Chapter 3: The Eldest Young Miss Who Did Not Exist

Huang Liang led Qingyun onward, weaving through the twisting corridors of the inner court for some time longer.

The deeper they went, the fewer voices she heard. In the end, even the sweeping servants disappeared from sight.

At last, they stopped before an unremarkable moon gate.

Beyond it lay a courtyard utterly different from anything she had seen in either the outer court or the inner court before.

The gray plaster on the walls had mottled and peeled away, exposing old bricks of uneven color beneath.

Wild grass thrust wantonly through the cracks between the paving stones, some of it already half a foot high, as if no one had cleared it for a very long time.

Broken clay jars and rotting wood were piled in the corners, all buried beneath a thick layer of dust. The entire courtyard was silent. There was no sound of human voices, no fragrance of flowers—only the rustling of wind passing through the neglected weeds, carrying with it a bleakness that spoke of abandonment.

Qingyun froze in surprise, her steps stopping at the gate.

Compared to the carved beams, painted rafters, and perfect order of the rest of the Bai Residence, the contrast here was simply too great. It was like stepping into another world.

“Steward Huang, this is...?”

Huang Liang did not answer at once. Standing in the courtyard, he swept his gaze over the ruined scene before him. There was no surprise on his face. If anything, he looked as though he had merely confirmed something.

Then he turned to Qingyun and asked a question that seemed completely unrelated.

“Qingyun, when your parents sold you into the residence, how much silver did they receive for you?”

Qingyun’s heart gave a sudden jolt. She did not understand why the steward had abruptly asked such a thing, but she still answered honestly. “I... I heard at home that it was about ten strings of cash.”

She did not actually know the exact sum. That day, when her adoptive parents had whispered together, she had only vaguely caught words like “ten strings” and “indenture contract.”

In this world, if one lived frugally, a single string of cash was enough for an ordinary family of three to scrape by for one or two months. For her poor adoptive family, ten strings of cash was already an enormous sum—enough to resolve their urgent need.

She calculated it silently in her heart. In this world’s currency, roughly one hundred copper coins made a string of cash, also called a diao. Ten strings of cash could be exchanged for one silver coin, and ten silver coins could in turn be exchanged for one gold coin.

By that reckoning, she was worth a single silver coin—equal to a thousand catties of grain.

She could not tell whether the Bai Residence was truly that wealthy, or whether this was simply the going price for selling oneself into slavery.

At the thought, that familiar, faint loneliness rose once more in her heart.

It would have been a lie to say it did not hurt. After all, that had been the home where she had lived for ten years. Meager though it was, it had still offered her a roof over her head.

But what was the use of feeling miserable? A road was walked by one’s own feet, yes—but hers had also been one she was pushed onto, with no other choice.

She lowered her eyes and stared at the dirt clinging to the toes of her shoes, her lips pressing together slightly.

Even though the soul within her had once been male, she still could not help but think too much.

Huang Liang noticed the subtle shift in her expression, but he offered neither comfort nor comment.

His gaze passed over Qingyun and settled on the solitary room standing in the middle of the courtyard. Its doors and windows were shut tight. The paper on the windows had yellowed and torn, and the whole place exuded a heavy air of decay.

“There is no use thinking about the past.” Huang Liang’s voice was calm and flat, cutting through Qingyun’s thoughts. “What matters is how you live from now on.”

He paused, then raised a hand and pointed toward the room. “The position I mentioned to you is to care for the person inside—the Bai family’s Eldest Young Miss.”

“The... Eldest Young Miss?” Qingyun jerked her head up, thinking she had misheard. She tried hard to recall the scattered bits of gossip she had heard before and after coming into the city.

“That cannot be right. I... I heard people say that the Bai Residence only has several young masters. And the one the Master dotes on most is Young Master Haotian, the legitimate eldest son.”

“You heard correctly.” Huang Liang nodded, his expression unchanged. “Young Master Haotian and the other young masters are all proper masters of the household. However, the Master does indeed have a daughter as well.”

“Wait!” Qingyun could not help but interrupt. She might not be especially clever, but she was by no means foolish.

In a great household, for there to be an “Eldest Young Miss” no one had ever heard of, hidden away in such a remote and dilapidated courtyard—one did not need to think very hard to know that the matter was anything but simple.

Was this really the kind of secret that a newly arrived servant girl, whose life and indenture were entirely in the household’s grasp, should hear or know?

A thread of unease coiled through her heart. It felt as though she had stumbled into a position far more troublesome than she had imagined. Inwardly, she weighed whether she should refuse this dangerous assignment.

But when Huang Liang saw her body stiffen at once and the uncertainty in her eyes, he actually let out a low chuckle, as if her reaction were entirely within his expectations.

“Do not worry,” he said, his tone carrying an almost indifferent certainty. “Since I am telling you, I am not afraid of you speaking of it. Besides...”

His gaze swept over Qingyun’s washed-white coarse clothes and her colorless face, his meaning unmistakable.

“Do you really think that if a little servant girl like you—newly arrived, with no backing and no roots in this residence—ran out saying that Master Bai has a daughter, anyone would believe you? And even if some idle fool believed half of it, what do you think would become of you?”

Qingyun was left speechless. Though Steward Huang looked amiable enough, the words coming out of his mouth spared no one.

And on second thought, he was right.

Her life was already in other people’s hands. Leak a secret? With what? To whom? Who would listen? Most likely, before the words even spread, she herself would have already “died of illness” or “lost her footing.”

This was not a threat. It was simply the cold, hard reality of her present station.

Yet understanding it did nothing to ease the feeling that something was deeply wrong.

If all she had to do was care for an unloved and forgotten young miss, why all this secrecy? Why deliberately choose a newcomer with no backing, no ties, and one who happened to seem capable of “enduring hardship”?

Huang Liang seemed to have no intention of explaining further.

He tilted his chin toward the silent room.

“Your task is to look after that young miss’s daily needs. Someone will deliver all food and other necessities to the courtyard gate every day. You need only fetch them on time. Without being summoned, you are not to leave this courtyard at will, nor are you to wander the residence speaking carelessly.”

His gaze sharpened and fixed itself on Qingyun’s face.

“The work is not heavy, but it requires care. More importantly, you must keep your eyes and mouth under control. Do it well, and you will have a stable life here. But if anything goes wrong...”

He did not finish the sentence, but Qingyun understood the unspoken warning perfectly well.

She stood where she was, her fingers curling unconsciously, her nails pressing into the rough calluses on her palms. Before her lay the desolate courtyard and the tightly shut door. Behind her lay the unfathomable depths of the Bai Residence...