Qingyu Case: Female Minister of Dali Temple

After muttering a few words, "It's okay to be busy, but you have to put your health first in everything you do," Chan Yi went out to ask Fu Jiu to bring breakfast.

While Fu Jiu brought breakfast over, Chen Shao continued to ask Quan Shuyu, "What do the girls in your room say? Are they willing to help out at the pharmacy?"

"I was just about to tell you about this," Quan Shuyu put down the account book in her hand and frowned slightly. "They don't want to go to the pharmacy. The main reason is that there are too many people in the pharmacy and it's hard for them to adapt. I also asked them what kind of place they wanted to go. Although they hesitated and couldn't explain it clearly, from what they said, they probably wanted to go to an embroidery workshop or something like that."

They were locked up in a dark room by Luo Jian and Luo Zhong, and were humiliated all day long. It is not difficult to understand why they were afraid to face the complicated comings and goings of people. Chen Shao pondered for a moment and then asked, "What are their names? How did they get locked up in Luo Jian and Luo Zhong's house? Have you asked them?"

Quan Shuyu looked at the roster in her hand. "Wang Su, Song Lingyi, Zheng Hua, Xu Chengmei, they are all relatively young. The oldest, Xu Chengmei, is only seventeen, and the youngest, Song Lingyi, is only thirteen. All four of them were sold or given to Li Hong by their brothers in the first two or three months of the year in order to get into the academy. Then they were transferred to Lu Yuanfei, and then picked by Luo Jian and Luo Zhong and brought back home."

Chen Shao flipped through the roster to the first few months of the year, found the names of several people one by one, and then found the names of the brothers who betrayed them from the notes behind their names. Then he checked the list of students who were arrested and saw that the brothers of several people were on the list, and asked again: "Do they know that the brothers who betrayed them have been detained?"

Quan Shuyu replied, "Chan Yi told them."

Chen Shao asked casually: "What are their reactions?"

Quan Shuyu hesitated for a moment, and her eyebrows couldn't help but twisted into a ball. "Song Lingyi and Zheng Hua are fine. They have always been resentful of their brother for betraying them. Wang Su and Xu Chengmei, especially Xu Chengmei, often ask me about her brother's recent situation. When they learned that the young master asked them to fight for the corpses, they both seemed a little reluctant."

Chan Yi sneered, "When their brothers betrayed them, they didn't show any mercy!"

Quan Shuyu sighed and said, "Xu Chengmei said that her brother was also forced to do so. Although Wang Su didn't say it so bluntly, the meaning was similar."

Chan Yi laughed angrily: "They are forced to do something, right? I will tell them now that no matter how forced their brothers are, if they do something like this, they will only be sentenced to death!"

"Stop!" Chen Shao called her and then asked Quan Shuyu, "Do they all know how to embroider?"

Speaking of this, Quan Shuyu couldn't help but laugh: "They all can do it. Song Lingyi's embroidery level is not low, but Zheng Hua is the most outstanding."

As he spoke, he took off the crabapple flower hairpin from his bun and handed it to her, saying, "This crabapple flower was made by Zheng Hua's skillful hands."

Chen Shao took the hairpin and was surprised to find that it was a silk crabapple. Looking at the delicate and soft petals, Chen Shao couldn't help but touch them with his fingertips and exclaimed: "This craftsmanship is really amazing."

Chan Yi took off her own jasmine hairpin and said, "She also made this one of mine. When she gave it to me two days ago, I thought it was real. I didn't expect that she made it out of silk gauze. It looks exactly like the real thing."

Chen Shao also took her jasmine hairpin and observed it carefully for a moment and said: "Not only is her hands skillful, but her mind is also skillful."

"You were busy the past two days, so I didn't tell you. Now that we're talking about this, do you still remember Cheng Erya from Zhougong Village?" Chan Yi said with a smile, "You promised Cheng Erya earlier that you would hire a silk flower master for her. I think we don't need to hire another one. How about letting Zheng Hua teach her?"

"She probably can't teach." Quan Shuyu shook his head and said, "Among the four, she is the one who is least willing to go to the medicine shop and the least willing to see outsiders. Look at the other three, when there is a little movement in the yard, no matter how scared they are, they will hide in the window and look out, but she never joins in the fun. Asking her to leave the prefectural government to teach people how to make silk flowers will probably make her more uncomfortable than killing her."

"That's true." Chan Yi nodded. "She barely speaks a few words every day. She either sits alone in a daze, or makes silk flowers, or follows the maids we hired to clean and sweep. It's really difficult for her to teach Erya."

Listening to their descriptions, Chen Shao frowned slightly, "How does she eat every day?"

Quan Shuyu lamented, "She doesn't eat much, and I tried to comfort her several times, but it was useless."

Chen Shao looked at Chan Yi.

Chan Yi said, "She was depressed and I prescribed some medicine for her. She took it, but it didn't work."

This is a sign of despair, and the situation is very serious. Chen Shao did not dare to delay and ordered Quan Shuyu: "Go back and see if she is awake. If she is awake, bring her here and I will talk to her."

He then instructed Chan Yi, "Go and bring over some of the snacks that the Crown Princess sent me, and make another pot of new tea."

Chan Yi quickly brought over the snacks and new tea and set them aside.

Chen Shao closed the roster in his hand and motioned to her, "Wait for her to come over. You and Quan Shuyu wait outside."

Cicada shell is good.

Zheng Hua was sixteen years old, of medium height, and pretty, but her expression was dull, and her eyes were ashen. She followed behind Quan Shuyu like a walking corpse. After entering the study, she didn't look around curiously, but knelt on the ground woodenly, lowered her head, and quietly waited for her fate.

After Chan Yi pulled Quan Shuyu out, Chen Shao said gently, "Get up."

Zheng Hua stood up obediently, but still kept his head down.

Chen Shao saw that she was like a puppet without consciousness, so he said, "Sit down."

Zheng Hua came forward obediently and sat on the stool where Quan Shuyu was looking at the account books.

Chen Shao continued: "Try some snacks."

Zheng Hua picked up a piece of dessert and took a small bite. Knowing that she couldn't taste it, Chen Shao still asked, "How is it?"

Zheng Hua swallowed the snack in his mouth and nodded, "It's delicious."

Chen Shao smiled and said, "This is the cloud cake from Baiweizhai, the best pastry shop in Beijing."

Thinking that she was being asked to taste the poison, Zheng Hua froze for a moment, then suddenly looked up at her. Chen Shao smiled and picked up the crabapple and jasmine silk flowers she had made for Quan Shuyu and Chanyi, "Did you make this?"

Zheng Hua nodded: "Yes."

"Well done." Chen Shao said with a smile, "At first I thought it was a real flower."

Zheng Hua's body froze again, and then he said woodenly: "If you like it, I can make a few for you later."

"Okay." Chen Shao agreed at first, then said with difficulty, "But I'm a man, and wearing flowers will inevitably make people laugh. Can you make the silk flowers look like this?"

Zheng Hua looked in the direction of her finger. On the corner of the desk stood a sketched white porcelain vase with a few crabapple branches in it. Perhaps because they were only recently inserted, the branches were still very fresh.

"These are the branches that Chan Yi cut from the garden. The weather is hot, so they have to be changed almost every day." Chen Shao said, "If we change these branches into silk flowers, we don't have to change them every day, and they can stay fresh all the time. Isn't it killing two birds with one stone?"

Zheng Hua replied, "Then I will make a few more flowers for you to use."

"Then I'll trouble you." Chen Shao deliberately hesitated for a moment before continuing, "I have two more requests."

Zheng Hua obviously didn't expect her to be so polite, and said anxiously, "My Lord, please tell me what you want to say."

"It's like this," Chen Shao sighed, "I promised Cheng Erya from Zhougong Village earlier that I would hire a master who can make silk flowers for her, but I have been looking for a long time recently and haven't found a satisfactory person. Today I saw the silk flowers you made and I like them very much. I wonder if you can teach her for me. I know that Zhougong Village is quite far from the prefectural government, and it is somewhat inconvenient to go back and forth every day. What I thought was that if you can teach her, I will send someone to pick her up and let her live and eat with you temporarily. The only troublesome thing is that Cheng Erya is only five or six years old, and you may have to take care of her while you teach her to make silk flowers."

When Zheng Hua heard that she was going to teach someone how to make silk flowers, her face turned pale. Then, when she heard that the person would be taken to the governor's mansion and that the child was only five or six years old, she immediately felt relieved and said, "I can teach her and take care of her."

Chen Shaosong said quickly: "Really?"

Zheng Hua seemed to sense her joy, and he pursed his lips slightly, and couldn't help but smile and said, "Yeah."

"Great." Chen Shao couldn't wait to shout outside, "Chan Yi, ask Fu Jiu to bring Cheng Erya to the governor's mansion immediately!"

Chan Yi was also a smart person. After answering "yes" loudly, she quickly went to the yard to call Fu Jiu down from the tree and whispered, "When you pick her up, first ask Cheng Erya's parents and grandparents if they are willing to take her back. Do you hear me?"

After Fu Jiu left, Chan Yi came back and said at the door, "Master, Fu Jiu has already left."

Hearing their undisguised happiness, Zheng Hua's wooden expression slightly softened. Chen Shao couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief when he saw this. Zheng Hua's biggest knot was not actually being betrayed by her brothers, but self-denial. She had such a beautiful handicraft of making silk flowers, and she must have relied on it to supplement the family income when she was at home. Despite this, her parents and brothers abandoned her without hesitation, which made her hate them, and she kept asking herself if she hadn't worked hard enough, which made them treat her like this? If she had worked harder, would she not have been abandoned? For her mentality, words of comfort were basically useless.

How many people don’t understand this truth?

It's just because you can't accept the result that you deny yourself again and again, assume a path that you haven't taken, and imagine different answers.

For people with this mentality, the best way to deal with them is to rebuild their self-confidence.

It’s just that self-confidence can collapse in an instant, but rebuilding it is a long process.

What Chen Shao lacked was time. However, seeing how she relaxed so quickly, she must be longing for a new life. After thinking for a while, Chen Shao decided to take a big chance: "Besides crabapple and jasmine, can you be any other flower?"

"Basically all flowers can be made into this," Zheng Hua's face suddenly darkened as he said this. After a while, he said dryly, "But they can't be sold for much money."

Chen Shao automatically ignored the second half of her sentence, "In that case, the second thing I want to ask of you is that after the bouquet I want is made, you can help me make some flower hairpins like this. But you can't use wooden hairpins anymore, you have to use gold, silver or jade, and the silk gauze must be made of better materials. The cake you just ate was sent to me by the Crown Princess at full speed. I have been unable to find a suitable return gift. Today, I happened to hear Quan Shuyu and Chan Yi mention that you can make silk flowers, and then I remembered that the Crown Princess also likes silk flowers the most, so I decided to use this as a return gift."

Send the Crown Princess? Zheng Hua was so scared that he suddenly stood up and said, "I..."

"You don't have to do too much. Just follow the Twelve Flower Order and do one for each person." Chen Shao said to himself, "You don't have to feel too much pressure. My return gift is just a token of my appreciation."

Since she had said so much, Zheng Hua, who was not good at saying no, had no choice but to agree.

After watching her return to the east wing, Chan Yi and Quan Shu Yu quickly went into the study. Chan Yi praised, "Young Master is really amazing. I saw that she was lifeless when she came here, but when she left, although her eyebrows were knitted, she was somewhat lively."

Chen Shao instructed Quan Shuyu: "Bring these snacks to her later."

Quan Shuyu echoed, "He is indeed more energetic than when he came."

"She is just a little bit more energetic, and it is still a long way to go before she recovers." Chen Shao gestured to her, "Bring this plate of snacks to her later. Also, have someone buy her any ingredients she needs recently."

After Quan Shuyu agreed, Chen Shao instructed Chan Yi, "I asked her to make a few silk flowers for the Crown Princess. Since they are for the Crown Princess, you can't use wooden hairpins anymore. Go back to the Wen family and bring back the unused jades for her."

Chan Yi smiled and said, "The Crown Princess likes silk flowers the most. Although her craftsmanship is a little immature compared to those old masters in the capital, she is more lively and agile. This should be sent to the Crown Princess. If she wins her favor, she will probably have a bright future."

"Even if she doesn't win the favor of the Crown Princess, she will have enough to eat with her craftsmanship." Chen Shao calmly changed the subject and gave another instruction, "After a few days, when she has almost finished making the bouquet I want, you can discuss asking her to make a few more flower hairpins for you. In short, don't let her have any free time in the next two or three months."

Quan Shuyu's experience was even more difficult than Zheng Hua's. He understood her intention and nodded. Chan Yi followed suit and said, "It's not that simple that the master doesn't want her to be idle. The reason why Cheng Erya wants to learn silk flower making is to make money. When she comes, after she learns from Zheng Hua, let her set up a stall outside to sell the silk flowers she made. Zheng Hua is her master, so how can he not help her?"

"That's a solution." Chen Shao looked at the hairpin in her hand and returned it to them. Zheng Hua has been arranged for the time being, but the other three are still unsettled. Wang Su, Xu Chengmei... that's all. They are willing to sacrifice themselves to support their families. That's their choice, and she has no right to interfere. All she can do is find a temporary place for them to stay. As for whether they can gain a firm foothold, that's their own business. It's just...

The Luo, Wu, Lu, and Wen families have so many shops, so they must have embroidery workshops. But it's easy to open an embroidery workshop, but it's hard to find people to manage it. In addition to not having time, she is also seriously short of people.

Never mind, it’s not something to rush after all. Chen Shao shook his head and turned his gaze to the boxes of evidence of Master Luo again.