For those who owed their lives, Bai Qingyan also said she would later ensure that Magistrate Zhou would give justice to the deceased.

The news that Bai Qingyan had opened the ancestral hall to punish Bai clan members who bullied the people of Shouyang surnamed Bai, and that victims had already reclaimed their ancestral homes or received equivalent compensation, spread throughout Shouyang City as if it had grown wings.

Those victims who originally didn’t believe Bai Qingyan would truly punish the Bai clan members rushed to tell each other.

Soon, more victims arrived, including gray-haired elders carrying memorial tablets of their sons and daughters-in-law, begging Zhenguo Princess to give them justice.

More and more people surnamed Bai gathered in front of the Bai family gate. Those who received compensation were all moved by Bai Qingyan’s great kindness and kowtowed in gratitude.

The faces of clan elders whose grandsons were involved grew increasingly grim. Even clan members who usually didn’t participate in wrongdoing and minded their own business were frightened by this scene. They turned to glare at their disappointing children, their eyes seeming to ask whether their sons and grandsons had caused trouble outside.

The commotion in the Bai ancestral hall was so great that even the womenfolk who had been waiting at home for news couldn’t sit still and rushed over, standing in the ancestral hall courtyard, holding back their tears and anxiously watching their children.

The Bai family descendant who had pushed the mute girl’s mother into the river was the Fifth Master’s grandson, the clan leader’s younger brother. He was so frightened he kept shouting: “Grandfather, save me! Grandfather, save me… I don’t want to be expelled from the clan!”

“Grandfather, clan leader! We’ll never dare again. Everything that should be returned has been returned. Even though my brother and I have been troublemakers, we’ve never harmed anyone’s life!”

“Grandfather, please beg the clan leader, grandfather, to spare me!”

When Fifth Master’s grandson pleaded, the other Bai family descendants kneeling in the courtyard all began begging for mercy.

The clan leader looked at the stack of case files still beside Magistrate Zhou, then at Bai Qingyan’s indifferent expression, and felt an ominous premonition in his heart.

One clan elder couldn’t bear it and looked toward the clan leader: “Clan leader, look… we’ve returned everything that should be returned. Can we not expel them from the clan? They truly know their mistakes this time and have learned their lesson. Why don’t you plead with Your Highness… for the sake of being from the same clan, let it be!”

Bai Qingyan remained unmoved and only said: “These Bai family children have bullied the people and committed countless wrongs! Clan leader, tell me… should they be dealt with according to Bai family laws and clan regulations, or handed over to Magistrate Zhou for punishment?”

The clan leader shuddered. The Bai family laws and clan regulations were much stricter than legal statutes! If punished according to Bai family laws and clan regulations, with hundreds of rod strikes, none of these children would survive!

It would be better to temporarily expel them from the clan first. When relations with Bai Qingyan improved, they could beg Magistrate Zhou for lenient treatment, and these children might still have a chance at survival.

“Father! When have our Bai family children ever suffered such hardship? Ah Jie is still so young. He’s been to prison and returned what should be returned. The dead cannot be brought back to life… didn’t we just compensate with silver? Why must you be so ruthless?” Bai Qingjie’s mother looked at her son kneeling on the ground, no longer even knowing how to cry, and wailed to the clan leader, “Our Bai family is a founding meritorious family! We’ve accumulated countless military achievements over the years. Can’t such merit protect the safety of the Bai family descendants?”

Bai Qingyan raised her eyes, her gaze sharp and terrifying.

“What fucking nonsense!” Bai Jinzhi was so enraged she cursed, drawing the long whip from her waist and cracking it through the air with a sound that split the sky, her imposing presence frightening the pleading woman into a shudder.

“Going to prison counts as suffering? My seventeenth brother was only ten years old when he rushed to the battlefield to sacrifice his life for the Kingdom, following my uncle to raise his sword in defense of the people, swearing to never retreat even unto death. He was beheaded and disemboweled, his belly full of tree roots and mud! Have these pig-dog beasts suffered as much as my seventeenth brother?! Can they compare to how young my seventeenth brother was?!”

Thinking of little Seventeen, Bai Jinzhi’s heart twisted in pain, her blood boiling. When had the Bai family children ever suffered such hardship? What kind of suffering… could compare to her seventeenth brother’s?!

“Our Bai family’s military achievements… how dare shameless scoundrels like you use them to plead for these pig-dogs?! The Bai family is indeed a founding meritorious family, and we’ve indeed accumulated countless military achievements over the years! But those were all military merits established by all the men of our capital’s Bai family sacrificing their lives on the battlefield! They gave their lives selflessly… was it so you could rely on the virtue of our Bai family sacrificing for the people surnamed Bai to bully the common folk and treat human lives as grass?!”

Bai Jinzhi spoke with piercing clarity: “If you want military achievements, when my grandfather, uncles, and brothers died in battle, why didn’t you go to the Nan Jiang battlefield to earn military merit? Instead, it was my elder sister from the capital’s Bai family, who had been seriously wounded serving the Kingdom in earlier years, who risked her life to go to Nan Jiang, defeated Xi Liang and Nanyan, and saved the border people of Jin from dire straits! Among the countless military achievements of the Bai family… which one of you sitting here contributed even an ounce of effort?! You dare to claim those merits for yourselves and use them to exonerate these things worse than pig-dogs! Have you no shame!”

The clan leader looked at Bai Jinzhi, his gaze falling on Eunuch Quan Yu, forcibly suppressing his anger and saying with insufficient confidence: “Our Bai family shares the same roots and branches, we’re all the same…”

Bai Qingyan’s beautiful eyes looked toward the clan leader, her gaze growing even colder: “Since we share the same roots and branches, you should know… the Bai family has rushed to battlefields for generations, fighting desperately through mountains of blades and seas of fire, not for military achievements. We would never rely on merit to excuse wrongdoing, much less be so shameless as to attempt to offset crimes with achievements! Within this Bai ancestral hall… with Bai family ancestors above, heroic spirits above! The Bai family direct line of the capital… from following Emperor Gaozu to establish the dynasty until now, there are already hundreds of memorial tablets… which one died of old age, which one didn’t sacrifice their life for the Kingdom?! Living for the people, dying for the nation—these six words are the Bai family legacy. Our capital’s Bai family has achieved this! But today, you clan elders standing here, search your hearts and ask yourselves—which of your families has achieved this?”

Bai Jinzhi looked at the people surnamed Bai outside the ancestral hall gate, unconsciously drawing closer to the main entrance of the Bai ancestral hall. She remembered her elder sister standing before the capital’s Bai family gate, recounting the Bai family’s achievements, making those treacherous villains who intended to frame the Bai family feel guilty, stirring the emotions of the people surnamed Bai… defending the Bai family.

She remembered when her elder sister beat the petition drum to force Prince Xin’s execution, how the people’s hearts turned toward her. She remembered her elder sister saying… that previously the Bai family was reticent and focused on action, never proclaiming their loyalty and righteousness aloud, which led to being forgotten.

She remembered the vast power brought by the people’s hearts in the capital.

Bai Jinzhi gripped the whip in her hand tightly, looking at those clan descendants kneeling in the ancestral hall courtyard, and shouted with full confidence: “My grandfather donned armor at sixty and took away all the Bai family men, even my ten-year-old seventeenth brother fought bloody battles and died for the Kingdom! Their sacrifice… was never for you bunch of things worse than pig-dogs!”

“The capital’s Bai family members are not fearless of death. Our Bai family people are also born of parents, with people earnestly hoping for their return. But every good son of our Bai family has never forgotten the ancestral teachings and is willing to fight to the death to protect the people! It’s because the Bai family regards the people of the Great Jin surnamed Bai as flesh and blood relatives. After all, tens of thousands of border people have no one to protect them. After all, bearing the empty title of Zhenguo, we fear being ashamed before the taxes and support given by the people surnamed Bai!”