Pastoral Daily Life

Lu Lingxi went to the police station to explain the situation and came back.

The two police officers who received him were very enthusiastic about him when they heard that he was Dahei’s owner. Dahei’s story had spread around the neighbourhood, and from time to time people came to the shop to look for Dahei when they bought flowers. After listening to Lu Lingxi’s account of what happened, both policemen reassured him that nothing was wrong with the shop and that it was just an ordinary dispute. If the tall man had not shouted that someone had been poisoned and Lu Lingxi had not mentioned the unspoken rules of the industry, the police would not have taken it so seriously. If the poisoned flowers were only made by the tall man to blackmail Lu Lingxi, it would be fine, but if they were really circulating in the market, it would not be a trivial matter, and the root cause needed to be investigated strictly.

After sending Lu Lingxi away, the police began to question the tall man. When the police looked like they were really serious, the tall man immediately gave an explanation. They had really been ordered to sully the reputation of Tiny Garden. However, the other party just gave them the plant smeared with the brightener. It was the two of them who added dichlorvos. They thought that Lu Lingxi was young and hadn’t seen much, so he would be easy to scare. They put some dichlorvos on top of the brightener in order to blackmail him for more money.

The police were relieved to hear that this kind of poisonous flowers were not in circulation in the market. They then called and spoke to Lu Lingxi, asking him if he had offended anyone. The police didn’t know how to control such things, so they could only tell Lu Lingxi to watch out for himself. If the other party really wanted to tarnish the reputation of Tiny Garden, they must have arranged for more than just one group of people, and they might come back again every few days. If anything happened, Lu Lingxi could always call the police. They would also help Lu Lingxi to keep an eye on it.

After thanking the police, Lu Lingxi hung up the phone and thought about what the police said about offending people. The only person he had offended was Lu Hongxin. But Lu Hongxin was still under arrest; so who else was there but Lu Hongxin?

Tiger and Erfei stayed at Tiny Garden. They saw that Lu Lingxi had hung up the phone and came over, “Little boss, is everything alright?”

Lu Lingxi nodded, quite grateful to the two. He often saw the two at the small restaurant and knew that they were Brother Feng’s men. But because of his prejudice against Brother Feng, he hadn’t spoken to them much. He didn’t expect them to stand up for him when something happened, so Lu Lingxi was a bit embarrassed.

Tiger looked careless, but he was actually very attentive. As soon as he saw Lu Lingxi’s expression, he guessed what the young man was thinking. He didn’t care about these things but was more concerned about what happened to the two people who caused the trouble. Were they looking for death or were there people behind them?

The two of them were in this business, and blackmailing people at the door was a common tactic familiar to Tiger. Especially when the two men were yelling outside without entering, it was clear that they were trying to tarnish the reputation of Tiny Garden. Lu Lingxi said what the police had said, and Tiger immediately patted his chest and took the matter on board. “I’ll get a few brothers to keep watch nearby. Any more trouble and they’ll be dead men.” Today he and Erfei were late in catching up; if they had been earlier, the troublemakers would have been dragged away as soon as they opened their mouths.

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“No, it’s too much trouble.” Lu Lingxi immediately tried to refuse.

Tiger laughed, “What’s the trouble, it just so happens that Brother Feng wants to clear the venue and the brothers have nothing to do lately.”

Lu Lingxi didn’t understand what clearing the venue meant, and when Tiger saw that he didn’t understand, he explained as if nothing had happened, “Brother Feng’s card and chess parlour is closed. He wants to take the brothers to do something else but recently there’s nothing to do, so it’s no trouble at all. If the little boss feels uncomfortable, just ask Xiaouhua’s lady boss to cook a specialty dish for us.”

When he said that, Lu Lingxi understood. For a moment he was a little surprised at how Brother Feng had suddenly closed the card and chess parlour. But it had nothing to do with him; meanwhile, Tiger kept insisting, and Lu Lingxi thought about it and agreed to the other party’s proposal.

Lu Lingxi didn’t hide this matter from Yan Yue and told him about it over the phone at night. Yan Yue had just found out that behind the plants on the market under the logo of Tiny Garden was Qiu Tian Gardening. When he heard that someone dared to cause trouble at Tiny Garden, his eyes flashed coldly.

Through the phone Lu Lingxi couldn’t see Yan Yue’s expression and was talking about Dahei’s heroic performance today.

“The man who caused the trouble tried to hit you?” Yan Yue asked slowly, squeezing the phone tightly, hiding a raging anger under the calm surface.

Lu Lingxi didn’t hear any clues, recalled the scene and hesitantly said, “I guess it wasn’t really about hitting me, he probably wanted to scare me. That’s not the point, the point is that Dahei’s reaction was so fast!” The topic turned to Dahei again as Lu Lingxi praised him over and over without mincing words.

Yan Yue didn’t say anything else and listened very haughtily to Lu Lingxi’s compliments to Dahei, adding a few patient praises for Dahei in the middle. After praising Dahei, Lu Lingxi again speculated whether it could be a vicious competition in the industry. But with Brother Feng’s men helping to guard the place, there was no fear of someone causing trouble.

Yan Yue wasn’t really surprised by Brother Feng’s involvement. However, there is always the truth that you can be a thief for a thousand days but you cannot guard against a thief for a thousand days (it’s difficult to guard against a thief for a long time), and this matter needed to be solved once and for all. Yan Yue didn’t intend to tell Lu Lingxi exactly how he was going to solve it for the time being. The two of them talked until late. Yan Yue saw that it was almost time for Lu Lingxi to rest and coaxed him to go to bed. Lu Lingxi dutifully agreed, and listening to the young man’s voice saying goodnight, Yan Yue smiled and said goodnight, too. As he hung up the phone, his face immediately darkened.

Qiu Tian Gardening…

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The case involving Lu Hongxin and his father had led to Qiu Tian being taken into custody and the family’s business had fallen into disarray. Qiu Jun was trying to keep the business afloat while trying to get his father out of jail. Occasionally late at night he thought about how it all started with Tiny Garden. If it wasn’t for the dog that Lu Lingxi kept, Lu Hongxin wouldn’t have gotten into trouble and the project wouldn’t have been stirred up. When he thought about it, the old grudges were linked together and Qiu Jun couldn’t help but want to get Lu Lingxi into some trouble.

Wasn’t the business of Tiny Garden good? Wasn’t it getting more and more famous? He deliberately released a batch of hormone-damaged plants and found a few florists he used to work with to distribute them to the market under the name of Tiny Garden. In addition, he also arranged for a few thugs to come to Tiny Garden every now and then to cause trouble. If the people around Lu Lingxi didn’t believe it once, after a few more visits the reputation of Tiny Garden would likely be tarnished.

Qiu Jun’s idea was good, but he didn’t expect to get caught by the police on his first day of making trouble at Tiny Garden. Of course, Qiu Jun wouldn’t have taken the matter of finding the thugs into his own hands, so he wasn’t worried that the matter would involve Qiu Tian Gardening. But before he could relax, he found that the aftermath of the incident was completely out of his control.

That night, someone on Fengcheng’s largest gardening forum broke the news that a batch of hormone-damaged poisonous flowers coated with dichlorvos to make the foliage look green was circulating in the Fengcheng gardening market. It took only one day for the rumour to spread throughout the gardening circle and then throughout Fengcheng. For a while, sales in Fengcheng’s flower market were dismal, and the florists complained for days. Just when everyone was scolding whoever had no conscience to do this kind of thing, the evidence gathered by the police after an unannounced visit all pointed to Qiu Tian Gardening.

With the confessions of the two men who had caused trouble at Tiny Garden and the testimonies of several florists, it was only fitting that a batch of unsold poisonous flowers was blocked by the police in Qiu Tian Gardening’s plant nursery. Not only did Qiu Tian Gardening lose its reputation in horticultural circles, but it was also cursed by everyone in Fengcheng. Qiu Jun faced jail time and was fined an exorbitant fine. When his family couldn’t afford to pay, Qiu Tian Gardening was resold at a low price. The buyer’s surname was said to be Xiao; he was not from the gardening community. In less than half a month, the dust had settled on the whole thing.

Inside the small restaurant, Wang Shuxiu was busy cooking. She had taken a day off to invite Xiao Feng and the others to dinner to thank them for taking care of Lu Lingxi during this time. It was only after Qiu Tian Gardening collapsed that Lu Lingxi told Wang Shuxiu about the trouble he had gotten into some time ago. Wang Shuxiu also realised that Xiao Feng had been looking out for Lu Lingxi. She didn’t know how to thank Xiao Feng, who hadn’t come to the restaurant since her last showdown with him. After thinking about it, Wang Shuxiu felt that it was inappropriate to thank them in any other way, so she just invited them over for a meal. It was up to Xiao Feng to come or not.

When Wang Shuxiu said she would invite them to dinner, Erfei and Tiger were very enthusiastic. The two of them had gotten to know Lu Lingxi quite well over this time and had even eagerly helped out with several trips to the plant nursery to bring the goods. They felt in their hearts that they and Lu Lingxi were a family.

Erfei asked Tiger with some excitement, “What do you think Xiaohua’s lady boss will cook today?” After saying that he licked his lips and said wistfully, “Actually, Xiaohua’s lady boss doesn’t need to cook anything, just put a bottle of tomato sauce to accompany the white rice.”

Tiger glared at him, “Don’t talk nonsense. The little boss said that Xiaohua’s lady boss’s specialty is steamed pork ribs with glutinous rice, so you have to have a big bowl, right? Right, Brother Feng?” Tiger managed to pass the conversation to Brother Feng.

Brother Feng glanced at him expressionlessly and nodded noncommittally.

Tiger picked up where he left off, “Brother Feng, what are your plans for the future now that we’ve taken over such a large piece of land in Qiu Tian Gardening? It’s not a good idea to follow the little boss in planting flowers, so we’ll be competitors in the future, right?”

Xiao Feng didn’t bother to pay attention to him. The plant nursery of Qiu Tian Gardening was in his hands, but in fact only a quarter of it was really at his disposal, the rest was all Yan Yue’s. He had seen Yan Yue’s methods and connections and had no intention of going against him. He would have to find out what he wanted to do with the land in the future but he would see what Yan Yue had to say first.

When he saw that Xiao Feng was not talking, Tiger was not discouraged. Anyway, Brother Xiao Feng would have to tell him sooner or later. He was just deliberately trying to get Xiao Feng to talk. Ever since the last time Brother Feng had spoken alone with Xiaohua’s lady boss, Tiger had felt that something seemed wrong with the two of them. Not only had Brother Feng never been to the small restaurant for dinner again, but he had also closed the venue and bought a plant nursery, making Tiger a little confused. But he could tell that Brother Feng still had his heart set on Xiaohua’s lady boss, otherwise he wouldn’t be so concerned about the little boss. This time when Xiaohua’s lady boss invited them to dinner, Tiger had been secretly paying attention to Brother Feng’s mood, but with Brother Feng’s usual expressionless face, Tiger really couldn’t guess what was on his mind. Was he happy or unhappy?

Tiger followed Xiao Feng to the restaurant with various thoughts in his head. Meanwhile, at Fengcheng Airport, Yan Yue and An Jie got off the plane in a low-key manner.

“Shall we go back to the hotel first or…”

“To see Xiao Xi.” Yan Yue couldn’t wait to see Lu Lingxi.