Chapter 23 Vanity_2

Her emotions became increasingly agitated, tears falling like pearls off a broken string.

"Whenever a passerby came by, they were deceptively lured into the mansion by any means necessary, swallowed alive and then their bones scattered haphazardly on the hills behind the house, keeping only their souls to serve as slaves."

Ye Family's young master, seated on the bed, slightly opened his eyes, then closed them again, feeling compassion, and sighed once: "Amitabha..."

The young lady sneered a few times, turned her body towards the Ye Family's young master sitting on the bed, and asked, "My lord, can you imagine? Originally, the Ye mansion was dilapidated and decaying, surviving only by selling off family assets to support your arduous studies. How come when you returned home after failing the exams, our home suddenly became prosperous and filled with wives and concubines? Just by my efforts and your mother's, along with one or two maids and servants, were we able to turn the tide and stabilize the family business? Don't you find it surprising and laughable?"

Ye Family's young master closed his eyes and did not answer; he was not really the young master of the Ye Family, and he was unaware of what the Ye Family had experienced. As for the young lady's questions, he did not know how to respond and could only sigh emptily: "Amitabha."

The young lady, upon hearing this, helplessly closed her eyes, letting her tears fall like rain, and after a long while, slowly opened her eyes and said bitterly, "Forget it, you're not really my husband anyway. Whether he ever gave it a thought, and what his thoughts were, you wouldn't know."

The last living person of the Ye mansion, their lord, had mysteriously turned into a monk, and she had to accept that it was fate; she had no choice but to accept that it was fate. Perhaps the person sitting on the bed was truly not their lord.

Afterwards, she pushed herself up to stand and turned to face the elderly lady and the sisters at the door.

Pointing at the servants waiting on the side, she laughed self-mockingly: "Who would have thought, these servants of the Ye mansion were the very bandits who once plundered and looted it?"

She staggered a few steps closer to the old lady, her smile sad and bitter: "Old lady, you watch these people day and night, do you no longer hate them? No longer bear a grudge?"

With that, she suddenly lost control of her emotions, screaming hysterically, "You've been blinded by this false prosperity! Have you forgotten how they humiliated us during their lives!"

Then she calmed down seemingly like a wild animal about to go mad, that brief moment of indifference.

She tilted her head, looking at the old lady's face, and coldly asked, "How does it feel in the cesspool? Is drowning there a glory to our family name?"

"Rubbish!" The old lady picked up her walking stick and knocked her to the ground.

Yet, the young lady did not rise to retort; she seemed crazed, laying on the ground, laughing madly at one moment and then weeping heartbreakingly the next.

"Hit me, since I've already been dead, it would be better if you could kill me again, hit me, kill me joyfully! Hahaha..." No longer maintaining her dignified and graceful demeanor.

To what depths of despair must one sink to no longer even desire to be a ghost?

It was truly a bone-deep bitterness, heart-wrenchingly painful.

The enraged old lady raised her walking stick to hit her, but just then the Crown Prince glanced up, a flash of cold light in his eyes shattered the thick walking stick, immediately falling to the ground, turning into dust.

The old lady was terrified, her knees weakening, and she knelt down. However, she was unwilling to give up just like that, her teeth gritted as she supported herself on the doorframe and stood up again.

And so she let the young lady weep and laugh madly for a while longer.

Eventually, she must have been tired enough. She sat up, haphazardly wiped her face, sorted her messy hair, and sniffled the mucus blocking her nose.

She knelt forward a few steps, kowtowing several times to the Crown Prince, and then stood straight up, regaining her prior composed and stable appearance, though her voice still quivered slightly.

"Though I may be short-sighted, sir, your eminence suggests you are a man of significance. I reveal these matters not to seek your forgiveness, but to wish that the world may have one less evil spirit like me to cause calamities."

With tears in her eyes, she held them back, her gaze particularly resolute.

"No matter if you command your fostered beasts to swallow and tear me alive, or strike and shatter Su Niang's soul, Su Niang fears not. She only asks for an outcome, better that than living in vile servitude in this world,"

Having said that, she bowed her head and gave another heavy kowtow, wishing for it all to end, seeking liberation.

The Second Crown Prince casually lifted a hand, facing the ground and mysteriously summoned a man draped in light purple brocade, his body encircled by seven three-clawed Soul-Binding Chains.

Behind the man loomed a beast with a green face and sharp fangs, part wild beast and part evil spirit. The creature's palms, like the Soul-Binding Chains, each displayed three claws. The claws were sharp as knives, ferocious and menacing.

The man's hair was peach-colored with a hint of pink, standing upward as if blown by a wind, and would probably reach just to his shoulders if allowed to fall. He had arched brows and phoenix eyes, a high nose and thin lips, a red line painted between his brows making his pale, thin face eerily charming.

He bowed deeply with clasped hands held above his head, respectfully saluting the Second Crown Prince, then spread open a ledger he was carrying, focusing intently as he searched for something with a brush made of human baby hair and inkstone.

In the blink of an eye, he murmured, "Ge Su Niang..."

His voice was enchanting yet chilling, like a dark wind sweeping across a hill under moonlight.

Suddenly, the Second Crown Prince snapped his fan shut, tapped it against his palm and calmly said, "Ge Su Niang, since you repent, I permit your reincarnation, suffer your own ill consequences."

Meanwhile, the summoned man, while listening, started recording something in the ledger. No sooner had his pen stopped moving than one of the three-clawed chains on his body lashed out quickly, shackling Mrs. Ge—Su Niang.

The man tucked the ledger back into his breast and passed the ink-brush behind him, where it was instantaneously caught by the green-faced beast, who clutched it tightly in its embrace.

The man, squinting his eyes, half-smiling, bowed deeply with clasped hands to the Second Crown Prince, pleading, "Things have been tight for me lately, perhaps you could grant me the rest of these?"

The Second Crown Prince waved his sleeve, and in an instant, the man transformed into a wisp of peach-pink smoke and swiftly disappeared into the ground, traceless in his arrival and departure.

Apart from the Second Crown Prince seated high in the hall, no one knew who the man was, but everyone could see that he possessed the power and right to control life, death, and reincarnation.

All in the Ye Family were shocked; this young master before them could summon and dismiss a man with such powers at will. Everyone was abruptly thrown into panic, scrambling chaotically throughout the mansion.

Night had fallen, and the sky was like thick ink spread across.

Although the night was like their natural element, at this moment, they couldn't escape. It was as if an invisible force sealed the mansion, preventing even those who managed to climb the walls from escaping, blocked by an unseen force.

Even though the old lady tried to maintain her composure, she could not hide the desperate anxiety on her face.

"You, you, you—are you human or ghost? Could it be... could it be that you are... a deity?!"

The Second Crown Prince ignored her, as always composed, always indifferent. He slowly stood up, hands clasped behind his back.

"As for you..." he said lightly, yet his presence was overwhelming.

The old lady's legs went weak, causing her to stagger backward several steps and fall to the ground, crawling backward in fright.

Suddenly, under the bright moonlight, a figure leapt like a hungry wolf, like a fierce beast. Instantly, the entire Ye Family turned into a mob of frightened spirits, running helter-skelter without regard for one another, each only concerned with their own survival.

...