“Hua Xiaoling! What did you do to me!” Xie Wenzhao gritted his teeth and looked at Hua Xiaoling, who was pressing down on top of him. His usual gentle expression had now taken on a few traces of ferocity. He, a dignified man, was actually pressed beneath a mere woman like Hua Xiaoling, and even… even taken such liberties by her! Truly outrageous! Truly outrageous!
Hua Xiaoling’s two hands were moving all over Xie Wenzhao’s body. In just a short moment, Xie Wenzhao’s belt was undone, and his robe had fallen open. He looked exactly like someone about to suffer the misfortune of □□. [Note: This is likely an intentional censoring implying sexual violation. Jinjiang’s censorship.]
Xie Wenzhao didn’t know what method Hua Xiaoling had used on him. He only felt that he had no strength throughout his entire body. He never would have imagined that one day he would suffer such humiliation. He could only glare fiercely at Hua Xiaoling with his eyes, hoping Hua Xiaoling would back off in the face of difficulties.
But Hua Xiaoling didn’t feel this was difficult—at least, it was far easier than learning to play the zither. Once she realized that no matter how hard she tried, she still couldn’t obtain Xie Wenzhao’s heart, she decided to switch directions and try developing in another way. She wasn’t greedy in this regard. Those romance storybooks always wrote about things like “you can get his body but not his heart, and even if you get the whole world, there’s no joy”—but she wasn’t like them. If she could just get Xie Wenzhao’s body, she would be happy enough to die, okay? Right now, she just wanted to give birth to a son. Once she had a son, she wouldn’t have to worry about anything in the marquis manor.
Looking at Xie Wenzhao’s angry face beneath her, Hua Xiaoling hesitated slightly. Her hands paused on the action of pulling open his belt. But then she thought, if she gave in to Xie Wenzhao this time, what about in the future? Was she really supposed to live as a living widow all her life? Then she might as well stay by the old madam’s side. At least the old madam liked her quite a bit.
Back then, it was Xie Wenzhao who was blind and mistook her for his beloved, and ended up sleeping with her. Since they’d already slept together, her purity was gone—so what harm was there in doing it one more time? Why was the marquis acting all coy now?
Hua Xiaoling took a deep breath. Anyway, Xie Wenzhao didn’t like her to begin with. How much more could he possibly come to hate her in the future?
And though people say “a forced melon isn’t sweet,” at least you can eat it. Xie Wenzhao liked Sun Yulian and Qu Hanyan more, but did they get to eat the melon?
This melon was right in front of her now—no matter what, she had to twist it down!
As Hua Xiaoling thought this, her hands moved even faster. In the blink of an eye, Xie Wenzhao’s clothes were already mostly stripped. The only regret was that her thin arms and legs really couldn’t manage to move Xie Wenzhao over to the bed. But if you looked on the bright side—who says you have to do it on the bed? In fact, maybe not being on the bed would make it even more interesting.
Xie Wenzhao, after all, was not a saint. Like most men in the world, even though he was mentally resisting, when faced with Hua Xiaoling’s various teases, his body responded honestly. There was no helping it. Sometimes, for certain men, it seemed the brain and the lower half were two separate systems, each doing its own thing. When it’s time to react—even if the Tathāgata Buddha himself came—he still wouldn’t be able to suppress it by will alone.
Xie Wenzhao’s face flushed red with fury. His gaze was half grief, half disgust. In the end, he simply closed his eyes, choosing “out of sight, out of mind.”
But some things couldn’t just be ignored by not seeing them.
Hua Xiaoling saw Xie Wenzhao resisting like this, and for some reason, she became even more excited. She practically wanted to dash out into the courtyard and laugh to the sky three times—Xie Wenzhao, you’ve finally gotten your comeuppance!
“Marquis, you right now are truly…” Hua Xiaoling had only learned a few characters in the past few days. Her belly didn’t have much ink [Note: means “not well-educated”], so she racked her brain and squeezed out six words: “So beautiful you could eat it.”
What the hell kind of damn description was that?! Xie Wenzhao suddenly opened his eyes. He was about to curse, but the education he had received since childhood made it impossible for him to say anything truly dirty or harmful. In the end, he forced out: “Hua Xiaoling, you are simply shameless beyond measure!”
Hua Xiaoling waited for a bit, and seeing that Xie Wenzhao didn’t say anything else, she was surprised and asked, “That’s it?”
Xie Wenzhao nearly died from anger.
Let him die.
No one knew about the suffering Xie Wenzhao was experiencing in the Linglong Pavilion. The secret guards delivered the rabbit doll that Meng Fu got from the Empress Dowager to Li Yue overnight. Li Yue held the rabbit by its two ears and looked at it for a long while, a bit curious as to how Meng Fu had managed to get this thing.
When he was little, he had a rabbit doll—it was personally sewn for him by the Empress Dowager. He liked it very much, but later on, he lost it. At that time, he was already not that young and felt too embarrassed to ask the Empress Dowager to make him another one.
Qingping came in and saw him holding a doll she had never seen before. She asked, “Madam, where did this rabbit come from? How come I’ve never seen it?”
Li Yue lowered his head and tugged at the rabbit’s ear, saying to Qingping, “Picked it up on the road.”
Qingping felt that their furen had recently grown increasingly disinclined to tell the truth. She would have to have had her head caught in a door on the way in to believe furen’s words. She asked, “You like stuffed dolls?”
In the past, how come she had never noticed that furen was interested in children’s things? If furen really liked them, then when she had nothing to do, she could also help sew a few for furen.
“Don’t like them,” Li Yue said.
Qingping thought that if furen’s eyes could just move away from that rabbit doll when he said this, she’d be more willing to believe what he said.
Qingping came over and laid out the bedding. Around this time, furen should be resting soon. She turned around and saw Li Yue still sitting there playing with the rabbit’s ears, and offered, “Shall I put it into the cabinet for you?”
“No need.” Li Yue casually tossed it— the rabbit doll landed neatly next to his pillow. It looked like he was going to sleep with that doll tonight.
Qingping fell silent for a moment. So this was what furen called “not liking it.”
Sun Yulian was scolded by the old madam because of a mishap with the house management. Along with it, even the account books and such were taken back. Everything she had gained that day turned out to be nothing but a yellow millet dream—within just a few days, the dream had ended. And since she was thin-skinned, the moment she thought of the servants surely whispering about her behind her back, she didn’t even want to step out of the door. These past few days, she had been pretending to be ill, staying in her own courtyard and seeing no one.
Qu Hanyan had gone to bed early. Ever since being punished by Li Yue to play the qin all night, she had calmed down a lot. During the day, when Xie Wenzhao came by, she didn’t even bother to deal with him. She ultimately still harbored resentment toward him because of that night. Outsiders saw that Xie Wenzhao was good in every way, but if he couldn’t even protect his own woman, what use were all those other “good” qualities to her? Back at the brothel, she might as well have followed some foolish wealthy man home.
The night grew deeper. In Luoyu Hall, the old madam was still going over the account books. After several years, she was once again holding the full financial power of the marquis manor. When she first married the old marquis, she especially wanted to manage the household. After enduring for so long until her mother-in-law relinquished authority and she finally got her hands on the books, even though it was hard work, she felt it was worth it. Later, when Xie Wenzhao got married, she wanted to keep a good reputation, and added to that her eyes had some minor problems, so she handed over the reins to Meng Fu early on. But she had also worried that once Meng Fu started managing the house, she wouldn’t take the old madam seriously anymore, so she kept a trump card in reserve. Now that the household power had returned to the old madam’s hands, she should logically be satisfied, but in reality, she wasn’t. The old madam read the account books until her eyes hurt.
She gradually realized that when someone is fighting you for control, these books are a good thing. But if no one wants them and they’re all dumped on you, they become a burden.
Managing the accounts of the marquis manor wasn’t easy at all. Income was limited, while spending was like water flowing away. Especially Xie Wenzhao—whether it was entertaining friends or shopping, he spent money like water. Before, the old madam had thought that no matter how much he spent, the marquis manor could still afford it. But now, with the books in hand, she realized that even adding in the few shops under her own control, cash flow was still tight. She finally understood that the difficulties Meng Fu had once mentioned weren’t baseless complaints.
But the old madam still didn’t want to bow her head to Meng Fu just yet. At most, she could promise that when Meng Fu finally admitted fault, she’d say two sentences less in scolding her. Only—when would Meng Fu come to apologize? Could it be that she, as the marquis’s wife, would really just throw it all away like this?
In order to know sooner when Meng Fu might regret it, the old madam sent a young maid every day to Jixue Courtyard to observe what Meng Fu was doing. Every time she heard the maid talk about how carefree and happy Meng Fu seemed, the old madam felt like she was punishing herself.
The old madam had come to see it clearly—Meng Fu really didn’t regret it at all!
That night, some were joyous, some were sorrowful.
—
Early the next morning, Hua Xiaoling came to Jixue Courtyard. She wore a long face—it was clear at a glance that she hadn’t succeeded.
Li Yue was sitting under the eaves basking in the sun. He glanced at her sideways and revealed a “just as expected” expression, saying, “Xie Wenzhao didn’t work?”
“No, furen.” Hua Xiaoling shook her head, then recounted everything that had happened later at Linglong Pavilion to Li Yue in full detail.