Chapter 3

# Chapter 3

On the day of Old Marquis Gu’s funeral, the crowd pelted Gu Jinxin with rotten leaves.

His father had arranged a minor seventh-rank post for him, but even that appointment was revoked after his infamous display of unfilial conduct.

Worse still, Meng Qingluo withdrew from their marriage agreement.

The Meng family had originally asked for five hundred taels in betrothal gifts. Once rumors spread that Gu Jinxin was unfilial and had brought death upon his father, they feared being implicated. They doubled the demand to a thousand taels and refused to provide a dowry.

Gu Jinxin’s temples throbbed. He denounced the Mengs for betraying their word.

He did not know that this was what the Meng family had always been like.

In my former life, after he rescued Meng Qingluo and brought her home as a concubine, her family proved anything but easy to manage. I had used money and influence to keep them in line, while Meng Qingluo quietly supported them. Only because they lived comfortably did they learn to act with restraint and propriety.

Now no one instructed or restrained them, and their original nature was plain. That was why they could worsen the Gu family’s misery in the middle of Old Marquis Gu’s funeral.

I heard that Gu Jinxin nearly struck them. Then Meng Qingluo arrived in flowing white, tears trembling on her lashes as she gazed at him with heartbreaking fragility.

He could do nothing against her.

Dejected, he accepted the Meng family’s terms and demanded that the marriage take place within three days. The Mengs departed triumphant.

Old Madam Gu finally lost patience and slapped her son across the face. “We believed your nonsense, and that was how one mistake became ten. Are you satisfied now?”

He ought to have been.

In my former life, his greatest grief had been that the woman he loved was merely a concubine, while I-his lawful wife-came from a powerful family and enjoyed an impeccable reputation. He had been forced to bow his head.

Now he had everything he wanted. Surely he should have been exultant.

As for me, I was taking another road.

In early spring, an imperial decree arrived: I, Song Jiaruo, was to become the Crown Princess.

My rank rose higher still. Invitations piled up by the stack. I declined most of them, but I could not casually refuse those from the palace.

At the Eldest Princess’s flower-viewing banquet, Her Highness suddenly suffered an attack of the heart. While everyone else stood helpless, I placed one of my pills in her mouth.

She slowly revived, looked at me through unfocused eyes, and squeezed my hand. “I owe you my life today.”

She bestowed lavish gifts upon me. After offering my thanks, I finally set out for home.

But someone blocked my carriage on the road.

Gu Jinxin ranted like a madman. “You had medicine that could treat a seizure of the heart. Why did you hide it? Song Jiaruo, you killed my father. I will never forgive you, not in this life or any other!”

That was the kind of man he was: cowardly, shameless, and utterly without responsibility. Unable to bear the weight of his father’s death, he would find any means to place it on me.

The guards flew into a rage and prepared to beat him.

I lifted the carriage curtain. “Wait.”

They stopped. Gu Jinxin tore free, wiped the blood from his lip with an elegant sweep of his sleeve, and glared at me as though he wanted to devour me.

I beckoned to my servant. “Tell everyone clearly. Did I refuse to save a dying man, or did Young Master Gu’s arrogance cost a life?”

The servant had been holding his anger for days. He raised the medicine box and called, “Young Master Gu, do you recognize this? The day Marquis Gu fell from his horse after you enraged him, my mistress ordered me to deliver this medicine. And you…”

He recounted every detail: how Gu Jinxin threw the box aside, how he swore he would never use anything sent by the Songs, and how he drove the servant away with insults aimed at my family.

The crowd grew more outraged with every word. By the end, many longed to beat Gu Jinxin themselves.

His face went white. In the bright spring sunlight, he looked like a bird freezing to death in winter.

“Impossible… Why would you have been so kind?”

I scoffed. “Because your own mind is narrow, you assume everyone else’s must be the same. The benevolent see benevolence, the wise see wisdom-and a creature with the vision of a rat sees rats everywhere. That is why the Song family wants nothing to do with you.”

At that moment, another passenger lifted the curtain: Crown Prince Chu Zheng.

Everyone bowed at once. Gu Jinxin sank reluctantly to his knees.

A faint smile touched Chu Zheng’s lips, though his eyes were cool. “Gu Jinxin has shown no respect for his betters, insulted his superiors, and slandered the Crown Princess in public. Thirty strokes of the cane, as a warning to others.”

The guards moved like wolves. Before Gu Jinxin could protest, they gagged him, forced him down, and administered all thirty strokes in the street.

His handsome face turned bloodred. Beads of sweat rolled from him as I watched in silence. Disbelief in his eyes gave way to fury, then regret.

I will admit it: my desire for revenge was deeply satisfied.

In my previous life, the massacre had brought the great clans down almost overnight. Talent withered, and the whole realm needed rebuilding. In those days, anyone who knew a few written characters could obtain a tiny post.

Gu Jinxin had ties to the old clans and a little talent of his own. He rose quickly from a seventh-rank appointment to the fifth rank, then sailed upward without meeting many setbacks. Naturally, he never learned fear.

This time he had placed himself against the great clans, and even the smallest glimpse of their power had left him badly wounded. Perhaps he would learn humility and manage his second life properly.

Otherwise, what a waste of rebirth.

I was lost in thought when a firm hand closed around my arm.

Chu Zheng held me, the corner of his mouth raised though the smile never reached his eyes. “What has you so absorbed?”

“I was wondering whether, if a person received the chance to begin again, he might still fail to make anything of his life.”

I was speaking of Gu Jinxin.

And of myself.

For I, too, could not be certain that everything would unfold as I wished.