Sun Yaowen looked at the mess before him, his eyes bloodshot from fury. He grabbed one of the servants by the collar and scolded angrily, "Where are they? We’ve come this far, and they’re still not found?"
The servant was scared and shaking: "We’ve...we’ve tried our best to find them, but Young Master should know, it’s not possible for us to search every household. We can only..."
"If we can’t search every house, then find a way to do it! Now! Go to the government office and report it, take their servitude contracts with you! Even if they’re dead, I want their corpses brought back!" Sun Yaowen gritted his teeth, almost trembling with rage.
It was obvious that he was furious to the point of madness.
"Yes, yes, I will go handle it right now!"
Fearing the brunt of his anger, Madam Zhao hurried away, "I will get their servitude contracts."
Sun Yaowen’s hands clenched tightly in his sleeves, he sneered: "Very well, you dare play me? You have your servitude contracts in my hand, even if I have to turn Lian’an Town upside down, I can’t let you run away. When I catch you, I will skin you alive!"
Looking at the disastrous scene before him, Sun Yaowen probably already knew he was done for. This matter would likely soon reach Grandpa Sun’s ears. He was in charge of the Yihong Courtyard now, the responsibility was his to bear. But he had to find a way out for himself, even if it meant finding a scapegoat.
——
Xin He had already left the flower-filled Tower, located in the horse carriage parked on Hua Street. Not far from the Yihong Courtyard, she could see the situation there by lifting the curtain of the carriage window.
Shulan ran over, her face showing a hint of gloating, "Young Master, I just went to see, there’s quite a commotion over at Yihong Courtyard. I heard that Sun Yaowen made some random girls perform onstage, which angered the guests. People started causing a scene and it took quite some time before they all dispersed."
Xin He watched as people shouted and cursed, leaving the Yihong Courtyard. Her lips curled into a smirk, "What’s the point of trashing the place? You can always fix it. The worst part is the loss of reputation, even if you fix the place, it doesn’t mean people will return."
"Exactly. Now that Jinghua has also run away from the Yihong Courtyard and they’ve lost half of their main performers. Plus after Sun Yaowen’s mishandling today, hardly any customers are willing to return. It’s impossible for the Yihong Courtyard not to collapse."
Xin He watched as a few servants hurriedly ran out of the Yihong Courtyard, heading towards the County Government Office. A smile spread across her lips, "Sun Yaowen really is impulsive, he wants to report to the officials so soon to capture people? It seems the situation at Yihong Courtyard is truly dire. Well, I’ve seen enough of this show for now, let’s go back."
As for the events that followed, probably only the people of Sun Family would have the privilege to see, which she had no interest in.
Shulan laughed slyly, understanding why her young master remained unruffled. She said nothing more, just climbed onto the carriage, and it slowly took off.
——
Xin He slept well that night, but for the Sun Family, it was a night of chaos and commotion.
"Scoundrel! What the hell happened?!" Grandpa Sun had been in a state of high and low tension because of Sun Yaowen’s disturbances. The old man, who was practically with one foot in the grave, nearly fainted.
Sun Yaowen knelt before him, sobbing and pleading for mercy, "Grandfather, it’s really not my fault... I don’t know how this happened. Everything was fine, and then suddenly those ten girls ran away. I’m really worried right now."
"Useless! You couldn’t even keep an eye on ten girls? Are all the people in Yihong Courtyard dead?"
Sun Yaowen was quick to dodge responsibility, "Exactly, I really don’t know how the people at the Yihong Courtyard run things. When I got there, they had already disappeared!"
Madam Zhao audibly gasped as she realised that Sun Yaowen intended to pin everything on her, "Old master, this matter is very strange. Those ten girls disappeared without a trace. And despite our best efforts, we haven’t found a single one. I suspect there’s some foul play involved here. Perhaps there’s something suspicious about the girls’ background...could it be a deliberate plot to frame us..."?
Mrs Zhao had thought about these things before, but she wasn’t as slow as Sun Yaowen. They were in a precarious situation, and the whole thing seemed very strange, but she couldn’t share these thoughts with him. What could this fool understand? Perhaps he would even scold her.
After all, these ten girls were brought here by Sun Yaowen.
As expected, Sun Yaowen exploded on hearing these words, pointing at Madam Zhao and cursing, "You rotten bitch, are you saying this is all my fault? You were clearly lax in your duties. Now you’re saying the girls arrived under suspicious circumstances? They were all bought from kidnappers by me, there can’t be anything suspicious about their background!"
Grandpa Sun’s head pounded as they bickered, he finally shouted, "Enough! Stop arguing! You’re about to ruin the Yihong Courtyard!"
After a long pause Grandpa Sun finally gathered himself. He too felt that the situation was strange. How could ten orphaned girls just suddenly vanish without a trace? Unless there was someone helping behind the scenes, he just couldn’t believe it. He knew all about the practices at the Yihong Courtyard. No woman has ever escaped from there.
Even if they had escaped, they would be caught within half an hour.
While Grandpa Sun was deep in thought, a servant hurriedly ran in.
Sun Yaowen recognized him as the one he had sent to report to the county office, "Is the case filed? Has the search started? When will those ten women be brought back?"
The servant however was drenched in sweat and fell to his knees, his face on the brink of tears, "Young Master, Grandpa Sun, I just went to the county office. But when they looked at the servitude contract in my hands, they said it was fake. They refused to file the case!"
Sun Yaowen’s face was instantly drained of color. Getting up from the floor, his eyes bulged out, "What did you say?!"
"The servitude contract is fake." The servant braved his fears and repeated the words.
"That’s impossible!" Sun Yaowen cried out in high pitch.
"The official at the office personally verified that the official seal on the contract was incorrect, it had a slight difference. It’s certainly not the seal from our county office. Since it’s a fake contract, they couldn’t file the case. Those ten girls, we have no jurisdiction over them." The servant’s voice grew weaker as the atmosphere increasingly intensified.
Sun Yaowen wobbled and collapsed to the ground.
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