CHAPTER 62: CHAPTER 62: TANG LIU TELLS A STORY

"Hmm, delicious, this tastes amazing, it’s the best pastry I’ve ever had in my life." Tang Liu almost choked, but after swallowing hard, he couldn’t stop praising: "Zhao Third Young Master, the stuff here is really good."

"You brat, how old are you, talking about ’in your life’ already." Zhao Minghua shot him a glance: "If it’s so good, then when you go to the Capital, grow a pair of ears, listen more, and tell my cousin when you get back. She loves to hear stories from the Capital."

"No problem." Tang Liu didn’t hold back and grabbed another piece of pastry, stuffing it into his mouth: "Let me tell you, this time going to the Capital, there’s a grander story, want to hear it?"

"What story?"

"The story I’m telling is about the Xiao family again." Tang Liu mumbled through bites: "Tsk, tsk, don’t underestimate Doctor Xiao’s granddaughter."

Zhao Minghua glanced at Chun Nuan: he never underestimated her!

"After Doctor Xiao got into trouble, his son and eldest grandson were exiled to the Northern Desert, and Old Mrs. Xiao took a group of women and children back to Shu City, I heard they did it under the Empress Dowager’s decree."

"You wonder about those truly guilty, why the Empress Dowager would give special attention." Tang Liu said: "So, many people suspect that Doctor Xiao died unjustly!"

Chun Nuan appeared indifferent, but she was thinking: People’s eyes are sharp, in their hearts is a scale of justice.

"Doctor Xiao’s legitimate eldest granddaughter is called..." Tang Liu slapped his forehead: "Right, she’s called Xiao Chunyu, and she married the legitimate second son of the Wu family, where the Minister of Public Works is kin. When the Xiao family was convicted, she was pregnant, and three months ago she gave birth to a girl, but the Wu family despised her, so they divorced her under the reasons of jealousy and disease."

Chun Nuan’s fingers in her sleeves dug hard into her palms, so it was like this!

Zhao Minghua was also surprised, now he understood why Chun Nuan wanted to see someone who had been to the Capital, her elder sister... how tragic!

"The Wu family is too unkind, how can they do this?" Even in Shu City and Changzhou, if it were the Capital, he at least would grab some brothers to bag the Wu guy and beat him until his parents didn’t recognize him.

"And what happened then, what about Xiao family’s eldest lady?"

Zhao Minghua knew Chun Nuan couldn’t ask, so he quickly served as her mouth.

"The second young master of the Wu family is crooked in many ways, he even had a liaison with a maid during the mourning period."

As Tang Liu finished speaking, Zhao Minghua shot him a dagger-like glare.

"Watch your language, my cousin is still a young girl."

This crude man is hopeless!

"Oh, oh, sorry, sorry, my lady, I didn’t mean it." Tang Liu awkwardly scratched his head: "But this is how the story goes, want to hear it?"

If you want to hear, the part about the maid can’t be avoided.

"Continue."

Zhao Minghua quickly urged.

"He forced his legitimate wife to agree to take a concubine, Xiao eldest lady said being in mourning, he should watch his reputation, and spreading it would harm their reputation, which angered him, and he walked away; later, when Xiao eldest lady gave birth she was in danger, if it wasn’t for the midwife’s skills, both mother and child would have died, and as it turned out she survived but would not conceive again, and then the Wu family spread news of wanting to take a concubine of equal status."

Chun Nuan’s palm hurt from digging her nails in!

She knew it, the Wu family was filthy.

"Xiao eldest lady naturally disagreed, said she wanted a divorce, but Wu Yunping, that is the second young master of Wu, directly divorced her, even abandoned his own daughter, driving them, mother and daughter with the dowry maid, out the door."

"If divorced, does she not get a penny of the dowry?" Zhao Minghua vaguely understood this principle.

"Isn’t that just like it." Tang Liu said: "Also because the Wu family was too ruthless, not leaving Xiao eldest lady a way to live, in a rage, Xiao eldest lady herself wrote a ten-thousand-character petition, went directly to knock on the Wenden Drum, and sued to the court!"

"Gosh, a petition to the court? That fierce?"

Zhao Minghua looked incredulously at Chun Nuan and signaled: Are the girls of the Xiao family not afraid of death?

"Good for her suing, Xiao eldest lady indeed is a heroine among women!"

The letter from Qiu Yan, in just a few words, could not express the elder sister’s suffering and tears.

Today, hearing Tang Liu’s description, Chun Nuan’s blood was boiling: Excellent, elder sister doesn’t provoke trouble but also isn’t afraid of it.

"And then?"

Zhao Minghua listened to the story with heart thumping: "Is suing the court so easy? The play says you have to be beaten a certain number of times before you see the Emperor, is that true?"

"In Great Xia, they don’t beat you, it’s rolling on a board with nails."

Chun Nuan’s voice was cold, her heart bleeding: "Rolling over a board with iron nails, piercing into the skin..."

She dared not close her eyes these days, for every time she did, she would dream of her elder sister’s mangled body.

"Indeed, it’s rolling on an iron board, I heard that after Xiao eldest lady knocked the Wenden Drum and rolled on the nail board, her clothes were soaked through with blood. The Emperor, after reading the petition, sent people to arrest the Wu family’s leaders, the Empress Dowager and Empress, hearing Xiao eldest lady’s ordeal, pitied her, and immediately sent an Imperial Physician to treat her, awarded her a thousand taels of silver, and the Empress also awarded her a hundred-acre estate."

"After Xiao eldest lady brought down the Wu family, her life wasn’t easy, I heard that families in the Capital all avoided her. Even the Xiao family’s former relatives, her mother’s family, avoided her, and no one visited."

There were some!

Chun Nuan silently remembered the Qiu family’s kindness.

Qiu Yan said elder sister and Panpan were fine and promised to take good care of her sister and niece, Chun Nuan believed her!

"Too..."

Zhao Minghua suddenly felt he lacked vocabulary, not knowing which adjective to use.

The look in his eyes towards Chun Nuan was also complicated.

Really, the girls of the Xiao family are all brave and fierce.

Suddenly recalling the first time he met her, even though her fingers hurt from crab pinches, she refused to release it into the water, determined to bite a piece out even if it killed her.

The Xiao family, not to be trifled with!

Zhao Minghua quietly swallowed a gulp.

Chun Nuan’s eyes held a different serenity.

The various events in Tang Liu’s story, she had thought about, but hearing it described was another matter.

"Has this story spread everywhere?"

Chun Nuan was still worried it might reach the ears of her grandmother and aunt, which is why later she arranged for them to move to the town to live.

On second thought, moving to the town was better.

After all, people in the village received information more swiftly.

Even the smallest rumors were exaggerated once they reached them.

In this small courtyard in the town, at least whoever came in had to be with their consent, unlike the village where news reached you unbidden.

Also, the womenfolk of the Xiao family typically remained home, and apart from the friendly Mrs. Zhao and Mrs. Zhang, there wasn’t a third lady, less socializing meant fewer idle rumors, and fewer leaks of secrets.