'Ji Yuanzhi?'
"Why it is him?" "Just now I saw a scab on his right thumb." Jing Rong affirmed. As soon as the conclusion came down, unwavering hatred overflowed from Ji Yunshu's delicate face. At once, she picked the paper with the fingerprint and the ink stone, and rushed out of the door. Jing Rong ran after her. Both of them continued to pick up their pace until they reached the reception hall. The place was crowded with the Ji's people, they apparently still hadn't recovered from their shock. A servant was applying medicine on Ji Yuanzhi's wrist while he was exuding a depressing aura of unwillingness. Whereas, Ji Muqing was wiping the tears on her face which was covered with red imprints, still fuming in anger. She was enraged! At this moment, they saw Jing Rong and Ji Yunshu had returned. Immediately, everyone from the Ji family became tensed. Ji Shuhan quickly stood up from the pear-wood chair. He was afraid that deity with sword-like brows would started to decapitate them. Outside, the rain continued to fall in drizzle. A layer of white "frost" had covered both Ji Yunshu and Jing Rong. They stepped into the room one behind the other. Ji Shuhan failed to understand, but he slightly bowed as his eyesight shifted around. "Your Highness?" Jing Rong didn't argue with him. He cast a side glance at Ji Yunshu and noticed her gaze. Her eyes were like ice daggers ferociously piercing through Ji Yuanzhi. Jing Rong tacitly understood. Thus after a moment, he took the ink stone and sheet from Ji Yunshu and walked toward Ji Yuanzhi. Realizing that Jing Rong was approaching him, Ji Yuanzhi became alarmed. He knead his hands until they changed shape and he was violently shaking. Jing Rong didn't let Ji Yuanzhi evaded as he grabbed the other hand and dipped it into the inkstone place on the table. Jing Rong's slender fingers firmly held Ji Yuanzhi's thumbs and made sure both thumbs were smeared with ink. After it was done, he raised the other's hands. Aaah! The movement was accompanied by Ji Yuanzhi's scream. "Your Highness! M-my hands…" "Your hand should be crippled." Jing Rong coldly berated. As soon as the words were said, he ruthlessly pressed Ji Yuanzhi's thumbs on the paper. The stamped fingerprints were well defined on the paper. Immediately, Ji Yunshu came over and took the paper. She then compared the fingerprints and one of the thumb print was nearly identical to the evidence she collected. Once again, she observed the thumb that Jing Rong held firmly. As suspected, there was a scab on that thumb. Her eyes reddened in no time and tears pooled as she looked at Ji Yuanzhi. "It's you! You forced Luan'er to die! You killed her!" Her voice was shrill as if she wanted to pierce everyone's ears with the truth. When the truth was revealed, apart from Jing Rong, everyone else was shocked. Ji Yuanzhi's face was twisted with pain. He stared at his hand restrained by Jing Rong. He painfully shook his head. "It's not me! W-what kind of nonsense are you spouting? I didn't force that worthless maidservant to kill herself." As soon as he heard "worthless maidservant", Jing Rong didn't withheld the strength of his grip and directly broke the other's hand. "H-have mercy on me your Highness!" Ji Yuanzhi tumbled off his chair, directly kneeling on the floor while gritting his teeth in pain. Jing Rong ferociously glared at him as he berated him. "This is the hand that took the life of a weak girl! It won't do if this Prince doesn't make an example out of you." "It's not me! It's not me…" At this moment, Old Madame Ji stepped forward; her eyes were red and her usual graceful and sumptuous appearance was stained by tears. She begged Jing Rong. "Your Highness, it's not possible for Yuanzhi to do such things. That servant hanged herself and even left a confession written in black and white. The truth is absolutely undeniable." When she stopped speaking, her expression was vicious as she rivet her eyes on Ji Yunshu. Her whole being was burning with anger. "You being sent to prison had already spread to everyone. Haven't you made my Ji family lost enough honor? You should know that if that girl, Luan'er, didn't confess to her crime, you would still be rotting in that prison cell!" 'Oh really? Then, you should I give my gratitude to your whole family?! Ji Yuanzhi, ah! Ji Yuanzhi! You have this kind of good grandmother is truly the blessing you cultivate for three lifetimes. For you, she could invert black and white. How powerful that it! If you can keep that life of yours, you must repaid her properly!' Ji Yunshu coldly sneered. She raised the paper in her hand. "This fingerprint and the incomplete fingerprint found on Luan'er are exactly the same, even that blank mark in the middle of the finger. This mark indicated that there was a scab on the thumb which caused the fingerprint to look incomplete. Moreover, that finger was soaked in tangerine water which makes the fingerprint remained on the paper up to 12 hours." After she spoke up to this point, she took out Luan'er's confession note, but the fingerprint can no longer be seen. Thus, with more certainty than ever, she turned to Ji Yuanzhi who was still kneeling on the floor. "Twelve hours have already passed. Therefore, the incomplete fingerprint in question could no longer be seen, but the smell of tangerine water still linger. According to my calculation, Luan'er's time of death was around yesterday night at the rat hour1, you were at her side at that time and was washing your hands with the tangerine water in my room before giving this paper to Luan'er, so she could write down that fake confession and forcing her to hang herself!" The evidences of his crimes were revealed one by one. "I… I didn't…" Ji Yuanzhi's expression was evasive and like before he continued to deny his crime. At this moment, Jing Rong threw Ji Yuanzhi's hand and let it go. Ji Yuanzhi's hand heavily hit the corner of the table. Bam! The pain made him teary. Ji Yunshu continued to hound him with her eyes as she interrogated him. "Why did you force Luan'er to die? Why? This is a human life! How can you be so cruel, treating her death as if nothing?" "I…" "You saw her hung herself and die in front of you. Doing such a thing, aren't you afraid to be plagued by nightmare at night?" Ji Yuanzhi's pupils suddenly dilated from horror. The corner of his mouth twitched, then trembled. "I didn't want to force her to die. I only… I was confused! I was confused at that time. I only want to maintain our family's reputation, so I did it, but I really didn't want her to die!" 'He confessed! Such a good confession!' Ji Yunshu refrained herself from crying. Her heart was wrecked with pain. It was unbearably painful! "It's not true!" Old Madame Ji threw herself next to Ji Yuanzhi and lamented, "Yuanzhi, how can you do such a thing?!" Ji Muqing was stunned. She even forgot about the painful slap she received. She spoke in shock, "Third Brother, you…" "I didn't mean it! I did that because I was confused at that time. I really didn't mean to kill her." Ji Yuanzhi continued with his litany. Jing Rong coldly watched everything. He couldn't tolerate it. "Come down." At his call, suddenly six imperial bodyguard jumped down from the roof and stood outside the reception hall with their hands clasped. "Did your hear everything earlier?" "Yes, your Highness. We have heard." "Good. Bring Ji Yuanzhi to the yamen. Let Lord Liu investigates the case." "Yes, your Highness." The guards came in and dragged Ji Yuanzhi outside. "Father! Grandmother! Save me!" Ji Yuanzhi shouted. His voice was trembling from fright. "Yuanzhi!" Old Madame Ji stretched her hand in an attempt to grab him back, but all she grabbed on was the empty air. Finally, Ji Shuhan recovered from his shock and immediately kneeled down. He begged Jing Rong. "I beseech your Highness! Have mercy! He is still young and commit an error in a moment of confusion. Your Highness is magnanimous, spare him!" "A moment of confusion? Spare him?" Jing Rong repeated Ji Shuhan's words with a severe expression. "Human life is priceless. You actually sum it into 'a moment of confusion'?" 'Preposterous!'
Grenn’s Rants Corner
Ace Attorney’s soundtrack might fit the mood.
Rat hour = between 11pm and 1am ↩
Ji Shuhan was not ready to give up. "Please, Prince, I beg you to consider the fact that I have been a functionary for this many years. Please make this an exception."
"I have thought of you wrongly, Ji Shuhan. To think that you would dare say something like that. I ought to correct the way you and your family think." Jing Rong turned around and ordered, "Bring him to the yamen now."
Jing Rong's bodyguard dragged Ji Yuanzhi against his struggles into the thin rain, towards the yamen. Chaos reigned in the Ji family, some were crying, others knelt down, and the rest were still stricken by bafflement.
Ji Shunan smashed the ground in frustration. He was angry at Ji Yuanzhi, but also at the cold-bloodedness of Jing Rong and his daughter. Ji Muqing was unable to hold it in anymore. She sobbed and raised her teary eyes to look at Ji Yunshu, "Luan'er was but a lowly maid, it matters little if she dies. Besides, she was sold to the Ji Mansion as a child, so we ought to have the final say over her life. Third Brother might be unreasonable, but he didn't kill her with his own hands; she hung herself. You can't put the blame on him just like that."
'A pathetic clown she is. Eager to make her presence noticed at every opportunity. I have but the strongest of dislike and the deepest of disdain for people like her. What does she seek? A way to display her own superiority through the misfortune of others?'
Ji Yunshu glanced at her scornfully and answered, "Is the knife the sole weapon of the murderer?" "But he did it for you, if it wasn't for him, you would still be in jail right now." "On this you are wrong; he did it for you. He did it for the prestige of the Ji family. He did it so you can become a princely concubine."
"…"
Ji Muqing could not find a retort to Ji Yunshu's words. Ji Wanxin pulled on her arm lightly and said, "Eldest sister, third brother is in the wrong for this."
"…You!" Ji Muqing was seized with anger. She turned to the side and was about to hit Ji Wanxin. He had barely raised her hand when Jing Rong's caught hold of her wrist and pushed her into the sandalwood chair on the side.
"Elder sister," Ji Wanxin looked worried. She approached Ji Muqing, but had barely grazed her sleeve before the latter pushed her away and cried, "Get away!"
Perhaps it was it due to her frailty, she lost her balance and fell back into Jing Rong's arm. She raised her head and her eyes collided with Jing Rong's frosty irises. Ji Wanxin bit her lips and a flush climbed up her face. She lingered until she felt a pair of hands – Jing Rong's, pushing her from the back, and she sensibly decided to back away. She kept her head lowered and remained silent; nobody seemed to have noticed this small detail.
The flame of anger within Ji Yunshu's heart, which had been concealed until now, until the Ji Yuanzhi was brought to the yamen, finally ignited and now burned fiercely within her heart. 'Don't worry, Luan'er, I will make them for every single bit of it.' Old Madame Ji was whimpering with her hands on her chest. She called out to Ji Yunshu, "Yuanzhi was your third brother, how could you?"
'How could I? I'll show you how I can.' Ji Yunshu swept across the hall with a saddened look and said with a low voice, "When I saw Luan'er corpse, my sadness was many folds superior to the one you are feeling right now. I died of hunger five years ago in the western quarters. When I wake up, the only person I saw was Luan'er. She was only eleven years old and wore nothing but a thin robe on her to protect her against the biting cold of the winter. Nevertheless, she gave everything she had to me. For the last few years, she's been the only one to keep my company; I've come to see her as my own sister. You, on the contrary, the same blood flows within our veins, yet you would let me die. This is the only love you've bestowed upon me. This cruel treatment, colder than than a winter night."
Ji Yunshu's every word resonated within the minds of her family. Jing Rong's heart ached at the learning of such her difficult past in her own home; he did not any of it before.
Ji Shuhan shook his head in an exasperated frustration. "So you bore that hatred so this long."
"Yes, I did, I remembered all the cruel treatment you have subjected me to." Ji Yunshu no longer felt the need to hide it. Her brows suddenly took on an air of sharpened knives as she confronted him, "Do you remember when you whipped Ji Pei thirty times? Do you remember the words he said as he laid in a pool of his own blood?"
Ji Shuhan froze at the mention of the question; everyone else followed. This name was was a taboo for two years: no one had ever mentioned it, and no one was ever to be allowed to do so. "Shut up! I forbid you to talk about it," browbeat Ji Shuhan. Each word came out of Ji Yunshu's mouth slowly. "He said, 'close are the bonds; thin is the blood. Today you are my father; tomorrow you shalt be my slave.'"
"Quiet!" This time it was Old Madame Ji. "He is dead, you hear me? Dead!" She smashed the desk energetically.
'Dead? Yes… I saw Ji Pei die with my very eyes, I saw his body carried out of the Ji Mansion. Dead with not a single corner of his body left intact; whipped to death by thirty lashes.'
Ji Yunshu's lips quirked into a bitter smile. "He's not dead. He mustn’t have died. I search that hill upside down, and still couldn't find his body. He told me that he would come back after to years." She sounded irrevocably certain of herself, enough so to make everyone wonder at the reason.
Ji Yunshu resumed her expression of coldness, turned around and left the Ji Mansion without turning back even once. She plodded into the thin rain with an unusual determination. She took the front gate, just as she did when she entered the mansion. Jing Rong caught up to her before she could realize it and extended an umbrella over her head in silence. He simply walked by her, not asking any questions, despite his interest being piqued by this new Ji Pei.
Ji Yunshu headed for the Memorial Hall, and she arrived just when Fu Bo finished putting Luan'er corpse into an old, tattered coffin. He mumbled something about burying her in a place with a nice Fengshui. Ji Yunshu eyes were slowly losing their focus as she stared at the object, and she uttered words of thanks and nod her head. She removed her hairpin and placed it into the coffin. "Luan'er, please rest in peace. May you live happier and better in your next lifetime."
The coffin was sealed, and Ji Yunshu bid farewell to Luan'er by burning a stick of incense. She stood under the roof of the entrance to the Memorial Hall with her head raised, looking at the dripping of rainwater as it ran down the eaves, just like sand in an hourglass. Jing Rong kept her company; he looked at her slowly unclenching brows and felt the same relief for the worry which preoccupied his heart. He dared not disturb her. Ji Yunshu was as tranquil as a painting, and cleaner than the rainwater who had yet to touch the ground. For a moment, Jing Rong earnestly wished that he had not been born in the royal family. He longed for a simpler existence amongst common people, one devoid of the calculations and schemings for the sake of the throne. What joy would it be, to share every sunrise and admire each sunset with the one he loved!
After a long time, Ji Yunshu finally shifted her eyes from the corner of roof to somewhere in the raining distance. She narrated, with a dispirited voice, "He's called Ji Pei. He's an orphan my second brother brought back from the battlefield."
Grenn’s Rants Corner
More about Ji Pei, the emotional knot in Ji Yunshu’s heart.
'Ji Yuanzhi?'
"Why it is him?" "Just now I saw a scab on his right thumb." Jing Rong affirmed. As soon as the conclusion came down, unwavering hatred overflowed from Ji Yunshu's delicate face. At once, she picked the paper with the fingerprint and the ink stone, and rushed out of the door. Jing Rong ran after her. Both of them continued to pick up their pace until they reached the reception hall. The place was crowded with the Ji's people, they apparently still hadn't recovered from their shock. A servant was applying medicine on Ji Yuanzhi's wrist while he was exuding a depressing aura of unwillingness. Whereas, Ji Muqing was wiping the tears on her face which was covered with red imprints, still fuming in anger. She was enraged! At this moment, they saw Jing Rong and Ji Yunshu had returned. Immediately, everyone from the Ji family became tensed. Ji Shuhan quickly stood up from the pear-wood chair. He was afraid that deity with sword-like brows would started to decapitate them. Outside, the rain continued to fall in drizzle. A layer of white "frost" had covered both Ji Yunshu and Jing Rong. They stepped into the room one behind the other. Ji Shuhan failed to understand, but he slightly bowed as his eyesight shifted around. "Your Highness?" Jing Rong didn't argue with him. He cast a side glance at Ji Yunshu and noticed her gaze. Her eyes were like ice daggers ferociously piercing through Ji Yuanzhi. Jing Rong tacitly understood. Thus after a moment, he took the ink stone and sheet from Ji Yunshu and walked toward Ji Yuanzhi. Realizing that Jing Rong was approaching him, Ji Yuanzhi became alarmed. He knead his hands until they changed shape and he was violently shaking. Jing Rong didn't let Ji Yuanzhi evaded as he grabbed the other hand and dipped it into the inkstone place on the table. Jing Rong's slender fingers firmly held Ji Yuanzhi's thumbs and made sure both thumbs were smeared with ink. After it was done, he raised the other's hands. Aaah! The movement was accompanied by Ji Yuanzhi's scream. "Your Highness! M-my hands…" "Your hand should be crippled." Jing Rong coldly berated. As soon as the words were said, he ruthlessly pressed Ji Yuanzhi's thumbs on the paper. The stamped fingerprints were well defined on the paper. Immediately, Ji Yunshu came over and took the paper. She then compared the fingerprints and one of the thumb print was nearly identical to the evidence she collected. Once again, she observed the thumb that Jing Rong held firmly. As suspected, there was a scab on that thumb. Her eyes reddened in no time and tears pooled as she looked at Ji Yuanzhi. "It's you! You forced Luan'er to die! You killed her!" Her voice was shrill as if she wanted to pierce everyone's ears with the truth. When the truth was revealed, apart from Jing Rong, everyone else was shocked. Ji Yuanzhi's face was twisted with pain. He stared at his hand restrained by Jing Rong. He painfully shook his head. "It's not me! W-what kind of nonsense are you spouting? I didn't force that worthless maidservant to kill herself." As soon as he heard "worthless maidservant", Jing Rong didn't withheld the strength of his grip and directly broke the other's hand. "H-have mercy on me your Highness!" Ji Yuanzhi tumbled off his chair, directly kneeling on the floor while gritting his teeth in pain. Jing Rong ferociously glared at him as he berated him. "This is the hand that took the life of a weak girl! It won't do if this Prince doesn't make an example out of you." "It's not me! It's not me…" At this moment, Old Madame Ji stepped forward; her eyes were red and her usual graceful and sumptuous appearance was stained by tears. She begged Jing Rong. "Your Highness, it's not possible for Yuanzhi to do such things. That servant hanged herself and even left a confession written in black and white. The truth is absolutely undeniable." When she stopped speaking, her expression was vicious as she rivet her eyes on Ji Yunshu. Her whole being was burning with anger. "You being sent to prison had already spread to everyone. Haven't you made my Ji family lost enough honor? You should know that if that girl, Luan'er, didn't confess to her crime, you would still be rotting in that prison cell!" 'Oh really? Then, you should I give my gratitude to your whole family?! Ji Yuanzhi, ah! Ji Yuanzhi! You have this kind of good grandmother is truly the blessing you cultivate for three lifetimes. For you, she could invert black and white. How powerful that it! If you can keep that life of yours, you must repaid her properly!' Ji Yunshu coldly sneered. She raised the paper in her hand. "This fingerprint and the incomplete fingerprint found on Luan'er are exactly the same, even that blank mark in the middle of the finger. This mark indicated that there was a scab on the thumb which caused the fingerprint to look incomplete. Moreover, that finger was soaked in tangerine water which makes the fingerprint remained on the paper up to 12 hours." After she spoke up to this point, she took out Luan'er's confession note, but the fingerprint can no longer be seen. Thus, with more certainty than ever, she turned to Ji Yuanzhi who was still kneeling on the floor. "Twelve hours have already passed. Therefore, the incomplete fingerprint in question could no longer be seen, but the smell of tangerine water still linger. According to my calculation, Luan'er's time of death was around yesterday night at the rat hour1, you were at her side at that time and was washing your hands with the tangerine water in my room before giving this paper to Luan'er, so she could write down that fake confession and forcing her to hang herself!" The evidences of his crimes were revealed one by one. "I… I didn't…" Ji Yuanzhi's expression was evasive and like before he continued to deny his crime. At this moment, Jing Rong threw Ji Yuanzhi's hand and let it go. Ji Yuanzhi's hand heavily hit the corner of the table. Bam! The pain made him teary. Ji Yunshu continued to hound him with her eyes as she interrogated him. "Why did you force Luan'er to die? Why? This is a human life! How can you be so cruel, treating her death as if nothing?" "I…" "You saw her hung herself and die in front of you. Doing such a thing, aren't you afraid to be plagued by nightmare at night?" Ji Yuanzhi's pupils suddenly dilated from horror. The corner of his mouth twitched, then trembled. "I didn't want to force her to die. I only… I was confused! I was confused at that time. I only want to maintain our family's reputation, so I did it, but I really didn't want her to die!" 'He confessed! Such a good confession!' Ji Yunshu refrained herself from crying. Her heart was wrecked with pain. It was unbearably painful! "It's not true!" Old Madame Ji threw herself next to Ji Yuanzhi and lamented, "Yuanzhi, how can you do such a thing?!" Ji Muqing was stunned. She even forgot about the painful slap she received. She spoke in shock, "Third Brother, you…" "I didn't mean it! I did that because I was confused at that time. I really didn't mean to kill her." Ji Yuanzhi continued with his litany. Jing Rong coldly watched everything. He couldn't tolerate it. "Come down." At his call, suddenly six imperial bodyguard jumped down from the roof and stood outside the reception hall with their hands clasped. "Did your hear everything earlier?" "Yes, your Highness. We have heard." "Good. Bring Ji Yuanzhi to the yamen. Let Lord Liu investigates the case." "Yes, your Highness." The guards came in and dragged Ji Yuanzhi outside. "Father! Grandmother! Save me!" Ji Yuanzhi shouted. His voice was trembling from fright. "Yuanzhi!" Old Madame Ji stretched her hand in an attempt to grab him back, but all she grabbed on was the empty air. Finally, Ji Shuhan recovered from his shock and immediately kneeled down. He begged Jing Rong. "I beseech your Highness! Have mercy! He is still young and commit an error in a moment of confusion. Your Highness is magnanimous, spare him!" "A moment of confusion? Spare him?" Jing Rong repeated Ji Shuhan's words with a severe expression. "Human life is priceless. You actually sum it into 'a moment of confusion'?" 'Preposterous!'
Grenn’s Rants Corner
Ace Attorney’s soundtrack might fit the mood.
Rat hour = between 11pm and 1am ↩
Ji Shuhan was not ready to give up. "Please, Prince, I beg you to consider the fact that I have been a functionary for this many years. Please make this an exception."
"I have thought of you wrongly, Ji Shuhan. To think that you would dare say something like that. I ought to correct the way you and your family think." Jing Rong turned around and ordered, "Bring him to the yamen now."
Jing Rong's bodyguard dragged Ji Yuanzhi against his struggles into the thin rain, towards the yamen. Chaos reigned in the Ji family, some were crying, others knelt down, and the rest were still stricken by bafflement.
Ji Shunan smashed the ground in frustration. He was angry at Ji Yuanzhi, but also at the cold-bloodedness of Jing Rong and his daughter. Ji Muqing was unable to hold it in anymore. She sobbed and raised her teary eyes to look at Ji Yunshu, "Luan'er was but a lowly maid, it matters little if she dies. Besides, she was sold to the Ji Mansion as a child, so we ought to have the final say over her life. Third Brother might be unreasonable, but he didn't kill her with his own hands; she hung herself. You can't put the blame on him just like that."
'A pathetic clown she is. Eager to make her presence noticed at every opportunity. I have but the strongest of dislike and the deepest of disdain for people like her. What does she seek? A way to display her own superiority through the misfortune of others?'
Ji Yunshu glanced at her scornfully and answered, "Is the knife the sole weapon of the murderer?" "But he did it for you, if it wasn't for him, you would still be in jail right now." "On this you are wrong; he did it for you. He did it for the prestige of the Ji family. He did it so you can become a princely concubine."
"…"
Ji Muqing could not find a retort to Ji Yunshu's words. Ji Wanxin pulled on her arm lightly and said, "Eldest sister, third brother is in the wrong for this."
"…You!" Ji Muqing was seized with anger. She turned to the side and was about to hit Ji Wanxin. He had barely raised her hand when Jing Rong's caught hold of her wrist and pushed her into the sandalwood chair on the side.
"Elder sister," Ji Wanxin looked worried. She approached Ji Muqing, but had barely grazed her sleeve before the latter pushed her away and cried, "Get away!"
Perhaps it was it due to her frailty, she lost her balance and fell back into Jing Rong's arm. She raised her head and her eyes collided with Jing Rong's frosty irises. Ji Wanxin bit her lips and a flush climbed up her face. She lingered until she felt a pair of hands – Jing Rong's, pushing her from the back, and she sensibly decided to back away. She kept her head lowered and remained silent; nobody seemed to have noticed this small detail.
The flame of anger within Ji Yunshu's heart, which had been concealed until now, until the Ji Yuanzhi was brought to the yamen, finally ignited and now burned fiercely within her heart. 'Don't worry, Luan'er, I will make them for every single bit of it.' Old Madame Ji was whimpering with her hands on her chest. She called out to Ji Yunshu, "Yuanzhi was your third brother, how could you?"
'How could I? I'll show you how I can.' Ji Yunshu swept across the hall with a saddened look and said with a low voice, "When I saw Luan'er corpse, my sadness was many folds superior to the one you are feeling right now. I died of hunger five years ago in the western quarters. When I wake up, the only person I saw was Luan'er. She was only eleven years old and wore nothing but a thin robe on her to protect her against the biting cold of the winter. Nevertheless, she gave everything she had to me. For the last few years, she's been the only one to keep my company; I've come to see her as my own sister. You, on the contrary, the same blood flows within our veins, yet you would let me die. This is the only love you've bestowed upon me. This cruel treatment, colder than than a winter night."
Ji Yunshu's every word resonated within the minds of her family. Jing Rong's heart ached at the learning of such her difficult past in her own home; he did not any of it before.
Ji Shuhan shook his head in an exasperated frustration. "So you bore that hatred so this long."
"Yes, I did, I remembered all the cruel treatment you have subjected me to." Ji Yunshu no longer felt the need to hide it. Her brows suddenly took on an air of sharpened knives as she confronted him, "Do you remember when you whipped Ji Pei thirty times? Do you remember the words he said as he laid in a pool of his own blood?"
Ji Shuhan froze at the mention of the question; everyone else followed. This name was was a taboo for two years: no one had ever mentioned it, and no one was ever to be allowed to do so. "Shut up! I forbid you to talk about it," browbeat Ji Shuhan. Each word came out of Ji Yunshu's mouth slowly. "He said, 'close are the bonds; thin is the blood. Today you are my father; tomorrow you shalt be my slave.'"
"Quiet!" This time it was Old Madame Ji. "He is dead, you hear me? Dead!" She smashed the desk energetically.
'Dead? Yes… I saw Ji Pei die with my very eyes, I saw his body carried out of the Ji Mansion. Dead with not a single corner of his body left intact; whipped to death by thirty lashes.'
Ji Yunshu's lips quirked into a bitter smile. "He's not dead. He mustn’t have died. I search that hill upside down, and still couldn't find his body. He told me that he would come back after to years." She sounded irrevocably certain of herself, enough so to make everyone wonder at the reason.
Ji Yunshu resumed her expression of coldness, turned around and left the Ji Mansion without turning back even once. She plodded into the thin rain with an unusual determination. She took the front gate, just as she did when she entered the mansion. Jing Rong caught up to her before she could realize it and extended an umbrella over her head in silence. He simply walked by her, not asking any questions, despite his interest being piqued by this new Ji Pei.
Ji Yunshu headed for the Memorial Hall, and she arrived just when Fu Bo finished putting Luan'er corpse into an old, tattered coffin. He mumbled something about burying her in a place with a nice Fengshui. Ji Yunshu eyes were slowly losing their focus as she stared at the object, and she uttered words of thanks and nod her head. She removed her hairpin and placed it into the coffin. "Luan'er, please rest in peace. May you live happier and better in your next lifetime."
The coffin was sealed, and Ji Yunshu bid farewell to Luan'er by burning a stick of incense. She stood under the roof of the entrance to the Memorial Hall with her head raised, looking at the dripping of rainwater as it ran down the eaves, just like sand in an hourglass. Jing Rong kept her company; he looked at her slowly unclenching brows and felt the same relief for the worry which preoccupied his heart. He dared not disturb her. Ji Yunshu was as tranquil as a painting, and cleaner than the rainwater who had yet to touch the ground. For a moment, Jing Rong earnestly wished that he had not been born in the royal family. He longed for a simpler existence amongst common people, one devoid of the calculations and schemings for the sake of the throne. What joy would it be, to share every sunrise and admire each sunset with the one he loved!
After a long time, Ji Yunshu finally shifted her eyes from the corner of roof to somewhere in the raining distance. She narrated, with a dispirited voice, "He's called Ji Pei. He's an orphan my second brother brought back from the battlefield."
Grenn’s Rants Corner
More about Ji Pei, the emotional knot in Ji Yunshu’s heart.
