Book 13: Chapter 4: Rearing

The residence of Grand Madame Ouyang.

In the spacious garden, flowers bloomed in profusion, welcoming the summer and across the stream bed laid with artificially created white pebbles, excellently pruned ancient trees showed off their green leaves.

While a garden that other families would proudly show to their guests numbered in the dozens in the Luoyang Sword Family, the greatest family under heaven and this was one of the most beautiful gardens even among the famous ones of the Luoyang Sword Family, it was a scenery that neither caught the eye nor satisfied the heart of the person pacing the garden anxiously while biting her fingernails.

“Late, so late…!”

“Why have they still not arrived?!”

It was Grand Madame Ouyang.

As if she had gathered all the gold, silver, and precious gems in the world her clothing and ornaments, which were originally luxurious, went beyond the limit, to the point of feeling vulgar.

Rather they had become even more splendid than before, back when she could roam the outside world to her heart's content prior to being placed under house arrest in her residence as she was now.

“Why is no one answering?!”

At her ear-splitting angry roar that forgot even dignity

“……”

Far from even reading her expression, they were so terrified that they avoided even each other's gazes, so what use was it even if there were dozens of mouths and twice as many lips in that place?

“……”

Her maids and butlers merely bowed their heads and bent their waists.

No one was willing to answer.

“Why is everyone silent?!”

In the past, knowing they had nothing to say since they knew nothing, she would have let it end at that point, grand Madame Ouyang's eyes burned bright red, exuding a highly ominous killing intent.

“Aha.”

“Come to think of it, now that my situation has temporarily plummeted,” as her hand moved toward her waist, the complexions of the butlers and maids turned pale instantly.

“even you vulgar wretches dare to mock me now, do you?”

In the past, a hand fan crafted by the finest artisan in the State of Zhongyuan would have hung from her silk belt but what Grand Madame Ouyang's hand gripped as she gnashed her teeth was none other than a whip studded with dozens of bright red thorns.

“……!”

Since Grand Madame Ouyang was placed under house arrest here, how many had been crippled by that whip?

The butlers and maids wanted to flee in fright but knowing that fleeing from that spot would mean losing their very lives even if they wet themselves where they stood, they could not move a single step.

“Grand Madame.”

As the awaited voice echoed in the garden grand Madame Ouyang's head snapped toward it like a snake's head.

“Elder Son…!”

Standing there was none other than Elder Son, who used to command the Jiangnan Division.

The old man, who as always had his long, white eyebrows groomed and hanging down, clicked his tongue as he looked at the whip she gripped.

“Tsk, tsk.”

“If you torment the underlings like that every day, soon there will be no one left to trim those fingernails you cherish so much, Grand Madame.”

At that advice, Grand Madame Ouyang snorted.

“Underlings are things that, if fed and let loose, will multiply on their own and increase naturally, are they not?”

At her words, Elder Son pressed his lips into a tight line.

“……”

It was not that he was dumbfounded by Grand Madame Ouyang's remarks.

For he, too, held a view on the lowly underlings that was not much different from hers.

“Could it be…?”

That was why Grand Madame Ouyang quickly realized the meaning of the silence he chose as an answer.

“Did those abominable bastards of the Supreme Executive Council finally block even the manpower for my residence?!”

“Ahem.”

Elder Son clearing his throat slightly, stroked his beard as he answered.

“Currently, the consumption rate of underlings in your residence, Grand Madame, is higher than that of the warriors deployed outside Luoyang.”

It meant that more people were dying here than the warriors dispatched for battle.

“Those cursed bastards—!”

As she spat curses toward the executive council members, Elder Son's next words reached her ears.

“It is not them.”

It meant it was not the executive council members.

If so, where was it?

“Could it be…?”

Avoiding her gaze, Elder Son pretended to look at the garden and nodded.

“It is a decision of the Elders' Hall. And…” he clicked his tongue softly and added, not all of the many elders on the Second Young Master's side had been imprisoned.

“…it was the elders on our side who first proposed that agenda.”

“……!”

Like Elder Son standing in front of her those who were passive participants or who superficially had not lent a hand to that chaos at all, still maintained their positions as elders.

“Th-Th-They…!”

A literal stab in the back.

Her complexion, unable to even speak properly, flushed as red as the glow of her eyes.

“…Since they must survive first to plan for the future, was there not no other choice?”

Although swords did not clash directly in the political arena of the Luoyang Sword Family merely surviving was rugged beyond measure.

Like a candle in the wind.

The elders of the Second Young Master's side, whose standing and honor had been ruined by the recent incident, were in a situation where they were barely holding onto their severed necks with their own hands.

“However, their loyalty remains in their hearts—” finally drawing her whip, she lashed the ground.

“Nonsense!”

A fierce sound of tearing through the air rang out, and flowers and grass scattered in all directions.

“Loyalty?!”

Grand Madame Ouyang shouted like a fit.

“Instead of gathering to put their heads together, plan strategy, and boost each other's morale at a time like this, are they not bastards who do not even come to pay their respects anymore?!”

Over the past few weeks how much she had screamed normally, her vocal cords, which belonged to a body strong from possessing internal energy, produced a hoarse sound.

“And what about the loyalty of such scoundrels?!”

Her whip struck the ground once more, and this time the hard garden stone shattered.

“In that case,” between that noisy racket and Grand Madame Ouyang's ear-splitting shouting, Elder Son's low voice cut through clearly.

“will you cast them out as well?”

Even after being showered with dirt and grass leaves, Elder Son looked at Grand Madame Ouyang without blinking an eye.

“……”

In any case, she herself had had no options since things turned out this way.

“…Enough of that talk.”

Her voice, hoarse just like her son the Second Young Master, was listless and hollow.

“Just tell me how my son is doing…” she staggered and sank to the ground.

Since the ones who would have quickly supported her or brought a chair had all just fled from the garden she had no choice but to perch on a garden stone.

“My lord's situation is the same as yesterday.”

The charge of bringing pirate groups into Luoyang to bombard it.

The charge of unleashing underworld mobs to plunder the streets of Luoyang and attack the forces of a fellow successor.

The Second Young Master, who was the final person responsible, was currently detained in the dungeon, waiting only for his trial.

“What about water and food? Is it properly delivered using what we prepared?”

“Yes. The guard personnel dispatched from our side are strictly delivering it directly to the lord.”

“It must absolutely never pass through anyone else.”

As they began discussing her son, a sharp malice rose on her face.

“When that young one suffered burns and was in desperate need of help, what that Yak woman and Tang woman did.”

The Yak woman referred to Yeon So-hyeon's mother, the Grand Madame of the Luoyang Sword Family, the Medicine Fairy Yak So-yu and the Tang woman was the way she called the Fourth Young Master Yeon Bi's mother.

“You must know as well, right?”

“…Yes, since I have heard it countlessly.”

The expression of Elder Son as he answered didn't seem to trust the story he had heard from Grand Madame Ouyang very much.

“Those wretches tried to kill my son under the pretext of helping to treat his burns.”

Regardless of Elder Son's expression, trapped in her distorted memories of the past, she trembled and continued speaking.

“if my son had been left in their hands, what do you think would have happened?”

“If they made the excuse that they did their best to treat him but my son died in the end, it would become a success that could not be more perfect.”

Her gaze shook uncontrollably, casting a bright red glow.

“They planned to eliminate my son like that, without even staining their hands with blood or shedding a single drop of sweat…!”

She shouted loudly.

“That day. Those wretches, who were normally so cold and distant, rushed in pretending to be so close and offering to help…!”

Grand Madame Ouyang shuddered.

“Elder Son. You should have seen those mad actions yourself!”

They packed bundles of medicine and came, knocking on the door again and again.

Even when Grand Madame Ouyang refused and tried to send them away, they stood firmly at the main gate, refusing to budge.

“If we do not treat him right now, it will be too late! The child's life is in imminent danger!”

“Madame Ouyang! Please open the door immediately!”

Bang, bang, bang!

The sound of them pounding on the door for a day or two was still ringing inside Grand Madame Ouyang's head.

“When I realized their dark intentions and kept resolutely refusing, those abominable wretches even sent the family physicians to lure me out!”

Spittle flew from her mouth, her focus drifted in the air, and her thrashing bodily gestures grew larger.

“They must have thought I did not know that the physicians of this family were all in cahoots under that Yak woman…!”

“……”

Bright red blood dripped from her face, which she was clawing at.

“I knew from the beginning that even those terrible burns were a sneak attack by that Tang woman!”

“I held out and endured somehow until the famous physician of Evil Tyrant Heaven arrived!”

A terrible madness.

“I endured, risking my life and everything!”

Even Elder Son, who had not avoided her formidable whip and had not blinked an eye as the dirt flew could not help but take a step back.

In a state of suffering severe burns all over his body until the physician arrived from that far distance, that the Second Young Master Yeon Ja-cheong survived with mere emergency treatment was something that could only be explained as heavenly luck.

“He is the son I protected with these hands. So this time, I must protect my son at all costs—” to prevent her madness from worsening, Elder Son quickly cut off her words.

“Please do not worry.”

“Because our side did not mobilize direct troops until the very end, the trial situation avoided the absolute worst.”

Had they mobilized direct troops the situation in the Valley of Sin might have changed, but in the end, the Third Young Master's side would have reaped the benefits.

“Since those who stepped forward from the Main Family, including the Institution, did so voluntarily anyway.”

Although it was the Second Young Master's faction that created the situation where they had no choice but to step forward in the end, that decision was made by themselves.

“They will have to take responsibility for their own actions.”

He quickly continued.

“As for what happened in the Imperial Capital, since the current patriarchs of the Sixteen Families cannot be interrogated, the investigation into that side will eventually fizzle out.”

Although Elder Son was speaking of somewhat positive things grand Madame Ouyang did not miss the things he was intentionally 'not saying.'

“What about the law enforcers of the Law Enforcement Court or those in charge of the investigation? Could they not be moved in the end?”

“……”

At least, to anyone capable of normal judgment reaching this point, there was no way any powerful figure or practitioner within the Main Family would go out of their way to step up for the Second Young Master.

“…Currently, along with the best experts we can contact, we are moving to reduce and delay the charges as much as possible—” at Elder Son's words that vaguely blurred the focus, Grand Madame Ouyang sprang up and shouted.

“At that rate, it will be too late!”

“What the point of dragging out the investigation and trial process?! In the meantime, will the other successors not have surged ahead so far that we cannot even catch up?!”

She approached as if she would grab Elder Son by the collar at any moment.

“Are there not many weaknesses we hold over them?! There are still many whose interests align with ours from a long-term perspective!”

Her trembling hands looked as if they would snap the old Elder Son's neck at any moment.

“Is it not because you are failing to properly utilize all those people?!”

“……”

Elder Son closed his eyes tightly.

By now, it was a point where hiding the truth from her any longer was meaningless.

“…All of them. Because of the Eldest Young Master, our lines with them have been severed.”

“All of them…?”

Elder Son nodded.

“…Yes, all of them. Without a single exception.”

Over the past few weeks he and the fellow elders who had avoided imprisonment did everything they could.

Really, as much as they possibly could.

Both inside and outside the Luoyang Sword Family and even with everyone outside Luoyang, they had made extensive contact.

But there was no visible result.

“What do you mean by that? Is our business network not still operating without any problems?”

“…Yes, indeed.”

The Second Young Master's side is the one with the greatest influence over the entire region connecting Luoyang and Jiangnan of Evil Tyrant Heaven.

If they were ousted, everyone would merely lose all those profits.

Even the Luoyang Sword Family had no clear alternative to replace them.

“All those business networks are still functioning. And yet, contacting those who can mobilize influence for this matter is impossible?”

At her words filled with disbelief, Elder Son sighed inwardly.

“…Yes, that is correct.”

“How on earth is that possible?”

There was no need to speak words that would only cause harm.

Elder Son kept his mouth firmly shut.

“……”

If he had answered without considering Grand Madame Ouyang's feelings, he would have said this: over the past few weeks, the influence of the Eldest Young Master inside and outside the Luoyang Sword Family had been growing at a terrifying pace.

'…Because that is Yeon So-hyeon, the swordless one who achieves what he desires even without a sword.'

“…I will visit again with news. Take care of yourself.”

Leaving behind Grand Madame Ouyang, who sat slumped in the garden with a look of utter despair, Elder Son moved his steps.

“Goodbye, Elder.”

Roughly accepting the greetings from the warriors, he suddenly turned his head and looked at Grand Madame Ouyang's mansion.

“……”

A beautiful garden.

A luxurious mansion.

It was a giant pen.

By maintaining the business of the Second Young Master's side and keeping their influence only as much as necessary it prevented Evil Tyrant Heaven from washing their hands of the Second Young Master and Grand Madame Ouyang, making Evil Tyrant Heaven have no choice but to cooperate in the Emperor's Yangtze River waterway expansion and maintenance project.

The pen created by Yeon So-hyeon.

And that place was Grand Madame Ouyang's hell.