Chapter 87 Part 1: Mid Autumn Festival
While the Ningyuan Marquis residence was discussing how to handle Jiang Yu’e, in the Jiang residence, the third branch courtyard, Yang-shi was also quarrelling with Jiang Yuan Xing for Jiang Yu’e.
“Yu’e is already together with Zhou Yan Bang, she could only marry into Ningyuan Marquis residence!” Yang-shi glared with wide eyes, probably because of Jiang Yu’e’s matter. Overnight, she actually appeared to have become much thinner, her face appearing even more sharp and unkind. Her high cheek bones made her look shrewish.
“I will not allow my daughter to be a concubine!” Jiang Yuan Xing transformed from his normal cowardly temper and was as angry as Yang-shi. He said: “Go to Ningyuan Marquis residence and become a concubine, in the future, her son would be just like me, could only be a shu born!”
This time, even Yang-shi was dumbstruck and she looked at her husband. When she married Jiang Yuan Xing, it’s not that she didn’t like it. Although Jiang Yuan Xing was merely the shu son, the third branch, but she was also merely the shu daughter of the minister of the agricultural department. Wanting to marry into a more prosperous family was also impossible. Moreover, Jiang Yuan Xing looked gentle, literary, and not hateful.
But the days of one’s life are lived with daily necessities. People’s hearts always like to compare. Compared with the honor and riches of the main branch and the second branch, the third branch lived their days hard pressed for money, causing Yang-shi to be endlessly annoyed. In her heart, there’s unreconciliation and blame, so Yang-shi frequently quarrelled with Jiang Yuan Xing. Jiang Yuan Xing never retorted and simply bore, which made Yang-shi see clearly that this man wasn’t gentle and literary, but actually had a cowardly temper. In his lifetime, he could only be a doc.u.ment checker.
They’d been married for many years, but this was the first time Jiang Yuan Xing had a dispute with her. Plus, his “just like me, could only be a shu son”, this kind of speech came out, Jiang Yuan Xing was obviously angered.
Jiang Yuan Xing was indeed very angry.
Only he himself knew how lowly it was as a shu son. Though it seemed that he normally didn’t compare and take these things into account, but in front of his two elder brothers, he always had a low self-esteem and couldn’t lift his head. When he was young, he had a fantasy, if his birth mother was old madam Jiang, then it would be great. Just like his elder brothers, possessing all that he could possess and receiving respect whenever he walked. Later, when he grew up, he understood, everything was based on a person’s fate. G.o.d wanted him to be born from a concubine’s belly, thus his whole life was destined to could only be under the foot of his two elder brothers.
His fate could not be altered anymore, but his daughter’s could. It’s possible for Jiang Yu’e not to walk this path. She could choose not to marry Zhou Yan Bang. If this was the case, her children also would not turn into this kind of miserable fate of a shu born.
“Then say, how to handle this?” Yang-shi unexpectedly became calm. She no longer quarrelled incessantly with Jiang Yuan Xing like before; rather she desperately said: “With Yu’e’s ident.i.ty, she can only marry into Ningyuan Marquis residence as a concubine. Could they possibly take Yu’e as the main wife? Now everyone in Yanjing already knows that Yu’e and Zhou Yan Bang were already together and no one else will marry Yu’e. Don’t tell me that you want her to stay in the residence all her life and be a spinster? Or to directly let her cut her hair and go to the temple, spending her lifetime in the nunnery?” Yang-shi mumbled: “I didn’t instruct my daughter well, but if you are not just a doc.u.ment checker, if the one meeting with a mishap wasn’t Yu’e, but the daughter from the main branch, the result definitely would not be like this.”
As if hit by lightning, Jiang Yuan Xing staggered two steps backward.
At this time, Jiang Yu’e ran in from outside. Once she came, she directly knelt down, and while crying, said to Jiang Yuan Xing: “Father, I don’t want to be a nun, I also don’t want to stay in the residence for a lifetime. It’s already like this, if I don’t marry Zhou Yan Bang, I won’t have any other way. Father, are you forcing your daughter to die?”
Seeing his wife and daughter like this, then thinking about his current ident.i.ty, Jiang Yuan Xing’s complexion was grey. He no longer had the strength to resist, squirmed his lips, and in the end, closed his eyes. After a long time he finally said a word, “okay”.
Thus, the dust settled.
……
The days pa.s.sed leisurely and the summer at last ended. Autumn, along with the fragrance of osmanthus flowers, rushed over together from the distant sky.
This summer was exceptionally long, many unconceivable things seemed to have happened in Yanjing. When thinking carefully, except for life and death, they were all trivial matters. However these trivial matters were also discussed by the people incessantly for several months.
One of these was the romance of Zhou Yan Bang from the Ningyuan Marquis residence.
Speaking of, since the palace feast where in front of the guests, Ningyuan Marquis’s heir got entangled with two females from famous families, each and every one of the male population envied Zhou Yan Bang for enjoying the joy of having several partners while the female population tacitly sympathized with Zhou Yan Bang’s original fiancee, Jiang You Yao.
To speak of, it was an unexpected disaster. As long as the year pa.s.sed, Jiang third miss would have married Zhou Yan Bang. Who would have known that such a thing would happen midway? Clearly didn’t do anything, but got her fiancee s.n.a.t.c.hed away. The people who were jealous of Jiang You Yao clapping their hands and said that everything was retribution. Wasn’t Jiang third miss’s marriage s.n.a.t.c.hed from Jiang second miss? It could be seen that if it’s not her thing, no matter how they grab it, they wouldn’t get it.
No matter what people said, the end of this romance was still Zhou Yan Bang’s marriage that was resolved.
Zhou Yan Bang would marry the Shen family’s daughter, Shen Ruyun as the wife, and at the same time, take the Jiang family’s fifth miss as the concubine.
Zhou Yan Bang was “disrespectful” to Shen Ruyun, and she was the secretary’s younger sister. A daughter’s innocent reputation was most important, so there was no other alternative but to take Shen Ruyun to enter the door. While Jiang Yu’e, most of the rumors circulating in Yanjing was that Jiang fifth miss and her about-to-become brother in law had long ago had a secret relationship. In order to mask this scandal, they had no choice but to bring her into the door. It’s just that the Jiang family’s third branch’s status was too low, so she could only enter as a concubine. Naturally, the Jiang family’s third branch agreed, invisibly reflecting that Jiang Yu’e and Zhou Yan Bang truly had a private affair since earlier.
Outsiders saw that Zhou Yan Bang had a tender wife and beautiful concubine in his arms, and also became the current emperor’s favorite, the secretary’s brother in law. This could be considered to everyone’s delight and satisfaction. However, among these, only Zhou Yan Bang himself understood the feelings clearly.