LEGEND OF THE GOLDEN TIGRESS

Xing looked outside to see the terrain of the Southern Province was different from the western province and the capital as it was plain. There were many villages on the way they went and Xing could see the people respective towards their carriages as it bore the Huang Eagle Sigil.

Xing realised the villages weren"t too poor but those people weren"t doing so well either. There were many villages with pottery as their main occupation on the way too.

After two days of swaying they reached the city of Dajing in the evening. As they pa.s.sed the gates, Xing could see the splendour of the city. Surely cities are more attractive than villages. The carriage pa.s.sed through the streets and reached a Manor with a high threshold doorway.

Well! Guess these kind of status symbols hold importance everywhere!

As Xing got down, she was welcomed by her cousins and Little RuYang jumped and hung on her neck shouting, "Big sis! You are finally here!"

Xing just hugged him back and let him down and she was dragged along by him as he was h.e.l.l bent on taking her to his courtyard.

But Xu mama interfered and Xing was brought to the Gentle Breeze courtyard she"ll be staying and Xing got tired by just walking there. Xing was someone who never shy away from walking as she prefers it. But may be the long journey got her, she felt like she"ll need a horse to get to her place as the Manor seemed too big as if half of Dajing is their Manor.

Xing walked looking around the grandeur of the place that may be a bit more than the Heavenly Flowers Palace and she wasn"t that amazed. Those who were amazed were the servants, maids and guards who saw an earth shaking beauty"s arrival in their lavish Manor.

Xu mama gave a glare to those stupidly staring people and summoned the butler of the Manor and gave him an earful surprising Xing not before hiding Xing"s face with a veil.

Xing saw the butler, almost fifty years old patiently listening to Xu mama"s scolding and she found something amiss. Why does the butler look at Xu mama the same way Shengli looks at me? Then again, what do I know about romance, right?

Later from other gossipy maids Xing learned that Xu mama was courted by this butler who is yet to marry for almost a decade before she left for the capital but Xu mama who had lost her husband and child didn"t accept his proposal. But the butler haven"t lost hope yet and Xu mama is still stubborn. We"ll it"s upto them, Xing thought. After all love doesn"t care about anything, right?

Xing who was a bit uneasy to meet the daughter-in-laws of the family as she might have been vilified by WanRou and Lady Huang cursed her wretched fate that made every woman hate her if she is dressed as a woman. Still after cleaning up, she dressed up appropriately and went to the dining hall lead by Xu mama.

She was in for a surprise as both of them were thrilled to meet her and left their husbands as they left their seats and welcomed her. Apparently RuYang never stopped talking about her the whole time and they even thanked her for helping Ruyang to speak which made Xing embarra.s.sed as she did nothing in that matter.

"Yangyang kept on saying how beautiful you were and seeing you we feel like his vocabulary to describe you was limited!", Mu Anran the first daughter-in-law and RuYang"s mother said and Xing was astonished.

They are saying unusual things about me! How should I react? They are just being polite right?

Xing gave an elegant smile and the Han Yao, the second daughter-in-law who was pregnant didn"t hold back on her praises too. Xing didn"t sense any malice from them and they kept on asking her many things each holding one of her arm and they only went back to their husband"s side when her uncle came in.

Xing was happy she get to find some rare breed of women who actually like her and was overjoyed. They didn"t act like pompous ladies at all and treated her as a friend, as equals and Xing was very pleased.

After dinner, everyone left after Xing was asked by her uncle to make tea and she received more praises and Xing felt like she was floating in clouds, very ecstatic!

"Why don"t you ask your man to call back those three guards he has for you?", Zedong asked sipping her tea.

"There are five of his people", Xing said and that surprised Zedong, "And you know the actual reason Haru brought his family down was because his brothers tried to sell out me to s.h.i.+hong, right?"

Zedong"s eyes widened with surprise for a moment and he composed himself. If so there is still one brother living in their Manor and he is a liability. So that"s why he left more people to watch over her? Wait! Something is amiss.. If he is just a liability, that lone wolf or Li ChengNuo or whoever he calls himself would have just killed him and get on with it. But he didn"t... That means he is using her as a bait..? If the Ming brother identifies her and tries to contact s.h.i.+hong again and exposes that Lord Táng is the Huang daughter won"t that a bigger risk? And why is his niece this calm saying this?

Xing watched her uncle and realised that her uncle had figured out Shengli"s plan. All she had to do is bait that brother.

"Uncle Little bun! " , she smiled and Zedong froze for a second, "What did you call me?", he asked surprised but his voice didn"t carry any hint of anger.

"Should I not call you that? At least in private?", she asked.

Zedong took a deep breath as he reminisced his Past , "I was a very chubby child and my mother always called me that but never let anyone else call me fat or other names. Even after I lost my weight growing up, she still called me "Little bun"... Right till she...", he sniffed his nose and Xing was just looking at him unwaveringly.

" You know what, to h.e.l.l with all those formalities! Just call me little bun. That won"t change the fact that I"m your uncle ", he said.

" Fine, I"ll call you Uncle Little bun then", Xing stressed the "uncle" and Zedong just shook his head. Stubborn, selfish, arrogant and inconsiderate and daughter of AoTian! What more can he expect?

"What did you want to ask me?", he asked.

"This brother of Haru, he really likes salt. He likes salt so much that he"d add a lot of salt in our dishes when we were young. So.. "

"You want to rub salt on his wounds?", Zedong interjected with a smirk.

"Literally", Xing smiled and Zedong nodded in agreement.

Smart, like-minded people are amazing! They are worth more than gold!

Xing got back to her courtyard and she received a letter from Shengli and she got it enthusiastically and for some reason, even his handwriting made her feel hot in the face and she read the letter. Shengli had advised him to be careful about her diet and nagged about the usual things her mother would nag about and then he wrote poetic stuff about how much he misses her and Xing became red with embarra.s.sment.

Xing wanted to write a reply and her heart didn"t calm down thinking about the words he wrote and she searched for words but it felt like her mind had gone blank and she even couldn"t write "Dear" as she forgot the strokes.

Geez! Is writing a letter this hard? How come he could write it so articulately?

Xing paced around the room for a while, rolled on the bed for a while, did some sword movements for a while but she could not figure out what to write.

After a long time of wondering and Xu mama"s worried inquiries, Xing decided to follow her heart and decide to write everything that she"d say to Shengli if he was there. As she reached that conclusion, her words flowed like water from a dam opened and when she finished it had a stack of paper that could be considered a booklet.

But Xing didn"t care about that and sealed the letter and gave it to the guard sent by Shengli and he gave a weird look sensing that was heavy and just shook his head and left.

The next morning Xing was dressed according to etiquettes and was taken to the memorial hall and she paid respect to her ancestors and Xing saw her mother"s name tablet being there too and she felt happy that she was included in the Huang family too.

And as she finished the rites and rituals, Xu mama took her around the Manor and that"s when a servant came to Xu mama to inform her that a servant surname Ming was punished for breaking the rules and was whipped.

Xing had a smirk to see a maid beside him with a big bowl of rock salt in her hands and asked to be taken there.