Chapter 172 : Duan Family Met With Mishap (2)

By きつね At March 09, 2021 2 Comments

きつね: The result for the poll in Chapter 171 is as follow :

?‍♀️ Thank you to those who have voted. Now, let’s enjoy the new chapter with the new footnotes style.

Yuxi looked at the fainted Duan Xinrong and sighed slightly. At this juncture, there was nothing else she could do. So she walked towards the man who was in the lead and said, “I am Han Yuxi, the Fourth Young Miss of the Duke Han of the State Residence. I am here today as a guest of the Duan family. Please give way to me. I have to return.”

Ancient Chinese necklet.

I actually didn’t know that necklet and necklace are two different things. A necklet is much more rigid than a necklace. ?‍♀️ Why am I such an ignorant person?

Image Credit | The actual drama producer via 偵探影子 (戴瓔珞項圈的古裝女子，花娉婷從容淡雅、薛寶釵笑容暖洋洋, Sept 29, 2018) @ Sohu

The man who was the leader of the group dropped his eyes to the necklet around Yuxi’s neck, and then sized her up for a moment, before asking with some suspicion, “You say you are the Fourth Young Miss of Duke of the State Residence. Do you have any proof?” If by any chance she was someone from the Duan family who had taken this opportunity to escape, then, he would land himself in serious trouble.

Yuxi responded with a cold face, “You should have heard of my Er Ge, Han Jianye, who is also serving in the Imperial Guard. If you are suspicious, you can have someone call my Er Ge to come and pick me up.” Her Er Ge had been promoted two ranks in a row, so many people must have heard of him.

All of them belonged to the Imperial Guard, and those present had naturally heard of Han Jianye. One of them walked up to the leader and whispered, “Leader, I heard that Han Jianye has a particularly beloved sister, whom he always picks up good things to bring back for. Listening to this girl’s tone, that sister should be her.” Otherwise, she would not dare to ask them to call Han Jianye over to pick her up.

The Leader also did not want to make enemies with Han Jianye. After all, Han Jianye’s backers were too hard for him to mess with. At that moment, he ordered two of the government troops, “You two, take her to see Chen Daren.” He believed Chen Daren would know if she was the young miss of the State Residence or not.

As soon as Yuxi walked out of the door, she heard a man shouted excitedly inside the room, “Ya, such a gem is enough for us to eat and drink for several years.” No need to mention the man’s excitement, afterwards there were more following in his wake by making rowdy jeering. Listening to their voice, they were all extremely excited.

Bingmei shivered in fear, but Yuxi just walked forward with a cold face. One of the two government troops who escorted them out muttered, “What bad luck.” Originally they could have gotten some good stuff from inside too, but instead, they had to send this silly little girl out.

The other soldier told him off in a lowered voice, “Don’t talk nonsense.” If she was really a young miss from the Duke of the State Residence, they could not afford to offend her.

When the group arrived at the main gate, Yuxi soon saw this Chen Daren. As she gazed at the man in an official minister’s robe in front of her, she froze. She had not expected this Chen Daren would be Marquis Taining’s shizi, and also the 9th Prince’s most trusted aid.

Chen Shizi had not seen Yuxi before and asked with a puzzled look on his face, “You are the fourth young miss of the State Residence?”

Yuxi nodded, “Yes. I was a guest at Duan Residence today, but I didn’t expect to come across such a situation. If Master Shizi doesn’t believe me, you can have my carriage driver come over and certify it.”

Chen Shizi was pretty sure he hadn’t met Yuxi before, “How did you know my identity?” This girl looked quite calm.

Yuxi was not afraid of him as she tilted her head, “I’ve met the Second Young Master of the Chen family. The two of you, Master Shizi and Second Young Master Chen, look very much alike.” They were brothers, so it was normal for them to resemble each other.

Chen Shizi nodded and asked one of the government troops to call Yuxi’s carriage driver over. The carriage driver was Kufu’s father, who rushed over when he caught sight of Yuxi. At the time he saw government troops entering the Duan Residence one by one, he noticed that both Zhou and Jiang family’s young misses had come out, while his young miss didn’t make a move for a long time. This made him scared to death.

Chen Shizi glanced at the mark of the carriage, where each mansion had put its mark. The mark on the carriage indeed belonged to the Han Residence. A man in armour next to Chen Shizi shouted, “Take out everything in your sleeves. You are also required to allow us to check your purse.”

Bingmei’s heart was in her throat. Luckily, she had listened to her Miss. Otherwise, she would have been discovered if she had brought any jewellery out.

Yuxi complied by pulling a handkerchief out from her sleeve and then shook her sleeve a little. It was the only thing she could hide inside her sleeve. As for Bingmei, she opened the purse she was wearing and shook out the contents in succession.

Chen Shizi waved his hand and said, “You can go now.”

Yuxi stepped on the stool and steadily got onto the carriage. When it was Bingmei’s turn to step on the stool, it was estimated her legs suddenly got weak that she fell off the stool. But Bingmei quickly got up and climbed onto the carriage on all four without even patting the dust off her body.

Chen Shizi glanced at the carriage and found the scene quite interesting. The master wasn’t even scared, but her maid was scared out of her mind.

Kufu’s father also hurriedly drove the carriage away from the Duan family residence. Only when he reached the corner, where it looked like they were quite far away from the Duan family’s lot, did he face the inside of the carriage and asked, “Are you all right, Miss?”

Yuxi answered hoarsely, “I’m fine. You should drive carefully.” It would be false to say that she was not afraid, but what worried her more right now was that she didn’t know what the Duan family’s situation was.

At this time, Bingmei finally took a breath of relief. She genuinely felt that she was unlucky since she just ran into such a thing when it was the first time she accompanied her Miss out. What would you call this situation if not her being out of luck?

Yuxi took off all Duan Xinrong’s jewellery that she wore and then said to Bingmei, “Use a handkerchief to wrap all these pieces of jewellery.” She hoped these pieces of jewellery would come in handy later on.

Once Bingmei heard this instruction, she immediately pulled out a handkerchief from her sleeve. Then, she took the jewellery handed over by Yuxi, and soon after she took off all the jewellery she was wearing as well. She put them all together inside the handkerchief. “Miss, these pieces of jewellery should be worth quite a lot of silver, right?” This pearl necklace alone cost several thousand taels. Once added up with the others, it would be a little over 10,000 taels.

Yuxi shook her head and chided, “This much money is barely enough to fill your tooth gap!” The magistrate’s office was so shady that no amount of money would be enough. However, this money should be enough to at least save Xinrong.

When Bingmei heard this, she did not dare to say anything any more.

After a while, Yuxi spoke out, “Open the window. Let me take a breath of fresh air.” It suddenly felt suffocating to be inside this carriage.

Before Bingmei pushed open the window, she shivered and advised, “Miss, it’s cold outside. You’ll surely catch a cold if you are exposed to this kind of wind.” They did not wear many layers of clothes either. It was okay if they were exposed to the wind for a little while. But they would definitely catch a cold if they were exposed to this chilly wind.

Yuxi said indifferently, “Just open it!” Her mind was currently in a mess. She needed a cold breeze to calm herself down right now.

The window was opened and a cool, cold breeze blew into the carriage. Bingmei shivered again. Nonetheless, Yuxi was seemingly ignorant and unaware of the freezing breeze. She even squinted her eyes.

After the carriage moved approximately about half a shichen, Yuxi realised they were approaching the State Residence, thus she instructed, “Close the window. After you go back, don’t tell anyone about this.”

Bingmei was unsure whether Yuxi was talking about what happened to the Duan family or about her requesting for the window to be opened. “Don’t worry, Miss, I won’t tell anyone. Even if my mother asked about it, I wouldn’t tell her.”

When they finally arrived at the State Residence, the carriage sped straight inside and did not stop until it reached the second gate. When two old women servants saw this scene, they went over and asked Kufu’s father, “What’s wrong with Miss?” The carriage could be driven to the second gate, but that was only under special circumstances. Under normal circumstances, they would have to get off at the main gate and change to a sedan chair.

Bingmei lifted the curtain of the carriage and said as if she was about to cry, “Miss is frightened. You guys, come over and help her.”

The two old women servants were startled when they saw Yuxi. Her face was as pale as paper, her lips were blue, and there was panic in her eyes. One of the old women servants asked, “What’s wrong Miss? How did she get this frightened?”

The other old woman servant rebuked, “What’s the point of you asking these questions? You should tell the First Lady and request for a physician to come quickly. I will carry Miss back.” With Yuxi’s current condition, they couldn’t even wait for the sedan chair to come. Hence, it was much faster to just carry Yuxi back to her yard.

All the maids of Taoran House were also frightened at the moment they set their eyes on Yuxi’s current appearance. “What’s wrong with Miss?” She went out as a guest but returned looking like this. What had happened in the Duan family residence?

Bingmei wiped her tears and retold, “The Duan family was raided, and those government troops were just like robbers, rummaging through boxes and cupboards. Fortunately, Miss said that we were from the Duke’s residence, and we were not Duan family members, so they let us go back.” After saying that, she added, “Miss Xinrong fainted from fear at that time, and we don’t know how she is currently doing.”

Zisu had nothing to say to that. She could only admit that her Miss was down on her luck when she encountered such a thing. Who could imagine that when one went there as a guest, one would encounter the host’s family residence to be raided!

When Qiu Shi heard that Yuxi was frightened, she hurried over. As she looked at Yuxi, who had shrunk herself into a ball, Qiu Shi blamed herself a little, “If I had known, I wouldn’t have let you go to the Duan family today.” On her way here, Qiu Shi already knew what had happened.

Yuxi smiled bitterly, “Who can imagine this would happen! Eldest Aunt, can you ask someone to find out what’s going on with the Duan family? I wonder how Xinrong Jiejie is doing right now.”

Qiu Shi readily agreed to her request, “Don’t worry, later I’ll have someone ask around and find out what exactly happened to the Duan family.” Speaking of which, it was fortunate that the marriage with the Duan family did not work out. Otherwise, she would have pushed her Jianye into a pit.

Physician Bai came over and took Yuxi’s pulse. He reported, “Miss has a bit of cold. Just by having some ginger syrup will do.” Yuxi’s body was in a very good condition that she didn’t even need to drink any medicine when she caught a cold.

A SIMPLE GINGER SYRUP

Qiu Shi thought she had heard wrong, “It’s just a cold? That child was at Duan residence today and ran into government troops raiding the residence. She was so scared that her face turned blue.”

Physician Bai was willing to accept other people’s views as he said, “I will prescribe a remedy to calm Fourth Miss’s mind.” He was only responsible for prescribing the remedy. It was up to Yuxi whether she wanted to take the prescription or not. If Physician Bai had to say, since Yuxi even dared to kill a bandit, she wouldn’t have been afraid of a few government troops raiding her friend’s residence. However, this kind of talk only occurred in his mind. He would never speak them out loud.

Yuxi drank a big bowl of ginger syrup, but she didn’t drink the prescription to calm the nerves. She learned pharmacology herself. How could she not know every medicine had its own side effect?

Yuxi could not sleep when she was lying on the bed. She simply went into her study, but could not get herself to read the book. As for practising her writing, she was unable to concentrate. In the end, Yuxi took her flute and played it in the yard. However, the tune was so messy that the melody went out of tune.

The people of Taoran House were frowning when they heard the chaotic tune. That was not music, that was devilish sound! However, everyone knew that Yuxi was in a bad mood. Therefore, no one dared to point it out.

After playing two pieces of music, Yuxi asked for the time. Afterwards, she continued asking about the time at least four to five times that afternoon, “How come it’s only the beginning of youshi? Why is the time passing so slowly today?”

Zisu turned speechless. In the past, her Miss always felt that time was too short and constantly complained about how a day would be gone in the blink of an eye. This was the first time she had grumbled that time was passing too slowly.

Yuxi finally got the news about the Duan at nightfall, “What? The Imperial Censor Duan is an accomplice of the late Crown Prince? How is this possible? Didn’t Imperial Censor Duan impeach the late Crown Prince several times?” It wasn’t an impeachment of someone close to the late Crown Prince, but a direct impeachment towards the late Crown Prince. Of course, Imperial Censor Duan had integrity. Not only he impeached the late Crown Prince, but he also impeached the Song family’s leading family members, Song Guifei and the 9th Prince.

The person who went to inquire about the news reported, “It is rumoured that the day the Imperial Censor Duan impeached the Crown Prince, it was actually to cover other people’s eyes and ears.”

Yuxi wanted to curse, but her upbringing prevented her from being rude in front of outsiders, “You continue to inquire and tell me if you have any other news.”

Zisu stuffed a hundred silver ticket to the visitor. Yuxi stated, “If this is not enough, you should let me know.” Since she was not trying to find out hidden information, the amount of silver she needed to use would not be much. But if she wanted to bribe others for detailed inquiries, the amount of silver needed would be enormous.

PS (Author): Sadly, I lost the draft I wrote yesterday because I forgot to save it. So I have to rewrite it again today. Tears are now streaming on my face…