White cabbage butterflies fluttered around the courtyard, and Gennu’er and An’er chased them behind, shrieking like they were butchering pigs, tripping and falling countless times, only to get up again with sweat plastered across their foreheads, stubbornly refusing to give up even though they never managed to catch one.
Qiqian’er and Wu Rong sat together beneath the veranda, eating seasonal fruit while keeping half an eye on the children at play.
Her mood was good enough that she felt she could die tomorrow and still have no regrets — everything had finally turned out the way she wanted.
It was the same with every married-out daughter: the moment she had a child, she was certain that her child alone was the sweetest, most adorable one under heaven, that there was no one who didn’t love him — especially in front of her own family. My child is the number one treasure under the sun.
The first thing Qiqian’er did upon seeing her older sister was naturally to present her son. Whether you like him or not doesn’t matter — you wouldn’t dare say he’s anything less than wonderful anyway.
Huo Wu Rong was, of course, delighted. She could never have imagined that the little sister she’d once worried herself sick over, who used to sleep curled up beside her in the same straw nest, would end up building such a fine, dignified, and smooth-sailing life all through her own effort.
What more was there to say? Her little sister’s precious treasure was now her own precious treasure too.
They had money now!
When she saw there were two children instead of one, she was even happier.
So she specially sought out the best silversmith in the market district and had a full “hundred-immortals cap” made entirely of silver for the children, along with a solid silver lock-charm.
It was said the lock was so heavy that once An’er wore it, he could no longer misbehave — it had the effect of a ship’s iron anchor. Such was the extravagance of their Huo Ninth Brother, the head of the guild, these days.
In the Yandu markets, whenever a household had a newborn, as long as there was a maternal grandmother’s family, no matter how poor they were, they would send a small cap at the full-month celebration — the kind stitched all over with little silver or brass figures of deities. If the cap was covered edge to edge with silver deity-figures, it was called a “hundred-immortals cap.”
If a newborn baby had such a cap, it meant the maternal family treasured that grandchild dearly and thought highly of them. And if, besides the cap, they also gave a silver lock to go with it — tsk, that was a wealthy household indeed! Add a pair of silver bell-horns on top of that, and even a county magistrate’s son wouldn’t have it better.
Huo Wu Rong had money in hand now, and she was willing to spend it on her sister — but since her sister was already married, she spent it on her nephew instead.
This woman handled money with the generosity of a legendary hero.
The moment she laid eyes on her nephew, she grabbed a hoe and, right in front of her sister and brother-in-law, dug up two fifty-tael silver ingots she’d buried in the corner of the courtyard wall.
She was so lavish about it that even Chen Dasheng — a man who mingled and dined within the imperial palace itself — was somewhat taken aback.
In the blink of an eye, three days had passed since they’d reunited, and Huo Wu Rong declared that though the Huo family had no men left, they still had to properly host a banquet for their brother-in-law.
And so, here they were.
Since it was meant to be a proper reception, she naturally called along some of her sworn brothers to keep them company — and just like that, over a dozen people showed up in a great bustling crowd, even Liu Daya tagging along to eat and drink for free.
This fellow knew the score — the moment he heard the banquet was being held privately in the back courtyard of a temple, he insisted on tagging along no matter what, chattering the whole way there that eating a “temple-back banquet” was purely a matter of fate — ordinarily you’d never get the chance.
Somehow word got out, and along the way they ran into Tang Jiuyuan, and eventually Chang Lianfang too.
These fellows had nothing better to do, and with noses like hunting dogs, they went wherever the good food was.
Not to be outdone, though Chen Dasheng had no idea what a “temple-back banquet” even was, being treated with such ceremony still gave him plenty of face — after all, whenever his sworn brother Tong Jintai’s wife went to visit her own family, everyone stayed quiet about it, but they all envied him underneath.
This crowd all claimed they wanted to experience a temple-back banquet, and it was only then that Chen Dasheng learned the truth: a famous chef, once he grew old and retired his knife, would no longer cook full banquets for the public — he’d only prepare one particular kind of meal, a neighborly favor-banquet for the local community, and even then only a handful of tables a year. That scarcity was exactly what made it so precious.
It was also because, back in the day, the chef had sworn an oath never to compete for the younger generation’s rice bowl, so he could only continue cooking under the pretense of “offering to the gods,” doing this kind of business at ordinary temples that permitted meat and wine — hence the name “temple-back banquet.”
Fifth Sister-in-law’s connections carried real weight — with just a single word, she’d invited a famous chef in Yandu who had long since stopped taking commissions, and had even borrowed the kitchen of Ding Gu Temple, known for its elegant lotus pond, formally sending an invitation card to receive her brother-in-law. That was how today’s happy occasion had come to be.
Aunt Ding Gu was a neighborhood deity of murky origin, with many differing accounts of her background, and her domain of responsibility was extremely broad — she looked after the sick in the alleys, warded off evil spirits, granted children, brought rain, and even, apparently, handled matters of fire.
Huo Wu Rong was under the patronage of Yao Chunfeng, who managed the side gate, which meant she could freely use the capital’s temple properties for her own private affairs. As for Huguo Temple, that was the imperial temple — a completely different matter from these little neighborhood temples where you’d find eight of them crammed into a single alley in Yandu.
The reunion atmosphere was warm and lively, and eventually the two children abandoned the butterflies altogether and started plucking blades of green grass to bring back and “offer” to their mothers. Wu Rong looked at her sister’s face, full of maternal tenderness, and laughed, saying, “Isn’t it strange? I always figured you’d end up with nowhere good to land, but instead — turns out of the three of us, you’re the one living the most comfortably. When people mentioned you to me, I asked around, and my goodness, you’re doing a hundred times better than your sister.”
The way Wu Rong talked was thoroughly like a man’s.
Qiqian’er’s mouth curved helplessly as she looked at her sister — dressed in men’s clothing, sitting with her legs casually crossed — and laughed. “A hundred times better, what nonsense. I’m nowhere close to you, Fifth Sister… What choice did I have but to change? Who doesn’t want to live well?”
Wu Rong lifted her teacup, took a sip, and sighed. “That’s the truth of it — you had to change! If I hadn’t run into Big Sister-in-law that day, and she told me you’d gone off with them, I really would have gone looking for you. But by the time I ran into her, it had already been seven or eight months. Ah, the world is so vast — I sent word through more than a few escort agencies, treated people to plenty of drinks, just hoping they’d keep their eyes and ears open in every direction, keep listening…”
She sighed again and looked at Qiqian’er apologetically. “Don’t blame your sister. Back then I was useless — I could barely keep myself from starving, let alone anything else.”
Qiqian’er’s heart ached with guilt, and she shook her head. Back when they were still at home, it had always been Fifth Sister who made the decisions about everything, while she and Liu Ning just went along with it.
She thought to herself: I really do have a black heart. In both my lifetimes, I never once imagined my sister would still be alive. “Don’t — don’t blame yourself, Sister. Don’t hold it against yourself either. As long as you made it through, as long as you’re still alive, I don’t blame you for anything, I wouldn’t dare to. You’re only a year and a half older than me — even if you’d found me back then, what could you have done?”
Fifth Sister had gone through her own share of suffering too — in her previous life, dragging along a version of herself with no backbone at all would have been pointless anyway. That cowardly, heartless self of before had let down the old madam, let down An’er, and let down her own sisters even more.
In her previous life, she’d never once heard of Huo Wu Rong — so it turned out this person had been Huo Ninth Brother all along.
Fate — sometimes, no matter how much you refuse to accept it, it catches up with you anyway.
Qiqian’er’s eyes stung, and she grabbed her sister’s hand. “Now the two of us are finally doing well, Sister—”
Wu Rong looked at her sister and nodded. “Mm?”
Qiqian’er looked her straight in the eye and asked seriously, “These past few days, you’ve been avoiding my questions about Liu Ning. Is it — is it because Liu Ning is gone?”
Huo Wu Rong fell silent. She stared at the lotus pond in front of her, but in her mind all she could see was Liu Ning’s head half sliced away, blood spraying across the sky…
After a long while, she forced a smile. “Hey now, what are you talking about? Liu Ning and I just got separated, that’s all — I was going to ask you the same thing, have you heard anything from her?”
“Is that so? No… I’ll have people look into it.”
“Look into what? When she’s ready to turn up, she’ll turn up on her own. Think about it — with how clever that girl is, she’s probably tucked away somewhere in some cozy little corner living the good life.”
“That’s true too. Sixth Sister was always the sly one — she was always the one with the ideas, and you were always the one doing the legwork, and I was always the one who got beaten in the end.”
“…Yeah, that’s how she was. Sly as anything…”
While the two sisters talked, the group of idlers eating and drinking in the pavilion were discussing this very topic among themselves.
Liu Daya sighed with an admiring tone. “You all tell me — how on earth did the Huo family raise their daughters? Every single one of them is extraordinary. I, Liu Daya, have seen plenty of remarkable women over the years — take our old Empress Dowager, or Consort Xiao — every one of them a rare and outstanding woman. But those two ladies were born into good families, born as noble ladies above everyone else. What did the Huo family’s girls have? Nothing at all. So how is it that each one of them turned out more capable than the last? My goodness — she’s in charge of the guild across nine whole market streets!”
The temple’s spirit-medium woman bustled back and forth with a few of her young apprentices, and before long, dishes began arriving one after another.
Today’s menu sounded modest by name alone — first came the four fruit dishes: fragrant citron, snow pear, flowering quince, and pomegranate, all last year’s fruit, selected from the best stock in the market district’s fruit warehouse and delivered specially.
After the four fruits came four dried fruits: longan, torreya nuts, lotus seed meat, and steamed jujubes.
These eight dishes formed the outer ring, followed by two honey-preserved dishes: honeyed green plums with lotus leaf, and eight-treasure honey preserve.
Then two sweet-and-sour dishes: fragrant shredded plum with ginger, and hawthorn fish balls.
Four wax-cured meats to go with the wine: cured chicken, cured duck, soap-bean sausage sticks, and ham.
Eight persuasion-wine dishes: mutton-tongue soup, braised shark, six-colored cocoon rolls, fresh clams, blood congee soup, braised lamb tripe, sliced lamb leg, and a mixed platter of braised chicken and rabbit.
Finally, four jars of fifteen-year-aged wine from Sanjiagou, five catties each, were brought out.
This was a top-tier full banquet — including the aged wine, twenty-five dishes in total. Everyone at the table had eaten every fine delicacy imaginable, and yet dishes like these had to be timed to the season; some ingredients simply couldn’t be found together outside their proper time of year.
But their head of the guild controlled the entire smooth street — there wasn’t a household hoarding good ingredients that could hide it from them.
What was rarest of all was that this banquet, delicious as it was, wasn’t the kind of delicious you found in a restaurant or in the palace — it was the flavor of an ordinary household’s once-a-year holiday feast, the kind everyone was sure to eat during festivals. That particular flavor was the finest thing under heaven, perfect for both drinking and eating rice with.
Once the feast was fully laid out, since the Huo family had no man of the house to host, Chen Dasheng took charge as the main host, raising his cup in a toast three times before everyone began eating in earnest. In no time, everyone’s whole body felt thoroughly satisfied and at ease — every bit as comfortable as could be.
Chang Lianfang set down his spoon and sighed. “I once heard my sister-in-law mention offhand that they’d spent their lives following around the womenfolk of a disgraced official’s household. I suppose seeing so much ugliness so early in life made her determined never to end up like those people, no matter what.”
Guan Si’er picked up the wine jar and poured himself a bowl. “Last night I went home and asked my father what a ‘guild head’ was. He said a guild head is like a relative from out of town — if a newcomer arrives in the capital with ten strings of cash to his name, that’s only enough to cover rent and meals for about a month.
“But if you happen to belong to a trade with its own guild, you can seek out the guild head of that craft, and if he accepts you, he’ll arrange everything properly for you — food, daily necessities, even how you’ll earn your living — all smoothly settled. Then those ten strings of cash could last you half a year instead. Anyone who can rise to become a guild head in the neighborhood markets is truly capable! My brother’s Fifth Sister-in-law here — tsk, she’s formidable, even more capable than my own sister-in-law.”
When he finished, Liu Daya cut in. “Being formidable is one thing, it depends on the situation. Back when times were hard for us, being tough wasn’t a bad thing. But Marquis Chen, you’ve already got two children and your wife’s carrying a third — you really ought to think about your sister-in-law’s future too. Don’t take offense, but I happen to have a—”
A faintly ingratiating look crossed his face. “…Well, my own cousin has a younger cousin who’s quite decent, close in age to Fifth Sister-in-law, and he’s also very—”
Chen Dasheng immediately waved his hand to cut him off, glancing over at the two sisters who were now holding hands, each cradling a child, playing and teasing them, and feeling a deep sense of contentment in his heart.
His own wife had always carried a certain emptiness inside her, as if the smallest wrong move on his part might make her fly away for good — that fear had never quite left him.
But now things were better. With her steady, grounded sister here, his wife had finally settled into the ordinary warmth of everyday life.
His sister-in-law absolutely had to be well taken care of.
With that thought, he smiled and said, “Don’t bring this up again, old Liu — it’s no use! Qiqian’er’s asked my sister-in-law about it more than once, and she always says she’s just like this now… she can’t go back to living the life of managing a household and raising children anymore. She says she likes being the one calling the shots for other people now, and she’s stubborn — if she found someone strong-willed, either she’d end up killing him or he’d end up killing her. And if she found someone meek and easily led, she wouldn’t be satisfied either. So what’s to be done?”
But Liu Daya was the type who valued family deeply, so he pressed further. “Now listen — you two are young and full of vigor, so of course you can say all sorts of bold things now. But once the children are born and grown, everyone has their own life to live — why should anyone else be obligated to take care of a sister-in-law who doesn’t want to marry?
“Good brother, listen to your elder brother here — I’m at least a decade and more older than you both, and I’ve learned the hardest lessons in life. And it wasn’t from official duties, mind you — work troubles, at worst you just quit. But family? Especially a strong-willed sister-in-law like this — eventually the children will feel a distance from her…”
He was a talkative sort, and just as he was getting into the swing of his lecture, a soldier arrived leading a small child wearing a cloth wrap over part of his face.
The moment Chen Dasheng saw the child, he smiled. He stood up and personally led the boy over to sit down, and once the child was seated, Chen Dasheng picked up a small bowl and served him a bit of each dish, letting him eat on his own at the table.
This small child, despite his size, greeted all the adults with the composed manner of someone much older, bowing and offering thanks — and then, without the slightest hesitation, untied the cloth covering the lower half of his face.
The whole table drew a sharp breath at once.
Those who had already seen him before showed no reaction, but those who hadn’t — especially Liu Daya and Tang Jiuyuan — were struck with pity, their faces filled with genuine heartache.
As for Chang Lianfang, having served in the army, such scars were nothing unusual to him — he was simply curious how a child this young had ended up with half his face marked by a blade.
The boy looked to be a little over ten years old. Half his face was as fine and handsome as a jade child from a painting, but the other half bore a raised, reddish scar, easily an inch or more long.
If an ordinary-looking child had such a scar, it might be bearable — but because the rest of this child’s face was so striking, the contrast made it all the more heartbreaking.
This child was none other than Bai Ruyi, who had spent nearly half a year at the scout training grounds. Qiqian’er had originally intended to place him with Old Xin, but Chen Dasheng had taken a liking to him instead and brought him along.
A few days earlier, when the two sisters had recognized each other, Chen Dasheng had thought long and hard about it. He himself was too closely tied to the imperial family and held sensitive matters in his hands; sooner or later, the brothers would each build up their own spheres of influence, all wielding real power. And yet here in his own family was this Fifth Sister-in-law — that was a vulnerability.
It wasn’t that he looked down on his sister-in-law at all — in fact, he admired her a great deal.
On the contrary, it was rather unlucky for her to become his relative, since everyone wanted to align themselves with him.
What to do, then? For the sake of safety, Chen Dasheng felt he had to make arrangements for this sister-in-law sooner rather than later. Otherwise, as his own influence continued to grow, she would remain a vulnerability — if it came to it, he could handle whatever came his way, but what about her?
Once the meal ended, everyone lost in their own thoughts, Chen Dasheng set down his chopsticks and said to Liu Daya and the others, “Gentlemen, you happened to arrive at a good time today. Since you’re here, why don’t you all serve as witnesses for us?”
Chang Lianfang set down his chopsticks, looked at the boy, and seemed to understand something, nodding with a laugh. “I knew it — the Huo family’s daughters really are something else. Fierce and sharp, through and through, passed down in the blood. And you don’t mind? You even indulge her?”
Worried he might upset the child, he pretended to rub his own cheek instead, winking at Chen Dasheng as he continued, “I’m waiting to see how this turns out for you. She’s still young — and you just listen to whatever she says?”
Chen Dasheng nodded. “What else can I do but listen? Before we came along, my sister-in-law was doing perfectly well on her own. Walk down any street and mention Huo Ninth Brother, and all of Yandu knows she’s a woman — who would dare disrespect her? My sister-in-law says this is how she’ll live for the rest of her life, and she’s not changing.”
Watching Bai Ruyi finish his soup, Chen Dasheng smiled and patted his head, untying a piece of jade from his waist and handing it to him with instructions: “Ruyi, go run an errand for me in the kitchen. Tell the old master that this meal was even more authentic than what you’d find at a top restaurant in Yandu — this is a token of thanks.”
Bai Ruyi stood, took the jade piece with both hands, and turned to head toward the kitchen.
Once Bai Ruyi was out of earshot, both Tang Jiuyuan and Chang Lianfang began, each from his own standpoint, to offer advice: since he cared so much about his sister-in-law, he should find her a smaller child, one without any facial scars at least, to raise.
What was this? The boy already started with one leg shorter than the other in life, so to speak — and now they’d sent over a child whose face was ruined, whose path to officialdom was permanently closed? Was the family really unable to support anyone better?
If they sent a fine, unblemished child, no need to say more, he could simply be raised without complication, and with the connections at this table, it wouldn’t be hard to secure some respectable standing for their sister-in-law down the road. What was Chen Dasheng even thinking?
Chen Dasheng only laughed softly. “What was I thinking? Heh, none of you are wrong! It’s all well-meaning. But our Fifth Sister-in-law has said it herself — this life of hers is the life of a neighborhood guild head, and for the sake of that dignity, she won’t change it. You all make it sound so simple — bring in some perfectly presentable child, and then what, have him become an official?
“Fine, when he’s small it’s easy enough to say, but people’s hearts change as they grow up. If he grows up and starts his own family, and word gets around all of Daliang asking which official household has a guild-head grandmother sitting in the back hall — how would that look?”
After Chen Dasheng said this, everyone fell quiet — after all, they were all outsiders to this matter, and what needed saying had already been said.
Chen Dasheng looked off into the distance, where Huo Wu Rong was already directing the spirit-medium woman in setting up the incense altar.
He sighed helplessly. “What does my household lack? Nothing! Never mind raising one sister-in-law — even if my wife had ten sisters, I, Chen Dasheng, could support them all. But she doesn’t want that! My wife is like this, and — hah!
“If, as you all suggest, we simply brought in a boy and raised him under our own roof, it might look better on the surface, but who doesn’t have their own private grievances behind closed doors? What’s wrong with Ruyi here? His character, his temperament — both have been tested. I trust this child. When my Fifth Sister-in-law grows old someday, I’ll pass the guild leadership on to him, and that’ll be a comfortable life for her. This boy can’t become an official — and for our purposes, that’s actually a good thing! Think it through carefully, gentlemen… isn’t that the truth of it?”