It was 9 AM in the morning. Ye Zhiqiang arrived at the tea house on time, bringing only two men with him. On Shu Yan's side, she had with her Shu Jianyang and also two others.

The purpose of today was to negotiate, not to fight.

"Yanyan. We are, after all, a married couple. And we have two children together. Is this really necessary?" Ye Zhiqiang said as he looked at the divorce papers that Shu Yan had drafted up, leaving him with absolutely nothing.

"Ye Zhiqiang, you want to talk about being a married couple? Why didn't you mention that when you were forcing me to have a divorce? And didn't you send someone after me yesterday? If I wasn't cautious enough, would I be sitting here right now? What leg do you have to stand on to say such a thing?" Shu Yan let out a sigh. She was so angry at him. "Alright. We all knew what is going on here. You can stop pretending now. Stop with the bullsh*t and just say whether you agree to my terms or not. If you're good with it, sign the papers and we are divorced. If not, I will see you in court and we will let the country decide."

This was the early 90s and a person's personal behavior was very important in the society. Shu Yan had all the evidence that she needed. If they were to go to court, she would definitely win the case.

"You sure you want to go to court? If we go to court, all the photos will become evidence for everybody in court and the jury to see. There's no embarrassing photos of me so I don't really care one way or another," Shu Yan said nonchalantly.

"Shu Yan," Ye Zhiqiang said through gritted teeth. He couldn't figure out how the woman who was dumb like a pig just a few days ago would turn into someone so sharp.

"I'm not deaf," Shu Yan said as she scanned over him, beginning to lose her patience.

Ye Zhiqiang took a deep breath, suppressing his anger, and said, "Just think about it, I am still the father of our two children. When I said I wanted a divorce, I never said I'd leave you penniless, right? This is a little extreme, don't you think?"

"I don't want to be extreme, but you guys had gone too far." Shu Yan sat up straight and stared squarely at Ye Zhiqiang.

From her memories, Ye Zhiqiang started being abusive to the original owner about 6 months ago and wanted to get her to leave on her own accord. When that failed, he started picking on her and beating her. She was beaten six times in two months' time. During that time, Li Jiaojiao would also go to their place periodically and say all sorts of things to insult the original owner and walk all over her. The original owner only committed suicide because she had no other options left.

No matter what kind of a person the original owner was, she was pushed to her death by the two of them. A life, just like that, was gone. No, Shu Yan did not feel that she was being extreme.

Neither one of them would budge, so the conversation could not go on. Ye Zhiqiang left in a huff. He would not be left penniless. Even if they were to go to court, that would take time. That would buy him time to figure something out.

He wanted to drag this out, but Shu Yan didn't. She couldn't keep on living in fear. Even if she could handle it, it wouldn't be fair for the two children.

"What do you have in mind?" Shu Jianyang asked. "I can have someone jump him. He'd be much more amenable after we've broke an arm and a leg."

Shu Yan wasn't sure what to say to that. Her cousin might look tall and handsome, and even seem very gentlemanly and refined when he was just sitting there quietly, but deep down under, he was still a ruthless man. He didn't get to where he is today by being nice.

"Third Brother, there are laws in the society. That's kidnapping, blackmailing, and assault. If he takes it to court, we will be the side in the wrong."

Being a gangster was not mainstream after all. Shu Jianyang had gave it his all in assisting her, Shu Yan, on the other hand, would also like to be able to help him out in some ways.

"Then what are you suggesting?" After the last few days of being with her, Shu Jianyang no longer looked at her as an ignorant village woman. Instead, he truly looked at her as a peer of his.

"Make an example out of them."

"Make an example out of them?" Shu Jianyang squinted his eyes, "You mean using Li Jiaojiao?"

Shu Yan gave him a light smile. Did they think she had forgotten about her? She just hasn't got around to her was all. She thought perhaps if Ye Zhiqiang would cooperate, then they would wait on it. But now that Ye Zhiqiang wasn't willing to cooperate, then Shu Yan would just have to do what she needed to do.

As the female lead's mother, there was a long and detailed background on Li Jiaojiao in the book.

Back in '92, college graduates would be assigned a job upon graduation. Li Jiaojiao attended a middle-of-the-road college but was still able to secure a position – as a finance personnel at a wine factory. In the book, Li Jiaojiao had very good eyes and had them set on the uncultured Ye Zhiqiang from the very beginning. After they got married, she used her wit to get into a government unit. With her good handwriting and writing skills, she was able to become the secretary of some higher up officials. By the time the female lead appeared in the book, Li Jiaojiao was already the head of Education Department. Ye Zhiqiang, meanwhile, also expanded his work tremendously and became one of the largest construction companies in City Xi. The female lead was born with the silver spoon, as the saying goes.

Most readers got the impression that Ye Zhiqiang left his ex-wife first before he got together with Li Jiaojiao. After all, back in those days there were no such thing as a marriage certificate in the villages. All Ye Zhiqiang had to say was "we were young and didn't know any better" and that was that.

Looking back at traditional marriages from the perspective of 2019, they felt very informal. A marriage was not really a marriage without a marriage certificate. That being said, many also didn't think divorce was a big deal either. Plus, the book cleared stated that Ye Zhiqiang gave his ex-wife a house and all the savings they had in the house.

Shu Yan only noticed all the details after she had transmigrated as the original owner. Or perhaps, it was because she was now looking at the entire incident from a whole different perspective. Had she transmigrated and become Li Jiaojiao? Shu Yan shuddered and didn't want to keep on thinking about that hypothetical.

It didn't matter. She transmigrated as Shu Yan, the old wife who was about to be dumped by a heartless scum of man.

All things considered, taking care of Li Jiaojiao was a much easier task. Considering that she didn't want to completely ruin things with Ye Zhiqiang just yet, Shu Yan only picked pictures that only had Ye Zhiqiang's back or side profile. She made three copies of the photos – one set for Li Jiaojiao's school, one for the factory that she worked at, and one back to her old home. She did not elect to use the post office. Everything was delivered by hand.

They were posted on the bulletin board at school, the announcement board at the factory, and Xiao Fei, the one who took the pictures to the village, did not post the pictures on the wall but gave a stack directly to a woman in the village and asked her to pass them onto Li Jiaojiao's parents.

"Holy mother of God!" the woman shrieked when she looked at the pictures. Her voice attracted many who gathered around her, all of them got very excited when they saw the pictures.

Entertainment was rare back in those days. When the villagers had free time, they'd always gathered around and gossip. Any man and woman that walked slightly closer to each other would be rumored that they were having a fling. Once the rumors spread, they sounded as though they were real.

Now, there were pictures right in front of them. These were solid evidence. They might as well have witnessed the actual event themselves!

"Isn't that this college student from the village? Her mom always brags about how amazing she is. She's amazing, alright." A woman poked her head over and said, "Aunt Guihua, don't just horde them all. There's a whole stack, hand some over to me already!"

"Yeah, Aunt Guihua, let the rest of us take a look. We want to see how a college student is different from the rest of us," an innocent-looking young boy said.

The normally stuck-up college student did what now? They may not be able to have her, but they could at least look!

Xiao Fei snuck away while the group was happily looking at the pictures. He still has to head to the neighboring village. Yan-jie said to distribute them to all villages within a 10-mile radius.

Within an hour, everybody knew that the Li's college-graduated daughter was no good. She slept with someone else's husband in the city, got caught red-handed by the wife, and these pictures were even sent back to her hometown.

Li Jiaojiao's grandma passed out when she saw the pictures. Her uncle and aunt were so angry their bodies shook. They both have daughters. With a niece like this, their daughters' reputation would be ruined too. Especially Li Jiaojiao's Big Aunt, they were in the process of arranging a marriage for her daughter. She wasn't sure if that would still happen now that this had happened.

When Li Jiaojiao's parents returned from the mountain, they just felt that everybody was looking and pointing at them. They were a little baffled. Everybody had always been friendly with them as they have a college student in their family. Now, they looked like they wanted nothing to do with them at all.

When they arrived at their front door, they just saw a sea of people blocking the entrance. Their hearts sank. What had happened at home?

Looking at the photos, Mother Li passed out immediately. After much hustle-and-bustle, she woke up, but sat on the ground, smacked her own thighs, and bawled, "How am I going to live? How am I going to live...."

Father Li sat to one side, smoking. He wasn't crying, but looked much more upset than Mother LI.

While all these were going on at the Li's, Li Jiaojiao wasn't having it any better either. She just walked into the factory and found everybody pointing and gossiping at her. All her colleagues that she used to hang out with was avoiding her like she was a leper. Wang-jie, who had always been nice to her, looked at her with grave disappointment.

"Wang-jie, what happened?" Li Jiaojiao's heart was pounding. She felt that something terrible was about to happen.

"Jiaojiao, you? Aye!" Wang-jie's face was beet red but was too embarrassed to bring up the subject.

"Li Jiaojiao, the director wanted to speak to you." Another girl, who had started here at the same as Li Jiaojiao, said. There had always been a tension between the two of them. As soon as she saw the pictures this morning, she snuck some of them to the factory director right away.

Seeing the pictures, Li Jiaojiao felt that all her blood had frozen, and she collapsed onto the floor.

"As you can see, we can't possibly keep you after something like this had happened," the factory director said meaningfully. "You've been to college. It wasn't easy for your family to put your through school. And you turned around and did something like this? You should go home and do some self-reflection."

Li Jiaojiao's whole body was icy cold. It's over. It's all over. Her reputation ruined. Her job gone.

When Ye Zhiqiang came back from his work site and saw Li Jiaojiao sitting there listlessly, he asked, concerned, "What is going on? Are you feeling alright?"

"Qiang-ge, my job is gone." Li Jiaojiao moved her head slightly and looked at Ye Zhiqiang like a drowning woman looking at straw.

"So what if you've lost your job? Are you worried that I can't feed you?" Ye Zhiqiang asked, unconcerned.

That $300 a month wasn't even enough for her to buy herself a dress. She might as well just stay home and give him a light-colored, chubby, and smart son.

Li Jiaojiao covered up her face and cried, "Our pictures were leaked, and everybody at the factory had seem them. My school too. What am I going to do? I want to die!"

Ye Zhiqiang stood up abruptly. His eyes were blood-shot, and he said, "I need to have a talk with her."