The Sweetness of the Seventies-Chapter 57 - Don’t be a Scapegoat_1
Chapter 57: Chapter 57: Don’t be a Scapegoat_1
Chapter 57 -57: Don’t be a Scapegoat_1
Third Grandma Qi was eating her meal while pondering whether or not to remind He Tiantian.
Now that Tiantian was living at her place, it hadn’t been long.
Would she annoy Tiantian if she talked too much?
But if she didn’t say anything, Third Grandma Qi was worried that Tiantian, being young and not quite understanding the ways of the world, might get taken advantage of in the future.
She felt deeply conflicted.
When Tiantian saw that Grandma Qi was only picking long beans and leaving the rabbit meat for her.
Tiantian felt touched and personally picked a piece of wild rabbit meat for Grandma Qi, smiling and saying, “Grandma Qi, eat some meat!”
Looking at the boneless piece of wild rabbit meat in her bowl, Third Grandma Qi bit down with the few remaining teeth in her mouth and decided to take the plunge.
Instead of eating the meat, she looked up at Tiantian and said, “Girl Tian, Liang Hongyu came to see you for sure to ask you to help look after those people who were sent down.
You are a kind child, willing to help as soon as someone asks or look pitiful.
There’s nothing wrong with it, but you need to be careful, if something happens, you will be the scapegoat!”
Tiantian stared blankly, blinking her eyes.
Grandma Qi’s words made a lot of sense.
At this time, getting too close to the workers sent down was very dangerous.
Now she was on Village Chief Qi’s side, but if something gets exposed, or if she is caught red-handed, would Village Chief Qi come forward to help her?
But now Village Chief Qi couldn’t even ensure his own safety, so how could he help her?
Tiantian’s face turned pale as she realized that, without knowing it, she had already landed herself in a very dangerous situation.
The benefits of being reborn made her think she had the upper hand, but as she changed things around her, some new circumstances different from her previous life followed suit.
The people were still those from her past life, but the situations were no longer the same.
“Then…
then what should I do from now on?” Tiantian asked with a troubled look, “If I…
if I don’t do what Aunt Liang or Village Chief Qi tell me to, I’ll have offended them, and I won’t have good days in Qijia Village.”
Third Grandma Qi looked at the flustered Tiantian and sighed as she consoled, “Girl Tian, I’m not trying to scare you, but to make you aware.
Just because someone is nice to you now, doesn’t mean they’ll always be nice to you.
When you’re on your own out there, think more about the consequences of what you do.
You can help those people, but don’t do it frequently and never in front of others.
As the old saying goes, a favor for a cup of rice can turn into a grudge over a sack.
Right now, you’re going out of your way to help those people, but the moment you have difficulties and can’t help anymore, those people will still hold a grudge against you.
If you help only occasionally, they’ll see it as a lifeline in their moment of need, and they’ll be grateful to you.”
“Grandma Qi, I’ll remember that.” said Tiantian, realizing she had overlooked a lot of details.
Without Grandma Qi’s advice, she might never have noticed!
“Remembering is good,” Grandma Qi said.
“As long as we’re not starving, let’s not take any risks!”
This was the self-preservation experience that Third Grandma Qi had accumulated over her lifetime!
“Yes, what Grandma Qi said makes sense,” Tiantian agreed.
From now on, she could secretly help those people, but definitely not so overtly.
At the same time, Tiantian also remembered that her relationship with Village Chief Qi and Liang Hongyu was one of using and being used.
The balance in this relationship needed to be just right—not too distant, but not too close either.
At least for now, that’s how things had to be.
As for the future, that would depend on how Village Chief Qi and Liang Hongyu acted.
If they were genuinely kind to her, Tiantian would treat them in kind.
Thanks to Third Grandma Qi’s reminder, Tiantian became much more cautious in her daily actions.
Old Man Bai, Professor Gu, and others noticed but assumed it was just Tiantian being careful and cautious.
The crops had already been brought to the threshing ground, and aside from Old Man Qi and Old Man Bai who stayed at the livestock team, everyone else went to the threshing ground to help.
Everybody was busy, competing against time!
On the side of the threshing ground, a few small wooden huts had been constructed with wooden beds and other materials to house the guards.
There were only four oxen in the livestock team, all of which had been brought over to trample the field.
Without enough animals, human strength had to be used.
Four people pulled a large stone roller across the field to strip the grains from the rice.
The only tractor in the village powered the threshing machine, with several people standing behind it, covering their mouths and noses with towels, threshing the rice bundles in their hands.
The village children were chased by adults to pick up rice ears in the field, and whatever they picked up belonged to their own families.
If lucky, one could gather a few pounds of grain in a day.
The elderly were stripping and rubbing corn on another part of the threshing ground, with not a single idle person in the entire village.
Even the old dog belonging to the production team spent these days running into the fields to catch rabbits and mice.
During the busy farming period, everyone ate in the canteen so that no one had to cook at home, all to save time.
He Tiantian and a few young people from the city were assigned to the grain drying group. freewёbnoνel.com
Their main duty was to spread and dry the clean grain delivered by the winnowing group, turning it over with wooden shovels every half hour to speed up the drying process.
Jingli and Lin Xiaoru were in one group, while He Tiantian and Ye Xiaofan were in another.
“So hot, I’m dying from this heat!” Lin Xiaoru kept grumbling as she hurried over to the shade of a tree.
Huang Jingli followed closely and, upon reaching the tree, drank water in big gulps, though she didn’t complain about the heat continuously like Lin Xiaoru did.
Ye Xiaofan rolled her eyes, thinking about how carelessly Lin Xiaoru and Huang Jingli worked; the grain on the field was uneven, with inconsistent thickness.
To cover the entire threshing ground, it would likely take more than an hour, but those two managed to finish in less than fifty minutes.
He Tiantian didn’t speak; she knew that Lin Xiaoru and Huang Jingli were just like that – always trying to cut corners when working.
No use talking about it.
They would act the same way later, so He Tiantian and Ye Xiaofan didn’t say anything now, no longer bothered by those two.
“Sister Xiaofan, let’s get started,” He Tiantian said, donning her straw hat, wrapping a towel around her face, and putting on gloves, fully geared up to work under the sun.
“Coming,” Ye Xiaofan, who was dressed similarly to He Tiantian, was tightly covered, not wanting the sun to damage her skin.
He Tiantian and Ye Xiaofan both worked diligently, re-flattening the areas Lin Xiaoru and Huang Jingli had unevenly spread.
They made sure it was not too thin or too thick and took one hour and ten minutes to cover the entire large field, which showed just how sloppy Lin Xiaoru and Huang Jingli were in their work.
The grains were sorted into different areas according to the order in which they were threshed, and once dry, they could be bagged and stored in the grain silo in the evening.
When it was time for He Tiantian and Ye Xiaofan to rest, it was Huang Jingli’s and Lin Xiaoru’s turn to work.
They rotated like this, the work not too arduous, and Tiantian was able to handle it.
“These two really are a perfect match in their laziness,” Ye Xiaofan said contemptuously, “Tiantian, you don’t live at the lodging site, so you don’t know them like I do.
I’m not trying to speak ill of them, but they are just too much.
They never do any housework or cooking at the lodging site, nor do they clean their own room.
When it comes to working outside, they’re always looking for ways to slack off.
Whoever ends up in their group is certainly unlucky.”
