Chapter 124: Powerless Rage

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She was someone praised by the capital. How could the educated youths not support her as team leader?

To refuse Xu Lin would be tantamount to showing disrespect to the capital, to slapping the capital in the face. Surely no educated youth with even a shred of common sense would do such a thing.

But Du Yong was already twenty-seven. He was no longer young, and he did not want to remain in the countryside farming forever. He wanted to return to the city.

Why? Why couldn’t Tu Hai and the others have arrived one day later?

If only they had come a day later, the team leader would already have been elected!

Du Yong was consumed by resentment, his heart erupting in a helpless rage.

Qin Zonghan was similarly furious in his powerlessness. He truly wished that this day had never come. Why had it come at all?

After completing his training assignment, Qin Zonghan went happily to report to his superior.

What awaited him was not praise, however, but a furious torrent of criticism.

The scolding left Qin Zonghan questioning his entire life. He wished time could turn back; he wished he possessed some supernatural power that could erase this moment.

“Qin Zonghan, I always thought you were a good comrade. I never imagined—never imagined you would…”

The superior pointed at Qin Zonghan, his hands trembling with anger. He truly had never expected Qin Zonghan to curse a young girl with such venom.

To threaten a young girl!

And that girl was the biological daughter their family had lost—the younger sister of Qin Zonghan himself.

She was also the younger sister with whom the Qin family had severed ties, whom they had refused to acknowledge even if beaten to death.

Not only had Qin Zonghan shown no affection or remorse toward his own sister, he had actually demanded that she take care of his adoptive sister.

What gave him the nerve to make such an unreasonable demand?

Had the Qin family raised her for even a single day? Had they ever once stood up for her or done her a favor?

And they even had the gall to promise that she could return to the Qin family afterward as their adopted daughter. Ha! Was the Qin family passing down an imperial throne to her?

If they did not love her, if they had chosen to sever their relationship, then they should have cut ties cleanly. Why write letters to curse and threaten her?

It was as though there were no laws anymore.

Unlike Xu Lin, who was receiving praise, Qin Zonghan was being cursed until he was thoroughly humiliated, with no face left to show the world.

As he stared at the photograph of the letter he had written, which had been mailed back to him, Qin Zonghan’s face shifted between livid purple and deathly blue.

He truly had not expected Xu Lin’s counterattack to be so fierce.

When he had written the letter, he had imagined the worst possible outcome would be Xu Lin ignoring it.

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But this—

“Do you know that the letter you wrote has already spread throughout the camp? Everyone is praising you, Qin Zonghan, as such a wonderful big brother!

“But are you really a wonderful big brother, Qin Zonghan?”

The superior grew angrier the more he thought about it. He pointed at Qin Zonghan’s nose and berated him for more than ten minutes, until his mouth went dry. Only then did he take out the letter Xu Lin had written.

“Look at this. These are Comrade Xu Lin’s demands. She and the Qin family have already signed an agreement severing their relationship, and she has published a declaration in the newspapers.

“So she has no so-called big brother. She hopes you will respect your position, stop claiming kinship where none exists, and stop issuing orders at random. Do you understand?”

The superior patted his own cheek. This letter truly felt like a slap in the face.

The young girl had not used a single harsh word. She had even expressed her demands in a humble, almost pleading tone. Yet his face still burned with shame.

This person had been a soldier he himself had trained.

He was ashamed.

With reddened eyes, Qin Zonghan picked up the letter and newspaper the superior had flung at him. As he read, the whites of his eyes grew bloodshot.

The letter contained no harsh words. It humbly asked the superior to persuade Qin Zonghan to stop writing letters to curse her.

She had already fled to the countryside. There was truly nowhere else for her to hide. She was pitiful, weak, and helpless—truly!

She begged the superior to be kind and help her. She would work hard in the countryside and contribute to the construction of the new rural society.

Look at her. Despite suffering such a great injustice, she had not made a single excessive demand, nor had she asked the superior to punish Qin Zonghan. How sensible she was.

But—

Qin Zonghan understood perfectly well that his future was over. He had been so cruel to his own sister, so utterly incapable of distinguishing right from wrong. He—

Qin Zonghan did not dare think about what came next. The more he thought about it, the colder his heart became. He knew that even if he remained in the army, he no longer had a future there.

He was finished!

Qin Zonghan had no idea how he left the superior’s office. He walked on in a daze until, suddenly, pain shot through his shoulder.

When he turned around, he saw his old rival beaming brightly.

“Brother, not bad. I have high hopes for you. I’m truly envious of your sister. You are absolutely the best big brother in the world—without exception.”

The smile was brilliant, yet Qin Zonghan saw the deep mockery beneath it. He forced himself to remain calm and struggled to make his mind work.

He did not know how much his old rival had learned, so he could only put on a show of strength and issue a warning.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I warn you—don’t make reckless accusations without evidence, or else…”

“Heh-heh, don’t worry. I certainly won’t say anything without evidence. I just happened to receive a certain poor girl’s letter asking for help…”

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“I came specifically to advise you. Even though you’ve severed ties, the two of you still came from the same mother’s womb. Don’t bully her too much.”

A letter asking for help?

Qin Zonghan’s head began to buzz. He remembered the superior saying that the letter had spread throughout the camp. Could it be—

“You were the one who spread it, weren’t you?” Qin Zonghan lunged forward and seized the other man by the collar. “You—you’re despicable!”

“Now, now, don’t go pinning that on me. I’m hardly the only one who received the letter. The superior received it. Your colleagues received it. The Publicity Department received it. The Logistics Department received it. Even the Women’s Federation received it.”

His old rival knocked Qin Zonghan’s hand away, grinning obnoxiously.

“You’ll soon be summoned for conversations with the other comrades. I hope you’ll take them seriously, listen to their guidance, and stop making life difficult for a young girl.

“She fled from the capital all the way to the countryside. Surely you don’t intend to drive her into the ground?”

With that, his old rival turned away with a face full of mockery, spat once, muttered that Qin Zonghan was bad luck, and strode off.

Qin Zonghan’s legs went weak. He collapsed onto the ground.

So many departments had received the letter. Even if the superior wanted to protect him, he could not.

Xu Lin. Xu Lin. What a ruthless heart, what vicious methods!

Xu Lin did not hear Qin Zonghan’s roar. Even if she had, she would not have cared.

Holding up her certificate, she smiled brightly as she accepted the congratulations of the educated youths and villagers.

Wang Facai and the old village chief stood among the crowd, sharing in the glory. They had originally thought that, after Hu Changming’s affair, their brigade had no chance of being named an advanced production brigade that year.

Now it seemed that might not be true. Their brigade could still compete for the honor.

Xu Lin’s assigned plot of land became lively after that. Some people came to watch the excitement, some came to help with the work, and others wanted to exchange ration coupons.

There were sugar coupons, cooking-oil coupons, meat coupons, industrial-goods coupons—whatever the type, such coupons were precious to the villagers.

Ordinarily, they had few opportunities to obtain them, especially industrial-goods coupons, which were the rarest of all.

Each person was still allotted three feet of cloth per year through the cloth ration, but industrial-goods coupons were not something just anyone could get.

Families with sons hoping to marry and daughters preparing to wed all wanted to exchange some coupons with Xu Lin.

Seeing so many people eyeing her resources, Xu Lin realized that refusing them one by one would take a great deal of time.

So she turned around and went to find Wang Facai.

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