The Comeback of the Cannon-Fodder Supporting Actress

Su Mingzhu actually didn’t want to go back to Yangjiazhuang.

Yangjiazhuang Village isn’t big. Any little thing that happens there spreads all over the place in no time, and all those gossiping aunties in the village are so nosy they can’t wait to shout it to the whole world. They also love to ”give you advice”—this you’re doing wrong, that you’re doing without propriety—everyone talking over each other, just dying for you to accept all their opinions and change into whatever they want to see.

Just because of that, Su Mingzhu didn’t like going back.

But now that Yang Dachou was gone, even if Su Mingzhu was unwilling, she still had to go.

Su Mingyu didn’t have as many thoughts as Su Mingzhu. As long as she had her books, it was all the same wherever she was.

Anning called the two kids’ teachers and asked for leave, then took the whole family on a plane back.

By the time they got back, a white funeral banner was already hanging at the door of Yang Dachou’s house. Before they even went in, they could hear the wailing from far away.

Anning, Yang Yu, and Gu Anzhen were all married-out daughters; when they came, they counted as relatives. They had to mourn outside before they could go in.

Luckily the three of them all knew the customs here. On their way, they’d already bought paper money and some offerings in the county.

The three of them handed the offerings and paper over to the steward. After he burned the paper, he led them into the courtyard.

When they first came, the three of them weren’t particularly sad. After all, none of them had really been close to Yang Dachou. Ever since they moved to the Capital, they hadn’t seen much of him for years. With him dead, they weren’t all that heartbroken.

But once they stepped into the yard, the three of them started crying as they walked, and it wasn’t just forced sobbing either—their tears were streaming down nonstop.

Just from this you could tell that the three girls from Yang Erchou’s family were each more shrewd and worldly than the last.

Su Mingzhu and Su Mingyu followed behind them.

Besides the two of them, Fang Xu and Wei Sha had also come. After all, the four of them were all grandchildren and had to be present for the funeral rites.

But the kids were still young, and the three sisters couldn’t just let four children go mourn by themselves, so they brought the kids in together.

Then what left the four of them—Su Mingzhu and the others—staring in shock was how Anning and her two sisters dropped to their knees in front of the ice coffin and burst into tears. That face-changing was something else; Su Mingzhu really wanted to give a thumbs-up and praise them as award-winning actresses.

And not only were they crying loudly; the tears really were falling, soaking the ground.

The three sisters cried so miserably, and even kept chanting as they cried.

Anning: ”Oh, my eldest uncle, my short-lived eldest uncle, open your eyes and look at us once more. My eldest uncle who I didn’t get to see before you died, how could you leave so early? With you gone, look at this whole family you’re leaving behind—doesn’t it just break a person’s heart to death...”

Gu Anzhen: ”My suffering eldest uncle, you who never enjoyed a day of good fortune, with you gone, who are we supposed to discuss everything big and small at home with now...”

Yang Yu: ”Why didn’t you wait for us? We rushed and rushed and still didn’t make it in time to see you one last time. How could you leave in such a hurry...”

The three girls cried so earnestly and affectionately that anyone who didn’t know better would think they’d had a deep bond with Yang Dachou.

Quite a few of the aunties who had come to help out felt sad listening to the crying, and the more soft-hearted ones had already turned their backs to wipe away tears.

Wei Sha tugged on the hem of Su Mingzhu’s clothes and whispered, ”Sis, are we crying or not?”

Su Mingzhu thought for a moment. ”Cover your face and pretend to cry.”

So she and Wei Sha covered their faces and faked crying. Su Mingyu disdained to put on an act; she just stood there with a cold face. Fang Xu felt that as a man, sobbing away wasn’t very proper either, so he just knelt behind Gu Anzhen in silence.

Very soon people came out of the house.

Yang Fuyu’s wife and a few aunts came to help Anning and the two sisters up.

The three sisters, who had just been crying their hearts out, wiped their tears the moment others helped them up, and in no time were chatting and laughing.

This really opened Su Mingzhu’s eyes.

Su Mingzhu thought that even after living a second life, she still couldn’t compare with her own mother—not even her mother; she couldn’t even compare to her eldest and youngest aunt.

She couldn’t help wondering how her grandfather had raised them, to end up with three such crafty people.

After Anning and the others finished their crying ritual, the Old Madam, who had been resting at home, and Li Cuixia came in.

The two of them hadn’t held the mourning ceremony outside; they came straight into the house.

As soon as she saw the ice coffin holding Yang Dachou’s body, the Old Madam’s legs gave out and she slumped to the floor. ”My son, my short-lived son, you’ve made me, with white hair, send off one with black hair, I...”

Li Cuixia cried as she tried to comfort the Old Madam. ”Mom, don’t be too sad. No one wanted Eldest Brother to end up like this, but there’s nothing we can do now. The dead can’t be brought back. You have to take care of your health. Eldest Brother’s gone and can’t be filial to you anymore, but you still have us.”

The Old Madam cried for quite a while before she managed to stop. She was old, after all, and after crying she felt unwell and couldn’t stay any longer at Yang Dachou’s house. Anning told Li Cuixia to take the Old Madam back home, and told Li Cuixia not to come again, but to stay at home and look after the old lady.

Li Cuixia was more than happy not to come.

There was so much going on here, with people constantly coming to offer condolences and cry, which really put a damper on one’s mood. How could that compare with the peace and quiet at home.

She just used taking care of the Old Madam as an excuse to slack off.

Li Cuixia could slack off, but Yang Erchou and Anning and the others couldn’t.

The Yang Family didn’t have many people to begin with. Yang Dachou only had two sons, and Yang Fugui was still in prison. That left only Yang Fuyu and his wife handling everything. The number of people in the mourning hall looked a bit thin. Now that Anning and her sisters were here, of course they had to put on mourning clothes and keep vigil.

Besides, because Yang Dachou had no daughters, Anning and her sisters, as nieces, not only had to wear mourning, but had to wear deep mourning.

Regular mourning would just be giving them a mourning headband—a strip of white cotton cloth wrapped around the head. But deep mourning required them to be dressed in white from head to toe: a mourning hat on their heads, mourning clothes on their bodies, a hemp rope tied around the waist, and white shoes on their feet.

Anyway, it was all pretty cumbersome.

That’s where the phrase ”wearing hemp and white for mourning” comes from. According to rural custom, that’s how sons and daughters in mourning should dress.

Before Anning came back, the steward had already made arrangements for them and had mourning clothes sewn. When Anning and her sisters arrived and finished their crying ritual, he brought the mourning clothes straight out for them to change into.

So the three of them had no choice but to put on hemp and white and keep vigil in the mourning hall.

After that, Zhang Xiangxiang, Zhang Xiangshan, and the children from Yang Lingni’s and Yang Baoni’s families came over.

Once these people arrived, the mourning hall finally started to look like something—at least it didn’t look so sparsely populated.

To put it bluntly, Yang Dachou’s own branch wasn’t very up to snuff. After he died, most of the people coming to offer condolences were villagers.

But Yang Erchou was good with people, so quite a few from town and friends he’d made in the county, once they knew his elder brother had passed, all came by to offer condolences and such.

Plus all the relatives.

The Old Madam’s relatives from her maiden family, Wang Shushu, Li Cuixia’s family, and then the in-laws and relatives from Yang Junni and her sisters’ husbands’ sides—they all had to come, otherwise people would say the Yang Family had been lacking in proper courtesy.

Because of all this, once Anning and the others arrived, they didn’t get a moment’s rest for ages.

By the next day, even more people came.

Anning asked Su Mingzhu, Fang Xu, and the other kids to come help keep vigil too.

They’d come quite early. They showed up for the early crying ritual and then stayed in the mourning hall all morning. Wei Sha, being pampered and delicate, couldn’t take kneeling for a whole morning.

She complained to Yang Yu a bit, but Yang Yu didn’t indulge her, only coaxed her. ”It’s just these couple of days. The dead are to be respected, and you’re still related to him by blood. Just treat it as doing this one last thing for your grandfather and sending him off on his final journey.”

Seeing her mother’s expression, Wei Sha didn’t dare act spoiled and ask to go out and play, and could only behave and stay put.

But she did wise up. After that she didn’t kneel at all. She hid in the back—when others knelt, she squatted there. Later even squatting felt tiring, so she found a little stool and sat on it. At a glance, it looked about the same as kneeling.

Fang Xu, though, was an honest kid. He knelt along with Zhang Xiangshan and the others for the whole morning until his knees were aching.

Watching Fang Xu being so straightforward, Su Mingzhu’s head hurt.

In the end she really couldn’t stand it anymore and pulled Fang Xu out, found a place where no one was around, and whispered, ”Bro, don’t you know how to slack off a bit? Didn’t you see Uncle Fuyu slacking? One minute he’s off ’looking for something,’ the next he’s ’going to the toilet.’ That’s his own father and he still doesn’t kneel honestly all morning. What are you being so honest for? Don’t your knees hurt?”

Fang Xu smiled. ”I saw everyone kneeling.”

Su Mingzhu almost rolled her eyes. ”Didn’t you see everyone picking their moments to sneak off for a bit? My mom’s been hiding outside for ages. He’s not even our real grandfather. It’s already good enough that we’re here for three days. Were you planning to kneel the whole three days? Don’t you care about your knees?”

”Okay, I got it.”

Fang Xu was genuinely grateful to Su Mingzhu. ”I’ll be more careful.”

Su Mingzhu didn’t hurry back into the mourning hall either, but tugged Fang Xu along. ”Let’s go find something to eat first. I’m starving.”