Emperor Hongwu held a banquet in the Fengtian Hall to receive his most capable adopted son Mu Ying, and also called Mu Chun back to the palace to accompany them in drinking and making merry. During the feast, Emperor Hongwu bestowed upon Mu Ying two hundred taels of gold, five thousand taels of silver, five hundred treasure notes, and one hundred bolts of colorful silk.
After the banquet, father and son both returned home together.
Marquis Xiping Mu Ying had returned, and besides himself, he was holding the hand of a small boy who had just learned to walk, with a string of concubines following behind.
The concubines were not all stunning beauties. One woman was dressed as brightly as a green peacock in the Xiaoling Mausoleum, with a horn dagger as an ornament at her waist.
The Marquis Xiping’s residence had not seen its male master for a full six years. Upon hearing that her husband had returned, Madam Geng felt as excited as withered wood meeting spring, but seeing the string of concubines like sugar-coated haws on a stick was like having a basin of ice water poured over her head: this was worse than being widowed!
Day after day hoping, night after night waiting, year after year anticipating, only to get this result.
Seeing his wife’s unfriendly expression, Mu Ying quickly began emphasizing the key points, saying: “They are all daughters of various chieftains in Yunnan, marrying into our Great Ming to show loyalty. You must arrange them well and not neglect them.”
It’s not that I’m lustful and want to sleep with these women—I’m rolling in bed for the country.
“Yes, my lord.” Geng Shi lowered her eyebrows and eyes submissively, her gaze peering outward. “My lord, why don’t I see Sheng’er? Did his maternal family take him away?”
Mu Sheng was the second young master of the Mu family, born to Geng Shi, whose grandfather was Marquis Changxing Geng Bingwen.
Mu Ying said: “Oh, Sheng’er didn’t come back. He stayed in Yunnan to garrison the territory.”
When her biological son didn’t return, Geng Shi immediately felt life was meaningless. She numbly led the string of concubines to the back courtyard to arrange their lodging, distributed the newly bestowed colorful silk, measured the concubines for clothing—four sets for each of the four seasons, and several sets of hair ornaments and jewelry had to be made.
Since they had married into the Mu family, they had to change to Great Ming attire. Otherwise, if people saw them, they would criticize her for lax household management and improper conduct.
While Geng Shi was deeply disappointed, Mu Chun on the side was equally delighted. He suppressed his laughter and said: “Father, so you’re only back to report on your duties and will return to Yunnan to continue garrisoning. When will father depart? Your son will see you off.”
Mu Chun couldn’t wait to quickly send this plague god away.
Mu Ying was too lazy to deal with this eldest son. He held the hand of his youngest son, who didn’t even reach his knee in height. “His name is Mu Xin. He’s your little brother. In the future, he will remain in the capital for education and won’t return to Yunnan. Xin’er, this is your big brother.”
Mu Xin was only two years old, an innocent child. At this moment, he was boredly picking his nose and dozing off. Upon hearing this, he quickly released his index finger from his nostril, bringing out some unidentifiable substance on his fingertip, and reached out saying: “Big brother, hug me.”
Mu Chun looked at the suspicious substance on his fingertip.
Knowing that his big brother found him dirty, Mu Xin without another word put his fingertip in his mouth and sucked it, saying proudly: “Clean now.”
Mu Chun nearly vomited up all the food and wine from the Fengtian Hall banquet. No wonder father wanted to leave his youngest son in the capital for education—was this child raised like a little dog running wild in Yunnan?
Mu Ying said: “Don’t find fault with him. You did the same thing when you were little.”
Mu Chun denied it: “I did not! I would never! Father is talking nonsense.”
“Take your brother to meet the ancestors.” Mu Ying carried his youngest son to the ancestral hall to offer incense to the ancestors. Mu Chun added his little brother Mu Xin’s name to the family genealogy.
Mu Xin tottered as he offered incense and kowtowed. When Mu Ying saw he was tired, he ordered servants to carry the youngest son back to his room to sleep.
Mu Ying was not without paternal love; he just didn’t like Mu Chun. Even the nose-picking youngest son was more lovable than his eldest son.
Fortunately, Mu Chun no longer cared. This kind of daily favoritism couldn’t stimulate him at all.
Once the youngest son left, Mu Ying removed his mask of loving father and immediately revealed his true “tiger father” nature, taking out a whip and cracking it on the ground. “You unfilial son, kneel down! Before our ancestors, tell me why you absolutely refuse to marry!”
Mu Chun knelt on the prayer mat: “Father, we’ve already agreed long ago that I only have eyes for Duke Weiguo’s daughter. All other rouge and common powder cannot catch my eye.”
Mu Ying’s heart had long been “tempered into steel” by his eldest son: “Duke Weiguo is sleeping in Zhongshan—how can he produce daughters? Don’t say such unrealistic things.”
Duke Weiguo Xu Da had passed away in the seventeenth year of Hongwu, which was the second year after Empress Xiaoci’s death. He was granted burial at Zhongshan, with the honor of being worshipped at the imperial temple. Xu Da’s tomb was right next to the Xiaoling Mausoleum, making him and Empress Xiaoci neighbors.
Mu Chun said: “Since that’s the case, I simply won’t marry. Anyway, the Mu family has four sons. Sons can produce sons, and sons’ sons will be endless—the family line definitely won’t be cut off. In the future, just adopt one to me. They’re all of Mu family bloodline, so the ancestors surely won’t mind who gave birth to them. Besides, I see father’s health is still quite good—”
Mu Chun was kneeling, so his gaze was exactly level with Mu Ying’s waist: “Perhaps next year you can give me another little brother.”
Mu Chun had once sworn that if Mu Ying privately arranged a marriage for him, he would strip naked and streak to the girl’s front door, ruining the match, disgracing the Mu family, and making Mu Ying lose face.
No one knew a son like his father. If it were someone else, Mu Ying would think they were just talking, but Mu Chun would really do it—he would trample the Mu family’s dignity underfoot like a shoe sole.
Mu Ying looked down at his indifferent eldest son: “Don’t you care at all about the Mu family’s honor or the family’s rise and fall, thinking it has nothing to do with you? Don’t forget that Mu family blood flows in your veins, and the title of Marquis Xiping’s heir is yours because you bear the Mu surname. If you weren’t surnamed Mu, you would be nothing.”
He continued: “Since you’ve voluntarily requested to cut off your lineage and adopt your brothers’ sons in the future, I’m too lazy to manage you. I can’t delay your brothers’ marriages for you alone. If this stubborn bloodline of yours were passed to the next generation, it might be a disaster that would ruin and destroy the family! Better not to have it!”
Being humiliated by his father like this, Mu Chun simply stood up. He was now half a head taller than Mu Ying: “What’s the purpose of producing offspring? To create an obedient puppet? Did I consent when you brought me into this world? When I was just born, I lost my mother—did I force her to death? I was raised in the palace until age seven—did I eat a single grain of rice from the Mu family? Did you hold me? Did you ever kiss me? Did you teach me to read and write, or teach me horseback riding and archery?”
“Before age seven, you were just a familiar stranger to me. After age seven, I was sent to the Marquis Xiping’s residence. Before I’d been there even a few days, you hung me in the ancestral hall and whipped me—”
Mu Ying roared, interrupting his son’s accusation: “That’s because you were disobedient, skipping classes! I punished you to recite books in the ancestral hall, and you took off your pants and ran around urinating while in the ancestral hall! Insulting our ancestors!”
Mu Chun: “I was only seven years old then! And you hung me up and beat me!”
Mu Ying: “When I was seven, I fought with a group of starving people every day for tree bark, and nearly got chopped up and cooked into a pot of meat soup! Did I complain about anything? You eat well and drink well every day, growing fat, so what if I beat you once?”
Mu Ying’s parents had starved to death during a famine year, and he was an orphaned vagrant. Because of his fierce fighting spirit when protecting food, Emperor Hongwu noticed him and adopted him as a son, changing his entire life.
Mu Chun: “You only know how to bring up old history—what’s the point? When you were seven, you gnawed tree bark; when I was seven, I had delicacies. Can I be as resistant to beatings and humiliation as you? You could immediately forget how much the whip hurt after one full meal and kneel down calling ‘father’—can I be like you?”
Mu Ying pointed at his eldest son: “So you’ve hated me since you were seven! If I had known this—”
“You should have beaten me to death that day!” Mu Chun roared: “Are you raising a son or a slave? Raising a son or a punching bag? How great do you think you are, believing that just because you sired me, you can casually decide my life and death, bully and humiliate me?”
“You don’t like my mother, you hate the Feng family, but you don’t dare defy the imperial decree and divorce my mother, maintaining a loveless marriage. You feel wronged and humiliated, but what fault is it of mine in your failed marriage?”
Mu Chun pounded his chest, making a drumming sound.
“Your marriage was unhappy because the Emperor and Empress arranged the match blindly and my maternal uncle beat you into a pig’s head. Did you say anything? Forget about defying the imperial decree to break the engagement—you didn’t even dare fight back when my uncle beat you! But you don’t dare touch anyone else, yet you chase after me, an innocent person, beating and scolding me! Isn’t it just because you knew I couldn’t fight back? With such cowardly performance, how do you expect me to respect you? To identify with you? To be proud of carrying Mu family blood?”
Getting to the emotional climax, Mu Chun grabbed a ceremonial sword from the ancestors’ altar table, drawing it with a swoosh—cold light flashing.
Mu Ying’s expression changed: “You unfilial son! Do you dare commit patricide? Giving birth to you was worse than giving birth to a preserved egg!”
Mu Chun wielded the sword, cutting a line across his own arm. Fresh blood flowed out like a winding little snake: “How I wish I wasn’t born from you. I hate having your blood flowing in my veins. I’d rather have dirty soy sauce flowing in my blood vessels!”
Preserved egg and soy sauce: What did we ever do wrong…
Mu Ying looked at the dripping blood on his eldest son’s arm: “Self-harming in front of your father is unfilial. Don’t think that because you suffered this minor injury, I won’t dare carry out family law.”
The distrust between father and son had reached its peak. Despite Mu Chun’s physical and emotional torment, Mu Ying thought his eldest son was just trying to escape punishment.
Mu Chun’s heart went completely cold. He simply broke the jar and smashed it, provocatively lifting his chin: “Who else do you dare beat besides me? Beat my uncle? Beat the Emperor? If you weren’t my father and insulted me like this, you’d have died under my sword long ago and been thrown into the Qinhuai River to feed the turtles.”
Father and son exchanged harsh words, the atmosphere growing increasingly “heated.”
Servants outside the ancestral hall had long gone to spread the news. Madam Geng had just settled the string of concubines and was instructing servants to select reliable wet nurses for the new illegitimate son, when she learned that the father and son who had just reunited were fighting in the ancestral hall again.
Upon hearing this, Geng Shi immediately felt like facing a great enemy and realized this was bad:
When young Geng Shi married into the Marquis Xiping’s residence, her stepson was still being raised in the palace. She gave birth to Mu Sheng and treasured him like a precious jewel, raising him until age five when Mu Chun came home, and everything changed.
From then on, the best courtyard and the best things had to go to Mu Chun first before Mu Sheng’s turn. Young Geng Shi was spirited and her heart was ultimately restless with injustice, so when Mu Chun was mischievous and punished, hung in the ancestral hall and whipped by Mu Ying, she didn’t immediately go to persuade.
Though Mu Chun was young, his temper was big. He was unconvinced and after being whipped, not only did he not beg for mercy, but he cursed loudly. The angrier Mu Ying got, the harder he beat, forgetting his restraint until Mu Chun hung his head silently—only then did he realize his eldest son had already fainted unconscious, barely breathing.
At that time, Mu Ying was so nervous his hands trembled as he tried to untie the rope knots, so he simply cut the rope with a knife and carried Mu Chun to find the imperial physician.
Seeing Mu Ying run out holding the blood-covered Mu Chun, young Geng Shi had a thought: If he just died like this, the heir position would belong to Sheng’er…
Afterward, Geng Shi was summoned to the palace by Empress Xiaoci for a severe scolding, saying she was unloving as a mother for not restraining her husband. If there was a next time, she would definitely be divorced.
Young Geng Shi cried and begged for forgiveness, saying she didn’t do it on purpose—being a stepmother was difficult, and when her stepson committed such a grave mistake and his father was teaching him to be human, it wasn’t her place to interfere.
Empress Xiaoci’s eyes were sharp as torches, seeing through her thoughts with one sentence: If it were her biological son Mu Sheng being hung and punished at the tender age of seven, would she stand by and watch?
“Don’t think this palace doesn’t know your petty thoughts. This palace has over ten sons, including the Crown Prince, none born to this palace. His Majesty is a strict father and sometimes beats and scolds his sons, but this palace has never allowed His Majesty to keep beating them. If something happens to Mu Chun again, it will be time for you to return to your natal family. If you don’t want to sit in the Marquis Xiping’s wife position, there are plenty of noble daughters who want to climb up there!”
Empress Xiaoci’s thunderous fury was something Geng Shi would never forget. It was the first time she had seen the usually kind and gentle Empress Xiaoci so angry. From then on, she never dared let her husband brutally beat his stepson and had to desperately intervene each time.
Geng Shi said with practiced ease: “Quickly, call Third Young Master Mu Ang, and also call Second Master Xu the eldest son-in-law, and the eldest young mistress to the ancestral hall to mediate.”
Mu Ying had four sons: Mu Chun, Mu Sheng, Mu Ang, and the nose-picking Mu Xin. The eldest son-in-law was Duke Weiguo Xu Da’s youngest son, Xu Zengshou, who had the premier reputation as the capital’s number one dandy. Learning that his father-in-law had returned home, Xu Zengshou quickly brought gifts and accompanied his wife to see his father-in-law.
Many hands make light work. When the father and son Mu Ying and Mu Chun were sparking with fire, Geng Shi came to the ancestral hall saying that old familiar line: “If you want to beat him to death, beat me to death first!”
Everyone rushed in together and saw Mu Chun’s arm dripping with blood—immediately crying out in alarm.
Geng Shi just kept crying. Third Young Master Mu Ang picked up the sword from the ground. The married eldest daughter quickly bandaged Mu Chun’s wound. Xu Zengshou grabbed the whip from his father-in-law’s hand: “Let’s talk nicely. Don’t start with violence. There are no overnight grudges between father and son. Harmony is precious.”
Xu Zengshou had an exceptional father, Duke Weiguo Xu Da, but unfortunately Xu Da had been gone for three years. Xu Zengshou, a well-fed man who didn’t know a hungry man’s suffering, assumed all fathers and sons in the world would reconcile.
For the sake of his daughter and son-in-law, Mu Ying put down his whip. Father and son looked at each other with mutual disgust, both snorted coldly, and left.
In the capital’s wealthy families, no matter how chaotic things were inside, they had to maintain the appearance of being good husbands, good wives, good sons, good daughters—a harmonious Great Ming model family on the outside.
The next day, Mu Ying entered the palace. Emperor Hongwu took one look at his adopted son’s expression and knew the matter had failed: “Mu Chun still refuses to marry? Didn’t you tell him that as long as he likes someone and they come from a respectable background—not from a prostitute family—you could be lenient and help him?”
Mu Ying was stunned: “We didn’t get to that point. Your subject and my dog of a son started arguing, and he even drew his sword to cut himself, saying he didn’t want to continue the Mu family bloodline and would rather have soy sauce flowing in his blood vessels. After that, everything went out of control and we argued until it was irreconcilable.”
Emperor Hongwu felt very regretful and sighed: “What a karmic debt! I didn’t do well as a matchmaker back then, causing you and Feng Shi to become a resentful couple. Before Empress Xiaoci passed away, she mentioned this matter and felt very remorseful, saying Mu Chun was pitiful. In the future, whoever he wanted to marry, as long as the other party had a respectable family background, she would help him, instructing me never to make my own decisions again, repeating the mistake and creating another resentful couple, ruining Mu Chun’s happiness.”
“Originally, I planned to marry Princess Shouchun to him, but because of Empress Xiaoci’s dying words, I changed my mind and granted Princess Shouchun in marriage to the Fu family. Now that you’ve returned to the capital, this was a perfect opportunity to ease your tense father-son relationship by helping arrange Mu Chun’s marriage. How did it become even more rigid instead?”
Mu Ying said: “It’s hard to explain in a few words. Your subject is incompetent and wasted this heaven-sent opportunity.”
This was twenty-three years of accumulated old hatred—like a tangled mess, how could it be easily untangled?
Father and son each spoke their own piece, each insisting they were right and the other was wrong, as if there was a high wall towering into the clouds between them, with both shouting at each other across the wall, unable to communicate normally.
Emperor Hongwu asked: “What do you plan to do next? Mu Chun is twenty-three years old. If he doesn’t marry soon, people will think he has some unspeakable problem.”
Mu Ying, thinking of his eldest son’s extreme behavior last night, said: “He does have problems. Mental problems, and they’re serious.”
“Tsk, how can you speak about your son like that as a father?” Even Emperor Hongwu couldn’t stand it. “All obedient children are similar, but each disobedient troublemaker is different in their own way. If you’re not deaf or foolish, you can’t be a grandfather. As a father, you need to be more open-minded.”
Mu Ying disagreed: “Should this father have to yield to his son?”
Emperor Hongwu said: “Sometimes you do need to take a step back. When Chun’er was desperate, he’d rather cut himself with a sword than stab you—he’s better than some of my sons.”