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The medicine’s effect was too strong.
Ye Chutang struggled for an hour before finally managing to counteract the beast’s poison.
Gasping for breath, she rolled off the bed and lay on the floor.
Her legs felt as though they no longer belonged to her, trembling uncontrollably.
“I didn’t expect it to be so exhausting on top, not only is my knee swollen, but my waist feels like it’s about to break!”
After saying that, she turned her gaze to the handsome man lying unconscious beside her.
His body was covered with many scars, both old and new, but the most noticeable were the numerous scratches all over his body.
Ye Chutang felt so embarrassed that she could not bear to look at him. She quickly got up and put her pants back on.
“I keep my word. Starting tomorrow, I’ll begin to treat your fire poison.”
With that, she picked up the man’s outer garment, which he had left by the cold pond, and wrapped his hormone-charged body with it.
Afterwards, she carried him and used her earth-based supernatural abilities to return to the camellia tree beneath the flower.
By this time, the sky had completely darkened.
The Liu family, surnamed Liu, had all perished, and the village was eerily quiet. The only sounds occasionally heard were the farmers eating and chatting.
Ye Chutang laid the unconscious Qi Yanzhou on the bed in the eastern wing room, stripped off his wet outer garment, and hung it on the folding screen to dry.
Then she went to the western wing room and found a set of undergarments that the old Liu man had just bought and hadn’t worn yet, and dressed him in them.
She even took the opportunity to touch his enticing abs.
Before leaving, she lit the oil lamp on the table, so that if the man woke up, he wouldn’t be in darkness.
Ye Chutang returned to the master room, lit another oil lamp, changed into clean clothes, and bandaged the injury on her forehead.
Weary and hungry, Ye Chutang sat by the table, taking out some bread and yogurt from her space. As she ate, she began to contemplate her next steps.
Should she continue living in the countryside, enjoying a carefree life?
Or should she return to the Shangshu Family’s estate to reclaim what belonged to her?
Before she could decide which path to take, she heard a knock at the door.
“Miss Ye, are you asleep?”
She immediately recognized the voice of Wang Shenzi, the woman from the village.
The master was particularly good at embroidery, and Liu Pozi had struck a deal with the town’s fabric shop.
The master was to embroider handkerchiefs for the shop, with each handkerchief’s embroidery costing fifteen wen. She would embroider two a day.
Wang Shenzi’s son worked as a woodworker in town, and every ten days, he would come to the master to collect the finished handkerchiefs, which he would then take to the fabric shop. Afterward, he would return with ten blank handkerchiefs for the master.
From this, he earned a ten wen commission, and the rest went to Liu Pozi.
Tomorrow marked the tenth day, and the master was supposed to deliver the ten completed handkerchiefs to Wang Shenzi this afternoon.
Unfortunately, the master had passed away, and she hadn’t been able to fulfill the delivery.
Wang Shenzi had waited for a long time and, seeing no one, took the initiative to come to the village herself.
After all, those ten wen were easy money, and no one would pass it up.
Wang Shenzi knocked on the door forcefully and shouted, “Miss Ye, Miss Ye!”
Her tone suggested that even if Ye Chutang were asleep, she intended to wake her up.
Ye Chutang still hadn’t dealt with the bodies of the Liu family, and she worried that if she didn’t open the door soon, Wang Shenzi might alert the villagers.
She quickly stuffed the bread into her mouth, threw the packaging and yogurt box into the space’s trash bin, then, recalling the master’s memory, went to the top of the wardrobe to fetch a bamboo basket.
At the very top of the basket, neatly arranged, were the ten embroidered handkerchiefs.
The embroidery was exquisite, a perfect double-sided stitch.
Ye Chutang took one handkerchief, then, with the remaining nineteen, left the room.
She called out from the door, “Wang Shenzi, wait a moment, I’ll put on some clothes and be right out.”
With that, she quickly made her way to the western wing room, lit the oil lamp, and fiddled with some clothes from the wardrobe.
From the outside, the silhouettes of the three members of the family drinking could be seen through the window.
Ye Chutang glanced at the scene with satisfaction before opening the courtyard door.
She handed the handkerchief to Wang Shenzi and explained, “Liu Pozi’s son came today.”
As she spoke, she deliberately shifted to the side, allowing Wang Shenzi a clear view of the western wing’s interior.
After Wang Shenzi saw the “family of three,” Ye Chutang quickly blocked her view.
“They’re still eating and chatting. I’ve been busy all this time and fell asleep from exhaustion. I forgot to hand over the handkerchiefs and missed one. Please tell Wang Dage and the shopkeeper that I’m sorry.”
Wang Shenzi, knowing that Ye Chutang was a young miss with the life of a maid, was not surprised by the injury on her forehead.
She sighed and asked, “Miss Ye, do you plan to keep living this way?”
Ye Chutang thought about her master’s soft and weak personality and tried hard to squeeze out a couple of tears.
“Wang Shenzi, I’m not liked by my parents, and I’m not favored by my stepmother. What can I do?”
The Shangshu was a second-rank official in the capital, and Wang Shenzi didn’t dare speak ill of the Ye family.
She quickly stepped back and said, “Miss Ye, I’ll have Cheng’er take your message to the shopkeeper. I’ll leave now. You should get some rest.”
“Alright, it’s getting late and the dew is heavy. Be careful on your way, Wang Shenzi.”
Once Wang Shenzi left, Ye Chutang immediately closed the door.
She tossed the two stiff corpses from the corner of the room into the western wing, then looted the valuable or useful items in the room and put them into her space.
Having spent more than a decade in the apocalypse, stockpiling supplies had become her greatest hobby.
Ye Chutang then went to the kitchen and took some cooking oil, pouring it over the three corpses to help the fire catch.
Finally, she moved the oil lamp above the three bodies, setting up a simple tipping device.
In about an hour, the lamp would tip over, igniting the western wing and burning the three corpses to ashes.
Hmph, they wanted to commit their treachery and then kill her master, making it look like she died of an illness.
Well then, she would make it appear as if they had accidentally knocked over the oil lamp after drinking, and perished in the flames!
After completing her setup, Ye Chutang left the western wing.
She thought that the fire would spread to the main house and the kitchen, so she moved everything useful from there into her space.
When she was done, she went to the eastern wing, taking the still unconscious man to hide him in the cellar behind the house.
Once the village caught fire, the villagers would surely come to put it out.
If they found an unfamiliar man in the eastern wing, there would be no way for her to explain.
After securing Qi Yanzhou, Ye Chutang moved the food, vegetables, and alcohol from the cellar into her space.
Then, she went to the main room to rest.
She was simply too exhausted, and before she knew it, she had fallen asleep.
Over an hour later, Ye Chutang was awoken by the cracking sound of wood burning.
The huge flames illuminated the room through the window, casting a red glow across the room.
She remained lying on the bed, eyes closed, resting, waiting for the villagers to come and put out the fire.
About two quarters of an hour later, the eaves of the main room caught fire, and the heat began to intensify.
At this point, the villagers had already noticed the fire and were running towards the house with buckets, shouting, “Water’s running out.”
The heavy courtyard gate was soon knocked open.
The “unconscious” Ye Chutang was carried out.
Wang Shenzi pinched Ye Chutang’s pressure point while slapping her face. “Miss Ye, wake up!”
Ye Chutang slowly opened her eyes, looking confused as she asked, “Wang Shenzi, what happened?”
“Miss Ye, your house caught fire. The western wing has collapsed, and Liu Pozi’s family of three is probably gone.”
Ye Chutang furrowed her brows slightly. “Caught fire? How did it catch fire?”
She then turned her head to look at the western wing, which had been reduced to ruins, her eyes filled with panic and confusion.
Wang Shenzi, recalling the silhouette she had seen earlier through the window, guessed, “Perhaps Liu Pozi and her family drank too much and accidentally knocked over the oil lamp. That’s how the disaster happened.”
Someone in the crowd muttered, “Evil people get what they deserve.”
The villagers all nodded in agreement.
They all knew how the Liu couple had tormented the master.
But it wasn’t their concern, and no one had bothered to intervene.
Now, with the Liu family gone, they were free to gossip and take some satisfaction from it.
As the villagers worked hard to put out the fire, Qi Yanzhou in the cellar finally woke up.