Unmarried - 1
The entire city of Xijing was immersed in the lively atmosphere of the Lantern Festival. Colorful lanterns hung high in the streets, children played and frolicked, adults smiled broadly, and the city was bustling with noise and people jostling each other.
Several carriages were parked idly outside the street, and the drivers chatted quietly not far away, so as not to disturb their masters who had returned for a short rest.
"I heard that the fabric is woven from seven-colored silk threads, and it can shimmer with a beautiful glow in the sunlight!"
Inside the carriage, a woman with a round face described to another woman with a round face, her eyebrows dancing and her gestures animated, how beautiful and dazzling her dress was.
"What's the point of saying all this? Do you have seventy taels of silver to buy a skirt?"
Looking at the slightly older woman, she impatiently slapped her younger sister's hand away.
"I didn't..."
The two exchanged a knowing glance and then turned to look at the other woman in the carriage.
Yun Yixia sat quietly in the corner, her eyes lowered, her shoulders hunched inward, her fingers twisting a handkerchief. As if sensing their burning gazes, she twisted the handkerchief even tighter.
The two younger sisters, Yun Yihua and Yun Yidan, chattered excitedly about the new Shu brocade skirts that had arrived at Suyifang.
Yun Yixia tried to minimize her presence on the side, acting cowardly and appearing particularly easy to bully.
"Third sister~"
Yun Yidan spoke in a sweet, cloying voice, but her hand gripped Yun Yixia's wrist tightly, her nails digging deep into the fair flesh.
"You've always been the one who loves us the most... right?"
"…yes!"
The Lantern Festival festivities continued until midnight, with people carrying lanterns and reluctantly returning home.
The horse's hooves clattered on the bluestone pavement as the carriage stopped at the residence of a fifth-rank official in the Ministry of Revenue. Three young women stepped down one after another.
"Third sister, can you carry these for us?"
Yun Yihua stuffed the dress she had been carrying all the way into Yun Yixia's arms, her gaze greedily fixed on it, and she whispered fiercely, "Give me a piece of her mind."
"What should I say when I see Mother later? I don't need to teach you, do I?"
"No...no need!"
Yun Yixia's eyelashes trembled slightly, her voice trembled, and she murmured her agreement.
As Yun Yixia entered, she tripped over the threshold and stumbled out, bumping into someone. The person raised their hand and pushed her, causing her to sway and nearly fall onto the cold ground.
In her panic, Yun Yixia rolled up her sleeve slightly, which landed right above a patch of bruised and swollen skin.
"How can you act so recklessly and haphazardly?"
The man frowned and glared at Yun Yixia, but when he met her moist, red almond-shaped eyes, his anger subsided, and he awkwardly looked away, his gaze inadvertently falling on the glaring bruise on her wrist...
"What happened?"
"I have met Father!"
Yun Yihua and Yun Yidan jogged forward to greet her, desperately trying to signal Yun Yixia to pick up the package that had fallen to the ground.
If my father sees this, things will definitely not end well!
"Um!"
Yun Wenyao nodded and followed the two sisters' gaze to the package that had been thrown out.
The servant, with keen insight, picked up the bundle and handed it to him, holding it above his head with both hands.
After being thrown and picked up, a bit of her underwear dress was revealed, shimmering with colorful light under the courtyard lights.
"Open!"
Even just looking at a corner of the fabric, it's already extraordinary. I can't even imagine how much money this whole outfit would cost.
"Father, my daughter's clothes..."
"Yun Yihua, shut up!"
Yun Wenyao recognized this material. The daughters of the Vice Minister of Revenue were arguing fiercely over the Seven-Colored Shu Brocade, and the news spread like wildfire throughout the South Street.
Privately, people joked that they looked down on the daughter of the vice minister, who came from a humble background.
Yun Wenyao's monthly salary is sixty taels, and a set of Shu brocade clothing from Suyifang costs at least seventy taels.
One dress is worth more than his monthly salary!
"You're coming back with me!"
It wasn't appropriate to discipline his daughter outside, so he snatched the package back from the servant's arms and stormed off to the main courtyard.
He wanted to ask Jiang why she had raised her daughter to be so extravagant.
"Clang!"
Yun Wenyao kicked open the door to the main room, where Jiang Xiumei was leaning against a daybed, checking accounts.
"What are you doing, sir?"
Jiang Xiumei sat up straight, her eyes sweeping over Yun Wenyao's three daughters who stood behind him with their heads bowed and eyes lowered. She lingered on Yun Yixia for a moment longer before naturally turning her gaze back to the man's face.
"You've raised a wonderful daughter!"
Yun Wenyao slammed the package in his hand down hard, speaking with a mixture of anger and urgency.
"They dare to spend nearly a hundred taels on a dress! They're all your well-behaved daughters!"
"Master, please don't be anxious!"
Perhaps there's some misunderstanding?
Let me ask them!
Jiang Xiumei's kind face and gentle tone successfully calmed Yun Wenyao down considerably, and he sat on the other side of the couch, gulping down tea.
"Mother, my third sister likes the dresses from Suyifang and wants us to go shopping with her!"
"You know perfectly well that my third sister has always been muddle-headed and lacks manners!"
Yun Yihua stepped forward and grabbed her mother's left sleeve, while Yun Yidan grabbed her right sleeve. Tears streamed down her face as she glanced at her father with a mournful look.
"Third Sister, what do you say?"
Jiang Xiumei glanced at her two daughters and knew what they were up to. Now was not the time to argue with them; she should pass the buck first.
"Father, Mother! I have nothing to say!"
Yun Yixia stood at the farthest point, her shoulders hunched so low they almost bent, her fingers twisting a handkerchief, her long eyelashes covering her eyes, and no one could see the mockery in her beautiful almond-shaped eyes.
"Father, Mother, look! She admitted it!"
Yun Yihua looked at her parents with a happy expression, but when she noticed that their faces did not look good, she immediately withdrew her thick lips that were showing her big teeth.
"Shut up!"
As a fifth-rank official in the Ministry of Revenue, Yun Wenyao was adept at handling the treacherous and ever-changing political landscape. How could he not see the subtle strife between his daughters?
His gaze fell on the bluish-purple crescent-shaped nail marks on his third daughter's wrist, and the veins on his forehead bulged high.
We are siblings born of the same mother, how could things have come to this?
"Look at the half-worn cotton clothes that Third Sister is wearing. Can she... dare to spend seventy taels to buy a Shu brocade skirt from Suyifang?"
Today is the Lantern Festival. Fourth Sister and Fifth Sister are dressed in bright and beautiful clothes, while Third Sister is dressed in plain clothes, her plainness revealing her sorrow. If you didn't know better, you would think she was a servant or maid.
"Father……"
Yun Yixia suddenly looked up, her almond-shaped eyes filled with tears, looking at Yun Wenyao with unspoken words. Her gaze drifted to the side, and she immediately shrank back and lowered her head in fright.
"Enough! Enough is enough!"
Yun Wenyao looked around and saw that the mother and her two daughters all had round faces, slanted eyes, flat noses, and thick lips.
Looking at Yun Yixia again, her face was an oval shape without any makeup, with crescent-shaped eyebrows, watery almond-shaped eyes, a round and slightly upturned nose, and lips that were naturally red without any lipstick.
For a moment, it dawned on him that Third Sister seemed to be that madwoman from the backyard...
"Third Sister, come here!"
Yun Wenyao grabbed Yun Yixia's wrist, making the three of them take a good look at the deep nail marks and the surrounding red and swollen skin.
"Father, the wounds...have nothing to do with Fourth Sister or Fifth Sister!"
The purplish-black swelling on the girl's fair and slender wrist was particularly striking, and her cowering and sorrowful posture made her even more pitiful.
"From today onwards, your two monthly allowances will be halved! You will also be required to copy the *Admonitions for Women* ten times daily!"
Yun Wenyao nodded to his two daughters, then turned to see Yun Yixia's frightened expression, and his tone softened unconsciously.
"You...go to the accounting office tomorrow and get twenty taels...to make two new sets of clothes!"
"Thank you... Father!"
The father-daughter relationship, a traditional tale of filial piety, is something neither side truly understands.
To avoid further embarrassment, Yun Yixia bowed to her parents and then left the main room.
"You bitch! Just you wait!"
Yun Yixia was bumped hard as she passed by Yun Yihua. She staggered and fell out of the door, still shouting, "Father, I'm alright!"
"Yun Yihua, you go kneel in the ancestral hall! Yun Yidan, you go too!"
With the bright moon hanging high overhead, Yun Yixia quickly left the main courtyard. As she turned the corner of the corridor, she could still hear the family of four arguing and bickering.
She stood at the boundary between light and shadow, her beautiful face half innocent and half sinister, with a very faint curve at the corner of her lips.
Don't rush!
The real show has only just begun!
Yun Yixia is a modern person who was reincarnated.
She fought her way through the corporate world, finally rising from a lowly frontline worker to a senior one. Once she completed her projects, she could be promoted to a company partner.
Tragically, Yun Yixia collapsed in her office while working overtime in the early hours of the morning. When she woke up, she had become a baby about to be born in the backyard of the Yun family mansion.
"Third Sister...hehe...Third Sister, come here!"
At the end of the corridor, a woman in white slowly beckoned to Yun Yixia.
She had a pair of beautiful almond-shaped eyes that looked over her with a watery gaze in the moonlight, making her unforgettable.
The woman stood in the shadows waving, like a beautiful ghost returning to life on the Lantern Festival.
"Greetings, Aunt Zhao!"
Yun Yixia walked over quickly, and Aunt Zhao suddenly grabbed her wrist, pressing it right on the purplish nail mark. She gritted her teeth and endured the pain without making a sound.
"Third Sister, I have something to tell you!" Zhao Zhuyu looked around nervously. "There's a ghost in this house! An evil ghost! She stole my child!"
"Um!"
Yun Yixia raised her other hand to smooth the messy hair at Aunt Zhao's temples, and squeezed out a syllable. No matter how much it hurt, she did not break free from her mother's hand.
"You crazy woman... uh! Greetings, Third Sister!"
An obese old woman walked along cursing, and when she turned the corner of the corridor and saw Yun Yixia, she froze, then revealed a fawning smile.
Although the mistress of the house did not favor the third daughter, she was not someone that a lowly old woman like her could offend.
"Take Aunt Zhao back safely!"
Yun Yixia didn't say much. The more she talked, the more mistreated Aunt Zhao would be when she got back.
"promise!"
The fat woman stepped forward to help Zhao Zhuyu leave, and before they had even turned the corner of the corridor, she roughly dragged her away.
"Third Sister, I've come to pick you up!"
At the end of the bluestone path, a bamboo-ribbed silk lantern drew ever closer. The maid walked to Yun Yixia's side and just then saw Zhao Zhuyu stagger and disappear around the corner of the corridor.
"Bai Wei... will she still struggle frantically after leaving here?"
Yun Yixia walked towards the back courtyard. She lived in the most secluded courtyard, and her monthly allowance was less than that of the nanny serving the mistress.
But... so what?
She can carve out a path to success in the modern jungle, and she can also carve out a place for herself under the ancient feudal system.
“My aunt is struggling fiercely!” Bai Wei sighed silently. “Unless she is forcibly taken away, she is unwilling to step out of the Yun residence.”
We knocked her unconscious and took her out once before, and she went even crazier after waking up.
It's difficult to place people within the mansion, so the only option is to give Granny Rong a minor punishment as a warning.
"Forget it!" Yun Yixia walked into her own courtyard. "Someone else might not be as good as Granny Rong."
Go back and have someone cut off one of the old woman's fingers; if she dares to disrespect her again, cut off her toe as well.
Humans have twenty fingers, so they'll eventually learn their lesson!
"promise!"
Bai Wei calmly locked the courtyard gate and quickly helped her master wash up.
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