🔑 New Month, New Passkey!
Ko-fi Supporters: The ad-free passkey for November has been updated! Please check your Ko-fi account or latest supporter post to click the new activation link and keep your ad-free access active.

Yunchu’s Vengeance - Chapter 246

Chapter 246 - The Death of Aunt Tingyu


The main door banged loudly and continuously.

Tingyu's face turned deathly pale in an instant.

Trembling, she said, "Madam, Eldest Young Master, please don't open the door. I beg you to stall for time! I can't be dragged back..."

The few days she had spent in the Hu family felt like hell on earth, a living death.

If she stayed in the Hu family any longer, she would die there sooner or later.

Furthermore, as a concubine who had run away, if she was caught after escaping, the principal wife had every right to execute her.

She couldn't die—Yun-ge'er was still so small!

Xie Shi'an shook his head: "Aunt Tingyu, this is the path you chose for yourself. No one can help you; you must face it."

"He's right," Lady Yuan advised. "Since you are already a concubine of the Hu family, you shouldn't have any further connection with the Xie family. Our Xie family is already in such a state that we cannot afford to offend anyone. If the Hu family decides to bring trouble upon us, the Xie family will be completely finished. Aunt Tingyu, just take pity on us, a family of helpless orphans and widows."

Tingyu dropped to her knees with a heavy thud: "Madam, please take pity on me too! I was forced by Xie Shi'an to climb into Lord Hu's bed. I never wanted to leave the Xie family... Now that things have reached this point, I don't want to blame anyone, nor do I want to implicate the Xie family. Just let me take Yun-ge'er away! The two of us will leave through the back door, and the Hu family will never know..."

Lady Yuan turned her head away and let out a sigh.

They had accepted the Hu family's silver, yet they were hiding the Hu family's person—this simply didn't make sense...

Xie Shi'an walked straight toward the main door.

Tingyu lunged forward and grabbed hold of Xie Shi'an's thigh: "Eldest Young Master, I gave you all my silver! Whatever you wanted, I gave it to you! Just take pity on Yun-ge'er and give the two of us a way to live, won't you?!"

Just as she spoke, Xie Shiyun came running out.

Opening his mouth, he bit down hard on Xie Shi'an's waist: "Eldest Brother, I hate you! You're not allowed to bully my aunt!"

A sharp pain shot through Xie Shi'an's waist, and a ruthless air swirled in his eyes.

He shoved Xie Shiyun away in one motion: "This is the choice your aunt made herself. She must bear the consequences."

He stepped over quickly and unbolted the Xie family's main door.

Standing outside were four burly older maidservants and four young manservants. They swarmed in together and immediately shut the main door behind them.

Tingyu watched in horror as the doors slowly closed; she had nowhere left to run.

The eight people who walked inside glared at her, and she instinctively shielded the child behind her.

"Well, well, Aunt Tingyu, you actually dare to run away!" The leading maidservant said coldly, "The laws of our dynasty state clearly that runaway servants and low-class concubines are just like deserters on the battlefield—they can be executed on the spot! Men, take action!"

For a proper, respectable concubine taken in through formal rites, the principal wife had no power over her life and death. But for a low-class concubine who had offered herself to the household and whose deed of indenture was held in hand, beating or killing her was no big deal at all.

Lady Yuan was startled. She had thought the Hu family was merely taking the person back, never imagining that they actually intended to execute a living person!

She hurriedly said, "You have misunderstood. Aunt Tingyu just came back to see her child, she didn't run away..."

"Her child?" The maidservant sneered. "She has a child, yet she still climbed into our master's bed—what a wanton woman! Our Madam took pity on you and let you become a concubine, yet you still pined for your former child and ran away on your own! A low-class woman like you is a disgrace to be alive! Disgracing the Xie family is one thing, but you also disgraced our Hu family! Beating you to death will save us from the mess!"

As the maidservant finished her words, she clapped her hands softly.

The four manservants stepped forward, surrounding Tingyu and Xie Shiyun.

Xie Shiyun hurriedly blocked his biological mother, shouting loudly, "You're not allowed to touch my aunt! I'm going to report this to the officials! I'm going to find my mother! My mother is the Eldest Young Lady of the Yun family—she will seek revenge against you!"

The maidservant's smile widened mockingly: "Your Xie family drove away the Eldest Young Lady of the Yun family, yet you still expect the Yun family to stand up for you? Is that even possible? Fine, enough nonsense—do it!"

A rain of fists and kicks rained down, and Tingyu let out bloodcurdling screams of agony.

Feeling Xie Shiyun standing in front of her, she hurriedly gave her son a shove: "Yun-ge'er, go to the back courtyard... Go back to the room, don't stay here, run... Ah, it hurts... I beg you, spare me... It hurts so much..."

Lady Yuan wrapped her arms tightly around Xie Shiyun: "Yun-ge'er, be good and listen! Go to the back courtyard!"

"Grandmother, I beg you to save my aunt! My aunt is being beaten to death!" Xie Shiyun wailed at the top of his lungs. Seeing Lady Yuan only sigh, he hurriedly turned to Xie Shi'an, "Eldest Brother! Eldest Brother! I beg you, hurry up and save my aunt! In the future, no matter what you tell me to do, I'll do it! I'll obey Eldest Brother! I beg you, Eldest Brother!"

Xie Shi'an remained unmoved, standing there completely still.

Lady Yuan covered Xie Shiyun's eyes, her hands soaked in tears.

At this moment, Aunt Jiang rushed out from the back courtyard holding a banknote for a hundred taels of silver, pleading, "The silver used to buy Aunt Tingyu back then—I'll return it to you! Please leave her a way to live, I beg of you!"

She and Aunt Tingyu had become Xie Jingyu's concubines around the same time, sharing a bond of camaraderie. She truly could not bear to watch Tingyu die like this.

Unexpectedly, the older maidservant spat on the ground: "Can a hundred taels of silver buy back our Hu family's face? Today, this low-class woman must die!"

Only after she died would outsiders remain ignorant of the fact that their master had taken another family's concubine as his own. If such an absurd matter leaked out, let alone the Hu family being mocked to death, they would also face impeachment by the Censorate.

A ruthless light flashed in the maidservant's eyes.

The manservants struck even harder, and the sound of Tingyu's agonizing screams gradually died down.

Xie Shiyun had cried until his voice was entirely gone.

Tingyu widened her eyes, staring in her son's direction, silently mouthing: "Yun-ge'er... Yun-ge'er..."

She regretted it. She regretted scheming with Xie Shi'an to climb into Lord Hu's bed... She should have taken Yun-ge'er away from the Xie family long ago, finding a place where no one knew them to live a quiet life under assumed names. Why did she have to walk this path just for that eighty thousand taels of debt?

Yun-ge'er was only four years old; without her protection as his birth mother, how was he going to live his future days?

"Aunt... Aunt..."

Xie Shiyun broke free from Lady Yuan's embrace and threw himself onto Tingyu, only to be dragged away once more.

One of the manservants kicked Tingyu violently in the head.

Spurt!

Tingyu spat out a mouthful of blood.

She lost consciousness in an instant, lying motionless on the ground as blood continuously trickled from the corner of her mouth.

Frightened out of his wits, Xie Shiyun sobbed hysterically before fainting dead away.

The maidservant pulled Tingyu's deed of indenture from her sleeve, tore it into scraps, and tossed them onto Tingyu's body: "Keep this embarrassing matter to yourselves—don't go spreading it around! Find a place to bury her quickly, what a total disgrace!"

The maidservant clapped her hands, and together with the group she had brought along, opened the door and walked straight out.

"Quickly, quickly! She's not dead yet!" Aunt Jiang crouched down, attempting to help her up. "Madam, hurry and call a doctor! She can still be saved!"

Lady Yuan covered her mouth and burst into bitter tears: "She keeps vomiting blood—her internal organs are ruined, she can't be saved..."

Besides, if she were saved, wouldn't that mean offending the Hu family? The loss outweighed any gain...

Aunt Jiang pressed her lips together tightly.

Tingyu clearly still had breath in her, she wasn't dead yet! Yet the Xie family was giving up on her just like this.

Could it be that she would be next?

Just as she was about to speak, a shadow fell before her. It was Xie Shi'an, standing right in front of her: "Aunt Jiang, where did you get this hundred taels of silver?"

Popular posts from this blog

The Early Spring - Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - The Rainy City That year, the rain in Beijing was heavier than usual, even heavier than in the south where Shang Zhitao had just left. The rain fell in a continuous drizzle, and faint clouds and mist lingered above the sky, making it hard to tell whether the scene was picturesque or desolate. Shang Zhitao was wrestling with her two large suitcases—one packed entirely with books, and the other filled with clothes and shoes, with nothing else inside. Traveling all the way from Nanjing to Beijing, the twenty-two-year-old had accomplished the monumental feat of her first independent migration. Fine beads of sweat dotted her forehead and cheeks, turning her face a flushed pink. Shang Zhitao felt as though she was about to melt. She calculated in her mind that she definitely had to go buy a fan tomorrow. The narrow partition room felt even more cramped because of these two suitcases. She heard the girl in the next room talking on the phone: "Should I go over to your ...
Read more

Against the Current - Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - Origins It is said that there was once a young boy in Jinling named Chen Wanquan. When he was five or six years old, he lost both of his parents, and his elder brother and sister-in-law sold him to the wealthy Lin family as a bondservant to work in an antique shop. As the days and months passed, he honed a sharp eye for authenticating antiques, calligraphy, and paintings. Because he had no property or family standing to his name, no respectable household was willing to discuss marriage with him, yet he had developed high standards and looked down upon ordinary maidservants. At the age of thirty, his employer promoted him to the position of third manager of the shop. A year later, out of benevolence, the Lin estate granted him a third-class maid named Mistress Xue, ordering the two of them to be wed. This Mistress Xue had originally worked exclusively on embroidery and sewing in the second branch of the household. Because she was quite attractive and possessed a competitive ...
Read more

The Early Spring - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 - The Beginning of the Story Shang Zhitao boarded the bus early in the morning. As the city was just waking up, the bus wound its way through the thin mist. With earbuds in her ears, she looked out at the streets. How industrious the people living here truly were; even at this early hour, the sidewalks were already packed with hurried commuters. She was a commuter too, rushing along. She wore a white shirt dress today, cinched at the waist with a slim light-brown belt. Her hair was tied up high, and though she wore no makeup, she radiated a peerless, youthful charm. Sitting there, she looked quiet and well-behaved, just like the obedient child from next door that people always talked about—outstanding, yet not too flashy. Shang Zhitao had always been this kind of person since she was little. Her academic grades were only slightly above average, and her looks were similarly middle-of-the-pack. Because of this mediocrity, even with all her diligence and eagerness to lea...
Read more