Zhu Yu finally understood what kind of life the original owner had been living, as Lu Xiaoyun had described. Look at the mother and daughter working together so well; no wonder the original owner was so bewitched that she lost her way.

So he tugged at Lu Yucheng's sleeve with a "pitiful" expression, looked up at Lu Yucheng with his watery eyes, and said softly, "Brother, my second sister says one minute that I'm cursed and destined to die a bad end, and the next minute that I'm strong-willed and will kill everyone in the Duke of Zhenguo's mansion. I don't understand at all. Is my fate strong or not?"

Upon hearing this, both Fang and Lu Jinmi choked.

Lu Jinmi looked at Fang Shi in disbelief; she seemed to have never thought of this issue before.

What exactly is Lu Xiaoyun's fate?

Lu Yucheng stared at them coldly, without saying a word.

He had never heard any of the things that Xiaoyun had brought death to her mother or that she was a jinx.

Every time she returned to Shengjing, the servants in the mansion treated Xiaoyun with utmost respect, and the stepmother, Jinmi, and Jinpei truly treated Xiaoyun like family.

Little did I know, this was the truth behind it all!

Lu Jinmi snorted coldly, but her arrogance had already diminished by three points: "Lu Xiaoyun, what else do you want! It's only because you got married that my mother couldn't bear to leave such a nice courtyard empty, so she let me move here. Everything I use is what you left over, what more could you want?"

As Lu Jinmi spoke, her eyes welled up with tears of grievance.

Fang pursed her lips and secretly wiped away her tears with a handkerchief, seemingly feeling unspeakable grievances and heartache due to being misunderstood.

"What you have, my third sister, second brother, and I don't have; what we have, you never lack. How can you be so shameless as to say such things? Mother always saves the best things for you, making it seem like you're her biological child and we were adopted!"

Startled, Zhu Yu poked his little head out and timidly asked, "Second sister, do you mean that when Father and Brother are not in the manor, I feel unwell, and the stepmother calls a doctor for me and deliberately has them prescribe extremely bitter medicine for my own good?"

"So when you're feeling unwell, the medicine is sweet? Because the stepmother often says that good medicine tastes bitter but is good for the illness. Since the stepmother treats you badly, she certainly doesn't want you to get better quickly, so she'll have people prepare candied fruit for you, right?"

Fang stared wide-eyed at her foolish daughter, who had been led astray by Lu Xiaoyun, and found that her face was turning pale and then flushed.

Even the way he looked at her seemed to have changed slightly.

"And those brightly colored clothes, either bright red or dark purple, and those gaudy hairpins, and the colorful makeup on my face, were all to highlight my beauty, weren't they?"

"So, second sister and third sister, why are you dressed so plainly? Is it because Mother doesn't want you to steal my thunder?"

Lu Jinmi's head was buzzing. She couldn't understand how Lu Xiaoyun, that little bitch, could say such hurtful things in such an innocent tone.

She gritted her teeth and said angrily, "Your mother has never been able to bear to scold or hit you. Even if you have greatly displeased the teachers in the manor, your mother will only try to persuade you with kind words. She has never forced you to do anything. What more could you possibly want!"

Zhu Yu nodded emphatically in agreement.

Zhu Yu tugged at Lu Yucheng's sleeve and said, "Brother, if that's the case, then the stepmother is indeed very good to me. She hired famous teachers to teach me and my younger siblings to read and write. I didn't want to, just like my second sister said, but the stepmother never punished me. I could do whatever I wanted. She's so good to me."

"But if my second sister and the others don't want to, the stepmother will give them a good beating and spread their buttocks wide open with such thick rattan canes. So, I haven't even finished learning the Three Character Classic and the Thousand Character Classic yet."

Fang: "..."

Lu Jinmi was forced to recall the past, and it seemed that even now she could still feel the piercing pain of being beaten with a rattan cane by her mother.

Whenever she or her younger sister and brother said that it was too hard and they wanted to rest for a while, their mother would whip them with a rattan cane until they were covered in bruises.

But Lu Xiaoyun, her mother never had the heart to scold or beat her. She lived a carefree and willful life, which Lu Xiaoyun envied immensely.

It wasn't until the last two years, when she and her second younger sister grew up and reached the age for marriage, that their mother stopped beating and scolding them, as the girls could no longer have any scars on their bodies.

But such days didn't last long. Then she had to learn to play the piano, do needlework, play chess, and paint. In these ten-plus years of her life, it seemed she had never had a full night's sleep.

She wasn't a bright person to begin with, and she was always a step behind her third sister in learning everything. Her second brother was still young, so she was the one who got beaten the most among the four of them.

Lu Yucheng clenched his fists tightly as he coldly stared at the mother and daughter before him, who were like bloodsucking leeches.

Is there anything else you don't understand? My sister developed that arrogant, domineering, and ignorant manner entirely thanks to her stepmother, Madam Fang.

I'm afraid that when he and his father returned to Shengjing before, his sister distanced herself from them and wouldn't even say a word to them, because she was bewitched by his stepmother.

He was confused; he hadn't noticed anything wrong with his sister before, and she had suffered their bullying for over a decade.

On the contrary, the past month since she married into the Prince An's mansion has allowed her to see many things clearly.

Thinking of this, Lu Yucheng's heart ached again. Prince An, he has gone too far!

My sister's sudden realization must have come to her senses because she suffered even more unfair treatment at the Prince An's residence.

"Anything else?" Zhu Yu asked softly.

"Since I can't enjoy happiness before I'm eighteen, why does my second sister say that I have things that she, my third sister, and my second brother don't, and that I've never lacked anything they have? I'm a little confused. Brother, do you understand? Do they want me to be well, or do they want me to die?"

Fang: "..." How was she supposed to answer that?

She glanced coldly at the girl cowering behind Lu Yucheng, only then realizing that Lu Xiaoyun seemed completely different from before.

Although she was thin and pale, she knew how to use her foolish daughter to fight back against them, and how to gradually force Mi'er into the trap she had set, so that Mi'er would reveal everything.

How stupid!

Enraged, Lu Jinmi shrieked, "Lu Xiaoyun, who can you blame for your stupidity and ignorance! Your mother is your elder, yet you are ignorant of manners, disrespectful to your elders, and have no sense of shame whatsoever! How dare you return to the Duke of Zhenguo's mansion? Why don't you just die in the Prince of An's mansion!"

Lu Yucheng shouted, "Second Sister, how dare you speak like that!"

When the Duke of Zhenguo heard that his son had brought his eldest daughter, he immediately called out to Old Master Hong upon entering the mansion. He knew that something must have happened, so he rushed over.