klisemfg Chapter 212 The Righteous Way (1)
Chapter 212 The Righteous Way (1)
The story takes place during the reign of Emperor Renzong of the Northern Song Dynasty, which was demonized. There was a magistrate of Yangzhou named Bai Shiyuan. In his family was an unusual girl named Bai Xingke.
What makes her unusual is that she is a time traveler who traveled from 2010 AD to the Song Dynasty imagined by the creator.
When little girl Bai Xingke was seven years old, she fell seriously ill, and it was this illness that took her life. Coincidentally, at this time, the modern soul Bai Yiyi traveled through time and space to Bai Xingke and survived for the little girl.
Bai Yiyi can be said to be very lucky. Just by traveling back in time to the home of a magistrate of Shangzhou and becoming a girl, she had already won over 99% of the women in the entire society at that time.
But she is also unfortunate, or rather, all the women in this story are unfortunate, because the creator has created an extremely male-loving society that is even more feudal than that of the Ming and Qing dynasties.
Here you can see a series of wonders such as the difference between legitimate and illegitimate children, the difference between men and women, the difference between the master and the concubine (only referring to women), the difference between the superior and the inferior, and the reputation/chastity (for women) being above everything else.
When talking about the difference between legitimate and illegitimate children, we have to talk about the two sisters who are the clients, Bai Fuying and Bai Xingke.
Bai Xingke is the youngest daughter of Bai Shiyuan and his first wife Du Hezhi. She has an older sister and an older brother. Bai Fuying is the daughter of Bai Shiyuan's concubine Lin Wenqing, and she has a younger brother. They also have a younger sister named Bai Weijing. Her biological mother, He Yulin, died during childbirth.
As mentioned before, there is a difference between legitimate and illegitimate children in this story, so in the plot, the eldest lady Du Hezhi and her daughters and sons all look down on the concubine Lin Wenqing and her children, including the modern man Bai Yiyi.
I don't know what kind of education influenced her, but she thought that concubines in ancient times were mistresses, third parties who destroyed other people's families. So since she was born, she has looked down on her half-sisters and half-brothers, especially Lin Wenqing, the "vixen who troubles the family" who competed for her father's favor and caused her mother to be neglected. She thought she was the biggest scourge in the family.
It's not just their family that's like this. All the wives of officials in this world are the same. They all think that concubines are all restless vixens, sinners who lead their beloved husbands astray. They call them "vixens" and "lowly creatures" all the time, and even scold their illegitimate children.
What about Lin Wenqing? She was originally a daughter of an official, but because her father was convicted of corruption and bribery, she became a singing girl.
When Bai Shiyuan came to Beijing from his hometown of Yangzhou to take the imperial examination, he met Lin Wenqing. He was attracted by her beauty and talent, so he redeemed her and reported to the government. Only after obtaining the documents for taking her as a concubine did he take her home.
At this time, Du Hezhi already had two children for Bai Shiyuan. She became very angry after seeing the letter sent back by Bai Shiyuan.
But she had no choice, because the rule of this world was that a good woman must be obedient and never disobey any decision of her husband.
Bai Fuying and Bai Xingke were born almost one after the other. Bai Shiyuan loved Bai Fuying more than his two daughters born to Du He. As for the son, he was the root of the Bai family. Men attach great importance to roots. Therefore, no matter how favored Bai Fuying was, she could never surpass their eldest brother Bai Mingzhou.
Bai Fuying herself was aware of this, so she never competed with Bai Mingzhou, the legitimate son. She only competed with her two sisters.
This was also what her mother Lin Wenqing taught her. She herself had a bad fate. She was a daughter of an official family and became a singing girl. In the end, she could only be someone's concubine. As a result, her children had to be born out of wedlock. She didn't want her children to become someone else's concubine like her, so she taught Bai Fuying to fight for it.
What are they fighting for? What are they fighting for? Of course, they are fighting for the favor and attention of the most powerful person in the family, so that they can marry better in the future.
Don't blame Lin Wenqing for having such an idea. In this kind of weird novel that teaches women to be obedient and follow the rules, marrying into a wealthy family is really the best way out they can think of.
Just like Du Hezhi, even if Bai Shiyuan favors his concubine over his wife and no longer likes his first wife, isn't she still the mistress of this mansion? As a concubine, doesn't she still have to bow and greet him when she sees him?
As a villain, he must have shortcomings. Throughout the entire plot, the biggest "shortcoming" of Lin Bai and her daughter is the word "competition".
Because they fought and harmed the interests of the protagonist, they were labeled as villains.
The creative team's reasons were very sufficient. You are just a concubine, and concubines are servants who can be sold at will. So what qualifications do you, a servant, have to compete with your master?
As for you, a little concubine's daughter, a money-losing piece of shit, how can you have the nerve to challenge the legitimate daughter?
You, the concubines, should kneel down and kneel upright. You should behave yourself and not fight or compete with each other. You should wag your tails and beg for mercy from us, the legitimate faction, and wait for us to be kind enough to give you alms.
The current "concubine" emperor Zhao Zhen: Stop, I have six points I want to say.
There is no way to stop it. Time flies. The three sisters of the Bai family have grown up while fighting openly and secretly. As for why they didn't bring Bai Weijing with them, it was because her biological mother died when she was born, and she was raised by a wet nurse.
This wet nurse was a very obedient person, so she raised Bai Weijing to be even better than her. To put it bluntly, she was introverted and timid, with little sense of presence in the mansion. She usually acted as a background board until the end, when she had her "highlight moment" in life - she was pulled out to act as a tool, and because she was tactful, she got a good marriage, and was pulled out to step on Bai Fuying, who was unhappy in his marriage.
When a girl in the family grows up, it is natural for her to talk about marriage, and thus the funniest and most hypocritical plot in the whole play emerges.
The heroine has a secret meeting with a man from outside her family, and it is so touching, that is true love. The supporting female character has a secret meeting with a man from outside her family, and she has affairs with other men, which ruins the family tradition.
Speaking of this foreign man, we have to talk about our "best man in the world" male protagonist Gu Ji.
The second son of Ningyuan Marquis's family, he has a half-brother. His father, Lord Gu, is a wife-loving person. After his first wife's death, in order to fill the deficit of the Marquis's family and avoid the fate of being stripped of his title, he "had to" marry Sun Lin, the only daughter of the richest man in Jiangnan, who is also Gu Ji's biological mother.
Gu Qingsheng married someone but didn't treat her well. He used other people's money but looked down on her background. He missed his deceased wife every day and ignored Gu Ji's biological mother.
Later, when Gu Ji's biological mother learned the truth, she was so angry that she died during childbirth. Gu Ji lost both his mother and his younger brother.
Afterwards, Lord Gu married Fan Ying, the concubine's sister of his first wife, and he also treated her coldly and was never nice to her.
Then Fan Ying was so angry that he said, "If you are not nice to me, I will ruin your baby."
The older one, Lord Gu, was watching closely, so Fan Ying couldn't do anything and could only torture Gu Ji.
Gu Ji was a "smart" child since he was young. He knew that his father had deceived his mother and killed her and her brother in order to fill the hole in the mansion. His father valued the title the most. Now his father had only two sons, one of whom was a tuberculosis patient and was dying all day long. The family hoped that he would pass on the title, so he followed his father to go against him.
Whatever his father tells him not to do, he insists on doing it.
Moreover, Fan Ying also deliberately indulged him, so Gu Ji began to let himself go, fighting, picking cats and dogs, and often staying in taverns and wine shops. He even kept a singer named Liu Qianniang, whom he loved, as his mistress, and had two children with her.
You ask why you don’t take her home if you really love her?
Because the Marquis' Mansion did not allow Gu Ji to take a concubine before he got married, and Liu Qianniang was of low status, the people in the mansion looked down on her and did not allow her to enter the mansion.
As Gu Ji wished, his reputation really became terrible. He was already in his twenties, but no one in the capital was willing to marry their daughter to him.
But he had a keen eye for talent and recognized Bai Xingke at a young age. He was able to see through her intelligence and sharpness beneath her soft exterior, as well as the fragility and loneliness in her strong character.
The two often met in private and gradually fell in love. Later, when Bai Xingke reached the age of marriage, Gu Ji took advantage of a polo match organized by a marquis's wife to express his love to Bai Xingke.
Bai Xingke's heart was beating fast, but she didn't agree because of the other party's reputation in Beijing. She also knew that based on Gu Ji's shitty reputation, unless Bai Shiyuan's brain was full of shit, there was no way he would agree to this marriage.
So the prodigal Gu Ji turned around and vowed that he would achieve something great, and then he would marry Bai Xingke with a grand ceremony.
Gu Ji’s wet nurse, Qin, no one knows her name. She has always been called Qin or Qin Ma Ma in the plot, so here we call her Qin Ma Ma.
When Nanny Qin saw that the child she raised had finally become successful, she was extremely happy. After learning that it was because Bai Xingke had given her son the motivation to grow up, she praised Bai Xingke to the skies, and then scolded the vixen Liu Qianniang who had "led Gu Ji astray".
Lu Changqing felt that the plot between Gu Ji and Liu Qianniang was very familiar. Isn’t this Emperor Zhenzong of Song and Liu E?
When Zhao Heng first brought Liu E to his house, his wet nurse also disliked Liu E and despised her poor family background. So when Zhao Er asked her why the prince looked so bad, the wet nurse said it was Liu E's fault because she was hanging out with Zhao Heng every day. So Zhao Er was furious and asked Zhao Heng to drive Liu E away.
She had reason to suspect that the author was using Liu Qianniang to allude to Liu E.
Hahaha, it’s so funny, how much must he hate Liu E?
I won’t talk about the story about foot binding in the middle. In the end, Gu Ji joined the army, earned military merits, and came back to propose to Bai Xingke in the Bai Mansion.
Bai Fuying was so angry that she swore that she would marry the prince of the marquisate.
So, at Lin Wenqing's suggestion, he secretly exchanged information with the son of Marquis Huai'en, but Bai Xingke framed him and let Bai Shiyuan catch him on the spot.
After interrogating and learning that this was Lin Wenqing's idea, Bai Shiyuan was furious.
I have said before that the world attaches great importance to reputation, so having a daughter who has an affair with someone means the family tradition is ruined, and the ruin of family tradition means the ruin of my reputation, and the ruin of my reputation means the ruin of my career, so he was so angry that he wanted to beat Lin Wenqing to death.
It was also at this time that Bai Xingke, with the support of the Marquis' Mansion, finally revealed the evil deeds that Lin Wenqing had done. She was afraid that Bai Weijing's biological mother He Yulin would give birth to a son, so she bribed the midwife to kill He Yulin. She originally wanted to kill Bai Weijing as well, but because she was a girl, she let her go.
He wanted to settle both old and new grudges, so he really beat Lin Wenqing half to death, and then sent her to another villa so that she could never return to the Bai Mansion.
In the end, Bai Xingke got married in a grand ceremony, but the Huai'en Marquisate felt that the daughter of a sixth-rank official was not worthy of their beloved prince, and was not satisfied with Bai Fuying as their daughter-in-law. However, since Bai Fuying's reputation had been ruined by the prince, they had no choice but to marry her into the family.
A daughter-in-law who is not favored by her husband's family will definitely have a hard time in her husband's family. Bai Fuying's life after marriage can be said to be a mess.
Not only was she tortured by her mother-in-law every day, but her husband was also a philandering man. Not long after they got married, he slept with one of Bai Fuying's dowry maids.
Bai Fuying quarreled with him, but he said, "No matter how lowly she is, she is better than you who gave her away for free before marriage."
Before Bai Fuying had time to feel sad, she received the news that Lin Wenqing had died. Bai Shiyuan didn't even hold a funeral, let alone tell her where Lin Wenqing was buried.
Bai Fuying had no choice but to look for her younger brother Bai Yuanhan and ask him where Lin Wenqing was buried. However, the ungrateful brother said that he was ashamed to have such a mother and embarrassed to have a sister like her, and asked Bai Fuying not to come to look for him anymore.
The fate of a wicked woman is to be deserted by her friends and relatives, and Bai Fuying achieved it perfectly.
Finally, she gave birth to five daughters in another eight years, fulfilling the author's most vicious curse on women - a salty land where every leg is swung to give birth to a daughter and no sons can be born.
The heroine Bai Xingke went to the marquis's mansion to fight with the stepmother and the concubine. She had clearly made a contribution by delivering the imperial edict, but in the end she gave the credit to her dear husband for the sake of reputation, and became an imperial edict thanks to her husband.
After defeating her concubine and stepmother, she gave birth to four sons, all of whom were promising. Her husband loved her so much that he even stopped riding a mare after marriage.
There were so many things Lu Changqing wanted to curse at, but the mission was more important now, so he went through and took over the body first, and then cursed when he met him later.
As soon as he put it on, Lu Changqing felt his back was wet. He looked down at his clothes. It was crazy to wear three layers of clothes in the hot summer.
Lu Changqing put down the pen in her hand, stood up and went to the inner room to take off her skirt that looked neither like a skirt nor a jacket, and changed into a tube top and a jacket. Just as she came out, she was stopped by Yuan Liu, the maid who served her.
"Third Miss, only the poor people out there dress like this. You are the daughter of the Bai family, you can't go out dressed like this."
Lu Changqing: ???
Isn’t this tube top and jacket the most common way of dressing for women in the Northern Song Dynasty?
Besides, it's summer now. Summers in ancient times were also very hot. If she were to wear three layers of clothes inside and outside like before, she would be so hot that she would die!
Lu Changqing blocked Yuan Liu's hand and said, "It's okay. I'll just dress in the house. It's too hot today and I can't stand it."
"Then I'll go to the lady and get some ice for you."
Lu Changqing waved his hand and decided not to go, otherwise Yuan Liu would be scolded because of him again.
"No, I'm wearing light clothes now. I'm just writing in the room. It's not a problem. You can go and do your thing."
"Okay, then I'll wait outside. If you have anything, just call me." After saying this, Yuan Liu retreated.
Lu Changqing returned to the desk and looked at the words written by Bai Fuying. The strokes were elegant and beautiful, and it was obvious that a lot of effort had been put into it.
Of course, Lin Wenqing’s contribution is indispensable.
Lin Wenqing's success today is naturally inseparable from her talent, in addition to her beautiful appearance.
Although her intention in letting Bai Fuying study was not very good, simply to have a reputation as a talented woman so that she could get married and please a man in the future, but by doing so she did enable Bai Fuying to master a skill that would be enough to support herself in the future.
Even though people nowadays look down on women's education, the world will eventually become reasonable, and Bai Fuying's talents will come in handy one day.