Tokyo: Starting with taking on his wife's debts

They were in the wrong to begin with, and they only dared to act so recklessly because Riko is easy to bully. What should we do next? I'm really worried she'll make a scene; it seems we'll have to do it secretly from now on…

Xiuming looked at her and whispered, "Aren't you supposed to be very brave? Are you scared by this little setback? I'm looking forward to your test. Good luck!"

"You're such a jerk, I love it!" Ayako didn't know whether to be angry or amused, then shouted into the kitchen, "Riko-chan, you can't blame me, it was your husband who gave you this opportunity... ugh!"

"Nonsense..." Xiuming quickly covered her mouth with his left hand before she could finish shouting, then adjusted the stainless steel support to carry her upstairs as soon as possible.

Riko hasn't received proper psychological counseling yet; it will take at least a week for her to adjust. Once she stops crying, she can be open and honest about it.

Even when he's having an affair, he considers his wife's feelings. Such a family-oriented man is a rare find.

Xiuming suddenly felt a warm, moist, and soft sensation in his left palm, which gave him goosebumps. Ayako was looking at him with a smile in her eyes.

Xiuming released his hand, his palm was wet.

Ayako was sticking out her pink tongue, making a "squeak" sound like a kitten licking water, and whispered, "How about that? You're such a jerk~~"

Xiuming placed his left hand on her collar and wiped the drool from his palm. "I use this hand to go to the toilet."

Ayako's expression froze slightly. She licked her bright red lips with her pink tongue and said, "Wouldn't that be even more exciting?"

"You're such a vixen."

"You are a beast."

A loud clang echoed from the kitchen as the green plastic fruit bowl holding the strawberries spun around on the floor.

Riko knelt on the white tiles, hurriedly picking up the scattered strawberries.

She kept her head down, her hair obscuring her face, and her muffled voice carried a hint of panic and grievance: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you... Please continue..."

Ayako was stunned.

Where did her aura go when she tried to take advantage of me? Was that all she had?

Ayako's eyes darted around, and she tentatively said in a soft voice, "Riko-chan, you don't need to pick them up, right? After all, they're not yours! There's no need to cherish them..."

"I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to..." Two clear tears slid down her chin and dripped onto the back of her hand that was holding the strawberry.

Ayako's eyes widened immediately: She really didn't mean it, she was genuinely scared, she really seemed so easy to bully! Ahh! From now on, I can live without any worries.

Xiuming was speechless: She cried again, she cried again... So annoying!

Although I really like her personality, I can only be like this to myself. What kind of behavior would others think of me?

Where did your dignified and poised demeanor go when you were with the elderly woman looking after the child?

Xiuming slapped his forehead, picked Ayako up in his arms, carried her up the escalator to the second floor, and said back, "Don't cry! Hold it in, or I'll settle the score with you later."

He carried Ayako back to her room, gently placed her on the white mattress, and adjusted the stainless steel frame for her.

"Wow~ you're so domineering," Ayako stared straight at him, her lips twitching as if in a joke, "Why don't you just divorce her and we get married? She can't control you at all, it's so pitiful to see you suffering like this..."

"Shut up! You selfish woman, you'll never be as good as her," Xiuming adjusted the stainless steel bracket, got up and walked to the door, then suddenly turned back and said loudly, "If you keep trying to provoke me into divorcing Riko, I'll dump you right now."

You think you can control me? No one has the right to do so except Riko, who is my legal wife.

Riko, who's so docile, is amazing.

Ayako, who's always meddling in other people's business, is just someone I'm playing around with. If she dares to interfere, I'll dump her immediately.

"You scumbag! Go to hell!"

Ayako grabbed the white goose-feather pillow again and threw it at him, this time with great force, hitting Hideaki on the buttocks. He didn't turn around and went downstairs.

"Damn it!" Ayako gasped for breath, her eyes darting around as if she had thought of something. She quickly composed herself, slowly picked up the remote, turned on the TV, and began practicing her embroidery while watching television.

When Hideaki walked into the kitchen, Riko was holding a green fruit platter, eating strawberries while shedding tears.

He stuffed the strawberries into his mouth one by one, chewing them vigorously until his cheeks were almost swollen like a hamster's. Red strawberry juice smeared all over his mouth, mixed with tears, and flowed down his chin, making him look somewhat terrifying.

"Are you crazy? You ate seafood and now you're eating so much fruit? You'll get diarrhea." Xiuming snatched the fruit plate from her, pinched her cheek, and tilted her face towards the sink. "Spit it out."

She vomited violently, knelt on the ground, and shook Xiuming's legs, crying, "Husband, please let me go home? I don't want to see her... I'm so sad... I'm so sad..."

"You can get used to it!" Xiuming helped her up and gently wiped her face with a white towel. "You can get used to it, right?"

Hideaki completely disregarded Riko's feelings and said such hurtful things.

"This is too difficult..."

Riko dared not disobey Hideaki's advice.

But every time she heard him say those shameless things to Ayako, as if he was about to do something shameless, she didn't know how to deal with it.

I really want to tell Xiuming that as long as he doesn't leave her and doesn't let her carry the debt alone, he can do whatever he wants outside, but please don't tell her about this kind of thing. Just let her live her life in a daze!

But she couldn't bring herself to say it. She was worried that Xiuming would really do that, and might even stay out all night, leaving her alone in an empty room, suffering all by herself.

Riko was so heartbroken that she almost cried herself to sleep, and her face turned pale.

“Hmm…this is indeed very challenging to one’s limits,” Hideaki said seriously, leading Riko out of the kitchen and up the escalator, and then said, “How about this, you go home after lunch.”

"And you?" Riko asked, tears streaming down her face, her eyes filled with expectation as she looked up.

“After all, she can’t take care of herself, so we have to look after her,” Riko’s eyes dimmed. Hideaki continued, “Don’t worry! She has an ankle injury, so there’s nothing we can do for her.”

"So you really do want to do something with her..." Riko looked down and saw her breasts, which were a size smaller than Ayako's, and cried again, "I... I can also put strawberries in my breasts..."

"What strawberry? This is ridiculous!" Shumei got annoyed as soon as Riko started crying and had no time to think about strawberries. He grabbed her ear and yelled, "Stop crying! This is 'malicious crying'!"

"Pfft—! Cough cough cough..." The sound of water spraying and violent coughing came from Ayako's room on the second floor.

Hideaki then turned and rushed towards Ayako's room, shouting indignantly, "You vixen, you are unforgivable too! This is 'malicious onlooker behavior'!"

There was no sound from Ayako's room.

Riko, on the escalator, was so frightened that her mind went blank. She just stared at Hideaki while he grabbed her ear.

"Is this new term hard to understand?" Xiuming released her ear, led her upstairs, and sighed, "You don't care about my difficulties at all. How can you cry whenever you want? Don't you have any manners? This is malicious."

"I'm sorry... I... I didn't mean to... I, I just couldn't help it... I, I'll never do it again..."

Riko not only didn't understand what Hideaki was saying, but also felt that something was off. However, his confident and aggrieved expression made it seem like a very reasonable statement, so she subconsciously attributed the mistake to herself.

"How could you not dare? You're just a repeat offender." Hideaki, who coined the new term, knew better than Riko how difficult it was for her. This was something she simply couldn't control. Of course, she still had to be suppressed, after all, she needed to show her authority!

"You're not allowed to cry in secret either. If you cry in secret, it's considered 'maliciously hiding and maliciously crying,' and if I don't find out, it's an even bigger crime!"

Riko opened her mouth and said, "I...I'm having such a hard time..."

"Didn't I already tell you the solution? Get rid of your brain, don't think about anything, just listen to what I say and do it. Can you do that?"

"Yes..." Riko made a huge decision, but she wasn't very confident. How could she possibly do it? Only a dead person would lose their mind!

"This is the kind of silly girl I like!"

As Xiuming spoke, he gently kissed her cheek. Riko lowered her head and suddenly felt that most of her grievances had disappeared.

The two returned to the nanny's room and sat on the single bed again.

The dream we've set for Riko is to learn embroidery, and since we have all the necessary tools here, we should naturally continue teaching her.

"Riko-chan, I understand how you feel. Since you don't want to see her, then you can study in this room. Can you do that?"

"Yes..." Riko pouted and nodded with a sob in her voice.

What kind of understanding is this? You're only truly understanding me if you don't flirt with her... Riko kept in mind Hideaki's advice to "throw away your brain" and didn't dare to say it out loud. She was really afraid that Hideaki would criticize her again for "maliciously bringing your brain into this."

Hideaki was satisfied with this, patted Riko's head, turned around and left the room, turning into Ayako's room.

Ayako was holding a water glass and watching TV with the remote control.

At a financial news conference, a politician in a suit with a sleazy face is giving a speech on how to resolve the collapse of the national economic bubble.

"Currently, our per capita GDP has reached $2.87, far surpassing the United States... We are now the richest country in history, capable of buying half of America! Therefore, current housing prices are not high! It's just that most of the money is deposited in banks, and there's an abundance of money in banks now! Some people are lazy and deliberately deposit their money in banks to maliciously earn interest! Others, despite having money, deliberately refuse to buy houses, causing the industrial and economic chain to jeopardize, showing no understanding of the country's difficulties..."

"Pfft—!" Ayako's face turned bright red as she sprayed another mouthful of water onto the TV. She dropped her water glass, bent over, clutching her stomach with one hand and her left ankle with the other, laughing and crying out in pain, "Ouch, ouch!"

"are you crazy?"

Xiuming picked up the water glass and put it on the bedside table, then took her embroidery tools and left the room.

He found the spokesperson's words quite interesting, so he quickly handed the bamboo basket to Riko and hurriedly ran back.

"Hey? Where's that person who was speaking on the news?"

Xiuming sat next to Riko and used "expert-level massage techniques" to massage the acupoints around her left calf and left ankle to relieve her swelling and pain.

The press conference on television had been replaced by a stock market commentary program.

"He was arrested before he could finish speaking," Ayako replied, squinting and gasping for breath. "He's the one who 'doesn't understand the country's difficulties,' a huge embezzler, and he was handcuffed on the spot. What a disgrace... Have you even studied traditional Chinese massage?"

"The economic bubble has inflated so much, and he still wants to save it? How could he possibly save it? I think he's just 'tactically appeasing the people,' inciting brainless people to 'maliciously save the country.' He's a talent, I like him."

Chapter 29 Couldn't you have said something nice to me to lie to me?

"Just like how you 'maliciously pampered' Riko? You raised her into a little fool, and then she could do whatever she wanted..."

Ayako grinned, fiddled with the remote, turned off the TV, and then said, "How about you run for office? I'll vote for you!"

"If I win the election, I'll be incredibly greedy! I'll transfer all the embezzled money overseas, so even if they catch me, they won't be able to get my money," Xiuming casually replied, continuing to massage the acupoints around her ankle with his left hand while his right hand massaged along her straight, smooth calves.

"Ah~~" Ayako's lips were slightly parted, her head tilted back and her eyes were misty as she let out a long sigh. Her clothes were pushed up high, revealing her proud figure, and her delicate collarbone appeared and disappeared with her breath.

Hideaki thought about all those high-end ingredients in the kitchen, worth no less than a million yen. He wondered if he could take this opportunity to find out about Ayako's family background and see if she had really inherited a large fortune.

He glanced at her flushed cheeks and said casually, "The banks are going to lower interest rates soon! And soon enough, they'll be down to zero! Rich people are all thinking about transferring their money abroad. What about you?"

"Are you going abroad to 'maliciously collect interest'?" Ayako said in a lewd voice, uttering words that left everyone speechless. "It's impossible for interest rates to drop to the bottom all at once; it will only drop slowly, at least several years before it reaches zero! After all, there are too many people who 'don't understand the country's difficulties,' and it takes time to catch them, doesn't it? Oh dear~~"

"Please don't make such erotic noises!" Xiuming immediately stopped what he was doing and solemnly warned her, "This is legitimate traditional Chinese massage technique, and I can open a business using it. Please don't insult it!"

She was shouting so loudly that with both doors open, Riko could definitely hear her.

Although I don't care if Riko hears me, it would be really annoying if she secretly cried again!

Ayako tilted her head back and blinked, then snapped her head back to its normal position. With a righteous and indignant air, she said loudly, "Isn't it all because of you? Don't I know what you're thinking? You're just giving me a 'malicious massage'. Keep going, don't stop. I like your malice."

She felt her ankle was almost healed... but it was just an illusion; it simply didn't hurt anymore...

Xiuming was speechless. How did the topic shift to this?

Was she doing it on purpose? I really hate women with brains like that.

"Ayako-chan, let's be honest! Did you actually inherit a large sum of money? Although the economic bubble is huge and about to burst, I still have many ways to make money. I need funds. Can you lend me some?"