The Cannon Fodder and Villain’s Happy Ending

“Xin’er!” Seeing Qin Xin’s perfunctory attitude, Mrs. Su raised her voice with an unhappy expression. “Don’t take this lightly! If word gets out, then it won’t look good on you either!”

“Don’t worry, mother.” Qin Xin stopped walking. Putting away the impatient look on her face, she reassured Mrs. Su with a smile. “It’s good enough if Qin Gui can recognize a few words, but do you think she knows how to read the accounts?”

Father and mother never said that Qin Gui could read or write.

Her smile was calm and collected as she stood upright under a wintersweet tree.

Thinking about it, it did make sense. Thus Mrs. Su put her mind at ease. That’s right, what would a country bumpkin know about reading?*

“Mother, if there’s nothing else, I’ll leave first.” Qin Xin bowed and went off.

When she returned to the courtyard, Qin Xin ordered the servants to send all the account books for the past three years to Qin Gui.

Two boxes of books were carried to Qin Gui’s Wanxiang Court by four stout maids who then excused themselves.

When Qin Gui saw the boxes of books, she felt her head throbbing.

She took one of the books out of the first box, and after turning a few pages, the numbers in the books were already spinning in her eyes, spinning so much that she was seeing stars.

She threw the book back and said, “Du Ruo, go to Big Brother’s place and ask him if he has a list of mother’s dowry from back then.”

Du Ruo bent her knees and answered her. Very soon, she brought back Mrs. Wei’s dowry list.

So, Qin Gui took the dowry list and the key to the treasure list, intending to start from there.

It took a full day for Qin Gui to compare the dowry list and another three days to read through the accounts.

Fortunately, she had help from the all-amazing Du Ruo. Otherwise, it would have taken more than twice the time for her to finish all of this.

After finishing the dowry list and the account books, Qin Gui went to see Qin Zening.

“Big Brother, not a lot is missing from the dowry list. Only about ten items. But the accounts of the past years are not correct. There is a difference of more than three thousand taels.”

Three thousand taels was no small number.

Mrs. Wei is the first daughter of the Wei family and she had a rich dowry. The stores, farms, fields, and other properties would make more than two thousand taels of revenue in a good year.

From the time Qin Xin took charge of the accounts, the profits were disastrous every year. The annual earnings were only a few hundred taels.

But the accounts were done beautifully well. Having learned a few days of bookkeeping from Empress Wei alone, she couldn’t see much out of it, but she can at least read the general ledgers!

It was normal to have a bad crop for one year, but three years in a row? Is she taking her for a fool?

Or perhaps, did Qin Xin think that nobody would check the accounts?

“The things missing from the treasury are a jade bowl with gold cover and dish, a Li Suizhi plum blossom painting, one upper-grade century ginseng, a jade paperweight, a jasper carved seal, an azure-glazed flower goblet, a gold necklace with eight inlaid gems, as well as a gold and jade bracelet. Seven items in total.”

Three days ago, they found four of them in those pawn stores near the capital, but since Qin Zening’s silver was not enough, he was unable to buy all of them back.

Qin Zeyu was sitting on the side, silent with his stubborn mouth pursed tightly.

These days, Qin Zening and Qin Gui did not hide anything from him no matter what they were doing. Even though they wouldn’t explain everything to him, they would bring him along to see and hear about it.

Before, Qin Zeyu always grumbling loudly that it was probably the servants and nothing to do with Qin Xin, but he was particularly silent today.

Qin Gui took a look at the kid and said, “Big Brother, before this Qin Xin only embezzled part of the proceeds, but now she took things out of the treasury to pawn. Qin Xin wouldn’t have encountered any urgent need for silver, would she?”

And that was why Qin Xin had gotten so panicked that she even did something as lowly as to steal Mrs. Wei’s dowry to sell.

Could it be…

Qin Gui’s eyes lit up and she said, “Daoist Master Yunguang!”

Qin Zening narrowed his eyes as if in thought. Only Qin Zeyu looked confused, looking back and forth at his brother and sister. “What? What happened with Daoist Master Yunguang?”