Chapter 3
Edward Quan ·
She suddenly placed a hand over her belly, hope in her eyes.
“I'm pregnant again. Your child! I don't have to fight for a title. I can serve beside her. Just let me stay with you!”
Only disgust and coldness remained in Lu Jingyan's eyes.
“Get rid of it. Another unnecessary child isn't worth keeping.”
“I warned you long ago. Stay in your place as my mistress. Don't covet the mistress of the household's position, and don't provoke Shen Anran. You brought this on yourself.”
Disbelieving, Su Wanrou wept and begged.
“The physician said this is my last chance. If I lose it, I may never conceive again. Jingyan, please spare the baby!”
She knelt and kowtowed.
His answer was a merciless kick to her lower abdomen.
Pain tore through her. Blood slowly soaked her skirt, a startling dark red.
In an instant, the child was gone.
He watched her curled on the floor without pity.
“I gave you wealth and peace. You were greedy for more. Today's suffering is your own doing.”
He turned and left without looking back.
All his guilt and regret were reserved for me, far away.
The woman who had stayed three years and borne his children was only a passing amusement, discarded without sorrow.
Lying in blood, Su Wanrou finally saw his faithless nature.
The gentleness was false. The devotion was false.
Every indulgence had been calculation and use.
From that day, love vanished.
Only hatred remained.
11
Wen Muyan and I rode south through vast mountains and rivers among simple, kindly people.
Far from the struggles and schemes of grand households, we kept company with growing things and healed people.
Free and unconfined.
The broad earth and sky soothed the darkness of those three years.
But peace didn't last long.
Lu Jingyan's searchers spread in every direction.
Carrying my portrait, he searched north and south, stubborn and frantic, refusing to let go.
Wen Muyan cursed him repeatedly.
“He won't stop haunting you! First he lies and makes you suffer. Now you've left, he pretends devotion. What a hypocrite!”
I smiled calmly.
“It's all right. This needs a final ending. Hiding isn't the answer. I'll return and finish it myself.”
I was no longer the sheltered girl lost in love.
Having seen through him, I no longer offered that weakness.
If he refused a divorce, the Shen family's rules and reputation would restrain him.
The old madam valued the family name most.
She would never permit a mistress, illegitimate children, and marital scandal to stain it.
After two days' rest, Wen Muyan and I returned at an easy pace.
As we entered the city, I saw Lu Jingyan in the street.
Only a little over a month had passed.
His former refinement was gone.
Worn clothes, bloodshot eyes, an emaciated, disheveled figure.
Nothing in his gaze but obsessive longing and remorse.
Seeing me, his eyes lit up.
He hurried forward with a cloak.
I stepped aside, distant and cold, avoiding every touch.
He froze, his fingers suspended.
Loneliness and panic filled his eyes.
“Anran, you're finally back. I've missed you. I've waited every day.”
I went straight to the point.
“Sign the divorce agreement and give it to me. I have no time for your performance.”
He went white and shook his head.
“I won't! I know I was wrong. I've broken with her and sent the children away. From now on, there will only be you. Can we begin again?”
Wen Muyan could bear no more.
She precisely inserted a needle at a point that left his body rigid.
“Too late! The harm is done. The lies are exposed. You think saying you're wrong wipes it all away? Dream on!”
Passersby gathered and whispered.
The scandal of the Shen family's young master keeping a mistress and children spread through the streets.
I watched his panicked face and repeated coldly, “The moment you chose betrayal, we ended.”
“I've taken my dowry and not a coin of the Shen household's property. I've done more than enough.”
“Bring the signed agreement by tomorrow. Otherwise, I'll petition the authorities myself and leave your family no reputation.”
I gave him no further glance.
Wen Muyan and I left together.
No retreat.
12
Early the next morning, someone knocked.
I expected Lu Jingyan.
Instead, I opened the door to Old Madam Shen in fine clothes.
Her usual false kindness was gone.
Carrying a staff, her face vicious, she stormed inside.
“Shen Anran, how can you be so cruel?”
She struck the ground.
“Jingyan was only momentarily foolish. A private household matter, and you make everyone know! You've destroyed our name. Are you determined to force us both to death?”
I watched the performance with nothing but indifference.
She had arranged the musk-soaked coral.
She had permitted the mistress and protected the children.
She had taken part from beginning to end.
Now she accused me of cruelty.
I laughed softly.
“A private matter? Keeping a mistress, secretly having children, deliberately using musk to keep me childless—each is your family's scandal.”
“You indulged your son's wrongdoing and harmed his lawful wife. What right have you to blame me?”
“If you truly care about your family, tell him to sign. Let your niece have her united family before another pregnancy makes an even greater joke of you.”
Struck where it hurt, she raised her staff in furious shame.
A figure suddenly blocked me.
Lu Jingyan had hurried over.
The staff landed heavily across his back with a dull sound.
He bent in pain but still shielded me.
“Enough!”
“It was my fault, not Anran's. You secretly switched the coral beads! You never liked her. You resented her distinguished birth and feared she'd overshadow you, so you plotted to deny her children!”
The doubts of three years were finally confirmed.
His mother answered in rage.
“I did it for you! For the Shen family! Three years without a child—how could she be its mistress? Without my permission for Wanrou, where would your heirs come from? Now you blame me?”
Mother and son tore off every mask in public.
I couldn't be bothered watching.
I held out my hand.
“Enough arguing. Give me your signature, and we're done.”
His back hurt badly. Pale and trembling, he took out an agreement he had already signed.
The paper was creased, plainly handled countless times.
I read every word and finally relaxed.
Three years of marriage ended today.
Red-eyed, he pleaded.
“Anran, after the divorce, I can ask for your hand again. Our wedding pouch is still here. Our bond isn't finished—”
I found it laughable.
“A broken mirror doesn't mend easily. A faithless man doesn't change easily. I won't jump into that fire twice.”
At the alley's end, Su Wanrou appeared with the boy and girl, pale and desolate.
She had finally come.
Lu Jingyan turned, saw his woman and children, and went ashen.
The old lies, debts, and wrongs all weighed upon him.
Wen Muyan laughed softly.
“The wedding pouch? Anran burned it long ago. Not a trace of that ill-omened thing remains.”
I looked at his desperate tears one last time.
“Take your woman and children away. Don't contaminate the plants in my courtyard. With hearts as foul as yours, your bad luck might spoil the herbs.”
Then I took Wen Muyan and left for the authorities, to seal and register the divorce.
To sever the marriage completely.
13
Once it was registered, everything was settled.
I felt wonderfully light.
Nothing held me.
Before I left the capital, Su Wanrou came again.
Bruises still marked her face. Cosmetics couldn't hide her exhaustion.
Yet she wore a ridiculous triumph.
“Shen Anran, you lost.”
She lifted her chin.
“I was the one beside him day and night for three years. The one who bore and raised his children.”
“You only had the title of wife. Nothing else.”
She touched the belly that no longer held a child and kept pretending.
“I'll have more children. We'll be a family. You're only a discarded former wife, alone.”
I found her stubborn delusion both pitiful and absurd.
I took a handful of fine salt and scattered it over her.
She screamed in alarm.
“What are you doing?”
“Clearing away some bad luck for you and cleansing the foulness for me.”
My voice was calm.
“Rubbish and a scoundrel. A match made in Heaven. May you remain entangled, tormenting each other forever, with no escape.”
She left in fury and ran straight into Lu Jingyan.
Seeing his dark face, she immediately changed hers.
She knelt weakly, trembling, all injured innocence.
Wen Muyan and I exchanged a smile.
We scattered salt through the courtyard, packed, and headed south again.
From now on, the sky was high, the road long, and the mountains free.
No faithless man and his troubles would cling to me.
14
Two years passed in a breath.
Wen Muyan and I traveled widely, healing people and watching the lives of the world.
My heart grew broader and clearer.
When we returned briefly to the capital, she brought all the news of the Shen family's end.
Cause and consequence had come full circle.
Lu Jingyan never married again.
He clung to the decaying residence, drinking away his days.
His scandal spread throughout court.
Noble families avoided his household and wanted no alliance with it.
He had cut off his own official future.
Su Wanrou stayed two years.
Outwardly gentle and obedient, she was filled with resentment and took revenge step by step.
The lost pregnancy, years of humiliation, days and nights of torment—she reclaimed each debt.
Under a meek appearance, she maneuvered secretly and took lovers without restraint.
Finally, Lu Jingyan caught her in bed with another man, exposing her before everyone.
Worse, the boy and girl he had raised for three years—Suisui and Wuyou—weren't his at all.
They were Su Wanrou's children by another man from years before.
Years spent raising someone else's children, deceived and loving wrongly, finally broke him.
Misfortunes came together.
Long indulgence and irregular living left him with a lingering chronic illness that could never be cured.
Old Madam Shen, who had set it all in motion, had been bedridden for two years.
Medicine could do nothing.
Tormented daily, unable to live easily or find release, she finally died.
As though overnight, he lost his mother, his children, his health, and his name.
Nothing remained.
He became an isolated, miserable man, despised by everyone.
After recounting the rumors, Wen Muyan laughed heartily.
“Good and evil meet their consequences. At last, they're tasting what they made!”
I smiled faintly and disclosed two secrets I had kept for two years.
“The old madam was bedridden because, before leaving, I gave her a slow poison. It didn't kill at once. Year by year, it damaged her organs and left her to endure illness.”
“Lu Jingyan's lifelong illness and childlessness came from the sterilizing incense I placed in his study. Day after day, month after month, it destroyed his vitality and chance of children.”
I had never been a saint.
If debts were to be repaid, I would settle them myself.
He had lied, concealed, calculated, and destroyed three years of my youth.
I would leave the rest of his life tormented and empty.
The road ahead was long.
The world was vast.
For the rest of my days, I would live for myself.
A cool breeze for company, growing things for friends.
Peaceful years.
A free and unburdened life.