Chapter 99

Chapter 99

Xie Run said softly, "As long as you don't commit crimes or harm others, I will ensure your safety and peace from now on."

Xie Run added gently, "But beyond that, I don't have the ability to do more."

Shiqie Lu knelt on the ground, earnestly kowtowing three times to Xie Run.

With reddened eyes, she said, "Though I am foolish, I would never dare to harbor harmful intentions!"

"Ju Zi used her own life to beg for your protection for me. How could I dare to betray her heartfelt devotion?"

Seeing her like this, Xie Run felt a touch of sympathy.

"You and Ju Zi shared a deep bond."

Shiqie Lu lowered her head, afraid that her tears would uncontrollably spill over.

After a moment, she said in a hoarse voice, "One winter, I was struck by cold and fell ill, unable to get up. She took care of my mother for me."

"She even helped arrange my mother's funeral."

"This debt of gratitude can never be repaid in my lifetime."

Xie Run understood somewhat. "So later, when her mother fell ill, you kept helping to care for her. Even after becoming a shiqie, you tried every way to bring her to your side to look after."

"You two supported each other, showing loyalty and kindness. But Ju Zi betrayed her master twice, and her reputation is not good..."

Hearing this, Shiqie Lu suddenly raised her head and asked, "Shufei Xie, do you think that a servant must be loyal to their master for life, no matter what kind of person the master is?"

"And that a servant who wishes to become a master is indulging in delusions, ungrateful, and betraying their master?"

Xie Run was taken aback.

Shiqie Lu's words were, in ancient times, typical of great rebellion.

After a servant sells themselves, their life belongs to the master, so naturally they must be loyal to their master for life.

This was a question that didn't even need to be asked.

A servant wanting to become a master was even more audacious.

Shiqie Lu's thoughts were truly bold.

Xie Run paused for a moment, then a faint smile curled at the corners of her mouth.

She shook her head. "Of course not!"

"The ancients said that a wise minister chooses a good master to serve. As a servant, who wouldn't want to follow a good master?"

Xie Run said, "There's no reason that just because a master is weak and incompetent, the servant has to suffer a lifetime of hardship and bullying."

"Would refusing to suffer make one disloyal? If that's the case, how many truly loyal ones are there in the entire prince's residence?"

Shiqie Lu's eyes shimmered with tears, looking at Xie Run with excitement.

She hadn't expected Xie Run to truly understand her!

Xie Run continued, "As for a servant wanting to become a master..."

"A shiqie wanting to become a shufei, a shufei wanting to become a cefei, and then climbing higher—who doesn't want to advance further?"

"Why is it that only when a servant wants to become a shiqie, it is called delusional?"

"But the term 'ungrateful and betraying one's master' carries too much weight." Xie Run sighed. "But if you think about it carefully, if you don't want to be a servant for life, there seems to be no other better path."

At that moment, Shiqie Lu felt as if her heart had been struck.

Shock mixed with infinite excitement, her body trembling silently.

Someone actually could empathize with her situation, her helplessness, and her constraints.

Tears fell like beads from a broken string, silent yet heavy.

Shiqie Lu laughed and cried at the same time. "Thank you, Shufei Xie, for understanding. At that time... I really had no other choice!"

That single phrase "had no choice" conveyed all the grievance and helplessness she had endured from being misunderstood and despised.

Xie Run was also moved, her emotions stirred.

"Though I haven't had much contact with you, I know you are not foolish."

"In this residence, as long as you don't harbor harmful intentions, the princess will allow you to live out your days in peace."

Shiqie Lu lowered her eyes, her tone calm and frank.

"Shufei Xie, your kind words are wise. I know what's good for me and have never dared to think of harming anyone."

"In this estate, the prince and princess see clearly. The more one stirs up trouble, the faster one dies."

Xie Run was slightly startled.

But on reflection, it seemed to be true.

When Shiqie Ning was a cefei, she had two sons and was extremely glorious.

But once she conceived harmful intentions, one mistake led to another, and she ended up nearly without even a coffin.

Shiqie Han was the same.

She held the connections of Shiqie Ning and was quite resourceful, but if she hadn't been impatient and resorted to various harmful schemes, how could she have fallen to where she is today?

If Shiqie Han had slowly planned, waiting for the future, no one would have had a better life than her.

For a moment, Xie Run and Shiqie Lu looked at each other, both feeling a sense of melancholy.

Shiqie Lu had cried, and her makeup was smudged.

Dan Tao brought a basin of water for her to wash her face and reapply her makeup.

After talking so much, her spirits had greatly improved.

Lu Zhi and Hong Xi brought out the Da Hong Pao and Lao Jun Mei teas.

Xie Run didn't dare drink too much tea, only smelled the fragrance. With the charcoal stove warming the room, the air was filled with a refreshing scent.

Shiqie Lu took a sip of tea, the fragrance spreading, leaving a lingering sweetness in her mouth.

She suddenly spoke: "I've never once thought Concubine An did me any favors."

As she said this, she stuck her neck out, with a stubborn look.

Xie Run smiled as she listened, waiting for her to continue.

Concubine Lu said in a calm voice: "I wasn't raised serving Concubine An from childhood; I was just assigned by the princess to wait on Concubine An."

"I was completely loyal once."

"When she was bullied, I stood up for her; when things were rough for her, I tried every means to help her."

Recalling the past, all Concubine Lu felt was bitterness, "But she was too incompetent."

This sentence contained all of Concubine Lu's dissatisfaction and anger towards Concubine An, as well as a deep disappointment and disgust.

"When someone slapped her left cheek, she'd turn the other cheek, just to avoid a fight."

"The people around her protected her, but when trouble came, she only knew how to hide and pushed us servants to take the fall."

Xie Run sighed, "The mistress and the servant are inherently different in status. I bet you got bullied a lot when you were her maid, didn't you?"

Concubine Lu looked up at Xie Run, surprised, then let out a bitter smile.

"So everyone in the manor already knew."

"It's only because I was a maid who became a concubine that they insist on calling me a bed-crawler to drag me down."

"So I'm automatically looked down on by them."

After speaking a few words with Xie Run, Concubine Lu saw through everything in the manor's inner courtyard even more clearly.

Concubine Lu said: "I am not afraid of being bullied; what I cannot stand is the humiliation from my own people."

The steam from the tea cup rose, blurring Concubine Lu's vision.

Her mind drifted back to back then, "Back then, she and Concubine Liu came into the manor at the same time; they were originally the same kind of people."

"That Concubine Liu was not even as good as her—she was just the daughter of a butcher—yet she bullied Concubine An so much that she didn't dare to speak up at all."

"I stood up for her, and Concubine Liu held a grudge against me. She forced me to lie on the ice in winter to perform 'lying on ice to catch carp.'"

"In the bitter cold of winter, the cold wind alone made your bones ache. If something went wrong, I would probably have lost my life."

Xie Run was startled, "Both are concubines; how could Concubine Liu control Concubine An's people? If Concubine An had refused, this matter probably wouldn't have happened?"

Concubine Lu gave a sarcastic smile, "She said at the time, 'Concubine Liu was just joking; she certainly wouldn't really harm my life. Let me go and come back quickly, at least let her vent her anger first.'"

Not to mention Concubine Lu herself, even Xie Run, as a listener, felt a chill in her heart at this moment.

Xie Run now understood why Concubine Lu detested Concubine An's incompetence.

This was not just incompetence.

It was another kind of cold-heartedness, just dressed up in a coward's shell, and thus accepted by the world.