Chapter 106: Chapter 100 New Year 3 Chapter 106: Chapter 100 New Year 3 At the time, the situation was rather complicated, and it might have been just rumors. No one verified the truth, but Lin Fei felt that given Jiang Nan’s extremely tough personality, it was unlikely that such a situation would occur. If those things had really happened to her, she might have chosen to commit suicide. Another theory was that Jiang Nan had become a female gang member in society, and despite many persuasions, her family couldn’t convince her to return and eventually disowned her. Regardless of the veracity, it was certain that she ran away from home in the end. Afterwards, there was no news of her. However, Lin Fei was more inclined to believe the latter situation.

At this moment, Jiang Feng brought out the electric grill, placed it in the center, turned it on, and the other adults gathered around, sitting in the living room and began discussing recent events with each other. Lin Jianguo used to be the core of the family, but now everything had changed abruptly, and naturally, he felt displeased.

The second uncle and the third uncle were both government employees, working at the Water Resources Bureau and the bank, both considered good positions.

“Jianguo, I heard your bookstore is developing quite well,” said the third uncle, who held a managerial position at the bank and always had a high opinion of himself, speaking in a loud voice.

Lin Jianguo smiled, “It’s alright.”

The third uncle laughed, “What do you mean by ‘alright’? Jianguo, if you say it’s okay, then it must be pretty good. I heard that many city leaders went to support your branch store.”

“Who were they? Tell me about it?” the second uncle interjected, interested in the news, as his sources at the Water Resources Bureau were naturally not as good as those of the third uncle.

“Basically, heads from all the departments involved went there. There were quite a few,” the third uncle chuckled. “Jianguo, you’re impressive without making a fuss!”

The fourth uncle sat aside, having once been in the core position, now completely ignored by the family members who only circled around Lin Jianguo. He lowered his head, a trace of gloom passing through his eyes. Remembering his former glory and comparing it with the present, his heart felt even more uncomfortable. He lit a cigarette and slowly smoked, watching coldly as others chatted with Lin Jianguo.

“The current issue is about Yuansheng’s situation,” Lin Jianguo spoke up after chatting for a while, switching the topic to Jiang Yuansheng. “Let’s see what solutions we can come up with?”

“Yuanhai, since you work at the bank, could you possibly help arrange a loan?” the fourth uncle quickly joined the crucial conversation, looking somewhat hopeful towards the third uncle, Jiang Yuanhai.

“This… is difficult! Mainly because you don’t have any collateral,” the third uncle flicked his cigarette ash, slowly explaining.

“You should be able to work something out,” Jiang Yuansheng suggested with a hopeful smile. Upon hearing this, the third uncle’s expression clouded.

What does ‘work something out’ imply? Technically, it means having him facilitate matters, using questionable collateral and schemes to secure loans, then rolling the money through several transactions to misuse a substantial sum temporarily. But the risk would fall on Jiang Yuanming—if something went wrong, he could face legal consequences, potentially even prison. Jiang Yuansheng wanted help but didn’t want any risks?

The third uncle scoffed internally, no longer wanting to deal with Jiang Yuansheng. With such thinking, no wonder his own backer couldn’t stand him anymore. He deserved to be tricked!

Realizing his younger brother looked glum, Jiang Yuansheng knew it was probably hopeless and turned to the second uncle, Jiang Yuanming.

“Second Brother, aren’t you quite close with Director Xu from the commercial bank? Could you maybe…”

Jiang Yuanming was about to agree when his wife, Du Li, interjected.

“Oh dear, Yuanhai’s relations with them are fairly ordinary too! The amount Yuansheng needs is too large, definitely impossible,” said Du Li. As she spoke, Jiang Yuanming dared not speak further, a typical case of henpecked husband. He could only apologize to the fourth uncle by shaking his head, indicating his inability to help.

“It’s okay, it’s okay.” Jiang Yuansheng forced a smile, though his heart was filled with extreme frustration.

Sitting to the side, Lin Jianguo felt somewhat unable to watch. He had faced similar situations before and knew all too well how they felt. After all, those present were family members and siblings. Creating too much distance between them wouldn’t be good.

“How about this? Our family can lend some money to Yuansheng as his restart capital?” Now that Lin Jianguo had converted the money he borrowed from Chen Jingde into shares, and was seeing substantial monthly profits, he felt financially more secure and hence spoke more generously.

Jiang Yuansheng sat silently on the sofa, his face barely holding a smile, waiting for others to decide. The feeling gnawed at him, and although he gratefully smiled at Lin Jianguo, deep inside he was actually harboring thoughts.

Recalling the time Lin Jianguo borrowed money from him, Jiang Yuansheng felt an unspeakable bitterness. “If he really wanted to help me with the loan, wouldn’t he have considered my feelings and chosen a private and calm moment? To declare it now, doesn’t that just blatantly slap my face?” His heart swelled with grief and resentment, feeling humiliated like a tiger being bullied by dogs, a dragon played by shrimps while he lingered in shallow waters. Remembering his days of glory.

He lowered his head and took a fierce drag of his cigarette. The gloom in his eyes deepened.

To one side, the third uncle, Jiang Yuanhai, noticed this and a flicker of mockery crossed his eyes. He was the first to refuse.

“Our family just had some bad luck; we just lent a friend over a hundred thousand, and all our spare cash is gone. There’s really nothing we can do!” he said helplessly, spreading his hands.

“We just bought a new house and haven’t even finished paying off the mortgage, so how could there be any spare money?” Jiang Yuanming’s wife, Du Li, quickly made excuses, afraid that if she spoke too slowly, Jiang Yuansheng would pester her like others might. What she said was true; their family really had bought a new house and hadn’t finished paying off the loan.

Lin Jianguo sighed helplessly in his heart. Even without being very savvy about human relationships, he could tell that his second and third uncles were reluctant to lend money. However, since he had brought up the matter, he felt he still needed to make a gesture.

“How about this, Yuansheng? I still have tens of thousands in savings. I’ll lend it to you first. Do you have any good plans? Share them, and we’ll all chip in some money as an investment,” he said.

Jiang Yuansheng managed to squeeze out a slight smile. “Thank you, Brother Jianguo.” However, he hated Lin Jianguo in his heart. He didn’t mention his plan and simply stood up and headed to the restroom.

When he came out, Lin You passed by the living room door, holding a black cat and walking coldly past him.

“Alright, Yuansheng, let’s talk about your plan. I believe in you; the fact that you started a business before shows you actually have strong capabilities. Everyone encounters failures in life! I can squeeze out fifty thousand for you.” Lin Jianguo waved at Jiang Yuansheng and smiled.

“It’s nothing,” Jiang Yuansheng said, his gaze suddenly catching the old man sitting in the inner room. “Isn’t there this house? Mom’s house could also be worth quite a bit of money. We could probably get several hundred thousand if we mortgaged it. Plus, mom is getting older now.”

“About that…” Jiang Yuanming started to feel uneasy. “Mom is still pretty healthy… It’s too early to talk about this.”

“It’s not too early,” Jiang Yuanhai also pondered. “When mom passes, this house will eventually face these issues. We four siblings should really discuss this thoroughly.” He always took advantage of any opportunity for gain and shied away from any expenditure.

Only Lin Jianguo’s face looked somewhat displeased.

“Grandma isn’t dead yet! And you’re already planning to divide her house! Uncle Four, do you even have any shame?” Suddenly a voice interrupted. Lin You stood on the side, her face cold.

“Also, dad, last time I heard Uncle Four say, it’s not that he doesn’t have the money to lend us, he just doesn’t want to lend it. He looks down on you!” Lin You said coldly. “Why should we help him when he has a problem, but he makes excuses when we’re in trouble!”

“What are you saying?” Lin Jianguo sternly chided when he saw Jiang Yuansheng’s complexion change.

“What does a kid know! Go away and play!” Jiang Yuansheng said with a grim face. With so many people present, having the past incident directly brought up, and seeing Lin Jianguo’s questioning gaze, he reluctantly smiled. “Don’t listen to the kid talk nonsense, what are you talking about? I meant well at the time.”

Lin You snorted and turned to go to the inner room where Jiang Feng and others, upon hearing the conversation amplify, hurriedly came out to see what was happening.

“It’s nothing, it’s nothing,” Lin Jianguo reassured verbally, but he still felt uneasy.

Sitting in the inner room, Lin Fei gave Lin You, who had walked in, a discreet thumbs up. Lin You was momentarily stunned, then both of them smiled simultaneously. Some things, when handled by Lin You, who seemed more promising in the eyes of the adults, tended to be more effective. If it had been Lin Fei herself, her father might have directly lashed out, given her current reputation as a poor student.

**********

“Bang!” A huge firework shot up into the sky.

In the night sky, stars filled the vast expanse.

Jiang Yan, being the oldest, brought the four family members to the community center’s activity square. Grandma had bought a bunch of fireworks in advance, all carried by her. With her right hand full and her left hand holding the youngest child, Huanhuan, who had just started kindergarten and was excited at the mention of setting off fireworks, eagerly followed. The family had only entrusted the oldest Jiang Yan to take care and look after her. Following her were Lin Fei, Lin You, Jiang Nan, and Jiang Bin from the third uncle’s family. Jiang Bin, due to family issues, seldom visited this side, and thus, had little emotional connection with Lin Fei’s grandmother and maintained a tough, delinquent look with silver-dyed hair, looking formidable and not very kind, with little contact with Lin Fei’s family.

Many people had already gathered around the square setting off fireworks, skyrockets, spinning wheels, firecrackers, and handheld sparklers of all kinds. The environment was filled with the aroma of gunpowder from the colorful fireworks lighting up intermittently.

The youngest Huanhuan immediately cheered, eager to snatch the fireworks Jiang Yan was holding.

“What do you want to set off, Huanhuan?” Jiang Yan put down her bag, ready to divide them up for everyone.

“I want to light the roman candles,” Jiang Bin walked over and picked a roman candle from the bag. This kind of firework could be held directly in the hand, being just a paper tube stick, and only needed the top end to be lit to continuously shoot out colorful fireworks.