In Shiyuan Village, the villagers who couldn't get their money back were heartbroken. Unable to do anything about the Huo family, they could only wait.

Seeing that the villagers were not making much noise, Mrs. Huo thought that these people were just like that.

She had no intention of paying these people back so quickly. Even if she had some money, it would have to wait until later.

How could Da Huo's intentions be hidden from the village elders? As soon as they saw Da Huo, they knew he wasn't someone to be trifled with. Someone like him might simply borrow money and not pay it back. They might say they'd pay it back after a while, but then, they might not pay it back at all.

After Lin Xiaowan learned about this, she thought it was a good thing she hadn't lent the money to Mrs. Huo. If she had, Mrs. Huo might have asked her to repay the money by asking someone from the Marquis of Jingning's mansion, claiming that her children belonged to the Marquis of Jingning.

That's not good!

The children born to Mrs. Huo and Liu Yanjing now call Princess Zhaoyang their mother. Mrs. Huo is a person who does not deserve sympathy. She is impossible to consider her children.

If Lin Xiaowan and her husband really wrote a letter to Liu Yanjing to tell him about this matter, Liu Yanjing might think that they were meddling in his affairs.

"It's a good thing I didn't lend her the money," Liu Yanqing sighed. "Those people in the village were just looking for the high interest. They all assumed she'd pay back more if she said she would. They thought that small amount of money was nothing to her."

"A few dozen or even a few hundred coins are nothing, aren't they?" Lin Xiaowan said. "When you were in the Marquis' Mansion, you should have known that this amount of money wasn't enough. A piece of clothing, rouge...that would cost a lot of money."

Even a concubine's wife like Lin Xiaowan had good food, clothing and other expenses in the Marquis' Mansion.

Mother Liu had never been too harsh on these illegitimate children. She simply distinguished between legitimate and illegitimate children and did not allow illegitimate children to have the same things as legitimate children.

Lin Xiaowan truly felt that Mother Liu had done a good job. She hadn't deliberately chosen bad wives for illegitimate sons like Liu Yanqing, nor had she allowed her illegitimate daughters to marry bad men. Even Liu Yanbo's wife, Su Qiuya, wasn't bad. Of course, Su Qiuya's and Liu Yanbo's marriages were quite different.

Su Qiuya was a person whose grandfather had saved the Jingning Marquisate, which was why the Jingning Marquisate was engaged to the Su family. Mrs. Su originally wanted Su Qiuya's sister to get married, but when the Jingning Marquisate got into trouble, Mrs. Su let Su Qiuya get married.

"That's true," Liu Yanqing said, "but after we were exiled, a few dozen or a few hundred coins were a lot of money and could buy a lot of things. Five coins for a pound of meat is not a small amount."

Liu Yanqing really thought that this amount of money was not small, but those people were just confused. Did they think that Da Huo was still the daughter of the Earl's Mansion? Yes, Da Huo was still, but those people in the Earl's Mansion would never treat Da Huo so well.

The eldest Huo had already married, but she still always caused trouble for her sisters from her natal family. With a girl like the eldest Huo around, it was difficult for the other girls in the Huo family to get married.

"Yes." Lin Xiaowan nodded. Isn't that right? "Those people didn't make much noise."

"What can they do? She's the only one in the family." Liu Yanqing said, "Forget her face being ruined. Even if her face wasn't ruined, they can't send her to a brothel, or sell her to someone else as a maid. They can't take her life, and they can't make any more trouble, unless they go to the Huo Bo Mansion."

But those people were just ordinary people. How could they get to Huo Bo's house?

It's a long way from the northwest to the capital. If they have the money to go to the capital, they might as well stay in the northwest. They have to spend more money to go to the capital.

Da Huo was not afraid of those people's disturbance at all. The emperor was far away, so the royal family did not punish Da Huo again. Da Huo relied on her status as the daughter of the Bo family to deceive the people in the village.

Liu Yanqing thought that he had not fooled those people, and he was still Princess Rongning's brother.

"You said I'm your younger sister's older brother, but I didn't go to the Rongning Temple, nor did I scam people outside." Liu Yanqing said, "The Jingning Marquisate is better than the Huo Bo Mansion, right? Only she dared to do that. She's not afraid that after a long time, others will know that the Huo Bo Mansion doesn't care about her that much. Who knows what those people will do to her."

"Even if the Bo Mansion doesn't care about her that much, she is still their daughter," Lin Xiaowan said. "It's okay for her to suffer a little. If she loses her life, the Bo Mansion will always send someone to collect her body. Others should still be more or less cautious. People should not fight against officials. It's always better to be cautious."

"That's right. They won't lend her money anymore." Liu Yanqing said, "They were just stupid. They thought she was telling the truth. They were also greedy. If they hadn't thought about the high interest, none of this would have happened."

"Who cares about them? It's not our money." Lin Xiaowan looked at her daughter standing in front of the strawberry field.

They planted some strawberries in the yard, and their daughter loved looking at them.

"Big sister, do you want some strawberries? Go get a basket and pick some for her," Lin Xiaowan said. "You've been standing here for quite a while."

"She knows how to pick them herself." Liu Yanqing said.

"What do you mean she knows how to pick strawberries? She just pops them into her mouth when she sees them, regardless of whether they are green or red." Lin Xiaowan rolled her eyes. "You're just lazy."

"I'm not lazy at all. I'm keeping an eye on her." Liu Yanqing said quickly, "I'm afraid she'll run out of the yard. If she runs out of the yard and there are beggars outside, what will we do? Didn't you say before that I should keep an eye on her? She's so young, she has to be allowed to play by herself. We can't stop her too much."

Liu Yanqing thought about when Liu Yulian was playing, the people around her just stared at her, and those people did not try to stop Liu Yulian.

“…” Lin Xiaowan was too lazy to say anything.

"My little sister is the same." Liu Yanqing said, "You've been controlling her all the time and not letting her see anything. How can she discover new things?"

"Just keep an eye on it." Lin Xiaowan said. If she said anything else, Liu Yanqing would start preaching these big truths again.

In the imperial palace, Chunlan, once Miss Lin Si, worked beside the empress. Chunlan saw a palace maid become the emperor's woman, but she had no such idea. Being the emperor's woman meant that she had to compete for favor, even if the concubine was the master, she was unwilling to do that.

Chunlan preferred to work hard with her own hands and served the Empress wholeheartedly. The Empress had a piece of land in the palace, and Chunlan took care of it.

The Queen was quite confident in Chunlan. She did not deliberately come forward to show off when the Emperor was around, nor did she deliberately leave anything behind. Although the Queen was considered to be a person who managed the palace servants around her very well, it did not mean that there were no people around her who wanted to climb onto the dragon bed.

"Empress." Chunlan saw the Empress coming and brought a small bamboo basket over. "The strawberries are red."

"Then pick some," the queen said with a smile. "Thanks to you for taking such good care of these crops."

"It's still the Empress who manages well. She lets me and others work here." Chunlan didn't dare to say that it was her own credit.

The Queen never told them not to do this or that. She gave them a lot of power and allowed them to plant whatever they wanted. And the palace servants also thought about what the Queen and the Crown Prince would like, and they would plant those things.

Chunlan was in charge of the greenhouse. She personally took the hoe and went to plant the land instead of waiting for others to do it. She was a servant, not a master.

In the palace, Chunlan sometimes saw some young and strong guards. She saw that those guards had no other thoughts, no intention of getting married, and she just wanted to do her work in peace and stability, and then leave the palace when she was old.

At least in the palace, she had enough food and clothing, and the Empress and the Emperor were not masters who could take the lives of palace maids at will. Chunlan felt that her life was much better now than in the Lin family. Her masters were kind, and she should do more for them.

"The weather has been a bit cold lately, don't let the crops get frozen," said the queen.

"It's not necessary for me." Chunlan had already asked someone to prepare charcoal in case of emergency.

Some of them went to the top of the greenhouse to sweep the snow. Fortunately, the greenhouse was curved, which made it easier for them to clear the snow, and the snow also slid down easily.

Chunlan stood beside the queen. Since the queen didn't ask any questions, Chunlan didn't say much either.

When the emperor came to the queen's side, he saw the strawberries on the table.

"There are strawberries so soon?" asked the emperor.

"In the greenhouse." said the queen with a smile.

"I see." The emperor picked up a strawberry.

The emperor knew that the queen had planted some crops in a corner of her room, and he thought it was a good idea. The emperor respected the queen very much. He was not as kind to the other concubines as he was to the queen, and the education of the other illegitimate princes was also different from that of the crown prince.

"There's not much room in the palace to grow much," the Queen said. "Give some to the Crown Prince and his men, and that's it."

"These are good enough. We don't need more." The emperor had no intention of rewarding the concubines in the harem. "Those glasses are indeed useful."

The emperor could sense the effects of Princess Rongning's creations. With the treasury now full, they no longer had to worry about the army running out of food. Some troops cultivated fields near their camps, producing a good amount of food.

Those culture media brought great changes to the Daliang Dynasty, and even the emperor felt it.

Some officials simply didn't know how good those things were. They had enough food and clothing, so the feeling wasn't that obvious. Others thought Princess Rongning was just average. They just didn't want to believe a woman was more capable than them.

"The glass in the palace windows has also been replaced," the Queen said. "The various colors of glass are really beautiful. But ordinary window glass is only clear, so it's difficult to get so many colors."

The Queen saw some decorations made of glass, which were no less beautiful than porcelain.

"Yes." The emperor nodded, "It's not that cold inside the house."

The emperor often came to the empress's place, not just on the first and fifteenth days of the lunar month. The concubines in the harem didn't dare to say much, except for a few who said the emperor favored the empress. But the empress was the emperor's principal wife, and they were concubines, so how could concubines say much about the empress?

In the Cen family in the northwest, Miss Cen has never gotten pregnant again since her miscarriage. Miss Cen came to give New Year gifts to her parents' home. She also wanted to go out and walk around, not wanting to stay at her husband's house all the time.

"Are you going back soon?" asked Mrs. Cen San.

"Well, I'll go back in the afternoon." Miss Cen wanted to stay at her parents' house for a few days, but her family didn't want her to stay. She could only think of sitting here for a while and going back to her husband's house later.

Miss Cen's husband already had a child born out of wedlock, and she was unhappy when she saw a child born out of wedlock. She really couldn't treat a child born out of another woman as her own. Even if she had considered marrying Liu Yanjing, it was because Liu Yanjing was the heir of the Jingning Marquisate.

If Liu Yanjing was not the prince of Jingning Marquis Mansion, Miss Cen would not have thought too much about it.

Miss Cen's current husband is just a young man from a small town, so of course she is dissatisfied with her husband.

"Okay." Mrs. Cen San said, "Is your son-in-law coming to pick you up?"

"How could he come?" Miss Cen said, "He cares more about the maids than me."

Miss Cen thought that her husband might be with some pretty maidservant or one of those charming widows. Her husband was not a man who cared much about his reputation. If he had, he would not have been involved with the Huo family before.

With the precedent of Mrs. Huo, Miss Cen no longer likes to associate with widows or women whose husbands are away from home all year round.

"You are the wife of the principal family, so please be more patient." Mrs. Cen San said.

"Mother." Miss Cen looked at Mrs. Cen San, "Haven't I endured enough?"

“…” Mrs. Cen San thought that it would never be enough. This was something she would have to endure for the rest of her life.

A few days ago, Mrs. Cen San saw the captain who was once engaged to Miss Cen. He was now married. Mrs. Cen San felt it was a pity. If her daughter had not tried to break off the engagement, she might still have married that captain.

That captain is definitely more reliable than the current son-in-law and can help the family.

What can she do? Madam Cen San looked at Miss Cen and said that everyone has to be responsible for their own choices.

"Your cousin and the others may not be living well." Madam Cen San consoled, "The Third Prince is a prince now, right? His concubine, your cousin, can only stay outside the palace."

"How can it be the same?" Miss Cen said, "Even if she stays outside, she will still serve Grandmother and she will not have to worry about food and clothing."

"Without her husband's favor, she'll either become a nun or stay at the farm," said Madam Cen San. "She'll be all alone. Don't worry too much. In a few years, if you don't have a child, bring a newborn to your side. Don't wait until the child is older to adopt him or her; you won't be able to raise him or her well that way."

Miss Cen remained silent. She didn't want to adopt the child born by her concubine.

In the capital, at the Cen family, Concubine Cen was still thinking about returning to the palace. However, the Third Prince had not come to see her often, and the Third Prince had only come to see Old Madam Cen less often.

Concubine Cen didn't dare to say much bad things about the Third Prince. At most, she would ask why the Third Prince didn't let the Third Prince come over to see her.

"It's almost the New Year, but the palace hasn't sent anything yet." Concubine Cen said.

"Wait a few more days." Madam Cen said, "It was a little late last year too."

"I don't remember much." Concubine Cen just felt that the people in the palace didn't care about them that much. "It's so cold, and they only gave us those two sets of clothes."

"If you don't have enough clothes, then make them yourself," said Old Madam Cen. "The allotment is just that. If you don't have enough, buy more yourself."

"The ones I make aren't as pretty." Concubine Cen's needlework was not that good, so the clothes she made were certainly not as good as those made by the embroiderers.

The palace had sent over some cloth, and when Concubine Cen saw it, she wondered why the palace didn't make more clothes for them. The Third Princess either wanted to save money or make things difficult for them.

Concubine Cen was reluctant to move, but she had no choice. She was reluctant to spend money to let outsiders do the work. The monthly allowance given to them by the palace was so little, and Concubine Cen was worried that she would not have so much money in the future, so she had to save some money.

The former Concubine Cen never thought that she would become so frugal one day. When she was in the palace, she wore good clothes, had good food and clothing, and could even compare with the princess.

Now, Concubine Cen didn't dare to think that her life could compare to the princess's. She just wanted the Third Princess to not interrupt their monthly period. However, the Third Princess would never do that. She was always a person who cared about her reputation.

At the Marquis of Jingning's mansion, the wife of Duke Chengguo came again. She wanted to discuss the marriage between Liu Yulian and He Xiyuan with the wife of Marquis of Jingning.

Before Liu Yulian and He Xiyuan went to Hainan, the wife of Duke Chengguo had come to the Jingning Marquis's residence. Since Liu's mother didn't agree, the wife of Duke Chengguo had no choice but to wait.

After Liu Yulian and the others returned to Beijing, Lady Chengguo waited for a few more days.

"After they get married, they can stay in the mansion for a few days before moving to the Princess's Residence. Or they can move directly to the Princess's Residence on the day of their wedding. There's no problem with that," said Lady Chengguo. "Our family has already discussed it. Before they get married, we'll give some things to Yuan'er, and he can take them directly to the Princess's Residence."

Lady Chengguo put a lot of effort into letting her son marry Princess Rongning as soon as possible.

"Here's the list," said Lady Chengguo. "This is part of what Yuan'er has been allocated. After he gets married, we'll give him and his wife some land and shops."

Liu's mother did not expect that the wife of Duke Chengguo would come up with such a list. This was not a betrothal gift, but something that He Xiyuan could get.

"When we start paying the betrothal gifts, there won't be much." Lady Chengguo said, "I know Rongning doesn't need these things, but they will be living together as a couple in the future, so we can't treat them badly."

"..." Mother Liu looked at the list, which indeed contained quite a few items. "The old lady at home also said that if Rongning marries into our family, she will be her granddaughter." Lady Chengguo said with a smile, "I will definitely treat Rongning as my own daughter."

Liu's mother only thought that other families did not ask for marriage in this way, but the people in the Chengguo Mansion were indeed different. Mrs. He of the Chengguo Mansion was a very embarrassing person, and the Jingning Marquis Mansion could not keep Liu Yulian forever, so she had to let her marry.

"Then let's pick a date and see which one is good." said Liu's mother.

When Lady Chengguo heard what Liu's mother said, she felt relieved. She was afraid that Liu's mother would still refuse to give in.

While Liu Yulian and He Xiyuan were in Hainan, Lady Chengguo added a lot of things to the betrothal gift list for her youngest son. The old lady at home always felt that the betrothal gift list was too small, and she said that the betrothal gift for Princess Rongning was for someone who had done a great favor to the Duke's Mansion.

Then, Mrs. He added things there. Every few days, she would think of something to add, and then do the same thing again after a few days.