Had Chu Linlang not stepped in with her courageous intervention, Tao Yashu would have ended up like Yixiu Junzhu — seized by the raiders, her reputation ruined.

Seeing Tao Huiru again, Tao Yashu was so angry she didn’t even want to speak. She simply hurled the teacup at her and stared at her aunt with cold composure.

This scene made everyone deeply uncomfortable. Others who had just woken up appeared quietly in their doorways, whispering among themselves, wondering what was happening.

Tao Huiru looked down at the shards near her feet, then looked up and pressed her lips together in silence. When she saw that her niece had actually arrived at the relay station before her and was standing unharmed before her, she was also caught off guard and deeply startled.

She did not truly not love this niece. After all, Tao Yashu was her older brother’s youngest and most beloved daughter — and one who the Empress Dowager had already privately marked out as a future candidate for the palace, with a brilliant future ahead. A great part of the Tao family’s prospects depended on this niece.

But at the time the situation had been genuinely desperate. Her niece had already been seized by the bandits and pulled into the water. Had she hesitated, more bandits would certainly have swarmed in — everyone was fighting to escape, barely able to look after themselves, let alone anyone else.

Besides, she had already prepared an explanation for the circumstances of Tao Yashu’s fall into the water and had it coordinated with the other three young ladies on the boat.

With that thought, the awkwardness vanished from Tao Huiru’s face. She saw Tao Yashu fling the teacup and turn to go back upstairs, and quickly went after her, catching hold of Tao Yashu’s arm. She said in a low voice, her eyes brimming with tears: “It was dark — I never saw you fall in the water at all. All I knew was to tell the others to keep rowing. It was only after we had escaped that I realized you had gone overboard. I’ve been torturing myself the entire time for failing to look after you. If only I had been the one to fall, not you — why are you treating me like this? Surely you don’t think I deliberately abandoned you?”

At that moment, the several women who had been on the boat with Tao Huiru instinctively chimed in, one by one, saying that the night had been too dark, and they had genuinely only heard a splash — they truly hadn’t seen who had fallen in.

Such brazen shamelessness left Tao Yashu’s whole body trembling faintly with rage. Hearing them speak in perfect unison like that — if the events of last night weren’t still so vivid in her memory, she might almost have doubted her own recollection.

She looked up and caught sight of Chu Linlang, who had just come downstairs, and her eyes lit up. Chu Niangzi had also been there at the time, and would naturally be able to tell truth from lies.

Chu Linlang had heard every word from where she stood nearby. After all, she had been there — how could these women not know it was Tao Yashu who had fallen? They had even been debating whether to save her.

It was clear that the charge of abandoning the Tao family’s legitimate daughter to save themselves was too serious for Tao Huiru to bear — so she refused to admit it. The others refused to admit it even more.

Just then, Chu Linlang stepped forward to smooth things over: “With that kind of chaos, everyone was frightened and disoriented. Not being able to keep track of things in the confusion is perfectly understandable. Fortunately, my boat happened to pass by and was able to pull Tao Yashu out of the water, so all has ended well — and that’s the best outcome we could have hoped for. Tao Yashu, don’t be cross with your aunt anymore. She’s had a hard time too. Let her get some rest… Tao Furen, please go and get washed up. I’ll have the relay station official prepare hot ginger tea for all of you.”

At these words, Tao Yashu turned sharply to look at Chu Linlang.

This young woman was known for doing everything strictly by the rules and always wanting to argue a matter to its rightful conclusion.

This boatload of people had abandoned her without a second thought, and now they were all lying in perfect unison — how thoroughly chilling. Yet Chu Linlang clearly knew the truth, had heard their lies just moments ago, and was now speaking in Tao Fourth Aunt’s defense. Didn’t that make her own act of throwing the cup an unreasonable scene?

Chu Linlang pressed firmly on Tao Yashu’s arm and smiled: “Didn’t you want me to help fix your hair? Come on — to my room.”

And with that, she took hold of Tao Yashu and pulled, dragging her into her own room by sheer force.

Once Chu Linlang had closed the door, Tao Yashu spoke in a cold voice: “What did you mean by that just now? You were trying to help them cover up their lies?”

Chu Linlang poured her a cup of water and said calmly: “If I were you, I wouldn’t have given them the chance to open their mouths and lie — I’d have marched right up and grabbed them by the hair and pressed them to the ground and slapped their faces. Whatever felt most satisfying is what I’d have done. But you are not me. You are not a cast-off wife of lowly merchant origins. You don’t need to worry about your reputation!”

Tao Yashu was intelligent, and though anger had clouded her mind a little just moments ago, she hesitated — and then immediately understood what Chu Linlang meant.

Chu Linlang said gently: “Everyone naturally protects their own interests and avoids harm — abandoning you in that moment was nothing more than pure human instinct. What was there to hold against them? You have no grounds to report them to the authorities. And one of those people is your own aunt. If you insist on making them admit they abandoned you, refusing to let it go — they’ll naturally start clamoring that you were grabbed around the neck and pulled underwater by a bandit, and they couldn’t get in to save you. If talk like that spreads, it’s only you — the young lady — who will suffer for it. All the more so given that you are no ordinary young woman. Your reputation must be completely without blemish.”

Tao Yashu slowly sat down in the chair. For a moment, her face was expressionless — then she laughed with a sad, quiet bitterness: “You’re right. I do need to be completely without blemish. And my aunt understands this too — that’s why she prepared her account in advance and got her story straight with the other ladies on the boat. She says only that I fell into the water. She doesn’t mention that I was grabbed by the bandits… If I don’t give her face, then naturally I’ll lose face too.”

As she said this, Tao Yashu’s old habit surfaced — she began absentmindedly rubbing at the folds in her skirt, over and over, convulsive and forceful.

Chu Linlang watched these small movements with great pain in her heart. She reached over and took hold of both of Tao Yashu’s hands, saying quietly: “You don’t bring up the fact that they left you to die — and they naturally have to protect your reputation in return. They won’t dare speak of it again. A person shouldn’t think only two or three steps ahead. If you have no overwhelming power behind you, fighting without it only makes you a laughingstock. Swallow even the most enormous grievance, keep it locked in your heart. Wait until the great eagle spreads its wings — and what will those sparrows amount to then? Arguing over who is right and who is wrong is nothing more than the satisfaction of saying what you want to say out loud and forcing others to bow their heads to you. We women — we were not born into an easy world. Wherever we find ourselves, the first duty is to protect yourself. That aunt of yours… has a calculating mind. She is not a simple person. Whatever you do, don’t fall out with her.”

What Chu Linlang did not say aloud was: that aunt of yours is not merely calculating.

She had once driven a close friend out of her mind, then taken that friend’s husband for herself.

A cunning fox who had been scheming and maneuvering for years — how could she possibly be outwitted by Tao Yashu, a sheltered young lady who had never truly seen the world?

That was why Chu Linlang had spoken up so quickly just now. She had appeared to be speaking on behalf of Tao Fourth Aunt — but in truth, she was trying to prevent Tao Yashu from cornering a dangerous woman and goading her into doing something far worse.

Tao Yashu looked at Chu Linlang. This young woman of humble birth had a way of thinking and dealing with the world that was entirely unlike the close friends she had known before — yet she always managed to leave Tao Yashu astonished.

She had heard of how Chu Linlang had had her own father and brother thrown into the county jail.

At the time, Tao Yashu had not quite approved, feeling that Chu Linlang had disregarded filial duty and violated the human bonds that governed proper behavior.

But now, after a harrowing brush with life and death, the ruler she had held so rigidly inside herself seemed to be quietly, secretly cracking.

She could even hear in the phrase “wait until the great eagle spreads its wings” the patient endurance — the sleeping on firewood and tasting gall — that Chu Linlang herself had once lived through. And the satisfaction of having finally turned the tables, of being able to say out loud all that had been kept silent.

She asked Linlang quietly: “When you can’t hold back, what do you do?”

Chu Linlang blinked, and answered with complete honesty: “I think about eating something cold to cool the fire. Don’t learn from me — I’ve eaten so much cold food that I’ve gone cold inside and can no longer have children.”

Tao Yashu heard this and let out a pained laugh. She reached back and took hold of Chu Linlang’s hand, and asked quietly: “Compared to what you’ve had to endure, what I’ve been through is nothing, isn’t it?”

The two of them had been through a life-and-death ordeal together, and Chu Linlang was speaking somewhat more freely with this young noblewoman now.

She smiled a little: “What is yours, in comparison? If you had been saddled with a father like mine, and then a first husband like my former husband — I promise you would never again beg for rescue when you fell into the water. You’d rather grab a stone and sink yourself to the bottom, rather than face either of them again.”

Chu Linlang’s words made Tao Yashu burst into laughter. She breathed in deeply and said quietly: “You’re right. I was impulsive. What do I do now? I owe you another favor — I’m never going to be able to repay them all.”

Chu Linlang had already thought it through: “Don’t trouble yourself — I never do anything at a loss. If you were to become Empress someday, don’t forget to grant me an imperial merchant title. Then I — a merchant wife whom others look down on — would truly have risen to the heights, and achieved a kind of nirvana.”

Tao Yashu was amused by this plainspoken, completely unembarrassed mercenary aspiration and started playing along: “You truly are like a farmer dreaming of being emperor — someone who’s never seen real wealth and only wants a golden shoulder pole. If that day ever truly comes, I’ll bestow upon you a young and handsome lord of princely rank, and you can be a noblewoman of distinction.”

Chu Linlang nodded: “That sounds excellent. I only hope whoever you bestow upon me is actually handsome enough — what if I find him lacking?”

The two young women dissolved into laughter together, and Tao Yashu’s internal gloom lifted considerably.

That evening at dinner, Tao Yashu made a solemn public apology to her aunt, saying she had been petty-minded and had misunderstood her. Throwing the teacup had been deeply disrespectful. She was willing to kneel through the night as penance, and begged her aunt to forgive a junior’s lack of understanding.

Tao Huiru had anticipated various reactions from this golden and pampered niece and had long prepared responses for each possibility.

She had already laid out the stakes clearly for the other three young ladies. If Tao Yashu was in a stubborn mood and refused to let the matter drop, they would all change their story and say that in the chaos, they had glimpsed what appeared to be a young woman in the water being grabbed around the neck by a bandit and held close — could that perhaps have been Tao Yashu?

If things truly went that far, even with Tao Yashu’s intelligence, she should be able to understand that if she kept forcing a confrontation, there would be no good outcome for her.

Tao Huiru, as her aunt, felt she had done everything within her power. But if it truly reached that point — just these few whispered insinuations alone would be enough to ensure Tao Yashu could never hold her head up again.

Yet against all expectation, this niece who was usually as inflexible and unyielding as a measuring rule had, in the space of a single moment, bent without difficulty — and far from pressing the matter further, had come to apologize and seek her pardon.

Given that, Tao Huiru naturally had to fully assume the posture of a benevolent elder. Under no circumstances could she now bring up what Tao Yashu had experienced at the hands of the water bandits.

If Tao Yashu extended this kind of gracious humility, and she still spread the story, wouldn’t that be a self-admission that she, as the elder, had left her niece to die — and that she was now ruining her niece’s reputation on top of it?

So she smiled and helped her niece to her feet, saying that blood was blood and it had all been a misunderstanding. They should both forget the matter and never speak of it again.

But when Tao Yashu was chatting and laughing with others, Tao Huiru’s gaze quietly shifted to Chu Linlang.

She felt certain that her niece’s change of heart had been Chu Linlang’s doing. She just didn’t know what had been said to persuade Tao Yashu.

And back on the sandbar when the danger had struck, it had been this young woman who had quietly persuaded everyone to get off the boat together — preventing a catastrophe.

The servants around her also seemed to be hidden dragons and crouching tigers — not a single one of them was simple.

What exactly was Chu Linlang’s background? She found herself unable to see through her. And then… she shifted her gaze back to Tao Yashu, who had just returned from seeing a friend out. Was it possible that her niece truly had the magnanimity and generosity to put this behind her, as though it had never happened?

At this thought, Tao Huiru couldn’t help but look again at Situ Sheng, who was standing at the relay station entrance, speaking with the station official.

She had heard he was here on official business and had happened to pass through to help.

A knot she had believed she had dissolved rose again involuntarily now that she saw him, impossible to suppress.

There was nothing to be done about it. Every time she looked at this young man, she felt an uncontrollable pull — she kept thinking of someone else. That person had taken up residence in her heart, carving out a hollow there, leaving her in anguish day and night without relief.

But the ages didn’t match. This person couldn’t possibly be his child… It was just such a striking resemblance. She couldn’t help staring, and unconsciously dug her fingernails into her palm…

Situ Sheng could not remain at this location for long, and it would not be appropriate for him to travel back to the capital together with so many noblewomen.

So at dawn the following day, he departed early.

Chu Linlang had risen early to see him off, and Sun Shi had also made a point of getting up early that day — to thank in person the Lord Situ who had saved both her and her daughter’s lives.

It wasn’t that Sun Shi stood on ceremony. She simply had a persistent feeling that this Lord Situ’s manner toward her daughter was somewhat ambiguous.

Linlang had been born with too fine a face. With looks like that, had she been the legitimate daughter of a wealthy noble family, she would have sailed through life with ease.

But she was the daughter of a woman as low-born as Sun Shi herself. She had failed her daughter — she had not given her a good birth.

So her daughter had relied on herself alone from childhood. What a pity that in matters of the heart, she had been unlucky. That Zhou Sui’an had wronged Linlang — if she now went through another man who was even more ruinous than Zhou Sui’an, what would become of her daughter?

As it happened, in Sun Shi’s eyes, Situ Sheng was exactly the kind of man who was even more ruinous than Zhou Sui’an.

A man of this caliber — in looks, in character, in official accomplishment — how could her daughter ever manage him? What’s more, her daughter had served him as a subordinate. The difference between their stations was like clouds and mud — there could never be a good outcome.

Judging by the way the two of them were around each other, there was not the slightest resemblance to master and servant. And more than once, she had faintly heard the sound of a man’s voice from the room next to her daughter’s — and she had always suspected it was Situ Sheng.

Linlang had already been through one marriage and long since gotten into the habit of making her own decisions.

When it came to matters between men and women, she as a mother couldn’t say too much directly — it would only embarrass her daughter and give her no way to save face.

But she needed to make things plain to Lord Situ: don’t think you can take advantage of her daughter for nothing. If he had no intention of marrying her, please keep your distance.

With this in mind, Sun Shi had come to see him off. But the two of them were always close together, and she couldn’t find a single opening to deliver her quiet warning.

At the riverbank landing, Linlang was helping him fasten his cloak and saying in a low voice: “No matter how busy you are, you must eat at regular times. When your head hurts, don’t forget to breathe in the headache-relief ointment I prepared for you. Even when you can’t sleep, at least close your eyes and rest… Stop moving your neck. How old are you, and you still don’t know how to take care of yourself. The dew is heavy and cold at dawn — at least put on a cloak to guard against the dampness. Guanqi — stop using any excuse to slack off and sleep. You need to remind your lord more often!”

Guanqi shrank his neck down and thought: why is it that when she scolds the lord, she ends up dragging him into it as well? Since Chu Niangzi had joined the household, he had actually become much more diligent than before — he’d even stopped letting his cloth stockings pile up.

Sun Shi stood nearby listening to her daughter’s tone of voice as she took the two to task, and felt her heart jump with fright — she was terrified that the stern, composed man who had come out of interrogation with blood on his hands would turn on her daughter in anger.

A man as solidly built and tall as that — if it came to blows, surely it would hurt even worse than when Chu Huaisheng had beaten people.

To her surprise, both master and servant — each one taller and more powerfully built than her — stood there and took the dressing-down without a word, neither one narrowing their eyes or snapping back.

Situ Sheng in particular had responded with nothing but a warm gaze, murmuring something to her daughter about wanting to eat her slow-braised salted pork belly.

And Chu Linlang looked up with a smile and said softly: “Fine — once we’re back in the capital, I’ll make it for you.”

This scene — the easy intimacy of it — looked for all the world like a pair of newlyweds reunited after a long separation. There was not a hint of master and servant about it.

And the way Sun Shi saw it, Situ Sheng had dipped his head more than once with what seemed like other intentions, and only held back each time when he noticed she was standing nearby.

Sun Shi suspected that if she were not present, this man — who seemed the picture of dignity and grace — might have tried to steal a kiss from her daughter or done something else boldly presumptuous.

Of course, Situ Sheng took his leave from Sun Shi with great politeness, saying all the right things about calling on her again once he returned to the capital.

In every word and action, there was nothing of the official’s arrogance — humble as a nephew of the family.

As Situ Sheng departed by boat, Chu Linlang stood watching with lingering reluctance and waved farewell.

When she turned back, she saw Sun Shi looking at her with an expression of worry, as though there was something she wanted to say but couldn’t quite bring herself to say it.

Chu Linlang knew her mother had surely noticed something, and also surely did not want her to have anything to do with Situ Sheng. Without waiting for Sun Shi to speak, Chu Linlang said gently: “Mother, Lord Situ is a good man. I know my own limits. Please don’t worry.”

Sun Shi hadn’t laid a finger on Linlang once in all her years of raising her — but now she felt a frustrated urge to give her a pinch: “I don’t see any limits at all. The way he treats you — does he intend to marry you?”

Linlang replied with a touch of wistfulness: “Even if he wanted to marry me, I wouldn’t want to marry him. I can’t bear children — if I married him, wouldn’t I just be living through everything I’ve already been through, all over again? I don’t depend on anyone to support me. What does it matter whether I marry or not?”

Sun Shi had not expected her daughter to speak in this manner. She was briefly at a loss for words, and could only say weakly: “But aren’t you getting the worse end of the deal?”

Chu Linlang let out a small laugh: “Who’s getting the worse end — that’s not certain.”

Sun Shi couldn’t stand her daughter’s devil-may-care attitude either — but this daughter of hers had long since stopped letting herself be managed. If she had been manageable, she wouldn’t have eloped with that scholar in the first place.

Having raised a daughter bold enough to defy the heavens, there was truly no use in fretting.

She could only stamp her foot in helpless exasperation and turn away.

For the rest of the journey, the group no longer traveled by water but switched to overland roads. Though it was bumpier and more tiring, the path remained peaceful throughout, and they returned to the capital without incident.

Just as they were on the verge of entering the capital, news finally came of Yixiu Junzhu, who had been taken.

She had been found in a human-trafficker’s cart heading northward — she and several other captured women had been on their way to the Kingdom of Jing.

It was said that a Jing noble had developed a taste for this sort of thing, and had specifically requested a selection of well-born women from Great Jin to vary his pleasures.

One could well imagine: had that original boatload of noblewomen all plunged into the water and not been found in time, so many daughters of Great Jin’s most distinguished families would have ended up cowering in Jing tents, humiliated in thin garments.

This would not have been a private scandal for one or two households — it would have become a national disgrace of thunderous proportions. Even if the Emperor wished to suppress it, the scholars alone, once they learned of it, would have been clamoring for war to wash away the shame.

News like this left the noblewomen who had survived the ordeal shaken with fear. Not so much out of concern for the fate of the nation — more out of visceral empathy, frightened on their own behalf.

But beyond a sharp intake of breath, Chu Linlang felt, above all, an astonishment she could not quite reconcile.

If certain Jing nobles truly desired women of Great Jin, they could simply buy them. Every year, some number of women were trafficked out beyond the border by unscrupulous kidnappers.

Yet to go to such elaborate lengths — deploying so many highly trained operatives — just for the work of an ordinary kidnapper?

There was something excessive about it, a sense of disproportionate effort. She couldn’t shake the feeling that whoever was behind this had a far more malicious intent: they were deliberately trying to provoke the rage of Great Jin’s civil and military officials — to shatter the fragile illusion of “peace” that Great Jin and the Kingdom of Jing had maintained for the past decade or so, and reignite the fires of war in grand and devastating fashion.

But what would anyone stand to gain from doing that? This was truly beyond the comprehension of a woman who kept herself out of politics.

In any case, the matter had grave implications. Although the incident had not been widely publicized out of concern for the reputations of the young ladies involved, it could not go unreported to the court.

As for the Yun family, gloom and grief had settled over them like dark clouds.

After all, Yixiu Junzhu had been seized in plain view of many witnesses, and a great deal of time had since passed.

When she was found in the bandits’ hideout, Yixiu’s clothing was in disarray and her expression was vacant. After returning, she refused to eat or drink, and when asked what had happened, she would not say a word.

The Emperor had also learned of the matter, and was reported to be furious. After all, the incident had taken place deep within Great Jin’s interior — on an official imperial canal, far from any border region. For someone to act so brazenly, and to actually transport an official’s daughter out of the country — this was grinding Great Jin’s dignity into the dirt.

That day, the Emperor went to Consort Jing’s palace, sat in dark silence without speaking, and at last let out a long sigh in her direction: “If I had known it would come to this humiliation, I should never have been so enraged when Yang Yi was captured and surrendered — I shouldn’t have had his entire family executed in my fury…”

With that unfinished, dangling remark, the Emperor rose and left, and for the next several days did not return to Consort Jing’s palace.

When an immortal above passes wind, mortal souls below are left in anguish trying to divine the meaning.

The more Consort Jing turned the words over in her mind, the more unsettled she became — the more alarmed her heart grew. When Yang Yi had been captured long ago, he should have died rather than surrender, to demonstrate his loyalty and honor. Yet he had surrendered to the Kingdom of Jing, which had greatly shamed the Emperor and provoked his fury — and so the entire Yang family had been executed by imperial decree.

And now — Yixiu was a woman, not a man, but wasn’t her situation an exact mirror of Yang Yi’s?

Could the Emperor’s meaning be that he was reproaching Yixiu for not taking her own life when she was seized — for failing to preserve her honor and the dignity of Yun family’s imperial kin?

The more Consort Jing turned this interpretation over, the more certain it seemed.

And with the Emperor’s long absence from her palace, how could she help but grow anxious? So she wrote her younger brother a long letter, in carefully veiled language, indicating that although Yixiu’s circumstances were pitiable, the Yun family had nearly a hundred members, with so many daughters not yet married — considerations of honor could not be ignored.

Yun Guoshu received the letter, read it once with wide eyes, and burst into sobbing.

He understood every word his sister meant.

Now that news of Yixiu being taken by people from the Kingdom of Jing had spread everywhere, not only had the Yun family lost all face — even Consort Jing had lost standing in the Emperor’s presence.

The Yun family had to demonstrate some show of principle, to be seen by the Emperor and by all under heaven. Otherwise this shame would stick to the Yun family’s name permanently, and Consort Jing along with every man, woman, and child in the family would never be able to hold their heads up again.

—