Bride Swap Backfire: My Cousin's Rebirth Made Us a Power Couple-Chapter 76 - 48: The Qian Family (3)

Here is the story of Chen Bai marrying into his wife’s family.

It was a story Chen Wanqing had heard from her mother.

The story began with the great drought in Guanzhong, when the entire Chen family fled south for their lives. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Entire clans were escaping at the time, and the Chen family, of course, was no exception.

At the time, Chen Wanqing’s paternal grandmother—Chen Song’s biological mother—was still alive and six months pregnant. In an era when even strong men struggled to survive, it was next to impossible for a pregnant woman to stay alive.

Chen Song’s mother died on the road. She went into premature labor but lacked the strength to deliver, and both she and the baby suffocated and died.

Sometime after, the matriarch, Mrs. Fang, joined them, all alone.

Not much was said of Mrs. Fang’s origins; she was just another pitiful soul, traded for grain by her parents only to be abandoned again.

At the time, Chen Song’s grandmother took pity on her son. He was an honest man, now a widower with a child, and she feared he would have trouble finding a new wife. So, she simply let Mrs. Fang stay with them.

Mrs. Fang was shrewd; she ate what she was given and endured when there was nothing, never causing trouble.

After another month of travel, they reached Qingshui County.

The imperial court was conducting large-scale disaster relief there, and all refugees were registered and assigned to villages and towns surrounding the county seat.

Mrs. Fang thus settled down with the Chen family and started a life with Chen Dachang.

But this peace was short-lived. Mrs. Fang’s belly began to swell, and eight months later, she gave birth to a son: Chen Bai.

Given the timing of the birth and the fact that the baby bore no resemblance to anyone in the Chen Family, anyone with eyes could guess the child’s true origins.

Since the child was not a Chen, and Mrs. Fang clearly resented him for it, one can only imagine how bitter his life was.

It could be said that Chen Song and Chen Bai were truly brothers in misery.

Compared to the third brother, Chen Lin, who was cherished and doted on, these two were like weeds in a field, left to be battered by the elements, their lives growing more difficult by the day.

After Chen Song happened to save Xu Su Ying and subsequently married her, Chen Bai went into town one day. When he returned, he announced his intention to marry into his future wife’s family.

Chen Dachang and Mrs. Fang were indifferent, and the rest of the Chen family paid it no mind. At most, they would mutter in private, ’What a spineless man. It would have been better to ’snatch’ a wife and bring her home like Dasong did, rather than marry out and live at the mercy of his in-laws.’

But regardless of what anyone said, Chen Bai did as he planned.

After marrying into the Qian family, he rarely returned to the Zhao Village except for Chen Dachang’s and Mrs. Fang’s birthdays. Even during festivals, he would usually just have someone deliver gifts. This saved him from the people at the old residence, who would greet him with snide, passive-aggressive remarks, treating him like a married-off daughter dutifully returning to her maiden home.

But enough of the past. Chen Wanqing spotted Qian Yuzhu and waved happily, motioning for her to come behind the counter.

"What brings you here? Second Aunt is still in her postpartum confinement. Don’t you need to be there attending to her?"

"My maternal grandmother is there. She said I was clumsy and all thumbs, so she told me to come find you, Qing’er. When she was selling grain, she saw you and De’an come into town. She also said she saw a tall, thin young man walking with you and figured he must be my future brother-in-law."

While Chen Bai’s early life had been full of misfortune, his circumstances improved visibly after he started his own family.

Although he had technically married into their family, the Qian Family were decent people, and the family’s matriarch, in particular, was quite shrewd.

She reasoned that if Chen Bai truly entered as a live-in son-in-law, people would always look down on him. ’He might not resent it at first,’ she thought, ’but who knows if, over time, this wouldn’t plant the seeds of future conflict?’

Besides, her family had always struggled to produce heirs and had a long-standing tradition of taking in sons-in-law. Over the generations, some ancestors had become influential and changed the family name back to their own. After so many changes, no one was even sure whose name "Qian" originally was. Therefore, it didn’t matter what surname the children took; as long as the family was close and happy, that was all that mattered.

One can only imagine how shocked and moved Chen Bai was to hear this. From that day forward, he treated his elderly in-laws as his own parents.

Chen Lin couldn’t stand to see his second brother’s life going so well and frequently slandered him in front of the old matriarch, Mrs. Fang.

One day, he would claim his second brother had snuck off to the opera behind his father-in-law’s back. The next, he’d say his brother was seen pushing his mother-in-law through the streets to the market. The day after, it would be that his brother was wiping filth from his in-laws, calling them ’Mom’ and ’Dad’ as if they were his own flesh and blood.

He painted a picture of Chen Bai as a weak, incompetent, and cowardly man who was ungrateful and would do anything for personal gain. This thoroughly disgusted the old matriarch.

The next time Chen Bai came to visit, the old matriarch threw the pastries he brought to the ground. In front of all the neighbors, she stood with her hands on her hips, pointed at his nose, and screamed, "Since you’re their live-in son-in-law, stop running back to my house day after day! My humble temple can’t house a great Buddha like you! Your noble feet should stay off my lowly ground!"

She went on ranting, "Raising a dog would have been better than raising you! You’re a true disgrace to our ancestors! When I die, don’t you dare mourn for me—I’m afraid your presence would just anger me back to life! You’re a reincarnated demon, and you deserve to die without a single heir!"