"Old hag, may you never die a good death, may you never die a good death!" Nanny Chen, as she spoke, clutched her belly and fell to the ground. Dark blood oozed from the corner of her mouth, and her eyes stared fixedly at the retreating figure of the Old Lady, wanting to speak but no longer able to utter a word.
Only in her final moments did Nanny Chen come to realize the saying, "One reaps what one sows." That bee ring, concealed with poison, was crafted at her own request years ago for the Old Lady, meant to silently take lives in desperate times.
Little did she expect that the Old Lady would end up using it on her!
Indeed, in life and death, there’s cause and effect; wealth and rank do not cycle. Her head hitting the ground heavily, Nanny Chen, a once-influential henchwoman, took her last breath, her eyes revealing the untold secrets she carried...
After the Old Lady left the secret room, the bodyguards returned to find the fallen Nanny Chen and quickly phoned Guan Jiu to report the death.
As for the Old Lady, she returned to her own room as if nothing had happened.
At that time, the maidservant had just fetched the doctor. The Old Lady no longer resisted and calmly lay back on her bed, letting the doctor conduct various examinations. Follow current ɴᴏᴠᴇʟs on novel·fıre·net
Du Shiniang walked in from outside. Since the news about the Old Mansion had been sealed off, Du Shiniang was one of the very few people allowed to come and go freely.
But she was under surveillance the whole time.
Upon seeing Du Shiniang arrive, the Old Lady wanted to send the doctor and the maidservant out, to whisper some secrets between them. However, it was clear that her authority as the former head of the family had diminished. While the doctor stepped back temporarily, the maidservant lingered in the room, monitoring every word and action.
"Hmph!" The Old Lady snorted coldly at Du Shiniang, "Shi Niang, I told you before to be more diligent, but you wouldn’t listen. Now you see your mistake, don’t you? Bai Yueru has completely revamped the staff of the Old Mansion. Even these two maidservants dare to disobey my commands."
"Grandmother, actually, Ah Chen is doing this for your own good. Your health is too fragile; you need plenty of rest. From now on, you should not bother with these matters. Just focus on your peaceful recovery. As for the Smart Girl Class, leave everything to me, I won’t let you down."
Du Shiniang knew the two maidservants were sent by Bai Yueru to watch the Old Lady, so she dared not say too much openly, only reporting subtly through conversation. The upheaval in the Old Mansion was mainly Sheng Shaochen’s doing; Bai Yueru was simply pushed forward as a figurehead. Du Shiniang wanted to mentally prepare the Old Lady for this revelation.
"Now it seems I can’t manage anything if I wanted to." The Old Lady continued, "I just paid a visit to Old Chen. I never thought she would be so rash, to take her own life with poison merely because I refused to go against Bai Yueru. It truly pains my heart. Thinking of how long she busied herself by my side and, in the end, obtained nothing. As for our Little Brother Kai, she had helped look after him since birth. I’m afraid with her gone, these matters will be unknown to others. Shi Niang, it’s now up to you to take good care of Xiao Kai. You must look after him for me."
To others, it was just an ordinary dialogue. However, Du Shiniang could sense the hidden message in the Old Lady’s words.
The Old Lady was subtly telling her that with Nanny Chen’s death, no one would know the truth about Xiao Kai’s mother’s identity. She advised Du Shiniang not to panic and, no matter what, to keep hold of Sheng Kai as her amulet. As long as Du Shiniang remained Sheng Kai’s mother, others would not dare to harm her.