Hearing this, everyone in the Li family was shocked and dumbfounded, their faces filled with utter disbelief.
“One hundred and forty-nine people… all executed?” the third son of the Li family murmured.
Shi Yin looked at Li Bi: “The Emperor’s heart is already ironclad. Petitions pleading for mercy have come in one after another, but the officials who submitted them were either dismissed from office or beaten with staves. By now, no one dares to utter another half a word. Do you really think the imperial concubine from the Shi family possesses the courage to defy the dragon’s scale?”
Shi Yin’s words were cold and merciless, somewhat exaggerated.
However, she knew full well that when Li Bi spoke those words, he was referring to his own pair of children, but the people present would never think that way.
Her mother-in-law was surely thinking right now: If the eldest branch’s children could be spared, why not the second branch’s? And why couldn’t the children of the third, fourth, and fifth branches be spared as well?
Although the Li family’s inner courtyard was not particularly filthy, whatever misdeeds had occurred were merely petty schemes among women involving silk ribbons and hairpins.
Yet once children were involved, a mother’s strength knows no bounds, and any underhanded means could be deployed.
At such a critical juncture, Shi Yin would never dare to gamble on that thin thread of familial affection.
Li Bi by this time knew that he had indeed been indulging in wild fantasies. He simply crouched down, hugged Chengzhou, and murmured softly, “It is your father who has implicated you.”
Shi Yin was no longer willing to keep up that facade of decorum with him. She rolled her eyes directly, pulled Chengzhou back to her own side, and holding Rong’er, followed the Li family’s group as the bailiffs urged them forward toward the Wei County prison.
The Wei County prison was crude and simple, and the prison cells were few in number. The male and female family members of the Li family were detained separately, each occupying two cells.
Li Bi’s two beautiful concubines and the third branch’s female family members were locked up in the same cell as Shi Yin.
At this moment, they were huddled in the corner, sobbing endlessly and piteously.
Shi Yin merely held Rong’er, gently coaxing her to sleep. Chengzhou leaned against her, resting against her knees, deep in thought about goodness knows what.
Over the past two days, the jailers did not make things difficult for the Li family, providing only two bowls of thin porridge daily—so watery that everyone’s pale complexions were mirrored in it.
On the third morning, the jailers arrived, unlocked the prison chains, and called out Shi Yin along with her son and daughter.
Hearing the commotion, Li Bi in the neighboring cell grew instantly anxious. If female prisoners were left by themselves, falling into the hands of these jailers invariably meant they would become objects of abuse.
“Where are you taking my wife and children! Stop right there! Do not touch them! The Shi family has a concubine consort in the imperial palace; you had better weigh your own worth carefully!”
He roared through the iron bars, attempting to use the Shi family’s influence to intimidate these jailers.
Annoyed by the noise, a jailer swung his whip and snapped harshly, “You’d better weigh your own life first! Your wife and children are being picked up from the prison by the Shi family for voluntary exile to Heishan Island.”
With that, he glanced sideways at him, his tone carrying a trace of mockery.
“As for you, it’s hard to say whether you can even make it to Heishan Island alive.”
Having said this, he paid him no further mind and led Shi Yin and the two children straight away.
The rest of the Li family instantly understood the moment they heard “voluntary exile”—
She had used the opportunity of severing ties with the Li family in exchange for accompanying her children, securing a glimmer of a chance for them to survive on Heishan Island.
When Li Bi learned that his wife was also heading to Heishan Island, a sense of relief actually rose in his heart. Yet upon second thought, he felt ashamed of his own despicable intention to bind his wife.
“Eldest Sister-in-law! I beg you, take my child along as well!”
“Eldest Sister-in-law, take mine too! I beg you, the journey ahead is fraught with peril; they will never survive to reach Heishan Island!”
“Eldest Branch’s wife…”
The surrounding voices were noisy and chaotic, but Shi Yin did not look back once, walking with great firmness.
She knew that from this step forward, the resentment was planted deep within the hearts of the Li family members at this very moment.
Yet she didn’t care in the slightest.
Leaving aside the crowd of the Li family, how many could possibly survive the journey of exile and successfully reach Heishan Island?
Even if a few managed to survive by sheer luck, from this moment on, she would never force herself again, nor would she maintain that gentle eldest daughter-in-law demeanor.
From this moment onward, she would live solely for herself and for her own children.
Seeing that Shi Yin did not look back, the Li family members immediately turned and went to beg Li Bi instead.
Pleas and weeping intertwined, making the noise headache-inducing.
Yet what could Li Bi do?
Shi Yin hadn’t revealed a single shred of this intention to him beforehand. Thinking back to the sharp, blade-like gaze she had given him earlier, it was clearly out of resentment for him saying things he shouldn’t have—and furthermore, to guard against the entanglement of these Li family members, which might ruin the Shi family’s arrangements.
Li Bi also understood that the Shi family did not possess such boundless power; extracting his daughter from this catastrophe was already the absolute limit of their utmost efforts.
Furthermore, his wife hadn’t even spared him a single glance when she left. How could there possibly be any way to contact her from within this prison?
“Master! Master! I beg you, let the matriarch take this concubine along too! This concubine is willing to do anything!”
The sound of Li Bi’s two concubines rang in his ears once more, and at this moment, he found the noise utterly unbearable.
“How can the Eldest Sister-in-law be so cold and heartless?! To only take away her own two children while completely ignoring all the other children of the Li family!” Lady Xie watched Shi Yin’s departing figure, her jealousy and hatred driving her half-mad.
“How can that rebellious, vicious woman who defies her elders have such a ruthless heart! As the eldest daughter-in-law, even if she refuses to share adversity with the Li family, how can she just pack up her own children and escape!”
Embracing the two grandsons of the second branch whom she had raised by her side, Lady Xie’s mother-in-law wept with a shattered heart, her words filled with venomous curses, as if this prison disaster had been brought upon them entirely by Shi Yin.
Clad in prison robes, Li Bi leaned against the cell bars. Listening to his own family’s curses, he suddenly let out a cold, derisive laugh: “She used the opportunity of severing ties with the Li family to trade for a chance of survival for her own pair of children. How is that considered ruthless? Do you truly believe the Shi family’s hands reach the heavens and can protect everyone comprehensively? If the Shi family possessed that kind of power, she would have long since completely severed ties with the Li family along with her children, without even needing to set foot on that dangerous Heishan Island!”
Through the wooden partition, Lady Xie’s mother-in-law did not stop her cursing: “Then she should still have tried her utmost to look out for the Li family’s children, instead of only caring about her own pair!”
“Mother, heaven destroys those who are not for themselves; she only wants to protect her children!”
Li Bi paused for a moment, then enunciated word by word: “To protect my children!”
At these words, Lady Xie’s mother-in-law finally reacted: what Shi Yin was protecting was also the progeny of her own eldest son.
Yet, yet…
She lowered her head to look at the two grandsons by her knees—they had been raised by her side ever since birth and belonged to the second branch.
Back when her eldest branch’s eldest grandson was born, she had also thought of keeping that child by her side to raise, but she had been stubbornly rebuffed by the eldest daughter-in-law, who firmly took the child back.
At that time, Shi Yin had always been gentle and compliant, yet for the sake of her child, she had defied her for the very first time, adopting a resolute attitude and yielding not even half a step.
Ever since then, she had simply confiscated Shi Yin’s management authority over the household and elevated the second branch to act as the household mistresses.
Originally, she wanted to make Shi Yin feel uncomfortable and let her know what it felt like to defy an elder. Yet Shi Yin seemed completely indifferent, showing not the slightest intention of fighting for power.
As days passed, her heart grew increasingly biased, showering boundless doting affection upon the two grandsons raised by her side, always reserving the finest items for them first. Partiality toward the second branch had thus naturally become a habit.
At this moment, holding her grandsons, Lady Xie’s mother-in-law was left with nothing but heartbreak. Her little grandsons, raised in such pampered luxury, how could they ever endure the hardships along the road of exile?
That Heishan Island was a remote and desolate isolated island upon the Northern Sea of the Great Jin dynasty.
From Wei County to Heishan Island, the entire journey required more than a month and a half on foot, trekking northward across mountains and ridges. By the time they reached the Changfeng Pier, early winter would be fast approaching.
Amidst the freezing cold and icy winds, they would still need to endure about three days of bumping about on a boat before finally stepping foot onto that island.
Such a perilous journey was something even robust adults might fail to survive, let alone two delicate young children of only six or seven years old who had been pampered since birth!
“When all is said and done, the Shi family is simply selfish! And vicious!”
The more Lady Xie’s mother-in-law thought about it, the more heartbroken she became, washing away even that sliver of remaining sanity. She couldn’t help but complain to Li Bi:
“Why couldn’t she just beg that Shi concubine in the palace for more grace? If they refuse for one day, she should plead for two; if they refuse for two days, she should kneel before the palace gates for a long time! I refuse to believe the Emperor wouldn’t be moved! By employing a few more seductive, flirtatious tricks, could she not salvage a fraction of it? It is clearly the Shi family refusing to put forth their full effort and only looking out for themselves, which is what caused our Li family to fall to this state!”