The Dreamer in the Spring Boudoir

Chapter 258 – How long will the road to revolution be? (1)

Chunpi bit her lips.

Ji Man passed by her and saw a deathly pale Liu Hanyun on the bed.

Liu Hanyun coughed a few times before sitting up and leaning against the headboard. “The weather has become colder, and the other servants are afraid of the cold, so they don’t want to come here to serve. Madam, why did you come here?”

Ji Man put Haohao down by her bedside. Behind her, the wet nurse walked forward and placed Xi-er next to Haohao. The two young babies seemed to feeling cold too. Haohao only widened his eyes. Xi-er wobbled his lips for a moment before bursting into tears.

“I remembered that I haven’t seen you in a while. Xia-shi happened to be visiting, so I brought the two children along too.” Ji Man’s expression wasn’t good. She turned her head and said to Dengxin, “Go and tell all of Linghan Courtyard’s servants to come and stand in the outside courtyard.”

Dengxin left right after making a sound of assent.

Xia-shi was left standing in the room and shivering. She clicked her tongue in disapproval and said, “That Honored Concubine Zheng lied to me. She said there was a difference in the treatment between honored concubines and ordinary concubines. Look at this pitiful place. Even my room has three braziers, but your room doesn’t have a single one. How about I bring you two of mine?”

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Liu Hanyun picked up the crying Xi-er and gently patted him as she tried coaxing him. Hearing these words, she looked at Xia-shi and wryly smiled. “No need. There are braziers in my courtyard too. They were just taken away.”

“Who took them?” Ji Man’s expression sunk again.

While Liu Hanyun was hesitating, Chunpi straightforwardly said, “It’s those older female servants. Just because they’re Mistress Yu’s servant girl’s relatives, they dared to take away all of my master’s braziers. They said that they need the braziers because they’re older and more sensitive to the cold. And then, there are those other servant girls. They dare to gossip about my master behind her back. They said that my master’s fortune would never be changed because she had been unlucky enough to give birth to a daughter.”

Ji Man pursed her lips. Although it was true that there would be incidents of higher rank people stepping on lower rank people in large households, Liu Hanyun was someone that the marquis was protective of. How could this entire courtyard of servants dared to act so outrageously just because she and the marquis hadn’t had the free time to visit her recently?

“Master, they’re gathered outside,” Dengxin reported with a solemn expression after entering the room. From her complexion, it seemed that she recently had a shouting match.

Ji Man nodded, stood up, and walked outside.

There were four servants scattered in the courtyard: two older female servants and two lower ranking servant girls. They unwillingly stood in the courtyard with their legs shivering from the cold.

Seeing that it was Nie Sangyu, one of the older servants smiled, approached her, and called out, “Second Miss.”

It really was someone from Nie Residence. When Nie Chenyu entered this household as an ordinary concubine, she had brought over many servants. Unfortunately, her status wasn’t high enough, so several of her servants had been sent to work in different courtyards.

Although Ji Man couldn’t remember the name of the person standing in front of her, seeing this servant’s fawning smile and the dislike in her eyes, Ji Man knew that this person was walking on a different path than her.

Ji Man lightly asked, “Do you think it’s appropriate to call a married woman Miss?”

Stiffed by her words, the older servant’s smile disappeared. She took a step back and called out, “Madam.”

Looking at her, Ji Man said, “I had thought it was just the marquis’s household servants behaving insensibly, and the matter would be settled by punishing them. But, the group of you caused the Nie Clan to lose face in front of the marquis’s household. People that don’t know better would think that Nie Clan doesn’t know how to manage their own servants. Otherwise, how could there be a servant like you that doesn’t even know how to serve her master?”

The older servant was very unsatisfied and retorted, “This servant came here to serve Third Miss. How could this servant have known that I would be sent to this desolate place? When this servant went to ask for coal in the winter, they weren’t even willing to give me that. The days here are far worse than when this servant was serving Third Miss.”

Dengxin scowled. “It’s only masters that choose their servants. This is the first time this servant heard of a servant feeling disdainful towards her own master. Honored Concubine Yun had such a good temperament. It’s your fortune to be chosen as her servant. How can you have the decency to say such shameful words?”

The older servant weakly harrumphed a few times and mumbled, “Third Miss has gained the marquis’s favor. Madam, why don’t you raise her status and send this servant back to her side?”

Ji Man smiled. “You don’t want to serve Mistress Yun, right?”

The older servant looked at her and nodded.

“Alright, go and pack up your belongings.” Ji Man waved her hand.

The older servant was thrilled. She hurriedly bowed and said, “Thank you, Madam!”

Seeing this, the other nearby servants also pleaded, “We don’t want to serve Mistress Yun either.”

“Alright then.” Ji Man lightly smiled. “The rest of you can pack up your stuff too.”

The servants cheered and hurriedly went to their respective rooms to pack up their possessions.

Looking at her master’s cold smile, Dengxin pursed her lips and said, “This servant will go and arrange for some sensible servants to come to Linghan Courtyard.”

“Go.”

By the time the four servants had finished packing up their stuff, Steward Qian was standing at Linghan Courtyard’s entrance.

Ji Man smiled at him and said, “I’ll have to bother Steward Qian with a task. Send these four servants to the back of the estate to wash clothes. The weather has gotten cold, and there aren’t many servants that can wash clothes.”

The four servants had originally been in high spirits. As soon as they heard these words, their expressions changed.

Steward Qian was also stunned. “Madam… This…”

“The marquis told me to take good care of Hanyun. It was my negligence that allowed these people to come here to serve her.” Ji Man continued to smile as she said to Steward Qian, “If the marquis get angry and wants to punish someone, I can’t afford his anger. In order to avoid these things from harming Mistress Qiling too, I have to use them as a warning against others from following their bad examples. Steward Qian, don’t you agree?”

Steward Qian paused before nodding. He gestured for the other servants to enter the courtyard and bring those four servants away.

“Madam! Madam! Forgive this servant!”

When the ringleader of the four servants had been dragged out, alarm and dismay finally appeared on the other three servants. One after another, they pitifully pleaded.

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