Eleven-year-old Meng Xiaoqu regretted one thing more than anything: letting his heart soften for a moment and telling Shi Wang, a refugee fleeing famine, that his family needed a hired hand.
Once Shi Wang came to live with them, Meng Xiaoqu realized he was a fearsome fellow. At only fifteen, he could beat men in their twenties until they begged for mercy.
The villagers all said that Shi Wang was young, yet his eyes and brows already brimmed with menace. Who knew what he'd done before? The Meng family had invited trouble into their home.
Meng Xiaoqu was frightened too. He worried that one day Shi Wang's fists would land on him, so he always tried to keep out of his way.
But what he feared never came to pass. Instead, Shi Wang taught a lesson to the people who bullied Meng Xiaoqu.
Meng Xiaoqu watched as those who had always picked on him turned as meek as quails in Shi Wang's presence. His fear soon gave way to admiration.
From then on, he was always running after Shi Wang. With Shi Wang around, nobody bullied him, and he got to eat roast chicken and wild rabbit.
The villagers teased him, asking whether Shi Wang was the family's hired hand or the son-in-law they'd brought home for him.
Eleven-year-old Meng Xiaoqu had only a vague idea of what a live-in son-in-law was, but he knew the villagers were making fun of him.
Tears of wounded indignation in his eyes, he glared at them and said, "That's not true!"
Years later, Meng Xiaoqu's father died unexpectedly, and the Meng family began to decline.
Meng Xiaoqu became a piece of meat surrounded by hungry wolves, with everyone eager to take a bite.
Shi Wang stood in front of him and drove them all away. Remembering the villagers' old joke, Meng Xiaoqu wiped his tears and asked, "Shi Wang, would you be my live-in son-in-law?"
**
A great drought left the fields barren and took countless lives, including those of Shi Wang's family.
He held fast to his mother's dying wish: to live well. On the road as he fled the famine, he fought others for food and struggled to survive, and by sheer luck made it through a world where the strong preyed on the weak. Traveling south, he arrived at Liutang Village.
Just as he was curled up in a corner, so hungry he could barely stand, a delicate little boy sized him up for a while, then gave him the sugar cake in his hand and showed him a way to survive.
The boy was like every other child: troublesome, fickle, and prone to tears. Shi Wang couldn't make sense of what was going on in his head. A few teasing remarks from others were enough to make him start avoiding Shi Wang again. But rumors could be damaging, and as a hired hand in the Meng household, Shi Wang really shouldn't get too close to his master's family.
Years later, seventeen-year-old Meng Xiaoqu tearfully asked Shi Wang to be his live-in son-in-law. Only then did Shi Wang realize that the child from back then had grown up without him noticing.
A tearful but resilient shou x a cold but fiercely protective gong
PS: Their romance begins when the shou is seventeen and the gong is twenty-one. Before then, neither harbors any inappropriate feelings.
Theme: Hard work brings prosperity.
