Chapter 73: The Will

After a long day of ceremonies and chanting, the Dharma assembly finally concluded smoothly.
When I went to ask Master Yanming how much it cost, he took out a phone from his kasaya and pulled up a QR code, “Fifty thousand, please.”

Monks nowadays even use QR codes for transfers.
I was just wondering how I was going to pay him.
I didn’t expect it to be so convenient.

And for over thirty of them, bringing so many precious Dharma artifacts to conduct a ceremony for me, they only charged fifty thousand yuan.
I felt like I had gotten a bargain.
The price they charged was too cheap.

Only after I paid did Mo Qingyan tell me that in order to deliver as many of the deceased as possible, the state and the religious association had negotiated the prices for conducting ceremonies, limiting the price of an ordinary ceremony to a level that common people could afford.

And common people would prepare red envelopes for the clergy during the ceremony as a kind of compensatory tip.
These clergy members also needed to spend a lot of money on their daily cultivation, so they would generally accept them as personal income.
This was also an established custom.

“Oh, right. How much did you spend on the red envelopes? I’ll transfer it to you. And Xiao Qing, thank you for preparing them for me. I’ll pay for all the red envelope money,” I said, opening my mobile banking app, feeling generous with my money.

“No need. This was actually for myself. It’s good to have a good relationship with the monks. They can be asked for protection at critical moments. Xiao Qing, you probably also offer some incense money every time you go up the mountain to worship, right?” Mo Qingyan said.

“That’s right. Brother Xiao, you gave me such a precious Dharma artifact. It’s only right that I prepare red envelopes for you once,” Ou Zhiqin also said.

“Alright, but at least the red envelopes that Xiao Qing paid for on my behalf should be paid by me. Xiao Qing preparing the red envelopes for me has already helped me a lot. I’d be too embarrassed to let Xiao Qing pay for them, and I’m not short of money now,” I insisted.

Seeing my firm stance, Xiao Qing respectfully complied.
She was still a student.
The red envelopes for the monks had cost over a thousand yuan, which was already close to the limit of what she could afford.
It was indeed a bit of a strain for her to pay for my red envelopes as well.

As I was transferring the money to Xiao Qing, a beautiful woman walked over with a smile and asked, “Bing’er, you should still be homeless, right? How about you come and live with your auntie for a while?”

My immediate instinct was to refuse her.
I didn’t know these relatives of the Xia family at all and would feel very awkward staying with them.
But before I could speak, another man said, “What’s so good about living in your old house? It would be a disservice to my niece. How about coming to your uncle’s house?”

“No, she should come to my house. Bing’er gets along very well with my daughter.”
“She should come to my house!”
“My house is more suitable!” a group of people immediately started arguing.

Officer Li, who had just seen off the monks from Mingwang Temple, walked back just in time to see the argument escalating.
He hurriedly came over and separated the arguing people, “What are you all arguing about?”

“Officer, we’re not arguing. We’re discussing her custody,” the man who claimed to be my uncle said.

“Custody? What custody?” Officer Li asked with a puzzled look.

“Xia Yubing’s custody, of course. She’s still a minor. She should have a guardian, right?” the woman who claimed to be my auntie said.

“Wait a minute, let me check,” Officer Li pulled up Xia Yubing’s information and then said, “Xia Yubing is currently sixteen years old, and will be seventeen in three months. She can already be considered a person with full capacity for civil conduct. She does not need a guardian.”

Hearing Officer Li’s words, disappointment appeared on several of their faces.
One person even muttered under their breath, “Tch, it would’ve been better if they died sooner.”

He said it very softly, and no one around heard him, only I, whose hearing had been enhanced for some reason, could hear.
This made me even more averse to living with them.

“Officer, although Bing’er doesn’t need a guardian, she has just lost her parents and must be in a state of grief and panic, right? And she’s still young, after all. It’s better for one of our families to take her in and take care of her,” Xia Yubing’s uncle said.

Officer Li thought this made some sense, so he nodded and asked me, “Miss Xia Yubing, which family do you think is more suitable? You can be taken care of by them.”

“Eh? I don’t need to trouble them. I can take care of myself,” I said quickly, afraid that the officer would forcibly assign me to a family.

“That’s not very good. After all, you’re a young girl. It’s not safe for you to live alone. And you can’t live in a hotel forever, right?” Officer Li said with concern.

“I’ll be fine living alone. Besides, I have the properties my parents left me, so I don’t have to worry about a place to live,” I said quickly.

“Hmph! Don’t be so quick to say that. It’s still up in the air whether those houses are yours or not,” the person who had complained about Xia Yubing’s parents dying too slowly said grumpily.

“Eh?” I looked at him in confusion.
At the same time, Officer Li also frowned and said to him, “The properties that Miss Xia’s parents left for her are of course her own. What do you mean by that?”

“That’s not necessarily true. Our parents are still alive. The old folks are also first-in-line heirs. They should also have a share of my brother’s inheritance,” Xia Yubing’s uncle said.

I was stunned.
It seemed that was indeed the case.
Spouses, children, and parents were all first-in-line heirs.
In the case where both parents died, according to inheritance law, their estate should be divided equally between me and Xia Yubing’s paternal and maternal grandparents.

I didn’t really care if I could get all of Xia Yubing’s parents’ assets.
In my opinion, it was enough to be able to support myself.
Even if I only got one-fifth of this estate, which was worth at least several hundred million, it would probably be enough for me to live on for the rest of my life.

But I was very afraid of wrangling with them, especially since the remaining assets were so complex, including real estate, bonds, funds, and stocks.
Unraveling such a huge estate would be very troublesome.
I would probably have to hire a specialized notary agency to do the distribution to sort it out.

“I understand. In that case, please, elders, discuss a result and then inform me. As long as I get my share, I have no objections,” I took the initiative to back down.
After all, this wasn’t my property to begin with, and I wasn’t that attached to it.

After hearing my statement, these relatives first breathed a sigh of relief.
Then, they suddenly became wary of each other, vaguely splitting into two factions with palpable hostility between them.

These two factions were Xia Yubing’s paternal and maternal families.
They were not on the same side to begin with, and now that it was time to fight for the inheritance, the conflict suddenly intensified.

Before they could start arguing, I said first, “Before that, I need a place to live first. My uncles won’t leave me homeless, will they?”

“Of course, you can. Niece, you can live wherever you want. We won’t let anyone bully you,” the adults all readily agreed.
When they realized I was someone they needed to win over, they immediately became incredibly enthusiastic.