This time, the sound didn’t escape Lou Chang’s ears.
Brushing aside the hands clinging to his chest, Lou Chang moved to step outside. Bai Man froze, catching hold of the corner of his robe, and demanded, “What are you doing?”
With his entire focus pinned on the commotion up on the roof, Lou Chang had no attention to spare for answering her.
Seeing his attitude, Bai Man assumed she knew exactly who he was hurrying off to find. She flared up in an instant: “Fine, Lou Chang! I knew it, all you care about in your heart is your wife!”
Tong Anying felt like gagging too. Caring only about your wife is the normal thing to do, isn’t it?
The other three exchanged glances and nodded in unison.
Then again, this Lou Chang is hardly a decent piece of work either.
Lou Yingyu suddenly felt an ache of sympathy for her second aunt.
Sure, Second Aunt was petty, shrewish, and constantly locked in screaming matches with her, but what had Second Aunt done to deserve this?
Huh? Why did the courtyard go quiet?
Tong Anying pricked up her ears to listen; indeed, there wasn’t a peep.
She leaned forward to take a look, but Tong Fengye gently pushed her head back down.
Tong Fengye whispered, “We might have been spotted.”
A vile piece of trash like Lou Chang, he wouldn’t try to silence us by killing us, would he?
“He wouldn’t dare!”
Lou Yingyu sprang straight up. Sure enough, Lou Chang had one hand clamped over Bai Man’s mouth while staring intently toward the roof.
Caught completely off guard by the sight of his own niece, Lou Chang froze.
His face turned an ugly shade of livid. “Lou Yingyu, what on earth are you doing here?”
Lou Yingyu crossed her arms. “I’d like to ask Second Uncle the very same question, what are you doing here?”
“Oh my!” Her gaze landed squarely on Bai Man, and her voice went impossibly loud: “Isn’t this my cousin-in-law? Don’t tell me my cousin is here too?”
Lou Yingyu made an exaggerated show of scanning the surroundings.
Gritting his teeth, Lou Chang snarled, “Lou Yingyu, get down here this instant!”
“Quite the temper you’ve got there, Lou Chang! Let me remind you: though you’re my second uncle in name, you’re merely a guest freeloading in the Prime Minister’s estate!”
“You, Lou Yingyu, you have truly grown lawless! Just you wait, I’ll drag you down and hand you over to Eldest Brother to deal with!”
One after another, Tong Anying and the others popped their heads out. Staring up at the four heads lined across the eaves, Lou Chang wondered if his eyes were playing tricks on him.
Tong Anying offered a cheeky grin. “Then by all means, catch all of us!”
Tong Fengye: “Go ahead, catch us.”
Feng Chu: “Yeah, catch us.”
Tong Fengye: “?”
“Fine. Splendid!” Lou Chang had thought Lou Yingyu finding out was merely a minor domestic headache. But now, with both the Tong and Feng families tangled in the mess, a ruthless glint surfaced in his eyes. “Then don’t blame me for showing no mercy!”
Lou Chang dragged over a ladder.
Lou Yingyu cradled the cat with one arm and shoved against the ladder with the other.
Tong Fengye and Feng Chu began prying off roof tiles and hurling them downward, while Tong Anying bellowed at the top of her lungs: “Help! Murder! Someone’s trying to silence the witnesses!”
In a panic, Lou Chang barked, “Shut your mouths, you brats! Nobody’s trying to kill you!”
“Aaaaaah! Murder! Silencing witnesses!”
When Tong Baibo and Su Zhouyue rushed to the scene, the first thing they heard was their daughter shrieking about being silenced. Su Zhouyue’s heart lurched. Darting beneath the eaves, she leapt lightly into the air, landing cleanly on the roof.
Tong Anying blinked, stunned. “Mother, why are you here?”
With one hand, Su Zhouyue pulled Tong Anying close, yanked Lou Yingyu back just as Lou Chang’s hand reached for her, and delivered a sharp kick that sent the ladder flying.
Lou Chang let out a wretched scream as he tumbled to the ground.
Su Zhouyue asked, “Are any of you hurt?”
All four shook their heads in unison.
Mother is too cool! The one hurting right now ought to be Lou Chang.
While Su Zhouyue stood watch on the roof, Tong Baibo unlatched the courtyard gate below. A crowd poured inside, and leading the charge was none other than Lou Yingyu’s second aunt, Xu Dongying.
Lunging forward, Xu Dongying grabbed Lou Chang by the ear. “Well, well, Lou Chang! Aren’t you capable! When I asked you for our daughter’s dowry, you claimed you didn’t have a copper to your name. Yet behind my back, you bought a sprawling residence like this! Why haven’t you dropped dead already?”
Lou Yingyu poured oil on the fire: “Second Aunt, Second Uncle tried to kill me!”
Xu Dongying looked up at Lou Yingyu on the roof. Seeing her niece looking so pitiful and aggrieved tugged at Xu Dongying’s heart—in-law though she was. Lou Chang was the girl’s flesh-and-blood uncle, yet he had dared lay hands on her!
Xu Dongying erupted in fury, cursing violently: “You black-hearted wretch! May lightning strike you dead!”
Sensing disaster, Bai Man turned to flee, but Xu Dongying snagged her by the collar in a flash.
“Don’t even think about running! Move, both of you, come with me!”
With a firm grip on each of them, Xu Dongying dragged them forward, leaving a grown man like Lou Chang utterly powerless to resist.
Only after Xu Dongying had marched them far away did Lou Yingyu murmur, “It seems when Second Aunt quarrels with me, she only uses thirty percent of her true power.”
Su Zhouyue instructed Uncle Zhao to escort Lou Yingyu and Feng Chu safely back to their respective manors. Then, turning toward Tong Anying and Tong Fengye, she smiled sweetly.
Tong Anying and Tong Fengye: “?”
Uh-oh. We’re doomed!
Inside the courtyard of the Marquis’s residence.
“Go on, speak.” A rattan switch rested beside Su Zhouyue’s hand. She accepted a cup of tea from a maid and took a measured sip.
Tong Anying attempted to act coy and sweet: “Mother, that roof was so high, I was scared out of my wits, sniff sniff.”
“Scared out of your wits?” Su Zhouyue wasn’t buying it for a second. “Then how did you get up there in the first place?”
“Uh.”
At the time, a wagon loaded with goods had been parked beneath the eaves. Tong Fengye and Feng Chu had used their strength to hoist her and Lou Yingyu up onto it first.
You can’t really blame us! Who told that wagon to be parked right there in the first place?
The system chimed in: Exactly, exactly!
Su Zhouyue arched an eyebrow. “Shall I praise the two of you for your remarkable luck instead?”
Tong Anying scurried to Su Zhouyue’s side and began gently kneading her shoulders, putting on her most obedient look: “Mother is the truly amazing one! The roof was so high, yet you flew up without even blinking an eye!”
“That was nothing.”
Seeing his wife on the verge of being led astray, Tong Baibo cleared his throat softly.
Su Zhouyue’s expression snapped back to stern composure. She poked Tong Anying’s forehead and said, “Tong Anying, you little slippery rascal.”
Clutching her forehead, Tong Anying mumbled, “I won’t dare do it next time.”
“You dare think there’ll be a next time?”
“I truly won’t dare!” Her eyes curved into sweet crescents as she tugged lightly at Su Zhouyue’s sleeve.
Su Zhouyue’s expression softened considerably.
Sensing her mother’s anger had subsided, Tong Anying snuggled into her arms and asked, “Father and Mother were summoned by A’shu, but who called Yingyu’s second aunt over?”
Su Zhouyue and Tong Baibo traded a glance.
Watching their tacit understanding, Tong Anying couldn’t help thinking:
As expected, Mother and Father are the most cunning and sly of all.
Su Zhouyue and Tong Baibo pursed their lips, their consciences entirely untroubled. What they had done was simply helping a neighbor in need.
“Still, how did so many people show up?”
Tong Anying wondered, Could they have all been drawn over by my yelling?
More likely, they had been summoned by Tong Anying’s inner voice.
Faced with such earth-shattering gossip, even Su Zhouyue would have dropped everything to race over and watch the drama unfold.
Su Zhouyue ruffled Tong Anying’s hair. “Loving a good spectacle is human nature. Come, let’s eat first.”
She took Tong Anying by the hand and walked away.
Tong Fengye, left standing alone in the courtyard: “?”
He called out loudly, “Did everyone forget there’s still another person standing here?”
“Tong Fengye, go copy the texts ten times,” Tong Baibo said, patting him on the shoulder as he passed.
Tong Fengye: “?”
Is it too late to pretend I’m invisible?
When the next rest day arrived.
An older maid serving beside Wei Mingning came to invite Su Zhouyue and Tong Anying to the Duke’s estate.
Su Zhouyue asked, “What is the occasion?”
The maid smiled warmly. “Madam will know once you arrive.”
Holding high regard for Wei Mingning, Su Zhouyue saw no harm in paying a visit.
While changing clothes, Tong Anying remarked, “Mother, I heard the Duchess has divorced the Duke.”
Su Zhouyue nodded. “Indeed.”
Leaning against the clothes rack with her head tilted, Tong Anying said, “Then let’s bring her a gift.”
“A gift?”
“Mm. To congratulate her on her new lease on life.”
Though the gift wasn’t meant for her, hearing her daughter express such thoughtful consideration melted Su Zhouyue’s heart.
Her daughter truly was precious.
“Very well.”
When Su Zhouyue and Tong Anying arrived, servants were busy replacing the plaque above the main gate.
The former “Duke’s Estate” had been taken down, replaced by “Wei Estate.”
The calligraphy style, however, remained virtually identical. Rumor had it that the Duke’s Estate plaque had been inscribed personally by His Majesty on the very day Wei Mingning was granted noble rank for her military strategy on the battlefield.
The current two characters reading “Wei Estate” appeared to have been brushed by the Emperor’s hand as well.
The maid escorted them straight into the manor.
Wei Mingning was attending to a personal matter, so the maid settled Su Zhouyue and Tong Anying into the outer parlor first.
Looking down at Gu Zhenye, who knelt on the floor desperately begging, Wei Mingning sneered coldly: “What are you doing? Isn’t this the blissful life of three you fought so hard for?”
Gu Zhenye wailed, “Mingning, I beg you to forgive me! Du Liu’er, she never loved me at all!”
Wei Mingning replied flatly, “I don’t love you either.”
“You’re lying.”
Gu Zhenye’s eyes widened in horror. Snapping back to reality, he pleaded again: “I truly know my mistake!”
You don’t know your mistake, you’re just on the brink of death.
Host, once that child grew up, he was meant to murder Wei Mingning, welcome Du Liu’er into the residence, and live happily as a family of three, walking right over Wei Mingning’s dead bones.
Thank goodness their scheme never came to pass! The Duchess is far too sharp.
Hearing that crisp, pleasant inner voice, the lingering irritation in Wei Mingning’s chest dissolved away.
Drawing a small dagger, Wei Mingning sliced clean through the hem of her skirt that Gu Zhenye was clutching. She said coolly, “Someone, throw all three of them out.”
She had kept them confined in the residence only so Gu Zhenye could see Du Liu’er and the child for who they truly were.
Now that he understood, why waste silver feeding them? She didn’t have money to burn.
“Mingning, Mingning!”
Wiping her hands, Wei Mingning stepped into the inner chamber. Beaming warmly at Su Zhouyue and Tong Anying, she said, “Pardon me for keeping you both waiting.”
Su Zhouyue smiled. “Madam Wei is too polite. We only just arrived.”
Hearing the title “Madam Wei,” Wei Mingning arched an appreciative eyebrow before taking the seat of honor. Su Zhouyue asked, “May I ask what made Madam Wei invite Anying and me over today?”
Wei Mingning came straight to the point: “I feel an immediate affinity with Anying. As you know, I have no children of my own, so I would like to take Anying as my goddaughter.”
Tong Anying was taken aback. Goddaughter?
Su Zhouyue looked down at her daughter. “Anying, would you be willing?”
This was her daughter’s own fortune to embrace, so Su Zhouyue chose to let Tong Anying decide for herself.
Wei Mingning possessed immense status and standing. If Anying became her goddaughter, even if the Marquis’s house were ever demoted in the future, Anying would enjoy an extra layer of protection.
Tong Anying looked at Su Zhouyue, then toward the radiant, gentle, and welcoming Wei Mingning. To be fair, she genuinely liked Wei Mingning, but.
Why does she want me as her goddaughter?
Host, probably because you are exceptionally charming!
Is that so?
Of course! Why else would I pick you as my host to eat melon and listen to gossip with? Isn’t it because you’re so gorgeous?
Tong Anying: “?”
What a pragmatic system!
Wei Mingning let out a soft laugh and said aloud, “Because you are exceptionally bright, sweet, and adorable.”
Hehehe.
Flattered and thoroughly pleased with the compliment, Tong Anying stepped forward and placed her small hand into Wei Mingning’s palm. “I would love to.”