On New Year’s Eve, the Xie family was beaming. Satisfied with Xu Qichen’s arrangements, the relatives had praised him very much, except for Liu Mingde. In the morning, before he could even change his clothes or get off the smell of alcohol, he was summoned to Master Xie’s room.
Liu Mingde declared right off the bat, “He offended me first!”
“How dare you talk to me like this!” Master Xie pointed at his face, “How dare you? The entire household has seen you target Lin’er, how can you deny it?”
“That’s because he bought their favour!”
“Silence!” Master Xie stood up. “Apologise to Lin’er, or get out of Xie mansion!”
Liu Mingde was very angry, but he dare not throw a tantrum in front of Master Xie. Suppressing his anger, he went to Xu Qichen’s room and found him sleeping. So Liu Mingde spat on the ground and left without saying anything.
Xu Qichen waited until he had closed the door with a loud bang before slowly opening his eyes. He took out the pocket watch Xie Rujun had given him a few days ago, opened it, and continued laying down for a while more before getting up from bed.
The sound of firecrackers could be heard for a long time. Many children were watching the excitement at the entrance of Xie mansion, even picking up the burnt firecrackers. As part of this year’s celebrations Master Xie had arranged for a lion dance team to perform in front of the Xie mansion. The celebratory drums and gongs were very lively.
Master Xie looked at the time. It was already past five o’clock in the evening. The dinner was about to begin. He said to the housekeeper, “Is Young master Lin still resting? Go and ask him to get ready and come down.”
“Yes, sir.”
Just as the housekeeper was about to leave, a servant announced, “Master, Miss He has arrived. She says she has something to tell you.”
“Miss He? The He family’s youngest?”
The servant nodded, “Yes, sir.”
“Well then, quickly invite her in!”
In a moment, He Yanyin entered the mansion. “Happy new year, Master Xie.”
“You’re here, Yanyin,” Master Xie stood up from the sofa and walked over to her. “Why aren’t you spending the new year with your own family? Surely you didn’t come here just to greet me?”
“Now Master Xie is just mocking me,” He Yanyin said with a smile. As she took off her coat, Master Xie saw that she was holding a document.
He asked, “Are you here to talk business?”
“Xie Lin asked me for a favour.” He Yanyin glanced upstairs, “Is he home? I need to talk to him.”
Master Xie nodded, pleased that Xie Lin and He Yanyin were on good terms. “He’s home. In fact, I sent someone to fetch him…”
At that moment, the servant who was sent upstairs to bring Xie Lin, suddenly rushed down the stairs. She ran so quickly that she was almost flying down the stairs. “Master, Sir, Young master Lin…”
Master Xie frowned, “What’s wrong with Young master Lin?”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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The servant fell to her knees with a thud. “Master, Miss He, I wouldn’t dare…”
Master Xie’s hands began to tremble, but he subconciously denied it. “It’s impossible, it’s impossible.”
“Master Xie, don’t worry. I’m a doctor. I’ll go up to check.” He Yanyin then ordered the servant to hold Master Xie and together, follow her upstairs.
There was no one else in the room. When they entered the room, they saw Xu Qichen lying motionlessly on the bed, not making a sound, almost like he was in deep sleep.
Master Xie called out to him, “Lin’er, Lin’er?”
He reached out to touch him, and found his hands ice-cold. Upon touching his cold face, Master Xie’s legs gave out, and he nearly fell to the floor before He Yanyin caught him
“Master Xie, let me. He might just be in shock.”
He Yanyin took off her gloves and put her finger under Xu Qichen’s nose. As expected, she felt no breath, so she opened his eyelids to check. Master Xie on the side was still anxiously holding onto a glimmer of hope. “What’s wrong with him? Is there a way to save him?”
He Yanyin sighed, “Master Xie, I’ll be honest. He is not breathing. I need to check his heartbeat now.” Then she removed the quilt, exposed his upper body, and put her ear to the left side of his chest. She felt something in his left chest pocket, took it out, and leaned down again to listen carefully for a while.
Master Xie was also a person who had experienced a lot of storms. Although he was in shock at the moment, he still had a hold of himself. So when he saw He Yanyin’s expression, he understood, but he was still reluctant to believe the facts.
“Go… Call Dr. Zhao over.”
He Yanyin suddenly said, “Master Xie, to be honest, I came here today because of your Dr. Zhao. I’m afraid he has been arrested by the police.”
This was the first that Master Xie had heard of the incident. He asked, surprised, “What did you say?”
He Yanyin handed the document to Master Xie. “Actually, Xie Lin should be the one to tell you this. He found something wrong with his father’s daily medicine, so he brought some of that medicine to me and asked me to test it for him. This is the lab result. The medicine given to his father really contains a poison. The daily dosage is small, which is hard to detect, but over time, it can cause extremely serious damage to the human body.”
She sighed, “Xie Lin was suspicious because his father’s health kept declining despite receiving treatment, so he asked me to help him investigate.”
Master Xie’s hand, clutching the documents tightly, was trembling, “Who!? Who on earth would dare…!?”
He Yanyin unfolded the paper that she had just taken out of Xu Qichen’s coat pocket, looked over it roughly, and then handed it over to Master Xie, “Master Xie, this was taken out of his pocket just now. Please have a look.”
Master Xie took the piece of paper and saw that it was a handwritten letter from Xu Qichen. Upon reading its content, he nearly fainted.
Grandfather,
I hesitated for a long time before deciding to write this letter. Right now, I’m in a lot of danger, so I must write this down as a precaution.
Not long ago, at Miss He’s banquet, I overheard a conversation between my aunt and cousin. They seemed to mention my father’s illness and the family doctor. At that time, I did not know of my own birth status, and was merely the Song family’s servant, so I did not dare to listen in anymore.
Recently, upon returning to my true family and while attending to my father, I recalled that incident and felt that something was wrong. So I asked Miss He, who has studied medicine overseas, to investigate the medicine that was prescribed to my father. Miss He has not come back with the results as yet. Also, I have not told Miss He about the incident at the banquet, only given her the medicine to check. However, my cousin seems to have guessed that I was the one who had bumped into them that day, and ever since, has frequently threatened me. I am writing this letter in case I am silenced. If the unspeakable happens to me, grandfather, please contact Miss He as soon as possible, and find out the truth!
Yours truly,
Lin’er.
“Go tie that evil thing up! Lock him up in the shed!” In his fury, Master Xie began to cough violently.
He Yanyin comforted him, “Master Xie, you only have one life, please take care of yourself…”
“I went through so much to bring my grandson back, how… how could he…?”
He Yanyin hesitated for a while, but when she saw the servants leaving the room she said, “Master Xie, it seems that Xie Lin died because he took sleeping pills, but this letter is not his suicide note. I think it must not be suicide. Has Xie Lin been ill or injured recently, and been prescribed medicine?”
Master Xie frowned in thought, “Lin’er was injured yesterday and ate some painkillers.”
She glanced at Master Xie, “I suspect that Xie Lin’s medicine has been tampered with.”
“Master Xie, Xie Lin’s body is cold. He has been dead for some time. Today is New Year’s Eve… It seems that there are many people visiting Xie Mansion. At this time, it is not appropriate to make a statement about the internal strife of the family.”
“But Lin’er…”
He Yanyin continued, “Additionally, I believe you know well that Xie Lin has always been someone talisman. Even though I’m a doctor, I also believe in some superstitions. His leg is like that because he took the fall for the Song family’s young master. He has the unlucky aura on him. Now that he is dead…”
“If we want to send him off in peace, then we must deal with this quietly and not let it affect the New Year’s celebration, otherwise, I’m afraid the whole year may be unlucky for you.”
He Yanyin’s words successfully calmed Master Xie down. He had always been a very superstitious person. In this situation, he truly felt some fear.
Furthermore, the entire clan was at the Xie mansion. If he did not deal with this quickly, someone will panic, and the news will spread across all of Jiangqu. Then surely, nobody would wish to do business with the Xie family.
“This matter… really needs to be dealt with as soon as possible.” Master Xie stood up, walked to the door, called several servants, gave orders, turned around and went back to the room. He saw He Yanyin still guarding the bedside, and said with difficulty, “Yanyin… this matter…”
He Yanyin could not hide her sadness, but she got up and said, “Don’t worry, Master Xie. I’ve known Xie Lin for a while and consider him a friend. Now that something like this has happened to him, I feel sad and naturally won’t spread the news. Besides, he trusted me very much. I hope Master Xie will punish the real murderer, that justice will be served for him and his father, who has suffered for many years.”
With that, she took her leave, leaving Master Xie alone in the room.
After all this time just when he thought that the family line wouldcontinue after all, who would have thought that his only son and his son would be sabotaged by their own family?
Outside, the sound of firecrackers continued on.
A dozen tables were set up for the bustling New Year’s Eve family dinner, amidst which, unknown to all, several servants took advantage of the chaos to smuggle the body of their young master to the Xie family tomb ten miles away, and buried it in in a hastily bought coffin.
The words of He Yanyin haunted Master Xie for a long time. He was really worried, so he invited a fortune teller to test them. What he said was very similar to what He Yanyin had said, but was even more exaggerated.
Master Xie paid a huge amount to invite experts to secretly bless the room. As they chanted, the loud and joyful celebration continued downstairs, making Master Xie deeply uncomfortable.
He Yanyin went home. She had barely eaten anything before the phone rang. After receiving the call, she changed and left the mansion again.
“It’s the New Year, where are you going?”
“Something came up at the clinic, I have to go.” He Yanyin hugged her mother before leaving and drove straight to Lin residence’s backdoor.
Lin Nianzhi had been waiting in the cold for a while. When she saw the headlights of the approaching car, she walked over to take a closer look. When she saw it was He Yanyin, she quickly got in. “Finally. Did it go well?”
He Yanyin nodded, “You can say that. My assistant has already called me and said he saw them go to the mountain.”
“Then we have to hurry.”
The pair drove to the mountain. It was quite late when they arrived. There was already a black car parked at the foot of the mountain. They watched cautiously as someone got out of the other car.
It was Song Yuanyan.
As she left the car, He Yanyin asked, “How did you make it here so quickly?”
“I guessed they would bury him here, so I drove here.” Song Yuanyan was very anxious, “Hurry up, it’s been nearly 5 hours.”
He Yanyin nodded and the three of them went up. This small mountain was bought by the Xie family a long time ago to be used as a cemetery. Over the years, at least 80 to 100 bodies have been buried here.
The moonless night was dark and the wind was strong. The bare branches in winter were swaying in the cold wind, making strange dancing shadows on the ground. Apart from the three of them, there was not another person on the mountain. Lin Nianzhi held a lantern and the light shone on the ground, making the atmosphere even more eerie.
Lin Nianzhi was wearing a hat and a scarf, but she still felt extremely cold. She moved closer to He Yanyin, “Yan… Yanyin, why do I feel so cold…?”
He Yanyin held her hand, “Don’t be afraid. You’ve had modern education, believe in science.”
“Science? I’m afraid there’s only metaphysics in her brain right now.” Seeing how she was trembling in fear, glued to the spot, he became even more anxious. “If I had known you were such a coward, I wouldn’t have called you over just to be a burden.”
Although Lin Nianzhi was very frightened, she was not going to let Song Yuanyan look down on her. “Who said I was afraid? This is not enough to frighten me!” Then she let go of He Yanyin’s arm and took two steps forward, stomping her feet. She even started to stretch and jump on the spot, making herself look relaxed. “I was just cold. So what? Can’t I be cold?”
Song Yuanyan stared at her expressionlessly, “Sure, of course. But Miss, watch your step.”
Lin Nianzhi looked down, and saw a plate of fruits and josssticks.
“Why are you jumping on someone’s grave?”
Not the offerings! 😂😂 Thanks for the chapter!
Can’t wait to see what happens next~❤
Oooo some death simulation drugs? Interesting way of “killing” off our lovely mc
♥️
ah! fake death!! nice!