CHAPTER 198: 198- HYPOCRITE [1]

The air in the ancestral hall was thick with the scent of incense and unshed tears.

Twelve urns, carved from dark jade, sat in a solemn row upon the high altar.

Each bore a name, a reminder of what it once was.

Fang Yuan stood before the assembled mourners, his figure a pillar of stark black against the grey stone.

His voice, when it came, was not loud, but it carried through the cavernous hall with the weight of finality, echoing off the tablets of countless ancestors who bore witness.

"Fang Guo," he intoned, the name hanging in the air. "Fang Shen. Fang Lo. Fang Rin." He did not rush.

He gave each name its due, a somber bell tolling for the departed. "Fang Wu. Fang Shi. Fang Kyu."

He continued, until all twelve names had been called.

"These elders... they met a tragic end, not at the hands of outsiders, but at the hand of my very own brother. To stand here and hold a funeral for them, some may see it as hypocrisy. Perhaps they are right.

But I will speak plainly. Ever since those elders left the Fang Clan, we have faced hardship after hardship. And in those months, I often found myself questioning... was the choice I made then truly the right one?

I did not expect their journey to end like this. I did not expect their lives to be cut short outside these walls, under my brother’s hand."

A silence followed, heavier than before.

"We have bled enough," Fang Yuan said, his gaze sweeping over the small cluster of widows and their relatives.

Their faces were etched with grief, fear, and a bitterness that had festered during exile.

"The grudges of the past have cost us our pillars. Your husbands, these elders, their journey began with a choice against me. It ended in a tragedy far from home. But they were Fang, in blood and in spirit. Their place is here, with their ancestors. And so is yours. I urge you to lay down your resentment. Come home. Rejoin your family."

For a moment, there was only the sputter of a candlewick.

Then, a woman at the front snapped. Her face, pale and drawn, contorted with raw fury.

"Home?" she shrieked, the word tearing from her throat. "You and your brother are a murderer! You think we are fools? You think we don’t know what you truly want? To finish what your brother started? Think again!"

The accusation hung, sharp and poisonous. Fang Yuan did not flinch.

He merely watched her, his expression unreadable, his calm a stark contrast to her hysterics.

He offered no defense, no denial. His silence was a void that swallowed her anger whole.

Another woman rose. Older, her movements slow and staggering, her eyes raw from crying.

She did not look at Fang Yuan but at the urn that held her husband.

"Oh, great Fang Clan Head," she whispered, her voice raspy with exhaustion. "For what reason do you truly call for us? We are so tired. We have lost our husbands to the machinations of your own blood. If... if it is to nip the problem in the bud..."

She finally lifted her gaze, her eyes pleading for an end to the torment. "Then please, make our ending swift. Let us rest in peace alongside them."

From the side, Lin Zhaoyue shot to her feet, her patience evaporating.

"Nip the problem in the bud?" she scoffed, her voice cutting through the hall.

"You think we’re blind enough not to notice none of you brought your children? You hid them away, thinking us monsters! Besides, killing you or your child would do us neither good nor harm, so at least speak with—"

"Zhaoyue." Fang Yuan’s voice was a low command,a blade of ice that severed her sentence.

It was the only sign of his will imposed upon the scene. He did not look at her, but his tone brooked no argument.

She clicked her tongue, the sound loud in the quiet, and sat back down, crossing her arms tightly.

Fang Yuan’s attention returned to the widows.

The brief flicker of emotion that had surfaced at the woman’s wish for death, a deep, profound regret was gone, smoothed back into a mask of somber resolve.

"Then there is nothing more to say," he said, his voice even, devoid of anger or persuasion.

"If none here wish to rejoin the Fang family, I will grant you this final opportunity. Take your husbands’ ashes. Leave this place. And from this day forward, you and your lines will no longer bear the Fang name. The protection and wrath of this clan will never touch you again. You will be free."

The older woman who had spoken first was the one to move.

Without a word, she walked slowly to the altar, her steps echoing. She paused before an urn, her trembling hand resting on the cool jade.

Then, she gathered it carefully into her arms, clutching it to her chest as if it were the last warmth in the world.

She did not look back as she walked out of the ancestral hall, out of the Fang family’s history.

One by one, the others followed. A silent, grieving procession.

They came forward, collected the urns, and turned their backs on their ancestral home.

They chose freedom over a fractured unity, isolation over a peace they could not trust.

Fang Yuan stood motionless, watching them go. He did not stop them.

He did not speak again. He simply let them leave, each departure a quiet failure, a ghost he would have to learn to live with.

The heavy doors of the ancestral hall groaned shut, sealing away the sight of the retreating widows.

The silence they left behind was profound, broken only by the whisper of burning incense.

Of the twelve urns, eight had been carried away into self-imposed exile.

The four that remained did so not out of loyalty, but out of a fear so potent it had kept their families from even daring to attend the funeral.

Their absence was a louder, more damning statement than any screamed accusation.

Fang Yuan stood with his back to the remaining urns, his gaze fixed on the intricate carvings of the clan’s history on the far wall.

He had offered them peace. He had offered them unity. They had answered with fear and silence. The Chapter of reconciliation was closed.

The soft click of heels on stone echoed as Lin Zhaoyue stepped forward.

The frustration she had been forced to swallow earlier was gone, replaced by a cold, razor-sharp focus.

She came to a stop beside him, her posture straight, her voice low and devoid of all sentiment.

It was the voice of a general reporting readiness.

"Husband," she said. "I’m ready on my side."

Fang Yuan did not turn immediately.

He let a final moment of silence hang over the empty hall, a quiet funeral rite for the hope that had just died.

Then, he slowly turned his head to regard her. The somber regret that had clouded his features during the proceedings had vanished, smoothed into an expression of chilling calm.

"Good," he replied, his voice equally low, equally devoid of warmth. "Let’s make a quick sweep of the Wu pests then."

With that, he turned his back fully on the ancestral altar, on the four abandoned urns, and on the failed diplomacy of the day.