Xie Sanye’s question made Old Lady Xie’s emotions, which had just calmed slightly, instantly agitate again.

“It wasn’t being driven out, it wasn’t…”

Xie Daozhi couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Mother, what are you saying?”

“Son!”

Old Lady Xie wept sorrowfully. “This was his great kindness to us mother and son—great kindness!”

That day when he returned from the yamen, he went into his study.

She waited until midnight but still didn’t see him come out. Just as she was about to rest first, he summoned her to the study.

In the study, a single lamp burned like a bean.

He stood before the window with his hands behind his back. He seemed to have encountered some difficulty—his brows were tightly knitted, his face without a trace of expression.

She dared not make a sound, only helped him pour out the cold tea and add a cup of hot tea.

When she brought the tea over, he didn’t take it. His gaze fell on her for quite a while before he said coldly, “I’ve already written the divorce letter. Pack up and leave with your son.”

The teacup in her hands shattered on the floor.

She knelt in panic and distress, crying out, “What did I do wrong for the master to divorce me?”

His face darkened without speaking, fierce energy heavy between his brows.

She panicked. Not caring about face anymore, she picked up a shard from the floor and stabbed it toward her own wrist.

He grabbed her hand to stop her.

She saw his softening heart and widened her eyes. “If the master divorces me, it would be better to just let me die.”

Their eyes met.

For the first time, she didn’t evade.

After a long while.

He patted her back. “The court may move against me. I’m afraid the Yan family will be difficult to preserve.”

“What?” She was frightened speechless.

“Those who can leave, I will arrange for them to leave. Those who cannot leave—that is their fate.”

His voice was calm and unruffled. “With a divorce letter, you can leave and no one will make things difficult for you.”

“I won’t leave. I won’t leave even if I die.”

“Think of your son, think of his future.”

He always spoke directly to the point.

“You are the most practical, most calculating woman. How is it that you’re confused now?”

“Master, I’m not confused at all. I…”

“It doesn’t matter what you are.”

He coldly interrupted.

“What matters is that you understand one thing: your son is the only person you can rely on in the future.”

“Then what about you? What about the young masters?”

“A woman shouldn’t meddle in men’s affairs. Just manage yourself.”

He suddenly rebuked her, his voice as severe as before, yet she somehow heard a trace of tenderness in it.

She was going mad.

“How can things be fine one moment and like this the next? Who did the master offend?”

“A despicable villain!”

His gaze was poisoned. “But no matter how many times I could redo it, I would still scold him bloody.”

“Master doesn’t think of himself, but should consider the entire household.”

She was truly panicking, almost speaking without thinking.

“Why couldn’t you endure it? Leaving others a line is leaving yourself a line!”

“Endure it?”

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, then opened them again.

“You’ve been with me for two years. Am I the kind of person who can endure?”

He was not, nor did he disdain to be. His eyes couldn’t tolerate a single grain of sand. Two years sharing a bed—she knew his temperament clearly.

He slowly turned around, his pupils dark and somber.

“I deposited a sum of money at a bank in the capital. Not much—just two thousand taels. If you and your son spend it carefully, it will be enough for these few years. After that, it depends on your own fortune.”

His tone suddenly shifted.

“But if you want that child to have great prospects, don’t give him an easy life. I understand this child’s temperament clearly—he can only rise up in adversity.”

She felt her heart was about to split open, the pain unbearable. Not caring about propriety, she rushed forward and desperately embraced him.

“Master, Master!”

He didn’t push her away, his voice gentle as he called her full name.

“Yang Hui, this temperament of mine was brought from the womb. I can’t change it and don’t want to change it. A person lives one lifetime—what do they seek if not to follow their heart in all things?”

“The master has followed his heart in all things, but the path has also been completely severed. What about us?”

Though she complained with her mouth, her arms held him even tighter.

What had become of this world?

Why were the ones driven to desperate straits always the good people?

What about those bad people?

“Without reaching a dead end, there’s no new life. Perhaps through this, my temperament might even change?”

He smiled self-mockingly, then gently pushed her away.

“Go. Take the divorce letter and leave tomorrow.”

She looked at him through tear-filled eyes, looking for a long time, just unwilling to move.

He narrowed his eyes slightly, concealing all the emotions in them.

“Don’t feel indebted to me. If one day your son has power and position, remember to extend a hand to help those few unworthy wretches of mine. That will be enough.”

She wiped away her tears, turned and walked to the desk, picked up that divorce letter, and suddenly tore it to shreds.

“You…”

“I entered your courtyard in nothing but a small sedan chair. Someone carried in by a small sedan chair is merely a concubine. To dismiss a lowly concubine—why would a divorce letter be needed?”

She looked up at him, accurately capturing the shock in his eyes.

“Master, I will never be with another man in this lifetime. If you are safe and sound, if the Yan household still has room for us mother and son, leave a place by your bed for me.”

He frowned, his gaze becoming less clear, as if covered with a layer of moisture.

“If you truly have trouble…”

She couldn’t continue through her tears. “Then… then consider it me leaving myself something to hope for.”

Otherwise, I won’t be able to go on living!

Life is too long. If there’s not even a bit of hope, not a bit to look forward to, how can one endure those endless bitter days, those lonely sleepless nights?

For the first time, a gentle and compassionate smile appeared on his proud face, directed at her. Then he spoke the last words he would ever say to her in this life.

“Where’s the cleverness? Clearly quite foolish too.”

She also replied with the last words she would say to him in this life: “I learned that from you.”

After speaking, she knelt and performed the grand ceremony before him, then walked into the sky full of heavy snow while shedding tears.

The next day.

The heavy vermilion gates of the Yan estate slammed shut with a bang, like a sharp knife stabbing heavily into her chest.

It truly hurt!

The emotions she had suppressed for so long suddenly collapsed, and she wailed in grief.

In the vast heaven and earth, once again only she and her son remained.

Having finished the last word, the old lady instead stopped her tears.

For her, recalling these events again—every scene was her longing and guilt toward him.

“This is the complete truth, pressed in my heart for a full forty years.”

Her voice gasped like someone drowning. “Son, he doesn’t owe us—we owe him, a debt we can never repay, not in several lifetimes.”

In the dead silence, Xie Daozhi realized his ears were ringing.

He couldn’t hear any sound around him, only felt his heart aching—aching until his stomach cramped in waves.

Someone was patting his shoulder. Xie Daozhi looked up to see it was Third Brother. Third Brother’s eyes were full of worry, his mouth opening and closing, saying something.

But he still couldn’t hear clearly.

Very strange—though he couldn’t hear anything, the experiences from those two years at the Yan family floated up like paintings, scene by scene.

He scolded him that his calligraphy looked like dog scratches…

He said he had no standing posture and no sitting posture…

He hurled the essays he wrote right at his head…

He scolded that doting mothers often ruin their sons, and if he didn’t want to stay in the Yan household, he should get lost…

Xie Daozhi gripped the corner of the table, struggling to stand up, staring at the old lady with bloodshot eyes.

“Why didn’t you say so earlier?”

“Why hide it from me for so long?”

“I… I had the chance to help him, I had the chance!”