An ugly girl starts off, then becomes a beauty

Two days after Dai Chengjun came, Ban Le also took the initiative to come to the Marquis' Mansion. She also politely handed in a letter of greeting on the first day. Sang Ling had already made preparations to welcome her.

That morning, he was waiting at the door as usual. When he saw her bringing her daughter, he was overjoyed. He walked past the front hall of Jingsi Ju and went straight into Wuyuan, where he sat down in the child's room to talk.

The daughters of both sides were about the same age, and because girls are generally precocious, the one-year-old child could already utter quite a few words. When the younger daughter met for the first time, the adults on both sides hugged each other and looked at each other, and they even recited a few incomprehensible words as if they were having a conversation.

All the masters and servants in the room were laughing. Old Mrs. Cheng laughed so hard that she fell backwards and almost fell down. Fortunately, a few younger people caught her, otherwise the room would have become lively again.

"The little baby is really interesting and lovable." said Old Mother Cheng. Ban Le couldn't help but pinch Le Yile's face and said to Sang Ling, "Your baby is really fat, how did you raise him?"

"It's still the wet nurse's milk that feeds her." Sang Ling replied, "How can I have the time to feed her? The wet nurses and old ladies at home take care of her eating, drinking, defecating and urinating. When we went to the south, it was also the child's grandmother who took care of her. I treated her badly."

"Does she love you?" Ban Le asked. Sang Ling held Le Yile in his arms and looked at his daughter for a while, his eyes full of love. "It's strange, she's always close to me and sticks to me, but not to her father."

"It's the same with our Niu Niu." Ban Le responded with a smile.

Since she entered the mansion and sat down, the Ban family's daughter has been smiling all the time. It is rare for Sang Ling to see such a smile on her face, and her depressed mood has improved a lot. "I can't teach her as much as you do. I can only let her learn to speak when I see her. I don't expect that she still can't learn as much as your family."

Now Niu Niu can talk more than Le Yile, and her actions are also more generous. The first time she came back, she ran around with her legs stretched out, causing Ban Le to chase her several times. In comparison, Le Yile was much more gentle and just sat there looking at her.

"My Niuniu is always noisy. I have suffered a lot to take care of her." Although Ban Le sighed, the happiness in her eyes was obvious. She looked at Niuniu lovingly and said, "I just want her to be happy every day and not have to be like me in the future."

Although the Ban family's daughter still had a smile on her face, her tone at the end of her words was a little lonely. Sang Ling looked away and said softly, "Dai Chengjun came to me two days ago and told me that the three of us could run the store together. She said you agreed too."

After he finished speaking, he only heard an imperceptible "hmm" from the other side, as if he didn't have much confidence either.

Sang Ling's mind immediately conjectured many possibilities, and finally concluded that Ban Le still did not have the courage to take this step. He used a bamboo stick to move the preserved plums on the plate, and pretended to say casually, "Last month, Nie Ce came back and said that Prince Xun was reported by someone. Are you okay at home?"

Who would have thought that Ban Le would be more indifferent than she expected when talking about this matter, and even revealed a hint of sarcasm, "It's good. If it wasn't good, how could I bring my daughter out?" She picked up a plum and put it in her mouth, chewing it carefully, "His cousin is probably dead, and is still imprisoned in Yongxiang. Her parents and several uncles were afraid of getting into trouble, so they took the younger generation to hide in their hometown. He became an official in the court, so he had to be confined at home, and he was always in the ancestral temple. I couldn't see him on weekdays."

That's it. Sang Ling was actually quite interested at this moment, so she picked up the dried plum and put it in her mouth. She immediately tasted a sweet and sour taste and couldn't help swallowing it. She became more energetic. She licked her lips and lowered her voice, "What on earth did his cousin commit?"

It was obvious that he was asked about something obscure. Ban Le came closer and covered his mouth with his hand. "I heard that he committed adultery with a concubine in the harem, and the woman got pregnant."

"He's not the emperor's—" Sang Ling's eyes were like torches, and he didn't know why he was excited. "He's popular with both men and women?"

"Isn't the emperor also..." Ban Le was bolder than her. He only said half of the sentence, looked her up and down, and spoke the rest of the words to her with his eyes.

So gossiping is really a good way to liven up the atmosphere. The resentful aura of the Ban family's daughter is no longer visible. She has regained some of the liveliness she had when she was in school. Sang Ling suppressed his smile and sighed helplessly, "This matter is really a mess."

"There are many more messy things." Ban Le didn't care. "Now I have to take care of Niuniu, so I don't have time to find out about those things. Otherwise, according to the past, I can tell you about them for three days and three nights without repeating myself."

Sang Ling couldn't help laughing, "Please don't. I've been listening to all these rumors in Beijing for three days and three nights. My ears are callused."

"How?" Ban Le asked curiously.

"At that time, we were on a boat to the south. It was boring along the way and we were looking for something to kill time. Ling Zhen talked to me about it for several nights."

The daughter of the Ban family smiled when she heard this. "She is the one with the least time among us now. She must know much more than me. Who knows how many strange stories I can hear from her. I want to go and listen to them."

"How about that..." Sang Ling refilled her ear cup with fruit juice and said with a smile, "Come to our mansion in a few days, call Ling Zhen, and the three of us will chat in the back yard. You may not know that we have a second yard there, and we have arranged for maids to live there. In the future, the three of us can live there occasionally. We can leave our husband's family behind and have our own little house. Wouldn't it be more free?"

This was a hidden message, how could Ban Le not hear it? After all, they were doing it for her own good, so she was of course happy about it, but she thought about the situation at home - although her parents-in-law had gone back to their hometown, there were still a few aunts and old women in the garden, and they would definitely be scolded for coming in and out frequently...

The Ban family's daughter took a deep breath, nodded and smiled, "Okay, then you can send someone to the East Marquis Mansion to call me."