She felt pain at first, but now she only feels numb.
She cursed every ancestor of the Shen family for eighteen generations until her voice became hoarse.
Just as she was exhausted from making a scene, the previously closed door suddenly opened slowly.
She turned her head sharply and saw Shen Qiyin standing solemnly in the doorway, her gaze calm and indifferent, without the heartache she had imagined, nor the hatred she feared she would see.
There was only tranquility.
Or perhaps, it should be described as deathly stillness.
"Yin, Yin'er..." This was the first time Madam Shen had felt so clearly and strongly that this daughter was probably really going to abandon her: "You're all I have left, you can't abandon me."
Taking advantage of her superior numbers, she became even more determined to put Shen Xiyin in a difficult position, even going so far as to kowtow to her.
"Mother, please help me, don't let your father divorce me."
"You are a piece of flesh that fell from your mother's body, how can you not feel sorry for your mother?"
Shen Qiyin, unusually, did not say anything nonsensical to deliberately provoke her as usual.
She slowly squatted down, looking directly into Madam Shen's tearful yet resentful eyes, and said, word by word, "Mother has lied so many times, and now she's even lying through her teeth. Don't I feel sorry for you enough?"
"you……"
“You resent that I am not a boy, which makes you unable to hold your head up in front of your grandmother and father, and you beat and scold me all the time. Although I am bitter, I have never felt resentment, because I love you.”
“You are foolish and have offended Grandmother many times. I have stepped in to protect you and keep you safe several times, but this has led to Grandmother using family discipline to beat me out of anger. It is also because I feel sorry for you.”
"You were afraid people would say you mistreated your illegitimate children, so you put them first in everything and never thought of me. I didn't dare to hold it against you, because I felt sorry for you!"
"But ask yourself honestly, do you deserve my heartache?"
After Shen Qiyin said these words, those who were watching the spectacle almost unanimously sided with her.
Madam Shen cared about three things most in her life.
One is to have a son.
Secondly, her husband's favor.
Thirdly, there is the reputation of being a virtuous wife.
The first two things were already destined to fail. If she were to make herself into a pariah at this critical moment, she might as well be dead!
She had personally experienced how sharp-tongued Chen Qiyin was; she couldn't stop her even if she wanted to, and could only watch helplessly.
Shen Qiyin: "Over the years, when you have nothing to do, you, along with my grandmother and father, have been nitpicking and finding fault with me, your daughter. But whenever you encounter any trouble, you always think of me first and push me out to take the blame for you without hesitation."
"Sometimes I even doubt whether I am really your child."
"Of course, of course!" Madam Shen didn't dare to pause at all. She knew that Madam Shen was her biological mother and she was already ruthless enough. If she were to mistakenly believe that the two of them were not mother and daughter, she would probably kill herself.
So, Madam Shen explained urgently, "You are the child I carried for ten months and gave birth to. The virginity mark on your wrist was applied by your mother herself."
Upon hearing this, Shen Qiyin's eyes flashed: "What did you say?" The mark of virginity?!
It wasn't a mole!
“Back then, your older sister asked the monks at the temple to help her order, but they were a bunch of big men and they didn’t know how to be gentle. I was afraid you would get hurt, so I ordered it for you myself.”
That's not entirely untrue.
But the truth is, you have to donate money to monks in temples to help a child get a virginity mark.
Old Madam Shen was reluctant to spend the money, so she told Madam Shen to find a solution herself.
She didn't know how, but she boldly tried, and accidentally applied the cinnabar on her wrist instead of her forearm.
She frowned, lost in thought.
She remembered her master saying that this so-called "virginity mark" was not reliable, and besides, she had never heard of anyone around her asking about it, not even Shen Ruyin and Shen Mengyin.
Seeing that she remained silent, Madam Shen realized this as well, and quickly explained, "Back when your father was an official in the Imperial Medical Academy, the former head of the academy had already said that this thing cannot be relied upon."
“After the news spread, very few families did it anymore. It was your grandmother who was stubborn and insisted on doing it this way.”
However, by the time of Shen Ruyin and Shen Mengyin, there were very few families in the entire capital that still had the "virginity mark" applied, so the old lady stopped insisting.
Shen Qiyin looked down at the crimson stain on her wrist, but felt nothing in particular.
She never truly doubted her origins.
Because if she weren't the daughter of the Shen family, then everyone, including her mother, shouldn't have treated her with disdain and resentment.
"Yin'er, Yin'er..." Madam Shen pitifully tugged at her skirt: "Mother knows she was wrong. Mother will never let you down again. For the sake of our mother-daughter relationship, please help Mother again."
"good."
Madam Shen was overjoyed!
Before she could speak, Shen Qiyin continued, "I can persuade my father to allow you to have a place in the mansion so that you won't have to wander outside and suffer the elements, but I can't make him give up the idea of divorcing you."
“You…” Madam Shen frowned: “How can you be so useless!”
"If you can't stop him from divorcing me, then what kind of help is this?" She instantly broke down: "I'm stuck in this ambiguous situation in the mansion. Am I going to go from being the legal wife to a concubine?"
What does Chen Xiyin say about his aunt?
That's a really nice idea.
Those watching the spectacle from the sidelines, seeing Madam Shen's rapidly changing face, couldn't help but feel indignant on behalf of Shen Qiyin, saying, "You bastard, that poisonous woman should be divorced, why bother with her!"
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