I turned cold at this moment. I then refused her unreasonable demands, but they quietly videotaped it all and published it on the internet.
They even ran to my husband's school to go on a rant about me using feudal superstitions to make money. Under pressure from public opinion, I could only return the difference in the deposit.
I chose a different paper material with a relatively stronger flavour and no spices. I always ensured that the ancient method of boiling paper to ensure that the paper material was non-toxic and harmless to the human body.
However, Xaviera still refused to let me go. She accused me of cheating consumers and leading several people to burn my paper money to the ground. The smell without added spices was not so good. The smoke was relatively stronger, but it could be non-toxic and harmless to the human body.
Unfortunately, Xaviera accused me of disregarding the lives of others and slandered me for blaspheming my ancestors by recycling unclean paper in a small workshop to use for paper money and blaspheming the ancestors. She also asked me to pay triple times the compensation.
I refused her request. It made them dramatize all this on the Internet, saying that I did not respect the deceased, that I cheated the elderly of their money and denounced my black heart.
In this case, the situation was still the same as my previous life. Everyone blamed me and made my life miserable.
After the severe pain that had just hit my body a while ago, I finally dared to make a plan. I still saw Xaviera still blaming me. She kept asking me to return the difference. On this occasion, I firmly agreed to her request.
“Okay, I'll return all the money to you, Xaviera.”
A few hot-blooded young men were stunned. Maybe they thought my reaction seemed a bit too nice for them.
After all, they didn't think it was possible for anyone to spit out again what they had eaten into their stomachs. A bunch of prepared tricks suddenly had no place to use. They were like deflated leather balls.
Xaviera looked at my eyes with a bit of disbelief. She had inquired. Then she knew that the villagers had all paid a deposit, which was not a small amount of money.
“You're as good as your word, Auntie Carmen. The elderly at home have difficulty walking and are too lazy to make a trip. In this case, you'll just return the money directly to us now.”
I looked at her softly. I then returned the paper money without saying a word.
“Let me say this first, Xaviera. I will return this money fully refunded to you. All paper money orders for this year will be cancelled.”
There were many parties and workers involved in making this paper money. The workers not only had to use stone grinders to grind the paper into pulp, but they also had to bring the paper money to be offered to the gods as well as offering incense and reciting scriptures.
Sometimes I still deliver goods to each household. If there happened to be a funeral in the village, I would help with the funeral process.
No one wanted to do something that was seen as bad luck for others. But for me, what I did was based on humanity as a fellow villager.
I would help people who need help as much as I could. Many people in the village did not understand the taboos and customs surrounding funerals. That was the reason I sometimes had to lead funeral ceremonies.
I didn't realize that in the eyes of this group of young people, it became the lips of the trickery. In the end, my family and I went on a desperate path. Hearing what I said, all the young people could not help but stand there in a daze.
Tomorrow was the Halloween Festival. It was simply too late to buy paper money elsewhere. If the elders of the family knew about it, they wouldn't slaughter them.
The village secretary smiled at me. He then tried to smooth things over.
“Carmen, we'd better use your family's paper money first. Tomorrow is the Halloween Festival. Let's not hurt the harmony among the villagers. In this case, just now Xaviera also said that the cost is only a few cents, you can sell it to everyone for two dollars.”
I looked at him with a hint of sarcasm in my eyes. The cheapest toilet paper in such a large package was more than two dollars.
The village secretary was close to crashing his abacus beads into my face. They just forced me to buy and sell as they wanted, trying to make me do business at a huge loss. This situation would only make my family and my business end up in a suspicious mess.
I shook my head decisively. “No, I disagree with what you say. I can't run a business that way. Sorry.”
