The Legend of the Concubine in the Harem

After the national mourning period ended and the emperor personally accompanied Concubine Zhao on a visit to her parents, the capital gradually returned to its former bustle and prosperity.

Tao Er, who was suspended from work for reflection, could not go out, and he also found that his wife suddenly began to dislike him for some reason. After thinking about it for a while and finding that he could not find any reason why he was disliked, he let the matter go - in his opinion, his marriage with Chen Peiluan was just the order of his parents.

At the beginning, it was Chen Peiluan who was desperate to marry into the Mansion of Duke Shen. Her own father and grandfather were unwilling to form an alliance with the Mansion of Duke Shen, but this woman was so aggressive that she ran to the road where the officials were on duty and knelt down... To be honest, even Tao Er himself could not see what was wrong with him that deserved Chen Peiluan to be so contemptuous of her.

He and Chen Peiluan had only met a few times before their marriage, and those were all normal social interactions. There was no private contact between the two. The only time they had contact was probably when they were hunting in the hunting ground in the autumn of a certain year. Chen Peiluan's horse accidentally stepped into a stone pit and sprained her leg. Tao Er happened to pass by and gave his horse to her.

There were only the two of them nearby at the time, plus two followers each, and only two horses. They couldn't just ignore them and let a girl like her and a maid dressed in men's clothes drag the horses back together, right?

Tao Er asked Chen Peiluan to ride his horse back to find someone, while he himself walked slowly down the mountain with his two followers and the horse with an injured leg.

But...isn't this a very normal behavior?

Tao Er was deeply puzzled as to why Chen Peiluan could do that for him later.

He doesn't know her at all!

The only time we were closest was when I helped you this time.

But the two eventually became husband and wife. Chen Peiluan's personality was a little strong, and Tao Er was used to being casual, so Chen Peiluan was in charge of all the affairs at home. Tao Er was initially somewhat shocked by his wife's behavior, but as time went on, he returned to the state of a young master of a mansion who just ate and waited for death.

Although he didn't have a concubine in his room, nor did he keep a mistress, and he didn't get involved with other women when he went out to socialize with his colleagues, to say that he cared that much about his wife Chen Peiluan... in fact, he didn't. For him, marrying a wife was more like finding a housekeeper who would sleep in the same bed with him.

As time went by, Tao Er gradually discovered that there was a huge gap between Chen Peiluan's expectations of him and his own expectations of himself. The two of them had different personalities and their ideas clashed several times. In the end, Chen Peiluan finally became pregnant, and Tao Er felt that he had done his best for her, so he completely let go of his wife and children and went to do things that interested him.

He is the son of a noble family and can easily find a way out of this unhappy marriage, but Chen Peiluan, who has gambled almost everything she originally had for this marriage, is in a dilemma.

She was competitive and strong-willed by nature. After she discovered that the real Tao Er was not the man she had in mind, she became even more unwilling to let outsiders think that she had made a wrong choice in this marriage. She pushed Tao Er even more to make progress, to compete for the position of Duke and for a position in the court, so that she could hold her head up high in the circle of ladies in the inner court.

Looking back at her exhausted past life, Chen Peiluan showed a resentful look towards the study. She took a sip of her cold tea to suppress her anger and asked the nanny, "Have you found the person I asked you to look for earlier?"

She knew that she was indeed not a good person, but the backyard was a battlefield where women fought each other. All she wanted was to secure her position as the mistress of the mansion. It was all because the female official did not enter the backyard, so she could not deal with her on the battlefield she was most familiar with. Otherwise, how could she have allowed her and Tao Er to be so arrogant in her previous life?

Chen Peiluan has been thinking about her past life over and over again these days. She thinks that if she divorces Tao Er now, not only will she not be able to take the child with her, but the child will also become a bargaining chip for the woman who may have come to Beijing and hooked up with Tao Er.

Anyway, without her in the previous life, Tao Er would not be able to hold on to his position as a Duke. In this life, Chen Peiluan had no intention of giving up her honor as the Duke's wife. She refused to divorce him and wanted to firmly hold on to Tao Er's position as his legal wife, so that his "true love" could only bow to her and become a lowly concubine!

They will be disgusted to death!

The maid in front of her had a bitter face. She answered respectfully, "Second Young Master, I have only found two people with similar conditions these days."

"Why are there only two?" Chen Peiluan asked with a frown.

The bitter-faced nanny also felt bitter in her heart and mouth - Chen Peiluan's standards for finding a concubine were really weird. First of all, the girl had to be young and beautiful, but this did not mean beautiful in the way that an ordinary girl looked good. Instead, she had to look heroic enough in men's clothes and bright enough in women's clothes.

Secondly, she also required that the woman must have read books, not just the ordinary four books for women, but the four books, the five classics, poetry, and travel notes... and she couldn't just read them, she had to have her own opinions.

However, how many families in the capital who are able to educate their daughters so carefully would be willing to let their daughters become concubines, and especially concubines who are clearly told to be obedient and never have a chance to make a breakthrough in their lives?

When the bitter-faced nanny heard Chen Peiluan's request, she wished she could turn herself into a bitter gourd on the spot. She took great pains to find two, but Chen Peiluan still felt dissatisfied. However, this nanny was a born slave of the Chen family and was of low status, so even if she had resentment in her heart, she dared not express it.

She put on a smiling face and answered in the words that best matched Chen Peiluan's thoughts: "Second Young Madam, calm down. There are very few educated women who are willing to be concubines... Second Young Madam, the two I found, one of them had a father who was also a minor official, but he accidentally died while serving in an outpost, and she and her mother are the only ones left in her family..."

When the girl's father was alive, she was a treasure in the hands of her parents. Although she was a girl, she was taught and raised like a boy. Later, her father passed away and her mother fell ill. Her grandparents favored her younger uncle's family. In order to pave the way for her younger uncle, they learned that the bitter-faced nanny was looking for a knowledgeable concubine for the son of the Duke's Mansion, so they hurriedly recommended this girl.

"So, her family also holds an official position?" Chen Peiluan frowned and thought about it. On the one hand, she felt that it would be difficult to control a concubine's family if someone was an official. But on the other hand, she thought that the official in this woman's family was her uncle, not her biological father, so she said with relief, "Mammy, find a day to take the invitation from the mansion and ask her to sign the contract and bring it in. Remember to explain the rules of our mansion to her. By the way, what about the other one?"

How can one concubine be enough?

Chen Peiluan thought with some indifference.

Naturally, the more tests of "true love" the better. In the future, when the female official can no longer be an official, she will enter the mansion as a concubine. Only then will this drama be more lively, and the hatred in my heart will be more relieved.

The other woman that Bitter-faced Nanny found was a little different.

"...She is the adopted daughter of a brothel owner in a music house. Although she is a good girl, she has been learning the tricks that nobles like since she was a child. She is proficient in reading, writing, singing and dancing. If she were not still young, I'm afraid she would be a famous courtesan."

The bitter-faced nanny spoke carefully, fearing that she would be angered by Chen Peiluan because of this not-so-innocent candidate. However, Chen Peiluan was stunned at first, then her brows relaxed, and she couldn't suppress her joy and asked: "Oh, is it really from the fireworks field?"

The bitter-faced nanny moved her lips, wanting to argue for herself. Although the girl was kept by a brothel owner, she was actually a clean and decent woman.

However, Chen Peiluan didn't care about this: "Prostitutes are good, but Tao Er is not worthy of harming those girls from honest families... Mammy, go and have a look. Let the brothel owner put her daughter up to entertain guests for a while. After the first one enters the mansion, we can go and buy this one in as well."

"Hehe... She has a lot of knowledge, but when it comes to serving men and pleasing men, how can she compare to prostitutes? Mammy has found a good person. I'll give you 20 taels of silver. Then go to my account and get the money. Let's settle on the one in front first." The more Chen Peiluan thought about it, the happier she became. She felt that the victory in the inner house she was most familiar with was just around the corner. "And take the money for bribing the brothel owner. Don't be stingy with the money."

The bitter-faced nanny's face suddenly stopped being bitter. Chen Peiluan was a strong person, but she was also very generous when spending money. The bitter-faced nanny still looked loyal on the surface, but in her heart she was calculating how much money she could make from this job.

She joyfully quoted a price that was more than four or five times higher to Chen Peiluan's housemaid, and happily took the banknote, took her son with her, left the mansion and headed straight for the home of the fatherless minor official's daughter.

It was not her widowed mother who came forward to finalize the lifelong marriage of the minor official's daughter, but her grandfather and uncle who only had their eyes on the future and money. Hearing their words, they wished they could carry their orphaned granddaughter and niece to the Duke of Shen's mansion in a sedan chair that very day. They even asked for only half of the money for the girl's contract and gave the rest to the bitter-faced nanny, begging her to speak well of their family in front of the nobles in the mansion.

After being flattered, the bitter-faced nanny left the house happily. When she was leaving, she caught a glimpse of a pale girl supporting a sickly-looking woman standing at the moon gate. She didn't pay much attention to it and just got up and was about to leave.

But she didn't expect the two men to catch up with her. The woman pulled her and said, "Mammy, Mammy, please be kind. My daughter has been engaged to my nephew from my mother's family. When her father was alive, he also said that our daughter cannot be a concubine. Mammy..."

The bitter-faced nanny's son stepped forward and tore the woman apart: "Being able to enter the mansion as a concubine is a blessing you will never get in your lifetime, why are you being so pretentious?"

The men in the family also came up and took the mother and daughter back immediately. After her uncle complained to his sister-in-law and niece, he stuffed a handful of silver into the bitter-faced nanny and apologized repeatedly, saying that his family would handle it and would never let the lady of your house down, etc.

The bitter-faced nanny put on a domineering expression, but she was still thinking about the "business" of the brothel owner, so she didn't stay any longer and left quickly with her son.

But when she went out to do her work today, perhaps she forgot to check the almanac, and even greater misfortunes were waiting for the bitter-faced nanny.

I came to the music house and found the brothel owner.

After the bitter-faced nanny told the brothel owner about Chen Peiluan's request, the brothel owner asked in surprise and delight, "Does your wife really not care about my daughter's body being touched by other men?"

After getting the nod of approval from the bitter-faced nanny, the madam laughed even more exaggeratedly: "To be honest, nanny, my daughter is well-behaved by nature, but she has a slightly stubborn temper. No matter what I say to her, she refuses to change her status and register. If it weren't for the fact that she was raised by me since she was a child, I would have...haha, now that you have the promise from your wife, she is just going to entertain a few guests, and she doesn't have to change her status to a lowly humiliation. She can even be a concubine of your nobleman in the future. I'm sure she won't be unwilling this time."

After saying this, he asked someone to find the girl.

The girl was an abandoned orphan, and the brothel owner picked her up and raised her. Because the brothel owner's heart was not as cold-hearted as it is now, she registered the girl under the household registration of an old couple of decent people. However, she was still raised in a music house since she was a child, and became an awkward person wavering between good and bad status. An orphan like her who was raised by a woman of bad status should have been registered as a slave, but the brothel owner's temporary kindness allowed the girl to be barely registered as a decent person after the old couple passed away.

But this situation was not safe. As her adoptive mother, the brothel owner who had raised her could drag her into slavery at any time as long as she was willing to spend money.

The girl took the old couple's surname, Bai, and was originally called Bai Niuniu. Later, the brothel owner disliked the name as vulgar, so she changed it to Bai Queci.

Not long after, the maid who went to look for her came back sweating profusely: "Mom, Queci doesn't want to come."

The madam raised her eyebrows and said, "This poor girl, I have worked so hard to find a good place for her, but she refuses to appreciate it!"

After saying that, she apologized to the bitter-faced nanny. The bitter-faced nanny was not surprised by Bai Queci's reaction, but stood up and went with the brothel owner to persuade her.

Bai Queci lived in a small courtyard next to the music hall. When the brothel owner and the bitter-faced nanny came, she was packing her things to escape. However, the brothel owner came too quickly and blocked them at the door.

"You unfilial daughter!" The brothel owner pointed at Bai Queci and scolded, "What are you doing? Could it be that you are so disobedient to your adoptive mother and refuse to accept the good marriage I found for you? Do you have a lover and want to elope with him?"

She looked around angrily, and finally her eyes fell on a scholar who was dressed simply, had a gentle and elegant appearance, looked like a good woman, and was the closest to her without a servant: "Did you seduce my daughter, you shameless man?!"

Lin Qiao came to a classmate gathering, but she didn't expect to be in a music hall. She wanted to go home under the pretext of being too drunk, but she happened to pass by the scene of the "mother-daughter conflict": "......"