No one spoke. The only sound in the entire courtyard was Yang Qi’s muffled groans.

Watching that face twisted grotesquely with pain, Hua Zhi found tremendous satisfaction in it. What goes around comes around — however you treated my little aunt back then, every bit of it is being returned to you today!

After watching Wang Rong land a few more blows, Hua Zhi finally spoke. “That’s enough.”

Yang Qi could no longer stand. His hateful gaze landed on Hua Zhi. Having just suffered, he was wise enough to hold back whatever vile words were on his tongue — no point bringing more suffering upon himself. Just wait until he got out of here. Just wait until he went home!

Hua Zhi wasn’t the least bit intimidated. She asked calmly, “Does it hurt?”

“I won’t write the letter of release!” Knowing what she was after, Yang Qi let out a cold laugh. Don’t even think about getting your way!

“You’re overthinking things again. Those blows just now were simply on behalf of my little aunt. As for everything else…” Hua Zhi’s expression didn’t change in the slightest. “I suspect you’re a tough one, so I’ve had something special prepared just for you. I hope you can hold out to the very end.”

Shao Yao rubbed her hands together with a gleeful grin, picked two items from her array of treasures, and had Wang Rong pry his mouth open. She dropped a single drop of each inside. No matter how much Yang Qi struggled, he couldn’t break free.

In terror he clawed at his own throat. After a bout of dry heaving, he brought nothing up. Then a wave of suffocating pressure struck, darkening his vision. Mercifully, it didn’t last long before it receded — the moment he caught his breath, it surged back again. It ebbed. It came back. Over and over.

At first he tried to cry out, hoping someone would hear and come to his aid. But when no one came and his suffering only worsened, he stopped.

One hand gripping his own throat, the moment the suffocation retreated he reached out desperately toward Hua Zhi — but even as the next wave closed in, she gave no reaction whatsoever.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t understood his meaning. But Hua Zhi knew men like Yang Qi. The moment he was free, he would make trouble for her in every way he could. She had already laid contingencies to keep that trouble from sticking to her — but for now, she could afford to collect a little more interest first.

Another quarter of an hour passed. Just when Yang Qi felt certain he would die in this place, he finally heard Hua Zhi’s voice. “Ready to write?”

Yang Qi’s relief was immeasurable. Afraid that moving his head would worsen the torment, he called out in a hoarse voice, “Yes — I’ll write it! I’ll write it!”

“Give him the antidote.”

Shao Yao poured a bowl of water into Yang Qi’s mouth, muttering to herself, “Completely useless — how long did that even last?”

Being looked down upon like that by a woman whose face he couldn’t quite make out, however pleasant her voice, made Yang Qi’s face go scarlet with shame — but then, the moment his mind flashed back to what she had just fed him, the red drained straight to white.

Wang Rong set down paper and freshly ground ink in front of him. Yang Qi stared at it with resentment, hand hovering, refusing to pick up the brush.

Hua Zhi didn’t bother reasoning with him. She simply said, “Give him another dose—”

“I’ll write it!” Yang Qi didn’t dare stall any further. He snatched up the brush with trembling hands and made to set it to paper.

Hua Zhi spoke again. “What I require is a letter of release written in your usual hand, Yang Qi. I know everything you think you can hide. If you don’t want to go through this again, write what I’m asking for, exactly as I’ve asked. If I find any irregularity, you can take a trip through hell and we’ll discuss whether you can manage to write it properly after that.”

The last of Yang Qi’s desperate cunning crumbled. The suffocating agony still lingered in his memory, the residual pain in his stomach unbroken. His hand jerked — a drop of ink fell onto the paper. His heart lurched with it. He quickly looked up at Hua Zhi, terrified she’d think it deliberate.

“There’s more paper underneath.”

Yang Qi pulled away the spoiled sheet. Not daring to try anything else, he gathered himself and began to write, stroke by stroke.

He was thoroughly bewildered. How could a person change so drastically? He had been married to Hua Xian for over ten years — he had practically watched Hua Zhi grow up. The Hua Zhi in his memory was a proper, well-bred young lady: quiet, stiff as a wooden doll, nothing remarkable in any direction. Yet that very woman had brought him to this wretched state. Could it be she had always been this ruthless? Had all those years of obedience been an act?

He didn’t believe a person could be so precocious — knowing from the time she first understood the world how to conceal herself. And the Hua Family had always been harmonious; there was truly no reason for her to have done so.

Yet he was certain of one thing: they had all misjudged her.

He glanced up at Hua Zhi and, with deep reluctance, wrote his name. With this document in her hands, the Yang Family had no more leverage over anyone in the Hua Family.

Wang Rong took it up and read it over carefully before placing it in Hua Zhi’s hands. Hua Zhi read through every character with painstaking care. After years of reading contracts, she knew very well how cunningly the written word could deceive.

Once she had verified it twice over and found nothing amiss, Hua Zhi rose and walked toward Yang Qi. Gu Yan Xi, who had watched throughout without a word, followed close behind.

“Yang Qi, among all the idle, unproductive sons of good families in the capital, I have always held you in the lowest regard. Even if you’d brawled with another man over a woman in the streets, I wouldn’t hold you in such contempt. But that is not what you are. You are the sort of man who locks his door and beats a timid, frail woman — a woman who followed you for over ten years, bore your children, never stood in the way of anything you wished to do, and yet you treated her like this. This, and nothing more, is the full measure of your ability.”

Such naked humiliation was more cutting to a man’s face than a slap across it. Yang Qi’s breathing came in ragged heaves, his complexion a furious red. But he didn’t dare move. He didn’t even dare speak back.

He would not endure that agony again.

“You’re free to go home and make your reports. See him off.”

Wang Rong gave her a formal bow. He genuinely admired this young Miss of the Hua Family — only a woman like this was worthy of Shizi.

Enough shrewdness. Enough resolve. Enough ruthlessness. And yet her fierceness in protecting her family made it impossible to harbor any ill feeling toward her. The Hua Family as it stood now — if she weren’t sharp, she might as well wait to be carved up by the great families.

He knocked Yang Qi unconscious and tossed him into the carriage, then drove the carriage away.

Hua Zhi let out a long, slow breath. It was finally done. The feud with the Yang Family could now be considered fully sealed — but so what? It was never she who had been without principle or loyalty first.

“Let’s go.”

The three walked out of the courtyard. A carriage was already waiting outside.

Hua Zhi glanced at the nearest dwellings, a good two hundred meters off, and asked no questions about what this place was used for. She let Shao Yao, who had already bounded up ahead, pull her inside.

Shao Yao turned and made a face at Gu Yan Xi, then happily squeezed in after Hua Hua.

A flicker of warmth crossed Gu Yan Xi’s eyes. He climbed up to the driver’s seat and took the reins.

The carriage moved with great steadiness. Each flick of the whip was restrained — yet the smile never left his face.

The two most important people left in his life were right there behind him, in the carriage cab. Every now and then he could hear their laughter. He could picture without difficulty exactly what they looked like right now — Shao Yao sprawled all over the place with no sense of posture, and Hua Zhi with curved brows and bright, shining eyes. Simply imagining it made his heart go unbearably soft.

One day he would find a home suited to Hua Zhi’s taste, and put both of them inside it. Let them do whatever they pleased. Whatever they wished — no matter what — he would be content.