Yu Tang’s face went deathly pale. She stammered without being able to get a word out, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Yu Minwu’s eyes immediately flashed with menace. “Yu Sanqi, don’t push your luck. Are you happy dragging the whole family down to the grave with you?”
Yu Sanqi was still smiling as she touched the bruises around her neck. “How could I be? If Second Brother kneels and apologizes to me, Fourth Younger Sister won’t have to shave her head and become a nun. I’ll be even happier.”
“Second Brother dotes on Fourth Younger Sister so much. It’s only kneeling. You’re certainly willing to do that, aren’t you?”
Yu Minwu’s face flushed bright red.
Yu Minwen stared at Yu Sanqi with an expression of utter disappointment. “Third Younger Sister, do you really have to take things this far?”
Yu Sanqi’s smile was indifferent. “Eldest Brother wants to kneel too? That’s fine by me. I can take it.”
Yu Minwen’s hand trembled, and he released her at once.
Yu Sanqi lowered her eyes.
They were filled with mockery. Even when it came to one another, this family was nothing more than dogs biting dogs.
Yu Minwen remained silent for a long while. Yu Minwu gritted his teeth and knelt anyway. “Are you satisfied now? Third Younger Sister, learn when to stop. Hurry up and accept the imperial edict!”
Yu Sanqi lowered her eyes.
Every member of the Yu Family glared at her. Their eyes held humiliation, resentment, and loathing—but not the slightest trace of remorse.
Who said that when someone died, the people left alive would definitely feel guilt and regret, and suddenly come to their senses?
No!
All they would do was resent her for not dying later, for keeping them from enjoying the glory and riches bought with steamed buns soaked in her blood.
They would resent her for having died and still causing trouble for the family.
When she was dead, they resented her.
Now that she was alive, they resented her just the same!
Their Yu Sanqi was supposed to be the old ox in the fields, the camel crushed beneath its burden of straw. Whether alive or dead, she was expected to do exactly what the Yu Family wanted.
But why should she?
They lowered their heads, and she was supposed to forgive them?
Did that mean all the knives driven into her in the past, all the stalks of straw that had crushed her to death, simply no longer existed?
Besides, even their bowed heads were nothing but false sincerity.
Yu Sanqi parted her lips and let out a cold, mocking laugh. Each word was chilling.
“I will never forgive you!”
She had come back from the dead—not to put on some performance of a loving, close-knit family with them!
She wanted knives and axes to fall upon them. She wanted all the glory of their entire household destroyed in a single day. She wanted them cut off from the light of day, with their paths ahead severed, until every kind of pain and every form of sin fell upon them themselves.
Only then would these people understand what it meant to have no path to repentance!
Yu Sanqi’s refusal to forgive made every member of the Yu Family’s expression change.
Yu Minwu shot to his feet, his eyes bulging with rage. “Yu Sanqi, are you deliberately humiliating me?!”
With his eyes bloodshot, he looked ready to devour someone. His fists clenched tight, as though he would punch Yu Sanqi to death the very next moment.
A trace of ghostly aura rose within the young woman’s dark eyes. Invisible to ordinary people, a black swamp spread from beneath her feet. Formed from ghostly aura, it had long since ensnared everyone in the Yu Family.
She could kill them at any moment, more easily than crushing an ant.
Suddenly, warmth enveloped Yu Sanqi. She saw a fist swing out from behind her and land squarely on Yu Minwu’s face.
Yu Minwu let out a scream and staggered backward, clutching his nose. Yu Minwen failed to catch him, and Madam Liu and Yu Tang were dragged down with them, all three tumbling to the ground.
Amid the chaos, Yu Sanqi paid no attention to their disheveled state. In her ears were the powerful heartbeat of the young general and his hurried breathing.
He held her tightly, his hands trembling slightly, as though he were embracing a precious treasure he had lost and finally found again.
His cloak wrapped her so completely that not even a breeze could pass through.
The black fox fur brushed against her face, carrying the heat of his body. Yu Sanqi lifted her eyes and met Yan Du’s lowered gaze.
He was extraordinarily handsome. Like cold jade, his beauty was matched by his martial bearing. He was noble without seeming ethereal. His eyes were a very light, clear shade—pure yet burning, just like him.
“Yu Sanqi,” he called softly.
“Welcome back.”
Back to this mortal world.