“Just, just ……”
“Come in and talk.”
Song San Xiao walked in, his foot on his shoe, pointing to the peanuts and melon seeds on the table, “Just divide a small pile out, let’s guess single and double as a family, and lose if we guess wrong ……”
He wanted to say the wrong guess lost a copper plate, lost the word out thought of Song grandmother just to his own some beating, hurriedly changed his mouth, “guess wrong penalty to drink a bowl of cold water.”
Song Shu could not resist slamming another peanut skin on him, “What kind of cowardly idea are you thinking, if everyone drinks two bowls of cold water, will they still be able to get up tomorrow morning to pay their respects?”
“Your second brother is right, drinking cold water won’t work.”
The family was sitting around and it was fun to guess the pairs, but not the cold water, “Think of something else.”
The only thing he could think of was to lose the coins, but he didn’t dare to say that, so he looked to Song Wan Yue for help.
“Let’s lose the coins, one at a time, capped at ten, as long as you lose enough for ten, you don’t have to take it out again, but you can take it back if you guess correctly.”
“This is good, or Yue’er is clever, you wait, I’ll give you that copper plate.”
Grandma Song carried the box containing the money over and opened it, handing out ten copper coins to each person.
Song San Xiao grabbed the money in his hand and didn’t want to let go of it. Although ten coins were small, adding the thirty or so he had in his hand was a lot.
Song Wangyue didn’t want it, “I’ll share it, everyone guess.”
“Okay.”
The crowd was excited, especially Song Shen, who was even worse off than Song San Xiao, with not a single coin in his hand, if he guessed correctly, he could win a lot of money.
Song Wan Yue used her hand to pull out some melon seeds and covered them in her hand, “Place your bets!”
“Single!”
Grandma Song withdrew a coin first, followed by Elder Song, and Song San’s small eyes dripped around to look at Song Lin and Song Shu a few times.
Song Lin was honest and bet the single along with Xu, Song Si also bet the single, Song Shen followed suit, Liu Cui Lan also followed, and only Song Shu scratched his head before betting the double.
“I’ll bet double too.”
Two against six, and if he won he would win three wens at once, and Song San Xiao bet on the double.
“I’m going to count it.”
Song Wangyue raised her hand, and all the people looked over, even Xu couldn’t help but hold her breath.
“Single, double, single, double ……”
The family all counted together with Song Wan Yue’s movements, and when the count came to the last one, Song San Xiao jumped up excitedly, landing on the ground and quickly pulling, three copper coins to himself, “I won with my second brother.”
“Admittedly, admittedly.”
Song Shu also laughed heatedly as he pulled the coins over.
Undeterred, Grandma Song pushed out another coin, “Again, still single!”
……
The family was having so much fun that they didn’t realise it was after midnight.
“It’s late, let’s all go back to sleep for a while, we still have to get up later to pay our respects, come come come, give me back all the coins.”
Song San Xiao was dumbfounded and covered his coins with both hands, he was lucky tonight and almost all of his guesses were correct, he won almost all of the coins of the family, “Why? These are all my winnings.”
“It’s true that you won them, but it doesn’t mean that they’re yours if you win them.
“I’m not convinced!”
There were nearly a hundred coins, he had never had so many coins in his life.
Song Lin patted him sympathetically on the shoulder, “What’s not to like, did you get the money out?”
Song San Xiao opened his mouth.
“Since you didn’t take the money out, even if you won it, it can’t go to you.”
Song San Xiao was completely dumbfounded.
Grandma Song leaned over, plucked his hands away, raked all the coins over and put them back into the box, waving her hand, “All hurry up and go back to sleep for a while, get up in two hours for dinner, then go pay your respects.”
Looking at his empty hands, Song Sanxiao wanted to cry, he had been excited all night, but in the end, he hadn’t gotten a single coin.
Song Lin patted his shoulder again sympathetically and walked out. Song Shu also patted sympathetically. As soon as Mother said she would give the coins, they guessed what was going on, except for Lao San, a fool who thought the coins would end up in his hands.
Song Si walked straight over.
Song Shen was the last one, and also wanted to pat Song San Xiao’s shoulder sympathetically, but his hand reached out and then retracted, he was “glad” that he had lost all the coins, if he had won them all, he would have been no better off than Third Uncle.
With his head hanging down and his shoulders slumped, Song Sanxiao went back to his house and pulled the quilt over him, scratching his hair several times in remorse. Why was he so stupid, why didn’t he know to take his own money out? He had lost a hundred coins for nothing, and he was heartbroken.
……
At dawn, everyone got up to pay their respects to Grandma Song and Master Song first, and Grandma Song took out her red envelope to hand out the New Year’s money.
“Yue’er is a girl, so she should spend more, so give her six taels of silver. Si’er and Shen’er are both boys, nothing to spend, one tael each.”
“Thank you, Grandma.”
Song Shen was overjoyed and took the red envelope with both hands, even waving it towards Song Sanxiao in a conspicuous manner, who couldn’t wait to grab it with his hands.
After eating the dumplings, Song Lin led the crowd to pay their respects.
Master Song and Grandma Song stayed home to entertain the New Year’s visitors.
The Song family was different today, as all the village families had people waiting at the entrance, and when they saw the Song family passing by, all the old and young came out to greet them, saying all kinds of nice things at no cost, making the family very uncomfortable.
After calling on the village chief and several village elders, Song Lin then let Song Si and Song Wan Yue go back.
Song Si was a scholar, so it was not appropriate for him to pay New Year’s visits to the village people. It was because Elder Song felt that he should not forget his roots that he let him come along, not considering that the village people would not dare to let him pay New Year’s visits. It is not necessary to say that Song Wan Yue is the future daughter-in-law of the Gu family, so even the village people would not dare to let her pay their respects.
“Big brother, it’s actually quite fun to pay respects to the New Year.”
As the two of them walked towards home, looking at the group of people going to pay their respects to each family, Song Wangyue said.
In her previous life, she had been seen by the organisation at a very young age and had been training in the base, and after she was able to come out on missions alone, she had even less chance to experience this kind of thing where all the families went out to pay their respects to the various families in the village.
“It was the same in previous years, but I didn’t hear you say it was fun, it was good if you didn’t yell about being tired.”
Song Wan Yue’s heart thumped and she instantly puffed up her small chest, “Isn’t that why I’m small? I’m nine years old after the New Year, I’ve grown up.”
Song Si couldn’t help but laugh.
“Sister Yue’er.”
As soon as the two entered the house, Erma jumped into Song Wangyue’s arms, her big eyes bent in delight, “My mother and sister have come over to pay their respects, and Grandma gave me and my sister New Year’s money.”
Da Ya heard the sound and quickly came out from the house, bowing, “Slave ……”