Counterattack of the Concubine’s Invincible Daughter

9. The Shocking News

Translator: Snowball

Concubine Song shivered with fear. “How is that possible? Lan’er, enough of this nonsense! How could Xiangqin meet Qingyun privately?”

“Madam Song, I’m sorry!” Lan’er said, gritting her teeth.

Xu Min was so angry that she almost fainted. “Mu Xiangqin, how dare she meet a man privately, and you’ve been having an affair with him for three months! Servants! Go to the Song’s Mansion with my letter and get her back!”

Concubine Song immediately knelt on the ground to beg for mercy. “Madam, please think twice! If you ask them to go to the Song’s Mansion, Xiangqin will be humiliated to the core and she won’t be able to show her face in public in the future.”

Xu Min lifted her foot and kicked Concubine Song hard. “She’s shameless enough to have an affair with a man. She can’t blame anybody else!”

Though Xu Min was in rage, she had to take the reputation of the Mu’s Mansion and her own daughter’s future into consideration. Therefore, she especially reminded her henchman to enter the Song’s Mansion from the back door.

Xu Min was so angry that she even forgot to dismiss the people in the front yard, so Mu Yingxue and the others had to keep waiting there.

At noon, Xu Min’s henchman came back. However, instead of getting Mu Xiangqin back, she brought Song Qingyun’s parents to the mansion.

At this point, Liu’er walked to Mu Yingxue quietly from behind and nodded to her slightly.

Mu Yingxue had only intended to teach Xu Min and Song Wanrou a good lesson and she was surprised when she caught sight of Song Qingyun’s parents. It seemed the play would be more interesting than she had imagined.

Song Zhong used to be a low-rank official. After his younger sister, Song Wanrou, became Marquis Mu’s concubine, he was promoted to Assistant Minister of National Defense at a stroke, so now he was an official of competitive status in the capital city. Song Qingyun was his only son, who was born when he was already a middle-aged man, so obviously, Song Zhong would definitely set the world on fire if he knew what had happened to Song Qingyun.

At the sight of her brother and sister-in-law, Song Wanrong rushed over and asked anxiously, “Brother, what are you doing here? Where’s Xiangqin?”

Before Song Zhong could say anything, his wife raised her hand and slapped Song Wanrou in the face. “You bitch! Why didn’t you keep an eye on your daughter when she was seducing my son? Qingyun doesn’t even want to go home now. Give me back my son!”

Nobody expected that Song Zhong’s wife would have made a scene as soon as she came. “How can you pin the blame on me? You should ask your son what he had done to Xiangqing! My daughter’s future has been destroyed by him. Give me back my daughter!”

Seeing them fighting, Xu Min burned with fury and she suddenly had a toothache. Song Zhong immediately shoved his wife aside. After the two women had calmed down, Xu Min asked with a frown, “Is Childe Song missing, too?”

Song Zhong answered with a sigh, “Madam, to be honest, my son, Qingyun, is indeed missing. His attendant said he went out alone yesterday in the early morning. My wife and I had sent the servants to look for him everywhere but failed to find him. It wasn’t until you sent someone to our mansion that we learned about Xiangqin and my son, so we came here in haste.”

Xu Min snorted. “Lord Song, look what your son has done!”

With an awkward look on his face, Song Zhong promised, “I should be blamed for not having disciplined him strictly. Madam, you have my words. If Xiangqin and my son find each other congenial, I’ll send someone to your mansion on an auspicious day to discuss their marriage. Now the most important thing is to find them. Madam, have you found any more clues?”

Xu Min knew it wasn’t the right time for accountability. If they wanted to cover the scandal up, they had to find Mu Xiangqin and Song Qingyun as soon as possible. “Not yet. Even Xiangqin’s personal maid doesn’t know their whereabouts.”

After a long period of silence, the two sides ordered their men to search again. This time, they dispatched more hands and expanded the scope of the search.

However, a while later, the butler, Mu Wanfu, suddenly rushed into the yard and reported to Xu Min that the Governor of the capital city was waiting outside. “The Governor said he knew the whereabouts of Miss Xiangqin and Childe Song,” he added. Hearing that, everyone was taken aback and felt a strong sense of foreboding.

Xu Min hurriedly dismissed the people in the yard except for the masters of all the courtyards. After having the maid clear up the main hall, she turned to the butler. “Guide him in. Hurry up!”

After a short while, the Governor, Lord Luo, who was in a dark blue official uniform, walked in with a serious look, followed by a bunch of attendants, and Xu Min immediately rose to her feet to greet Lord Luo. Though she was the marquis’ wife, the emperor never bestowed her a title, so she had to be respectful in front of the Governor of the capital city.

“Greetings, Mrs. Mu!”

“Lord Luo, I didn’t know you were coming. I’m sorry for keeping you waiting!”

“Mrs. Mu, there’s no need to be punctilious.”

“Lord Luo, please take a seat!”

As the Grand Preceptor’s daughter, Xu Min always greeted guests in the proper way. If it weren’t for the fact that she was as jealous as any other women, Mu Yingxue might even think highly of her.

“Oh? Lord Song is here, too!”

“Exactly!”

Though he managed to put on a serious look, Luo Wu despised them inwardly when he saw the people of the two families. It was inconceivable that such a scandal could occur between relatives!

“Lord Song, you just saved me the effort of going to your mansion.”

Next, with a wave of his hand, four of Luo Wu’s attendants carried two bamboo stretchers into the yard. Although the stretchers were covered with white cloth, judging from the shape of the items underneath, there should be a corpse on each.

The atmosphere instantly turned suffocating. Xu Min, Song Wanrou, Song Zhong and his wife all had a bad feeling.

“Lord Luo, they are…”

“Someone reported there was a murder in the plum garden on the hill behind your mansion and a man and a woman were killed. I went to the spot with my men and found two corpses in the hut. After our investigation, it was confirmed that the dead are Miss Xiangqin of your mansion and Lord Song’s son.”

“My son!”

“No! Impossible!”

Before Luo Wu could finish his words, two screams rang in the main hall simultaneously. Next, Concubine Song and her sister-in-law rushed to the bodies covered in white cloth. Song Zhong’s head buzzed and he almost fell to the ground.

Kneeling on the ground, the two pale women lifted the white cloth on the bodies with trembling hands and pounding hearts. When they saw the body in front of them wasn’t the one they had imagined, they both let out a sigh of relief.

Stunned as Song Wanrou was when she found out that the dead was her nephew instead of her daughter, she felt a little relieved.

Her sister-in-law’s reaction was the same as her.

Seeing that, Mu Yingxue almost couldn’t help laughing loudly. When she saw Ouyang Ruo looking at her, she managed to hold her laughter back.

The two women looked at each other and then shifted their gaze to the body at each other’s feet, which immediately seized them with grief again. They rushed to the body next to the one by their feet, weeping aloud. As they were too sad and anxious, they ran in such a hurry that they ended up bumping against each other and falling to the ground.

Disregarding the pain, they instantly scrambled to their feet and pounced on the bodies of their own children.

“Impossible! Yun’er, my son!”

“Xiang’er, Xiang’er, wake up!”

The main hall immediately became a total mess. Song Zhong wrapped Song Qingyun’s body in his arms with bloodshot eyes and began to shiver all over out of grief.

“Who the hell killed my son?”

“Xiang’er, wake up! You’re my only daughter. How am I supposed to live without you?”

Though Xu Min looked sorrowful, she was actually angrier. “What on earth happened, Lord Luo?”