“Your Highness! Chu Nanxing—Chu Nanxing’s been beaten!”
Qi Yun hurried into the study.
Yan Qi’s hand paused as he practiced calligraphy. Before the ink could drip, he set down his brush and went to wash his hands. “How badly?”
Qi Yun looked incredulous. “He was completely overwhelmed. He couldn’t fight back at all.”
Qi Yun’s shock was understandable. That was Chu Nanxing, after all. Though he was only a fifth-rank commandant at present, everyone in the army knew the name Young General Chu—especially for his astonishing strength.
Many said the King of Xuanzhao had manifested and chosen him as the Chu Family’s treasured heir.
Now that treasured heir was being beaten like a dog.
Yan Qi showed no surprise. There was a subtle anticipation in his eyes.
“Also, I looked into the past of Shen Yuzhu’s birth mother, Concubine Liu.”
“She came from a family that raised beautiful girls to be sold as concubines. At first, Duke Shen kept her outside the estate. He brought her into the household only after she became pregnant. She died in childbirth when she gave birth to Shen Yuzhu.”
“Strangely enough, after she died, the Duchess took Shen Yuzhu in and raised her. Princess Regent was only three at the time, yet the Duchess neglected her completely, leaving her in a small courtyard with only an old nanny to care for her.”
“The old nanny who cared for Princess Regent when she was little is the same one we brought back today—the one blind in one eye, Nanny Xu.”
“Some of the older servants at Duke Shen’s Residence say that after that, the Duchess seemed like a different person. She mistreated her own daughter, while raising her concubine-born daughter as if she were a precious jewel.”
Even Qi Yun thought it sounded uncanny as he spoke. “Your Highness, could it really be that the King of Xuanzhao couldn’t bear to see her descendants suffer, so she manifested?”
“Otherwise, there’s no explaining how Princess Regent suddenly became clear-minded and so incredibly strong. Tsk… I almost want to go pray at the King of Xuanzhao’s temple myself.”
“Praying there won’t do you any good,” Yan Qi said, his meaning unclear. “Have Chu Nanxing find out whether the hairpin is in Shen… Princess Regent’s possession.”
Qi Yun suddenly understood. So that was why His Highness had summoned Chu Nanxing to the capital?
It was entirely possible!
If the King of Xuanzhao had manifested, she certainly wouldn’t allow her relic to remain in the hands of an impostor!
In the study, the candle flame flickered as the night wind swept past. As if sensing something, Yan Qi glanced toward the candle.
The wind, traveling north and south, carried their conversation into a woman’s ears.
In Wutong Courtyard, Chu Zhao opened her eyes lazily, a glint of interest in their depths.
Just as she’d expected: Yan Qi, the little brat, was looking for her “relic”—the Black-Iron Phoenix Hairpin she’d possessed after her death.
But the hairpin was nothing more than an ordinary object. Before Chu Zhao had borrowed a corpse to return to life, it might have been of some use. Now… it was just scrap iron.
What did the little brat want with it?
Chu Zhao looked down at the “real grandson” sprawled beneath her, serving as her stool, and lashed his backside with her whip.
Chu Nanxing cried out in pain, mortified and furious. “Shen Zhaozhao! You can kill a man, but you can’t humiliate him!”
“Can’t I?” Chu Zhao stood and whipped him several more times—across the face, then the backside. “Then let me teach you this: a useless coward can not only be killed, he can be humiliated any way I please!”
“Ah! Stop hitting me! Don’t hit a man in the face—no, don’t hit my backside either! Shen Zhaozhao, you— I was wrong, Older Cousin! Older Cousin, stop hitting me!”
Chu Nanxing scrambled away, clutching his head. He was thoroughly beaten.
Why? Why was it that after this little fool regained her senses, she’d become so skilled at martial arts? And stronger than him, too! She didn’t look like she’d ever trained in martial arts!
“When you were a foolish little girl and people bullied you, I stood up for you! Shen Zhaozhao, ugh… Older Cousin, have a heart… Stop hitting me…”
Chu Zhao’s whip hand paused. There really was such an incident, tucked away in the scraps of Xiaokugua’s memories.
The real Madam Chu had been the legitimate daughter of the Chu family’s second branch, and the sister of the boy’s father, born of the same mother.
Later, when Concubine Liu took possession of Madam Chu’s body and began mistreating her own daughter, Madam Chu’s elder brother came to visit with his wife and children. He had intended to persuade Madam Chu to change her ways, but the visit ended in a bitter falling-out.
At the time, five-year-old Chu Nanxing had seen Shen Yuzhu bullying Xiaokugua. He’d rushed to defend her and ended up with a split head for his trouble.
Remembering that, Chu Zhao’s gaze softened a little as she looked at the boy.
He was a good-for-nothing, but even at such a young age he’d known to stand up for his own and protect his cousin. That counted for something, at least.
Chu Nanxing looked up and met the gaze she’d use on a grandson. He nearly passed out all over again.
But then… his face reddened, and he asked suspiciously, “How did you get so powerful? Did the Old Ancestor really manifest?”
“Curious?” Chu Zhao gave him a half-smile. “Want me to show you in a bit?”
Chu Nanxing’s eyes lit up. “How?”
Chu Zhao’s smile vanished. She kicked him, making him stagger. “If you want to see, go hitch up the carriage.”
Chu Nanxing blinked. “Where are we going? The curfew’s already started.”
“Duke Shen’s Residence.” Chu Zhao rubbed her wrist. “Your Ancestor says there are things that are hard to do in the daytime, but just right for the night.”
There was something wicked in her smile. Chu Nanxing swallowed instinctively, an inexplicable chill creeping over him.
Duke Shen’s Residence.
Just as Chu Zhao had said that afternoon, the retribution was only beginning.
A spark had injured Shen Yuzhu’s eye, and her entire left eye was bloody and suppurating. The household physician examined her, then could only shake his head again and again.
By nightfall, Shen Yuzhu had fainted from the pain several times. A maid entered with medicine, then screamed and bolted from the room.
“Second Miss’s face! Her face is rotting!”
Terrifying red blotches had spread across Shen Yuzhu’s whole face, like ghostly handprints. They were visibly festering and suppurating.
Madam Chu—or rather, Concubine Liu—wailed and beat her chest, clinging to Duke Shen’s legs as she begged him.
“Please, my lord! You have to save Mingzhu! What will become of her? How can she ever marry looking like this?”
“It’s all Shen Zhaozhao’s doing! She must have done this. She’s a demon! If only we kill her—”
“Then why haven’t you killed her? How did that wretched girl survive?” Duke Shen grabbed her by the throat.
Concubine Liu’s eyes widened. She was so shocked she could barely speak. “You… you…”
“That fool was in your hands, at your mercy, for all these years, and you still let her turn the tables on you?” Duke Shen looked at her with disgust. “You low-born creature from the brothels—you really are good for nothing!”
Concubine Liu was terrified out of her wits, even more frantic than she’d been that afternoon when Chu Zhao exposed her for “occupying another’s place.”
She truly was a ghost who had taken possession of another’s body. Yet now, as she looked at Duke Shen—the man she had shared a bed with night after night—she felt a chill to her very bones.
Even now, Concubine Liu didn’t understand how she had become Madam Chu.
The year she died in childbirth, she opened her eyes again to find herself the mistress of the household, Madam Chu. The overwhelming joy had nearly knocked her out. After that, she hurried to bring her daughter over to raise her.
At first, she hadn’t planned to harm Shen Zhaozhao. Someone had reminded her that Shen Zhaozhao had deep blessed fortune, while her own Mingzhu had been born lowly, with a lowly fate. Wouldn’t it be better to steal Shen Zhaozhao’s fortune outright?
And those Fortune-Stealing Arts—who had taught her those, again?
Concubine Liu suddenly looked up and fixed her gaze on Nanny Zhou.
“It was you! You taught me all of it!”
Standing behind Duke Shen, Nanny Zhou looked at her calmly. There was not a trace of her former obsequiousness. “Concubine, you have only yourself to blame for being so useless.”
Duke Shen waved a hand. “Deal with her. Now that Shen Zhaozhao has regained her senses and the Prince of You has involved himself, we owe them an explanation.”
As Concubine Liu watched in terror, Nanny Zhou drew a peachwood spike from her sleeve and approached her slowly. “Don’t worry, Concubine. One thrust with this spike, and your soul will be scattered. You’ll be spared the torment of becoming a wandering ghost.”
“No! You can’t do this to me!”
“Shen Jue! You’re the one who made me this way! You were the one secretly urging me on! How dare you pin all the blame on me? I don’t want to die! I don’t—”
Concubine Liu lunged for the door, but it had been locked from the outside.
“Concubine Liu, go in peace!”
Nanny Zhou gripped the spike and thrust it at her.
At the brink of life and death, a loud crash rang out.
A demonic wind burst through the door, sweeping icy snow into the room and knocking everyone inside off balance.
A woman strode in, the night wind billowing through her fox-fur cloak. Chu Zhao lowered her hood unhurriedly and looked around at the roomful of beasts, neither human nor ghost, with mocking amusement.
“Well, well. It seems I arrived just in time~”