Chapter 5

Chapter 5

I bought Madam Zhao and her daughter.

A wife from an official family and a young lady from an official family, sold off by the authorities for two hundred and sixty taels of fine silver.

After so many years at Yujing Tower, there were plenty of things I did not understand, but this much I did.

As long as you were a woman, you had a price in this world.

Courtesans had the price of courtesans. The female dependents of implicated officials had the price of female dependents.

Either way, it was all a sale.

If you did not want to end up being sold, then all you could do was…

I thought of the Grand Princess, and for once, my expression softened for a fleeting instant.

Do not disappoint me. Do not let my hopes come to nothing, Li Zuiwan.

Only after the bailiffs had counted the silver and confirmed the amount was correct did the man in charge force out a smile.

“The authorities will send men to inspect the place at regular intervals. First, to see whether the people are still here and whether anyone has run away. Second, to collect the Gold Flower Tax on the sale.”

“Very well.” I nodded and saw the bailiffs out.

No sooner had they left than Ah Rong came over curiously. “What is the Gold Flower Tax?”

“By the laws of the dynasty, half of the money paid to buy an official courtesan must be turned over to the inner court. In other words, for every two taels of silver paid, one tael goes to the palace.”

I explained it calmly.

“Why do we not have that? What does the palace need so much silver for?”

It was Ah Rong’s first time hearing of the Gold Flower Tax, and her eyes widened in surprise.

“Actually, the two of us have to pay the Gold Flower Tax as well. It is just that Yujing Tower pays it to the authorities on our behalf. One part out of ten.”

I patted Ah Rong gently on the arm.

Who would ever complain about having too much money?

It was fortunate mosquitoes had no fat on their legs. Otherwise, even the mosquitoes in the capital would have been scraped clean.

“The ladies in the palace need money for new clothes, hairpins, rouge, powders, and all the rest. That money comes from here.”

Ah Rong still wanted to ask more, but I cut her off gently.

“You have had a hard time serving that old dog these past few days. I have already had a maid send over some nourishing tonic. Remember to drink it.”

After sending Ah Rong away, I finally looked at Madam Zhao and Miss Zhao, who were sprawled on the floor in a miserable state.

Ignoring the trembling Miss Zhao, I studied Madam Zhao instead. “Madam, it has been a long time.”

Madam Zhao’s face shifted from livid to deathly pale, her teeth chattering. “Now that I have fallen into a place like this, my only choice is death!”

What noble, righteous words.

That ringing declaration almost lit up the whole of Yujing Tower.

“Of course. Then, Madam, please go to your death.” With perfect seriousness, I took out a strip of white silk and handed it to her.

Then I added, “It was two hundred and sixty taels of fine silver. If Madam dies, then I will have no choice but to have Miss Zhao earn it back.”

Madam Zhao understood what I meant, and her whole body began to shake.

“The former manager of Yujing Tower was very fond of forcing decent women into prostitution. Whenever she saw a pretty young wife or maiden on the street, she would set up a trap to lure their fathers or brothers into gambling. Once those men lost money, they could only sell whatever could be sold at home. When there was nothing valuable left, they sold the women of the family. Well, in their eyes, women were nothing more than goods anyway… That was how Ah Rong came to Yujing Tower.”

I reached out and adjusted the wick of the oil lamp.

Miss Zhao was only fourteen or fifteen. Though she feared me somewhat, she still had more of a young girl’s natural hot blood than anything else.

“What a terrible woman,” she said, only realizing after the words left her mouth that she had misspoken. She hid behind her mother and looked at me.

“Yes. So after I took over, I made that manager lie in the back courtyard and receive customers for one copper coin each.”

I paid no mind to Miss Zhao’s little movement. I merely smiled.

“She tried to kill herself too. The first time, she failed to hang herself, so I had both her arms cut off.”

“The second time, she bit her tongue, but she still did not die, so I simply had her tongue cut out as well.”

“The third time, she tried to smash her head against a pillar, but she was discovered again. So I cut off both her legs.”

“She is still in the back courtyard now. Would Madam Zhao like to go have a look?”

When she saw that I truly meant to have a maid drag her away, the dignity Madam Zhao had been struggling to maintain vanished.

“You… what exactly do you want?”

I looked at her coldly. “Choose for yourself. Either you stay at Yujing Tower, and your daughter takes a drug that will make her appear dead before assuming a new identity. From then on, she will be a student at the Grand Princess’s academy. Or you can die. But you had better die cleanly. Otherwise, I cannot promise what I will do to you, and your daughter will have to repay me those two hundred and sixty taels of fine silver in your place.”

Madam Zhao hesitated for a long time. In the end, she chose the former.

When the people from the women’s academy came to take Miss Zhao away, the girl suddenly asked me a question out of nowhere.

“Lei Niangzi, why would the noble people in the palace establish a law as unreasonable as the Gold Flower Tax?”

Them? They were all tyrants, enemies of the people.

Women like us who spread our legs and became whores were ten, a hundred times cleaner than those tyrants and traitors.

“Because they are the ones above us,” I answered Miss Zhao without the slightest hesitation. “Those above have the power to make every rule and manipulate everyone’s life.”

“Study hard. The Grand Princess intends to establish the Women’s Imperial Examination. If you pass, you will have the power to make some of the rules…”

“I don’t know how much that power can achieve, but at the very least, getting your mother out of Yujing Tower won’t be a problem.”

Miss Zhao nodded, bowed deeply to her mother, and left Yujing Tower.

The moment the little girl was gone, I called Ah Rong over. “Go on. Slap her.”

Ah Rong hesitated for a long time, but in the end, she swung her arm wide and landed a slap across Madam Zhao’s face.

That day, Madam Zhao had slapped Ah Rong. Today, I made the decision to let Ah Rong slap her back.

Now they were even.

I had been about to order a maid to escort Madam Zhao, whose hair had been knocked loose by the blow, back to her room when a question suddenly occurred to me. “What should I call you?”

“They all call me Madam Zhao, or Madam Zhao, née Liu,” Madam Zhao murmured.

“Your dead wretch of a husband caused you to fall into a place of pleasure, and you still want to take his surname?” I said with a sneer.

Madam Zhao was silent for a long time before she spoke softly. “My surname is Liu. My courtesy name is Fengxian. No one has called me that in many years.”

As an official’s wife, she was not even worthy of having her own name mentioned.

As a whore, she could keep her original name.

This world was truly too interesting. So interesting I almost wanted to laugh out loud.

“Take Feng Niang back,” I said, having the maid escort Liu Fengxian away.

Only after Liu Fengxian’s figure vanished at the end of the long corridor did Ah Rong ask me with a horrified look on her face,

“Did you really chop off Bitao’s limbs and put her in the rear courtyard to receive customers? I pass by the rear courtyard every day. How come I’ve never seen her?”

Bitao was Yujing Tower’s former manager.

She was also the prop I had used to frighten Liu Fengxian.

“Eavesdropping?” I looked at Ah Rong with a beaming smile.

Ah Rong widened her eyes and looked at me innocently. “Xiao Chun, you’re a magnanimous person! How could you possibly scold me over such a tiny little thing?”

Of course I would not truly quarrel with Ah Rong over something so minor.

If there was anyone in this world who had truly treated me well, then aside from my mother, there was only her.

But I, Lei Jingchun, was a whore. If a whore exposed her true feelings and let someone get hold of them, she would not be far from death.

So I pinched Ah Rong’s cheek, neither too lightly nor too hard.

Mm. This girl had been washing her face with floral dew lately, and it seemed to be working rather well. The feel was no worse than tender tofu from the west side of the city.

“It’s normal that you couldn’t see Bitao, because I made all that up to scare Feng Niang.”

I helped myself to Ah Rong’s cheek with perfect confidence.

Then, in my heart, I silently added another sentence.

Right after I killed that dead husband of yours who sold you, I went to the woodshed and killed Bitao, who had been locked up there.

Burying one corpse was burying. Burying two corpses was also burying. Since I was already at it, why not simply kill one more person?

It saved trouble, didn’t it?

“Oh, so that’s how it is.” Ah Rong nodded. “Feng Niang is so pitiful. We have the Grand Princess backing us, and we aren’t short on money. Why don’t you show some kindness and let her go, Xiao Chun?”

She was always so kindhearted.

Madam Zhao had slapped her once before, and yet she had already cast it out of her mind.

“She is useful.” I did not explain further. I only refused Ah Rong.

Of course Liu Fengxian was useful. Before she married, when she was still young, she had a childhood sweetheart.

And this sweetheart happened to come from the Lei Family of the imperial capital.

He was a collateral clansman of Chancellor Lei, my biological father.

Of course, aside from my private grudge, there was another reason.

Chancellor Lei’s students and old subordinates filled the entire court. Only by bringing him down would the Grand Princess’s path become smooth.

The bait had already been set.

When would the fish bite?