The pond water was bitterly cold, with a thin layer of ice already forming along the edges. Bone-piercing chill assailed Shen Jianglin from every direction.
Shen Jianglin did not know how to swim. The moment he jumped into the pond, he regretted it. In his extreme panic, his limbs thrashed desperately trying to stay afloat, but the struggling only caused more water to flood his mouth and nose, everything dissolving into chaos. Compounding his plight, he wore thick padded cotton garments that, once waterlogged, dragged him ever downward. In only a matter of moments, darkness closed in before his eyes, and all strength for struggling left him as he sank toward the pond's bottom.
On the shore, the maidservants and elderly serving women fell into utter disarray. Nanny Wang wanted nothing more than to throw herself in regardless of the consequences, but she herself could not swim, and plunging in would have been futile. She was held back from rushing in by the others. The young manservant and little maidservant who accompanied her were at a complete loss, knowing nothing but to sob and wail, darting about in panic like headless flies.
This was the inner courtyard—ordinary manservants and grown men in management positions were strictly forbidden from entering without cause. Madam Wei's side did have two maidservants and serving women who could swim, but with the weather so bitterly cold and snow still falling from the sky, a healthy person jumping into that icy water would come out half-dead. So they merely made excuses that none of them could swim, pushing and shoving at one another while ordering the young maids to hurry to the outer courtyard and summon help.
By the time two swimming-capable stewards were summoned, Shen Jianglin had already sunk completely to the bottom. When they pulled him out, his face was deathly pale, and his chest showed not the slightest rise or fall. The two stewards pressed a few times on Shen Jianglin's belly, then turned him upside down to try to drain the water from him. Some water did indeed trickle from his ears, nose, and mouth, but his body remained limp and utterly unresponsive.
The two stewards exchanged a glance, knowing in their hearts that it was beyond any remedy. All they could do was kneel before Madam Wei and beg forgiveness.
Concubine Xu, having rushed over upon hearing the news, went weak at the knees. She could not even cry. Marshaling her last shred of strength, she crawled forward on hands and knees, gathering her son's head into her arms. Her throat seemed blocked by a great stone, and it took several breaths before a wail finally burst forth from her.
Madam Wei wished to go over and see for herself, her own heart fluttering with indecision, when Concubine Xu suddenly went mad, charging at Madam Wei as if to ram into her. Had she not been restrained by a crowd of maidservants and serving women, that charge would certainly have sent Madam Wei sprawling.
Though held back, Concubine Xu's mouth was certainly not idle. Along the way here she had already learned the full story of what had happened. Her hair had come loose from its bun in her frantic rush, but she paid it no mind. In her heart she was utterly convinced that Madam Wei had killed her son—this boy was her only, her sole son!
Ling-ge'er had crawled out of her own belly. From birth he had been frail of constitution. When he was first born, he was barely as big as a kitten. He could not sleep soundly at night, wailing the moment he was set down. She and Nanny Wang had taken turns holding him, walking and rocking him to sleep through the long nights—those days had been truly agonizing.
He rolled over at three months, sat up at six, crawled at seven, and was pulling himself up and walking at eight. By his first birthday he could walk and call out to people, and it made her weep with joy. Only by age three had he grown sturdy. And then Madam Wei announced that she would take him on as her own, to be raised by his legitimate mother.
Concubine Xu naturally could not bear to part with him. But what kind of future could he have following an ordinary concubine like her? Everyone around her urged her to recognize what was good for her—even if her heart was bleeding, she had to smile through her tears and send her son over.
On ordinary days, she would steal a couple of glances at her son under the pretext of paying her respects. At first, whenever her son saw her, he would cry and want to be held. Gradually, though, he came to acknowledge only Madam Wei as his legitimate mother. However much it hurt inside, Concubine Xu thought that acknowledging his legitimate mother was ultimately for the best—if the legitimate mother felt a bit more pity for him, it would count as a little more security for her son when he grew up.
But who could have known—who could have known—that yesterday he was still a perfectly healthy person, and today he would be lying there stiff and straight? How could Concubine Xu bear it?
For the first time, Concubine Xu lost all sense of rank and all reason, and she screamed at Madam Wei: "It's you! You killed Lin-ge'er! It was just a lousy jade pendant—what was it worth? Was it worth tormenting a child like that? Now he's dead—are you satisfied? Are you satisfied?!"
Madam Wei had never in her life been cursed at to her face like that. She was so furious she nearly fell backward. Already consumed with guilt over Shen Jianglin's death, being cursed at by a concubine like this, she could only swallow her timidity and stiffen her back to retort: "He jumped into the pond himself. I only said a couple of extra words to him—am I not even allowed to discipline him? I am his legitimate mother. He ought to respect and honor me. He stole the jade pendant and denied it to the death, and even dared to jump into the water. As things stand now, you can only blame his own thin fate. No one harmed him. Everything was his own doing. Even if you take it to the master, it's still the same!"
The more Madam Wei spoke, the more she felt she was not in the wrong. But then she thought of how Shen Jianglin had actually died just like that, and her heart was thrown into a dense, tangled mess of irritation and pain.
Concubine Xu collapsed on the ground. One of her shoes had been trampled off in the struggle. Her face was covered in tears and snot, and she did not care. She plopped down beside Shen Jianglin and wailed in a shrill, desolate voice: "My Lin-ge'er, ah—open your eyes! Look at your concubine-mother one more time! Why didn't you take me with you? This world won't let people live anymore. I might as well slit my throat right here and be done with it!"
As she spoke, she actually struggled to stand up and tried to jump into the pond too, frightening everyone into scrambling to surround her and hold her back.
Madam Wei was choked speechless, nearly fainting on the spot.
But after all, a child had died—a child who had lived alongside her day and night for seven years. However great the grudge, at this moment she could only let Concubine Xu vent.
And just then, in the midst of all the chaos, Shen Jianglin suddenly vomited out a mouthful of water with a "blah," then coughed heavily twice, and collapsed back again.
But this time, he was breathing.
Concubine Xu and Madam Wei were both stunned by this new turn of events. It was someone nearby who spoke up—"Should we carry the second young master back to his room?"—that finally brought everyone back to their senses.
Concubine Xu had Shen Jianglin carried directly to her own courtyard to look after him personally. She would never again feel at ease leaving the child to Madam Wei.
Madam Wei, at this moment, did not want to have anything to do with Shen Jianglin either. She simply turned a blind eye and nodded to the people around her in agreement.
As the person was being carried away, no one noticed that Shen Jianglin had opened his eyes once—looking at the crowd around him with some terror and bewilderment—and then tightly shut them again, as if unable to believe what he was seeing.
Shen Jianglin had thought he had crashed into the sea below when his plane went down, and had been rescued by people who fished him out. But when he opened his eyes, the people around him were not medical or rescue personnel at all. They were all dressed in ancient clothing, chattering and arguing in a noisy bunch around him.
Had he—run into some kind of costume drama set?
What on earth was going on?
He wanted to think it over, but this body had already reached its limit. The next second, he blacked out, completely unconscious, left entirely at the mercy of others.
With tears in her eyes, Concubine Xu had someone remove Shen Jianglin's soaked clothes and wipe him down with a warm cloth. Nanny Wang filled every hot-water bottle she could find and tucked them into the bedding to warm the bed. When Shen Jianglin, dazed and confused, lay back down on the bed, he let out a comfortable sigh from the bottom of his heart—finally, his body was no longer cold and clammy.
The whole ordeal had taken nearly half an hour. Shen Jianglin had in fact drifted back to consciousness again, but this time, when his mind cleared, he noticed something was wrong.
His mind was flooded with two sets of memories. Only after he had absorbed them all did he realize that he had transmigrated!
Plato said that the soul and the body can be separated, and only the soul can achieve true immortality. Shen Jianglin had studied philosophy for so many years and had never imagined that today he would become the one to verify this theory.
Shen Jianglin let his thoughts run wild for a while. Afraid of being discovered, he kept his eyes closed, but the sounds around him grew ever more distinct.
He felt someone come in and take his pulse. After a while, someone fed him medicine, grumbling all the while: "Thank goodness I came today, otherwise she would have killed you! I will definitely tell the Master about this and make him stand up for us mother and son!"
Hearing this, Nanny Wang paused with the medicine bowl in her hands. After thinking it over, she still lowered her voice and advised, "Madam Wei has never been harsh to the Second Young Master. Today's incident has already caused enough of a stir. Concubine, you'd better keep things calm. Now that you've moved the Second Young Master back to your own courtyard, if you want to send him back to the main courtyard in the future, I'm afraid it will take a great deal of effort."
Though timid, Nanny Wang was shrewd. Having served in the Rong'an Marquis Manor for so many years and having frequent contact with Madam Wei, she had some understanding of Madam Wei's temperament.
This was Shen Jianglin's wet nurse, a person originally bestowed by the Old Madam. Even though Concubine Xu held half-master status, she still listened to Nanny Wang's words.
Hearing this, Concubine Xu had in fact already begun to regret her impulsiveness earlier. It was only in front of the servants that she put on the airs of a mistress and stubbornly held her ground. Now that Nanny Wang had pointed it out so plainly, her heart was even more unsettled, and a flicker of anxiety crossed her delicate, beautiful face.
Finally, she patiently finished feeding her son the medicine carefully, then wiped his mouth with a silk handkerchief. Only then did Concubine Xu pull Nanny Wang over to sit at the Eight Immortals table nearby and ask urgently, "Nanny Wang, what do you mean by that? Back then, it was she who said she wanted to properly raise the child, and that's why my heart's flesh was torn away from me. Although today's incident was truly outrageous, if I may speak bluntly, Madam Wei probably isn't very good at raising children either, is she? Now to just wash her hands of it like this—I'm afraid the Master won't agree either."
Concubine Xu was stubborn, finding excuses for herself, yet inside she was panicking terribly.
Nanny Wang was a person of experience and had long since explained all the ins and outs to Concubine Xu. No matter how much Concubine Xu resented Madam Wei in her heart, she understood that in today's matter, Madam Wei was sixty percent at fault, but her son was also forty percent in the wrong.
Whether or not the items were taken, and even though the madam scolded her, she didn't dole out much punishment—just admit it and be done with it. Why make a fuss about dying or living? Such a fiery temper.
"I wanted to advise you earlier, Concubine, not to bring the child back to your own courtyard. The madam's expression was already quite ugly at the time. If you had carried him over to the main courtyard, the madam would have taken over his care, and naturally she would have been the one to raise and educate him afterward. As it is now, you've given the madam the perfect excuse to wash her hands of him."
Nanny Wang wanted to say that a child who makes a fuss about dying or living like this is not easy to look after. Today he was saved, but what about next time? You can't speak too softly or too harshly to him—he's not your own flesh and blood, and even without an opportunity, she was already thinking of driving Brother Lin away, yet Concubine Xu stubbornly handed them ammunition to use against her.
Nanny Wang looked worriedly at Shen Jianglin lying unconscious on the bed, and heaved a heavy sigh: His birth mother has a head that just doesn't work well, and his legitimate mother has probably been frightened by this whole affair. How are they ever going to get through the days ahead?