Chapter 170
Chapter 170
Zhou Wanting tightened her grip on her handkerchief and forced her expression to settle.
She rose and turned to Xiao Lan.
“Uncle Xiao, I know this woman, and she has ties to the Zhou Family. Would you allow me to take her away?”
Xiao Lan was exceptionally shrewd. Besides, he had already heard Jin Bao say that the woman was Zhou Wanting’s younger sister.
Now Zhou Wanting merely claimed to know her. She was clearly trying to conceal the truth.
But this was the Zhou Family’s affair and had nothing to do with the Xiao Family.
The two families had always maintained a good relationship, so Xiao Lan did not make things difficult for her. He nodded.
“Very well. Take her away at once. As for this man, he appeared here under suspicious circumstances. I cannot allow you to take him, Miss Zhou. He will remain with us.”
Zhou Wanting glanced at the man on the floor. Someone had covered his body with clothing, but she did not recognize him.
Her mind was in chaos. How had her fifth sister, a sheltered young lady, come to know this strange man? Worse, she had been violated in an inn.
Zhou Wanting could not deal with anything else now. She had to take her sister home first.
After such a scandal, she had no heart to continue investigating the Star Maiden. She summoned her attendants, had them dress Zhou Wanyi, then covered the girl’s face with a handkerchief and took her away.
Xiao Lan ordered his men to bring the still-unconscious man back to the Xiao residence.
Jin Bao pointed toward a woman in the crowd outside.
“Uncle Xiao, that woman is bad too. Catch her!”
Seeing that the scheme had been exposed, Chen Shuhan’s maid tried to flee. Jin Bao spotted her immediately, and Xiao Lan had her seized as well.
After Zhou Wanting bid farewell to Miss Xiao, she boarded her carriage and headed home.
Partway there, Zhou Sheng climbed into the carriage. His expression was so dark it seemed water might drip from it.
“Father, when your daughter entered the room, Fifth Sister had already been violated. The Xiao Family took the man away. There is nothing we can do but swallow this injustice in silence.”
Zhou Sheng looked at the still-unconscious Zhou Wanyi and slapped her across the face.
The pain jolted Zhou Wanyi awake. She sat up in a panic.
She stared around in confusion, then became aware of discomfort throughout her body, especially a stinging pain between her legs.
Her last memory was of drinking tea and chatting with Young Master Chen in the inn room. After that, she remembered nothing.
When she recognized the two people seated before her, panic surged through her.
Guiltily, she shrank backward. What frightened her even more was that she had somehow ended up inside a carriage.
How had she gotten here?
Zhou Wanyi lightly touched her cheek. It stung. Someone had clearly struck her.
Then she saw the ice in Zhou Sheng’s eyes and immediately understood where the slap had come from.
She could hardly believe it. Her father had always doted on her. She was the daughter born late in his life, and everyone in the Zhou Family indulged her. From childhood until now, her father had never laid a finger on her.
Why had he hit her? Simply because she had secretly met a man?
But had they not driven her to it?
Her father was the one who played favorites. She wanted to prove that she, too, could benefit the Zhou Family through the family she married into.
Deathly silence filled the carriage, broken only by the creak of its wheels rolling over the yellow earth.
After a long while, Zhou Wanting finally tried to mediate.
“Father, Fifth Sister is young. She may have been deceived. The most urgent thing is to learn who that man is. He is now in the Xiao Family’s hands. If they learn something from him before we do, we will be placed at a disadvantage.”
Zhou Wanting was remarkably calm. She had never regarded her own sisters as rivals competing for affection. In her view, only a powerful Zhou Family could give her secure footing in her husband’s home and prevent its members from mistreating her.
After Qi Sihai’s betrayal, she understood that more clearly than ever. Her maiden family had to become stronger. She could always marry into another family, but she would only ever have one maiden family.
Anything that harmed the Zhou Family was an obstacle to its rise and had to be removed as quickly as possible.
Zhou Sheng slowly closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he looked at Zhou Wanyi.
“Speak. Who was that man? How did you become entangled with him? You are the sheltered daughter of a great family, and you have not even come of age, yet you have already lost your chastity. If word spreads, you might as well slit your throat. The Zhou Family cannot bear such disgrace.”
Zhou Wanyi felt as though the sky had collapsed. She understood every word her father spoke, yet strung together, they made no sense. She had lost her chastity?
How could she not know?
Her thoughts were a churning mess. She clutched the collar of her clothes, all too aware of the unfamiliar sensations in her body. No wonder…
“Father, your daughter truly does not know how this happened.”
Zhou Wanyi no longer dared conceal anything. She recounted everything that had happened over the past two days, beginning with the moment she met the maid. When she finished, she took out the jade pendant and handed it to Zhou Sheng.
“Father, I truly did not know Young Master Chen was a swindler. What am I supposed to do now?”
For all her arrogance, Zhou Wanyi was still a young girl who had not yet come of age. This sudden ordeal had left her completely lost. Her mother was not beside her, and she did not know whom else to ask for help. She was like duckweed adrift on water, or a fallen leaf carried by the wind.
Zhou Sheng held the jade pendant and frowned deeply. It seemed the entire affair had been a trap from beginning to end. If someone had set such a trap, they must want something. But his daughter had been so foolish that the man had violated her before she could even uncover his full intentions.
The thought that this man had targeted the Zhou Family to gain access to the Star Maiden filled Zhou Sheng with irritation. He had come today to investigate the Star Maiden. Instead, he was returning empty-handed after losing a daughter to scandal.
“Father, today’s trip was not entirely wasted. I learned quite a bit about the Star Maiden from Miss Xiao.”
Zhou Sheng’s tightly furrowed brow finally relaxed. At least he still had this second daughter.
“Wanting, quickly tell Father. Are the stories about the Star Maiden’s abilities true?”
Zhou Wanting gave him a concise account of everything she had heard about Jin Bao.
Zhou Sheng was delighted.
“Then the Star Maiden’s powers truly are real. It is time for our family to act.”
He immediately ordered the driver to increase their speed. While the Star Maiden remained a guest of the Xiao Family, he had to form an alliance with her. The Zhou Family controlled all the salt ponds in the Northern Frontier. If the Star Maiden harbored great ambitions, she could not bypass them. He needed to return home and devise an offer impressive enough to satisfy her.
As for Prince Cheng…
War raged everywhere, and Prince Cheng’s forces were consuming enormous resources. He might not endure to the end. By contrast, the Star Maiden was established in a peaceful corner of the Northern Frontier. Under her, the region was certain to prosper one day.
Zhou Sheng was an old fox indeed. Others looked five years ahead, while he looked ten.
Back at the Xiao residence, Xiao Lan dismissed the servants after bringing Chen Shuhan and his maid inside. Only members of the Xiao Family, Xiao Che, and Jin Bao remained.
“Bring a bucket of cold water and wake him.”
The bucket was poured over Chen Shuhan, and he immediately regained consciousness.
His head felt as though a heavy object had rolled over it and was about to explode.
Jin Bao secretly covered her mouth and giggled.
When she burst into the inn room, she had found the man lying on top of that big sister and bullying her. He had climbed onto the bed without even removing his shoes. Jin Bao swung her little fist and knocked him unconscious.
Her tiny fist might look soft, but a single blow carried tremendous force. If she truly struck to kill, she could smash a person’s skull apart.
She had shown mercy and merely knocked him out.
Even so, Chen Shuhan felt an egg-sized lump swelling on his head.
At the time, he had sensed something crash through the door from outside, frightening him so badly that his body nearly failed him. Then a blur attacked.
He remembered nothing after that. The next thing he knew, he was waking up here.
Only when he saw the hall filled with people did he realize he had been captured.
He climbed to his feet and saw his maid kneeling nearby.
“Xing’er, where are we? What happened? Didn’t I tell you to guard the door?”
Xing’er did not dare answer. She kept her head bowed without making a sound. This was Xiao Family territory. They had no chance of resisting here. It seemed both of them were doomed this time.
“Young Master Chen, why did you appear at an inn in Baishui Town and seduce a respectable woman? Do you realize that violating a respectable woman is a serious crime here?”
Xiao Lan’s tone remained relatively mild. Until he confirmed the man’s identity, he had no intention of openly turning hostile.
Chen Shuhan studied Xiao Lan and immediately understood that this was the Xiao Family’s head. He had heard that Xiao Lan had already broken with Prince Cheng. Chen Shuhan had come to Baishui Town precisely to turn members of the Xiao Family and bring them into Prince Cheng’s service.
He also intended to marry the Zhou Family’s legitimate daughter and forge an alliance with the family. But his inquiries had revealed that the Zhou Family did not intend to ally by marriage with the Chen Family. That was why he had resorted to such a filthy method to take Zhou Wanyi’s virginity.
As the saying went, flies did not settle on uncracked eggs. Zhou Wanyi was hardly a good person herself, or she would never have trusted him for such petty benefits.
Women like Zhou Wanyi could be found everywhere in the Capital. He had never truly desired her.
Chen Shuhan would never expose Prince Cheng, so he had no choice but to invent an explanation.
For others to believe him, his lie had to be half true.
“I am the second legitimate son of the Chen Family’s count’s household in the Capital, and I conduct business in the Northern Frontier year-round. As for your accusation that I seduced a respectable woman, Family Head Xiao, what evidence do you have? Our feelings for each other were mutual.”
Xiao Lan truly had no evidence. The Zhou Family had already taken its daughter away, and he could hardly confront them at their home and damage their reputation.
The Eight Great Families of the Northern Frontier were bound together. When one prospered, they all prospered. If Xiao Lan protected the Zhou Family now, it would remember the favor and repay the Xiao Family.
But from what Xiao Lan knew of the Zhou Family, it would never permit a daughter to lose her virginity before marriage. Moreover, as far as he knew, the only Zhou daughter currently of marriageable age was the child born late in the family head’s life, Zhou Wanyi.
And Zhou Wanyi had not even come of age. This man surnamed Chen was an animal, scheming against a girl so young.
Yet if Chen Shuhan refused to speak, there truly seemed little they could do to him.
Just then, a physician entered with a medicine case, following Miss Xiao.
“Father, I can prove that this man surnamed Chen deliberately plotted against a respectable woman.
“These ashes were collected from the inn room. The physician examined them and confirmed that they came from aphrodisiac incense.
“I also found Datura pollen in one of the teacups. It is a primary ingredient in sedatives.
“This proves the man first drugged the woman unconscious and then raped her. He took two separate precautions to ensure his scheme succeeded. His intentions were despicable, Father. You must not spare him.”
The physician who had accompanied her confirmed both findings on the spot.
The evidence was conclusive, leaving Chen Shuhan with nothing to say.
But he trusted in his status as a member of the Chen Family. Even after committing a crime, he did not believe Xiao Lan would dare do anything to him.