Chapter 313 The Virtuous Empress Who Became Cannon Fodder (Extra Chapter 1) ...
Lin You didn't stay in this world for long, but after she left, she had a significant impact on Gu Shi and Ye Yunhua.
Fortunately, Ye Yunhua grew up in a high-pressure environment and has always been good at regulating her emotions, so she quickly adjusted her state.
Although Gu Shi could not see Lin You, he had successfully added her as a friend at the last minute and could chat with her online.
After expressing the sadness of two separations, Gu Shi successfully added two more tasks to her schedule, keeping her so busy for several days that she didn't have time to follow the gossip. After that, Gu Shi's mood had almost recovered.
Both Lin You and Xiao You condoned his behavior of deliberately creating small troubles for himself.
Gu Shi was imprisoned for over a hundred years without any warning. He didn't grow up to be a monster and take revenge on the world, nor did he become mentally twisted or act abnormally. He was just a bit of a troublemaker. What's so incomprehensible about that?
After receiving a large basket of spirit fruits from Lin You, a holographic game console from Xiao You, and resuming his previous workload, Gu Shi's mood brightened considerably.
Originally, because the quasi-heavenly Dao's fortune and rules on Ye Yunhua's body were about to collapse, this world would experience some turmoil, such as natural disasters or man-made calamities. That's why Gu Shi was preparing to arrange a chosen one.
Now that Ye Yunhua's aura of rules is even stronger, and with the materials left by Lin You for maintaining the small world, there is absolutely no possibility of world turmoil. In fact, for the next few hundred years, this place will be blessed with good weather and peace.
Therefore, although Gu Shi had to learn cultivation and set up formations, his work became much easier, and he still had time to enjoy watching the drama unfold.
There are many gossips and family dramas in the mortal world, but what Gu Shi cares about most are the Qin family father and son in the palace, and Ye Yunhua's relatives in the Ye family.
The puppet "Ye Yunhua" has no human emotions and acts fairly and justly, which is admirable and respectable to most people. Only those who were once favored by Ye Yunhua will feel uncomfortable.
Besides the two children who were always taken care of by Ye Yunhua and were closest to her, the other person who was the first to notice something was wrong was Ye Yunhua's mother.
The emperor secretly subjected Ye Yunhua to cold violence, and even subtly taught the two children to do the same, in order to ensure that the heir would not be influenced by Ye Yunhua to favor the Ye family, and to prevent the eldest prince from becoming too close to the Ye family after inheriting the throne, which would lead to the Ye family gaining more power and causing trouble.
However, the emperor still put a lot of effort into maintaining appearances for the Ye family. For example, the rewards given to General Ye on his birthday each year were the most generous.
In previous years, the emperor would set a standard for the rewards, and Ye Yunhua would try her best to find something suitable for the Ye family within that standard.
For example, among the rewards given by Emperor Qin Shaoan was one hundred bolts of silk and satin. Ye Yunhua would select the colors, patterns, and thicknesses that were suitable for her parents, elder brother and sister-in-law, and children throughout the year.
For example, Ye Yunhua would also help select precious jade artifacts, including some of the various styles suitable for the Ye family, as well as some without royal markings that did not require offerings. This would make it easier for the Ye family to give gifts to various places, saving the matriarch of the family a lot of trouble and money.
Even the snacks and fruits that were given as gifts were chosen by Ye Yunhua to suit the tastes of her family. Although she did not have to choose them herself, she only gave a few instructions, but they were still much to everyone's liking.
Although the emperor never said anything about this, he secretly believed that Ye Yunhua was biased towards her maternal family, which was one of the reasons why his attitude towards her had always been indifferent.
Ye Yunhua didn't pay attention to this reward. After the Imperial Household Department sent someone to inquire, they only received the reply that it was sent according to custom. Naturally, the things the Ye family received were not to their liking.
As the saying goes, those above set an example for those below. Even if the people in the Imperial Household Department wouldn't use substandard products to fool others, they also wouldn't put in much effort.
After all, there is a big difference between opening blind boxes and designated items. On the surface, this matter does not seem to have any problems, but if you calculate carefully, Madam Ye's housekeeping expenses will be 30,000 to 50,000 taels of silver more.
This is just the extra silver spent on this one reward. There will be various festival gifts and rewards in the future. If you calculate it over a year, it will probably cost hundreds of thousands of taels.
This doesn't mean that the palace gives the Ye family hundreds of thousands of taels of silver in rewards every year. The main point is that whether they use the palace rewards as gifts or for their own personal use, they all carry a brand effect and reflect a sense of prestige.
Even if the silk clothes bestowed by the palace are about the same price as the fabric that costs thirty taels of silver a bolt outside, they can still make you look like you're wearing three hundred taels.
However, without the thirty taels of silk as a reward, the Ye family would have had to spend three hundred taels, or even more, to purchase silk in order to maintain their status and appearance.
The same principle applies to jade ornaments. If they are well-made imperial gifts, no one will care how much they are worth; they are just a prestigious item to have on a gift list.
Whether given to colleagues or close subordinates, it is a sign of being valued. If one does not have such a suitable imperial gift, one can only buy this sense of being valued with something of value.
Of course, not all of the imperial gifts are unusable, but compared to the easy, effortless, and cost-effective rewards of the past, Madam Ye now has to put in several times more effort to arrange them, and she can only reduce the extra 30,000 to 50,000 taels of silver to 10,000 to 20,000 taels.
A lot of money was spent, and there were many more problems. Unfortunately, Ye's mother had no way to express her suffering. Her public image had always been that of a capable homemaker, so how could she talk about such things?
If word gets out, it would be that the Ye family was picking and choosing royal gifts. On a grander scale, it would be that the Ye family was arrogant and spoiled because of their merits. On a smaller scale, it would be that the Ye family had a strained relationship with the Empress.
Not only could Ye's mother not tell anyone, but she also had to keep the matter completely hidden from outsiders. She could only talk about it with Ye's father and son in private.
But these trivial matters were of no concern to Ye's father, who held a high position of power, and his self-righteous son.
"It's just a woman's petty thoughts. Perhaps you haven't seen her throw tantrums enough lately. Just go to the palace a couple more times and have a talk with her." General Ye didn't even raise his head after hearing this.
"It's just the pattern of the fabric and the size of the ornaments. We have countless of these things in our storeroom. Why should Mother care so much?"
Upon hearing this, Young Master Ye offered a few words of comfort to his mother, but unfortunately, it had no effect whatsoever.
Mother Ye's distress continued until the New Year's rewards. This wasn't because the New Year's rewards returned to normal, but because finally someone in the family was there to share her distress.
As the Lunar New Year approaches, Beijing becomes much more lively. Some officials from other places come to Beijing to report on their duties, and many merchants from other places take the opportunity to come and sell their goods.
With more people, more trouble arises. A spoiled brat who is used to being praised in other places will cause a few troubles every year when he encounters a spoiled brat born and raised in the capital.
Unfortunately, the one who caused trouble this year was Young Master Ye's brother-in-law. He got into a fight on the street with the son of another fifth-rank official who was returning to the capital to report on his duties. In his arrogance, he killed the other man, leaving him childless.
A fifth-rank official is nothing to the Ye family, but this fifth-rank official happened to be the emperor's childhood companion, someone he grew up with and who even shielded the emperor from an assassination attempt, injuring his body in the process. To this day, he is the only son of this family.
The emperor looked at his friend, whose hair had turned white overnight and who looked more than ten years older, and intended to severely punish the murderer and make him pay with his life. However, the murderer happened to be the brother-in-law of the eldest son of the Ye family.
The eldest daughter-in-law of the Ye family is more than five months pregnant. She is crying and wailing at home, trying to protect her younger brother. Even the imperial physician said that if she continues to make a scene like this, she might not be able to save the baby.
Young Master Ye was naturally reluctant to part with his wife and children, so he also went to the emperor to plead for mercy. He didn't say that the punishment was unacceptable, but only that the other party was still alive and, according to the court's laws, did not deserve to die.
Now it's impossible to distinguish who is right and who is wrong; it's just a matter of whether the emperor values his comrades who risked their lives for him more, or whether he cares more about the power of the Ye family.
Since neither side can be ignored, only one person can step forward to mediate, and the best candidate is naturally Empress Ye Yunhua, who has connections with both the Ye family and the Emperor.
If Ye Yunhua were to step forward, kneel down, and plead for mercy, the emperor would naturally go along with it, give the culprit a few lashes, lock him up for a few days, and the matter would be over.
This matter is certainly not just about the safety of Young Master Ye's brother-in-law; it also involves the power of the Ye family and the relationship between the emperor and the Ye family.
Compared to the bigger picture, what are these minor grievances compared to Ye Yunhua kneeling for several hours, being confined and reprimanded by the emperor afterward, and even having her reputation affected?
That's how Ye's mother persuaded "Ye Yunhua." If it were the Ye Yunhua who had been manipulated by the Ye family for over a decade, she might have agreed immediately.
But the current "Ye Yunhua" is doing things according to Lin You's programmed settings, which are all based on the requirements provided by Ye Yunhua.
Ye Yunhua had been restricted since childhood and didn't really understand the meaning of "puppet." She only thought that Lin You had someone impersonate her through certain means.
In order not to burden the actress playing the role, she did not make any additional demands beyond her duties as empress.
Therefore, when Ye's mother spoke earnestly for a long time to Ye Yunhua, it was all just ordinary social etiquette.
Mother Ye couldn't be too direct about this, so after hinting at it several times, she unilaterally assumed that the matter was settled, regardless of whether "Ye Yunhua" agreed or not.
Before leaving, Mother Ye was very magnanimous. She knew that being the Empress was busy, so busy that she couldn't even take care of her parents and relatives. She didn't care about the previous gift list. She only hoped that she could think more about her family in the future.
After Ye's mother returned home, the Ye family began to wait for Ye Yunhua to make her move, while the emperor was also calculating what he could gain from this charade.
Even the two princes noticed this, and Qin Xi even secretly arranged for people to place prayer mats in some places as backup, and to make sure that the mats were placed carefully.
When Qin Heng found out, he pursed his lips and a sarcastic remark rolled around in his mouth, but he didn't say anything in the end. He even awkwardly asked someone to cover for Qin Xi.
The stage was set up, and a group of people waited and waited, day after day, but Ye Yunhua still didn't take any action.
The emperor even made an unprecedented visit to Ye Yunhua's home and had a meal with her. Apart from taking up half an hour of her official business, nothing else happened.
A few days later, Ye's brother-in-law, who had been living a life of luxury in prison, was on the verge of death because he was constantly worried and couldn't eat or sleep properly. If this continued, he might die.
The victim was depressed all day long, and the emperor's fifth-rank attendant was so angry that he suffered a heart attack, aggravating his old injury, and was on the verge of death.
Although there's some exaggeration in the descriptions of "half-dead" and "almost dying," the matter really can't be delayed any longer.
If we delay any longer, the Lunar New Year will be just around the corner!
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
