The spring weather was getting better day by day, and people’s moods seemed to be the same. Jiang Susu and Xia Yan treated Jiang Ruan with extreme courtesy. Since Jiang Li had been confined, she hadn’t been seen again. Apart from occasionally encountering Second Aunt’s cold mockery and sarcasm, the rest of her days passed peacefully and plainly, as if this tranquility was how things should naturally be.
Lu Zhu poured Jiang Ruan a cup of red date and lotus seed tea, with freshly delivered locust flower honey from the kitchen added to it. The color was bright and crystal-clear, extremely beautiful to look at. Jiang Ruan supported her chin with one hand, casually flipping through the book in her other hand.
“Miss, please take a rest. You’ve been reading for half the morning,” Lu Zhu said with a smile. “Those who don’t know might think Miss is preparing to take the top scholar examination.”
Bai Zhi laughed and scolded: “How dare you tease Miss like that—you’re becoming more and more improper.”
Lu Zhu looked at Jiang Ruan and just smiled: “But it’s true, isn’t it, Miss? Did this servant say anything wrong?”
Jiang Ruan was watching her two maidservants banter when she was about to say a few words, but then saw Lian Qiao walk in with a cold expression. Lian Qiao was usually all smiles, so this expression must mean something had happened. Sure enough, before Jiang Ruan could speak, Lian Qiao said: “Just now this servant was passing by Yanhua Garden when I was stopped by Nanny Li from Madam’s side. She said that seeing our Ruan Residence was short-staffed, Madam personally selected several maidservants who will be sent over shortly. Bah! I thought she had been behaving these past days, but sure enough, she harbors ill intentions—this is clearly inserting people into our courtyard.”
“Keep your voice down,” Bai Zhi hurriedly said. “Walls have ears.”
Lu Zhu also frowned: “This is truly going too far.”
Jiang Ruan smiled slightly and slowly picked up her cup. Using such a banner of doing good for her, she couldn’t even refuse. She couldn’t openly suspect the household’s head madam. Xia Yan was always like this—unreasonable demands disguised with a bright exterior, who knew what filthy thoughts lay beneath.
It seemed Zhou Nanny’s words were echoing in her ears again: “First Miss, this old servant has words that must be spoken even at the risk of death. Your mother’s death back then was no accident—it must be related to that woman in Yanhua Garden. This old servant wanted to stay in the household to find evidence, never expecting to end up in this state. First Miss might not believe these words, but this old servant served Madam for many years and knew her constitution well. That illness came so strangely, and Master paid no attention… First Miss, Madam was murdered!”
Her fingers unconsciously tightened around the handle of the fine white porcelain cup. Jiang Ruan’s gaze turned cold. Zhao Mei’s death was related to Xia Yan—she believed this without doubt. If Jiang Quan also knew of this matter yet had tolerated it until now, he shouldn’t blame her for being ruthless in the future.
Thinking thus, she heard someone announcing from outside: “Miss, Sister Du Juan from Guilan Garden has come.”
Du Juan walked in with a beaming smile: “The Old Madam asked this servant to request First Miss to come over. There are some matters to discuss.”
Jiang Ruan stood up and asked gently: “Thank you for making the trip, Sister Du Juan. We’ll go right away. Does Sister Du Juan know what it’s about?”
Du Juan smiled: “First Miss, please don’t address this servant so formally—this servant doesn’t deserve it. This servant also doesn’t know exactly what it’s about, but looking at the date, the Lantern Festival should be approaching.”
Lantern Festival! Jiang Ruan’s pupils suddenly contracted, her expression abruptly stiffening. Her hands seemed unable to straighten, standing there rigid as stone.
Bai Zhi asked worriedly: “Miss, what’s wrong?”
Only then did Jiang Ruan come to her senses, smiling: “It’s nothing.” But her fingernails hidden in her sleeves secretly dug into her palms.
Lantern Festival! Lantern Festival! The day that had ruined her reputation in her previous life, which should have been during that New Year just after she first returned to the household years later. The mockery and ridicule in everyone’s eyes that day, the feigned concern of Xia Yan and her daughter, Jiang Quan’s coldness—all vivid in her memory. Reborn in this life, her return to the Jiang household had been moved up several years. She didn’t know if that day of filth and despair would also repeat itself, but regardless, one thing was already different—she would no longer allow herself to be slaughtered like a stupid pig. Whoever had harmed her would receive it back a thousand, ten thousand times over!
Du Juan had been looking at Jiang Ruan with a smile, but now couldn’t help but shiver inside, feeling that Jiang Ruan’s gaze seemed ready to devour people, no different from the evil spirits painted on temple walls in the eighteen levels of hell, emanating a ghostly aura. The next second, however, she saw Jiang Ruan looking at her with a smile, her eyes clear as mountain spring water, saying gently: “Let us go to Grandmother’s courtyard then.”
In Guilan Garden, Jiang Susu and Xia Yan had already arrived earlier. Seeing Jiang Ruan and Du Juan enter, Jiang Susu was the first to jump down from Old Madam Jiang’s couch, her voice filled with unstoppable excitement: “Big Sister, three days from now is the Lantern Festival! Grandmother has ordered that the sisters in our household go together to play on the Linglong Boat. Big Sister hasn’t been there before, right? It’s so much fun!”
Xia Yan said gently: “Ruan’er has just returned to the capital. The Lantern Festival is very lively. Why not go take a look together? It would be good to partake in the festive atmosphere.”
Jiang Ruan raised an eyebrow, sneering inwardly. Indeed, whether in her previous life or this one, Xia Yan and her daughter’s desire to harm her hadn’t changed one bit.
The Lantern Festival was a very special holiday in the Great Jin Dynasty, especially for people in love. Men and women of marriageable age would come out to play on this day, and many romantic stories began at the Lantern Festival. On this day, the noble children in the capital had their own ways of celebrating. There would be two magnificently decorated flower boats adorned with carved dragons and painted phoenixes. Young ladies from prominent families, daughters of nobility, and princesses would sit on the Linglong Boat, while young masters from prominent families, princes, and imperial princes would sit on the Qingsong Boat. The two flower boats would cruise the lake in parallel—close enough in distance yet maintaining proper separation between men and women.
The Lantern Festival boat gathering was actually just a matchmaking event among the upper nobility. Young ladies could display their talents before these young masters. If someone truly possessed exceptional talent and beauty, winning the hearts of many young masters, by the next day after one night, they would be famous throughout the capital. So this day was also a competition to prove oneself, with daughters of prestigious families secretly competing, hoping to secure a good future and a good husband for themselves.
Jiang Susu’s title as the capital’s foremost beauty was precisely due to her stealing the spotlight at the annual Lantern Festival. Poor Jiang Ruan in her previous life had no understanding of these machinations and was deceived by Jiang Susu into not only making a fool of herself on the Linglong Boat, but something else happened afterward. The next day, Jiang Susu was no longer the most talked-about person after the Lantern Festival, because that person had become Jiang Ruan. That Lantern Festival day, rumors flew throughout the capital, Jiang Ruan’s reputation plummeted, and she became the capital’s biggest laughingstock.
If all this wasn’t enough, there was one scene from her memory that was deeply etched in her mind. That day when everyone was mocking and ridiculing her, only the Eighth Prince alone spoke gently in Jiang Ruan’s defense. It was just that she had been blind back then, forcibly seeing the mockery in those eyes as care and concern.
Meeting old acquaintances again in this life, everything had changed. She now knew the wolfish ambitions beneath his gentleman’s facade. For the Lantern Festival three days hence, what kind of grand gift should she present to not waste this lifetime?