only then did he realize his wife was afraid of mosquitoes.
"Wife, you sit in the courtyard for a bit. I'll go smoke out the mosquitoes."
Quynh was skeptical: "What are you going to use to smoke them out?"
Dai was puzzled: "With mosquito-repelling grass, of course. Don't you know about mosquito-repelling grass?"
As if!
Why the hell should I know what some damned mosquito-repelling grass is?
Back in her room, if a mosquito flew in, she'd just turn on the air conditioner and let it freeze to death!