Chapter 47 Sheng Huai'an's head was as big as a bucket
Ye Mingzhu gave a soft snort, pulled up the quilt, and covered her ears.
Sheng Yunche: "...?!?"
After a while, he gritted his teeth and fell asleep.
As he slept, he sneered and patted his chest in anger.
...
In just a few days, the Duke of Wei's mansion has changed completely.
The wall was repaired in just two days, but the garden, trees, and shrubs took three days to clean and tidy up.
However, no matter how many things there were or how busy they were, it was no problem for the servants.
After separating from the West Mansion, everyone from the steward of the Duke's Mansion to the maids responsible for cleaning and sweeping, smiled more often because they no longer had to deal with the troublesome Jia Shi.
In short, the house has been completely transformed.
Princess Ronghua's decisive actions forced the resentful Jia family to compromise.
After a few more days of delay, the West Mansion finally converted the side gate into the main gate and hung a plaque that read "Sheng Mansion" on the gate.
This change brought the division of the Duke of Wei's family into the open.
No one dared to ask Sheng Yunche anything, after all, his unpredictable and capricious nature was already well known, and even the current emperor had a headache over him. No one in Yanjing City dared to provoke him.
But Sheng Huai'an was different.
His public image has always been that of a gentle, polite, and humble person. After he recovered from his injuries, when he went out to banquets, even people who were not very familiar with him would feel comfortable asking him a few questions about the inside story of the family division.
Some people sarcastically said that it was a pity because he was disliked by Sheng Yunche because of a woman, and he would never be able to benefit from the Duke of Wei's mansion again.
Some people comforted him, saying that he was very talented and could take the imperial examination without Sheng Yunche's help. But then they changed the subject and asked him if he was out of money, since his servant was always going to the pawnshop.
Even bolder people directly asked him with a smile if he still had improper thoughts about his cousin's wife and was entangled in private affairs, which was why Sheng Yunche disliked him and drove him out of the Duke of Wei's mansion.
Sheng Huai'an had lived for over twenty years under the protection of the Duke of Wei's mansion and had never experienced such ridicule and malice.
He had long considered that after the family split up, he might be neglected and no longer enjoy the same glory and flattery as before.
But he never expected the situation to be this bad!
His face, which had been swollen from Sheng Yunche's beating, had recovered completely, but the strange looks and contemptuous words from the crowd felt like slaps to the face, making it sting with pain.
After a few times, he stopped going out to banquets.
Suppressing his anger, he locked himself in his study and buried himself in his studies, vowing to pass the imperial examination with flying colors, make a name for himself, and make those who looked down on him, especially Sheng Yunche and Ye Mingzhu, look at him with new eyes and regret not winning him over sooner.
Linfeng Hall.
Ye Mingzhu was unaware of the solemn oath Sheng Huai'an made in his heart.
But she knew everything he had been through recently because Yanzhi reported to him in detail every day.
In his past life, Sheng Huai'an had a smooth and successful life, but now he was disheveled and humiliated... and this was only the first step in his downfall.
She had previously instructed Ruixiang to investigate the businesses of the Western Mansion. Although the Western Mansion has now become the Sheng Mansion, the information Ruixiang collected is still useful.
After looking at the thick stack of papers in her hand, she smiled slightly.
Now that the family has split up, it's time to kick them while they're down, cut off the Sheng family's source of income, and let Sheng Huai'an, Liu Rumei, and Jia Shi fight like dogs.
Ye Mingzhu recalls her past life.
After she married Sheng Huai'an, Jia refused to relinquish her control over the household affairs, keeping control of the several shops in the mansion and forbidding her from interfering.
As a newlywed, she was completely devoted to Sheng Huai'an and had 200,000 taels of silver as a dowry. She didn't actually care about these things, but Jia Shi didn't believe her.
It would be one thing if they didn't believe her, but once they knew she had money, whether it was a problem with her fabric shop or other businesses that were not doing well, Jia would come to her and cry and beg her to take out her dowry money to cover the losses.
After taking her money, Jia still spoke rudely, openly and indirectly saying that she was full of money and that marrying Sheng Huai'an was a step up for her. She also said that she was scheming and wanted to seize the power of the household management.
She wasn't so easily swayed; she might tolerate it once or twice, but she wouldn't be happy after three or four times.
She told Sheng Huai'an that her dowry was her private savings, and if Jia Shi continued to slander her, she would only care about their life together and would no longer concern herself with the public expenses.
That time, and for the first time, Sheng Huai'an forced Jia to bow down to her and made Jia hand over the household management to her, saying that only she could manage the household well.
Feeling trusted, she took out 50,000 taels of silver to supplement the family income and was determined to revitalize the businesses in the West Mansion so that Sheng Huai'an would no longer have to worry about household matters and could focus on the imperial examinations.
Fearing that she was staying up too late to do the accounting and would disturb his reading and rest, she repeatedly urged him to sleep in the study in the front yard.
He said he couldn't bear to see her sleep alone, and she persuaded him several times before he reluctantly agreed.
At that time, she was overjoyed, feeling that she had married the right person and was willing to do anything for Sheng Huai'an.
Now that I think about it, what exactly was Sheng Huai'an doing when she lit the lamp to check the accounts?
Is he really reading in his study, or is he fooling around with someone?
He can be shameless, but he also harms people!
...Thinking of this, Ye Mingzhu dug her nails into her palms, a surge of anger rising within her.
She quickly closed her eyes, trying to bring her thoughts back to normal.
There's no need to dwell on past lives.
Just focus on the present.
Ruixiang had gathered very detailed information. Although she had been a wandering ghost for over a decade and had completely forgotten the details of the shops and estates in the western manor, she now remembered them all clearly:
A mid-to-high-end restaurant, a three-story building, is currently the main source of income for Xifu, bringing in about three to four hundred taels of silver per month.
It's a small jewelry shop, but it has a master craftsman with outstanding skills and a good reputation. The shop earns about one hundred taels of silver per month.
A cosmetics shop sells common lip rouge, perfume, and hair oil, as well as brewed medicinal tea, with a monthly revenue of about twenty or thirty taels.
The bookstore was ordinary and unremarkable, with a monthly revenue of less than ten taels of silver.
There were two small estates in the western suburbs of the capital, one a mountain estate and the other a farm estate. Due to lax management, the estate managers were corrupt, and the tenants were not diligent, so the harvest was almost non-existent. They only sent some produce to the government office on a regular, seasonal basis.
Destruction is far easier than revitalization, especially when one has an overwhelming advantage.
Ye Mingzhu and Ruixiang discussed for a quarter of an hour and quickly made arrangements for the restaurant and shop.
Ruixiang accepted the order and left in a hurry, clearly eager to avenge her.
Ye Mingzhu couldn't help but laugh.
...
Jia feels like the sky is about to fall.
Ever since the family split up, for some reason, all sorts of bad luck have befallen her!
First, he accidentally broke his leg while working as a chef in a restaurant for nearly ten years, injuring his bones and needing three or four months to recover.
Then the old master craftsman of the gold and silver shop hugged his grandson and said happily that he didn't want to work anymore and wanted to go home to enjoy his retirement. No matter what they did, they couldn't persuade him to stay.
Finally, a new cosmetics shop opened diagonally across from hers, as if it were challenging her. The cosmetics were white and translucent, the lip rouge was a beautiful color, and the price was even 10% lower than hers!
The bookstore and the two estates on the outskirts of Beijing were fine, but they hadn't had much of a harvest to begin with!
This is absolutely terrible!
She didn't have much money to begin with, and relied on the income from a few shops each month to barely keep the household running.
Now that her three most profitable shops have run into trouble and her income has plummeted, she is extremely anxious and has developed several blisters on her lips.
She really wanted to talk to someone about it.
But Sheng Huai'an was engrossed in his studies behind closed doors, and she couldn't bear to disturb him.
Liu Rumei always looked frail and weak, like a willow in the wind, and you couldn't get any useful information out of her no matter what you asked.
Thinking about it this way, besides her, there was no one else in the family who could manage things, not even anyone to consult with.
Having no other choice, she rushed to Songhe Hall, crying and begging the old lady for mercy, saying that she could no longer go on living like this.
But the old lady was unwilling to see her at all. She simply sent out the servants around her, gave them two hundred taels of silver, and sent them away.
After enduring a few more days, when it was time to distribute the monthly allowances to the servants, Jia Shi couldn't come up with enough money and didn't want to use her own private savings anymore, so she finally couldn't hold back any longer.
She summoned a few burly, rough-looking women and led them into Liu Rumei's Qinghui Garden.
There were few servants in Qinghui Garden. Liu Rumei had only a magpie, a wet nurse, and a few old women responsible for cleaning.
The cleaning women would leave as soon as they finished their work and didn't often serve her in the yard.
Therefore, Jia led her people to Liu Rumei's door, barged into her room and ransacked it. No matter how pitiful she cried on the surface or how resentful she was in her heart, she could not stop them.
When Sheng Huai'an arrived in a hurry after hearing the news, Jia had already found a full 10,000 taels of silver notes and jewelry worth three or four thousand taels in Liu Rumei's trunk.
We're rich!
Unlike her previous anxious and irritable state, Jia stood in the courtyard with her hands on her hips, looking smug and beaming.
"I knew you had money, you slut! But you've been fooling me like I'm a fool. You're always complaining about being poor and desperately trying to squeeze money out of the public funds!"
"I should have seen through you long ago. What kind of good woman is a woman who would even embezzle my son's pension? And you say you're saving it for Hao'er? Bah!"
"The household is going through a difficult time right now, so I'll take this ten thousand taels of silver and these jewels! I'm not that kind of wicked mother-in-law. When things get better in the future, I'll give you some more silver so you can buy some simple jewelry!"
"By the way, forget about the gold, just buy silver. You're a widowed woman who needs to remain chaste for your husband, so you shouldn't be flaunting it."
"..."
Jia was in high spirits and wanted to give Liu Rumei a few more words of admonishment, but Sheng Huai'an shouted "Mother!" and looked at her with a livid face, which interrupted her good mood.
"Huai'an, why are you here?" Jia looked a little embarrassed, but quickly became assertive. "Several shops in the family have run into trouble, and we really have no money to spend. We can't even pay the servants' monthly wages... If it weren't for this, I wouldn't have asked your sister-in-law for help."
Even though Liu Rumei was usually very patient, she couldn't help but cry and question, "Are you asking me for help? You broke into my room and ransacked it; it's clearly robbery!"
"Second brother..." Tears welled up in her eyes again as she clutched her chest and looked at Sheng Huai'an with a sorrowful expression. "I know the household is in dire straits, but how easy is it for a weak woman like me with a child? I don't ask you to make Mother return all the money to me, but you can't take it all away. You can't force me to my death!"
"How did I force you? You're the one who's forcing me to my death!" Madam Jia jumped up and started cursing. "You've been hiding ten thousand taels of silver notes and refuse to hand them over. You've really hidden them well! The Liu family is just a small, insignificant household. When you married into the family, you only had two thousand taels of dowry money. Isn't all this extra silver just money you plundered from my Sheng family? Now the family is struggling, we can't even afford to eat. What's wrong with asking you to take out some money to use? Huai'an, tell me, isn't that the truth?"
Both pairs of eyes turned to Sheng Huai'an at the same time, waiting for him to give an answer. For a moment, he felt like his head was about to explode!
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