Courtyard House: The Frog Boy Brings Back a Genetic Potion at the Start

How could Madam Jia be afraid of her appearance? She immediately let out a cold laugh through her nostrils.

"What are you glaring at me for? You old codger, what are you still complaining about? I advise you to be smart and behave yourself! Otherwise—"

She drew out her words, a shrewd glint in her eyes, "Don't blame me for being ruthless and tearing your pockets dry!"

The deaf old woman was so angry that she trembled all over and almost lunged at him.

Yi Zhonghai quickly and secretly grabbed her sleeve, afraid that something else would go wrong at this critical juncture and turn what could have been discussed into a deadlock.

"Sister-in-law Jia,"

He stepped forward and stood between the two men, saying, "The police told us to negotiate a private settlement with you."

Just name your price. As long as it's reasonable, we'll definitely agree to it if we can.

He deliberately emphasized that it was "reasonable".

He emphasized the four characters and stared intently at Jia Zhangshi.

Her behavior just now had already made Yi Zhonghai wary—if this woman took the opportunity to make exorbitant demands, things would become difficult.

Jia Zhangshi curled her lip; she saw right through Yi Zhonghai's intentions.

But the situation is different now.

She didn't respond to Yi Zhonghai's words at all; her eyes remained fixed on the deaf old woman's face like nails.

Jia Zhangshi immediately raised her hand to show a number.

Before she could even speak, Sha Zhu, standing beside her, blurted out with a grin, "Fifty yuan, right? Okay, Aunt Jia, that's a pretty reasonable price. We'll pay for it!"

He was even secretly pleased, thinking that Jia Zhangshi was reasonable after all. He had originally thought that he would have to pay a hundred or two hundred, but now he only had to pay fifty, which was a real bargain.

Yi Zhonghai and the old lady listened from the side, their tense expressions relaxing slightly—fifty yuan was indeed an acceptable amount.

Even though Jia Zhangshi's attitude remained tough, she was willing to endure the indignation since it would save her a large sum of money.

"Idiot Zhu, did you get your head stuck in a door?"

Madam Jia scoffed, glancing at him sideways with disdain. "Fifty yuan? That's not even enough for the change of money for the medicine these past few days! Do you really think I'm some kind of benevolent saint, or that the Jia family is easy to bully?"

As she spoke, she shoved a stack of hospital bills into Yi Zhonghai's hand. "From admission to discharge, all medical expenses, room and board costs—not a penny less—you'll cover it all!"

Yi Zhonghai looked down at the receipts and silently calculated that they probably added up to more than two hundred.

It's no surprise that Jia Dongxu's injuries were severe and the expenses were high.

He frowned, but finally nodded: "Okay, we'll accept the money."

Now…

He reached for his money, but Jia Zhangshi abruptly raised her hand to stop him. "What's the rush? You think this is over?"

She raised her chin, speaking with righteous indignation, "My son suffered this ordeal for nothing, bitten by a snake and barely conscious. Are you suggesting we just let it go?"

Yi Zhonghai's heart sank, and he knew something was wrong.

At the same time, a surge of anger rose in his chest—this woman knew better than anyone how the snake got there, yet she had the nerve to turn around and extort money from him, it was utterly outrageous! He gritted his teeth inwardly, feeling that Jia Dongxu deserved to be bitten, and that the Jia family's current predicament was entirely the retribution for their own misdeeds.

"How much more do you want?"

Yi Zhonghai practically spat out those words through gritted teeth.

"five hundred."

Jia Zhangshi spoke casually, as if she were talking about today's vegetable prices.

"How many?!"

Sha Zhu cried out in surprise, his ears ringing as he thought he had misheard.

Not only him, but the neighbors who were watching the commotion also gasped and exchanged surprised glances.

This amount is an astronomical figure in the eyes of ordinary people—at the current monthly income of about twenty yuan per household, it would take more than twenty years to save five hundred yuan without eating or drinking.

Adding to the five or six hundred they had taken from the old lady, the Jia family had now truly become the richest family in the courtyard.

Even though Jia Dongxu has been frequently going to the hospital lately and spending a lot of money, he still has a solid savings of seven or eight hundred yuan left.

"Good heavens... my entire family couldn't scrape together that much money."

Even Yan Bugui, who was usually very particular about his words, couldn't help but mutter a curse.

He quickly did some mental calculations and realized that his savings were far behind those of this old woman. He was both shocked and heartbroken.

The Jia family's habit of feigning poverty now seems like a pre-arranged performance.

If this kind of situation can be called poverty, Yan Bugui thought to himself with self-deprecation, then he wasn't even "poor".

This word doesn't even deserve to be mentioned.

Xu Damao muttered under his breath, "In the end, this kind of method is still the quickest way to make money."

He just sighed inwardly, realizing he didn't have that kind of luck.

Liu Guangfu clicked his tongue: "They're almost a thousand-yuan household. If the Jia family ever complains about being poor again, I'll be the first to object."

A murmur arose from the crowd of onlookers.

The sudden windfall of such a fortune by the Jia family is hard for anyone to accept.

If the money had come from a legitimate source, others might have just been envious and said a few words, but in everyone's eyes, it was clearly extorted under a pretext—which inevitably made people have other thoughts.

However, Madam Jia was as thick-skinned as a city wall, and she didn't care about the pointing fingers and glances from those around her.

For her, only what she can actually hold in her hands is truly valuable.

"How much did you just say?"

Yi Zhonghai couldn't help but press for answers, his gaze towards Jia Zhangshi almost sparking with anger.

The deaf old woman next to her was so angry that she trembled all over, her chest heaving violently.

She hadn't expected Jia Zhangshi to use this as an excuse, but she hadn't anticipated that the woman would ask for such an exorbitant price.

Although she had some savings over the decades and often ate at the Yi family's house, she couldn't withstand such financial drain.

"Five hundred yuan, not a penny less!"

Jia Zhangshi stood with her hands on her hips, her voice sharp and shrill.

"This is blatant robbery!"

The deaf old woman almost broke into a trembling voice, "I don't have it, and I absolutely won't give it to you!"

Yi Zhonghai suppressed his anger and tried to negotiate: "You're asking for five hundred? Where are we supposed to get that? Give us a real number, and we'll pay for your medical expenses."

Madam Jia didn't even blink, but instead sneered, "There's no room for discussion."

Five hundred plus the cost of medicine, not a penny less.

You think I'm extorting you? Fine, if you don't agree, then Jia Dongxu will be yours to support from now on.

I'm going to spread this story throughout the factory and alleyways, so everyone can see what kind of people you are—or, we can all go to the police station together.

Now I'm asking one last time: should I or shouldn't I? If you don't agree, I'm going to the police station right now. I don't want the money, I just want you to go to jail.

"At worst, we'll all die together!"

She became more and more excited as she spoke, her voice rising to a high pitch, like a wild bird going berserk.

Xu Damao and the others listened with a mixture of shock and interest, and decided to add fuel to the fire by exaggerating the situation.

Yi Zhonghai and his companions were seething with hatred, but they were powerless against these onlookers and could only swallow their frustration.

At this moment, they had no time to care about Xu Damao's affairs.

Of the ten sentences Jia Zhangshi had just uttered, nine were rambling nonsense. Only the sentence "Let them continue to serve their sentences in jail" struck Yi Zhonghai and the other two like a sharp thorn.

The police officer's words couldn't have been clearer: if this matter escalates to the police station, even if a private settlement fails, it will have to be handled officially.

What does it mean to be a public employee? It means you'll really have to wear shackles and spend your years behind those high walls.

They had only spent a few days in the detention center, but the cold and suffocating atmosphere was already unbearable to recall. If they were to actually spend several years in prison... Yi Zhonghai felt his scalp tingle and dared not think any further.

He turned to the deaf old woman, his throat bobbed, and his voice was a little dry: "Grandma, I'll pay for your medical expenses first."

This is the limit of what Yi Zhonghai can do right now.

The recent string of expenses has already emptied his savings of many years.

Even with a generous monthly salary of ninety-nine yuan, I couldn't afford such a constant stream of expenses.

More importantly, his last hope—that Sha Zhu would take care of him in his old age and see him off in his final days—is now shaky and less real.

If even this last resort falls through, then from now on, I'll only be able to rely on my meager savings for my coffin.

Therefore, every penny saved is a penny earned.

The deaf old woman clenched her teeth, her cheeks taut with wrinkles, and after a long while, she nodded heavily: "Fine! But we need a written agreement, clearly stating in black and white: We've paid the money, this matter is settled, and from now on, whether Jia Dongxu is paralyzed or lame has nothing to do with us!"

The old lady had a burning passion in her heart, but her mind was unusually clear.

She knew Jia Zhangshi's character all too well. If the terms weren't written down, this woman might bring up this old grievance again and start tearing things apart whenever she was short of money or something went wrong at home.

At that time, there will probably be no peace.

Yi Zhonghai and Sha Zhu nodded in agreement almost immediately.

Being wary of Jia Zhangshi has now become an unspoken consensus among them.

Madam Jia, however, seemed completely unconcerned and readily agreed.

In her eyes, what did it matter if she pressed a fingerprint or wrote a note, as long as she could get real money? Her son wasn't dead, and she had suddenly received such a large sum of money. Wouldn't her life be comfortable and happy from now on? Thinking of the good things, an irrepressible smile unconsciously spread across her face.

This smile, when seen by Yi Zhonghai and his two companions, felt like a red-hot iron burning their hearts, making them clench their fists in frustration and their teeth itch.

The written agreement was eventually drawn up, and the money was given to Jia Zhangshi.

As she watched the thick wad of banknotes being handed out, the deaf old woman felt as if her heart, liver, and lungs were being twisted in pain, convulsing with agony.

She had scrimped and saved her whole life, scrimping and saving every penny. Was it all just to fill the bottomless pit that was the Jia family? A surge of anger suddenly rose to her head.

"It's all Hao Jianguo's fault! It's all that damned bastard's doing! I'm not finished with him!"

The old woman hissed and growled, a fierce light flashing in her cloudy eyes.

Although she hated Jia Zhangshi for her insatiable greed, the deepest thorn in her heart was firmly planted on one name—Hao Jianguo.

In her view, the source of all the misfortune was that boy stirring things up behind her back.

"If he hadn't said that out of the blue, insisting on searching my house, would the police have even bothered with it? Even if your wife went to check, it was only because Hao Jianguo instigated her!"

She turned to Yi Zhonghai, her tone resolute.

However, the old lady seemed to have deliberately forgotten that the root of this disaster was their own evil intentions.

If they hadn't been so scheming to frame Hao Jianguo, why would Hao Jianguo have "returned" that snakeskin bag?

Go to her room? Without this beginning, everything that followed would be meaningless.

However, at this moment, the deaf old lady, along with Yi Zhonghai and Sha Zhu, had already been seized by a stubborn resentment, and reason had been abandoned.

They vented all their resentment and anger on Hao Jianguo.

It seems that only by firmly believing in an "enemy" can one find a reason to keep from collapsing amidst a series of setbacks and losses.

Otherwise, we really wouldn't be able to live like this.

"That's true, I think so too, old lady."

That snakeskin bag in your room, Hao Jianguo must have tampered with it.

He must have seen us throw the bag into his room and copied us, returning it—no wonder he was so confident that day.”

Sha Zhu gritted his teeth and said, "This time he really guessed right."

Even though he had figured it out, Sha Zhu still couldn't do anything about Hao Jianguo.

Yi Zhonghai's face darkened, and he said in a low voice, "If that's really the case, then that kid is too deep."

They orchestrated this whole scheme so quietly; their cunning is truly frightening.

As he spoke, he couldn't help but gasp, a chill creeping into his heart as he looked down on Hao Jianguo.

If Hao Jianguo really has such abilities, they will have to be extra careful when they face him in the future.

"So what if he's powerful? What storms haven't I weathered? I don't even consider his little skills a threat."

The deaf old woman muttered to herself, "Hmph, I was careless before, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to outmaneuver me."

The scars had barely healed, and the pain was already forgotten, but the old lady started making plans again.

Sha Zhu and Yi Zhonghai were both taken aback by what they heard.

But having learned his lesson, Yi Zhonghai was still uneasy and quickly pressed for an answer: "Grandma, do you... have another idea? Are you really confident in dealing with Hao Jianguo? He's too shrewd. If you're not absolutely certain, I think it's best to lay low for now."

He was indeed very uneasy.

They had just drawn the last match and were released from detention; it's hard to say there weren't eyes watching them all around.

If anything happens at this time, the people in the courtyard will surely notice—in Yi Zhonghai's view, no one in this courtyard is easy to deal with, and no commotion can be kept secret.

Sha Zhu nodded in agreement.

Although he was also apprehensive, if the old lady really had a way to deal with Hao Jianguo without anyone noticing, he would naturally be happy to do it.