Chapter 33

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Chapter 33

The old house was even more rundown than Fan Changyu’s, clearly not well maintained. Inside, things were scattered in disorder. Because of the winter fire pit, the tables, chairs, and stools were covered in a thick layer of soot and dust that hadn’t been wiped off.

If you sat down without wiping first, your clothes would pick up a lot of smoke stains when you got up.

The furnishings were just cheap earthenware pots. Both Fan Da and his father were heavy gamblers; any valuable items the family once had were long pawned off for cash.

The old couple of the Fan family lived in the West Room. Old Man Fan called out at the door, “Old Woman Fan, Changyu is here.”

Lying on the bed, Old Woman Fan simply turned over, facing away from the door, clearly unwilling to say a word to Fan Changyu.

Old Man Fan looked a bit awkward and explained to Fan Changyu, “Since Daniu’s death, she’s been like this all these days.”

Fan Changyu didn’t take it to heart and didn’t bother to offer any condolences. Ever since she could remember, Old Woman Fan had never shown any kindness to their family.

She took the handkerchief Old Man Fan handed her and wiped off the stool, then sat down by the fire pit in the main room to warm herself.

As Old Man Fan hung the cured meat above the fire pit to continue smoking it, Fan Changyu noticed the bowls and chopsticks left on the table, not yet cleared away.

Judging by this morning’s meal, the old couple had been eating rice porridge. Even during the New Year, there wasn’t a hint of meat on the table.

Fan Changyu frowned. After Old Man Fan sat down, she asked, “After my uncle’s accident, the authorities gave twenty-five taels in compensation. Didn’t you use that money?”

Twenty-five taels was no small sum. For an ordinary family, if they were frugal and had no medical expenses, ten taels could cover a year’s worth of costs.

Old Man Fan mumbled, “That money has to be saved for your cousin’s wedding…”

Fan Changyu raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me he lost it all at the gambling house again?”

Old Man Fan said, “The money is with your aunt. She’s worried that the mourning period will delay the marriage arrangements, so she plans to have your cousin marry during the period of intense mourning. They’re already looking at potential brides.”

Hearing this, Fan Changyu said no more.

Everyone lives their own life. The old couple used to favor Fan Da with everything good they had. Now that their son was gone, naturally, all the good things were kept for their grandson.

As long as the old house didn’t try any schemes against her family’s home, she was willing to maintain the peaceful coexistence between the two households.

She asked, “What was it that you mentioned earlier about my father?”

Old Man Fan’s face, full of wrinkles, glowed in the firelight, making him look even thinner. He sighed slowly, “Daniu’s misfortune might be my own punishment.”

Fan Changyu found this a bit strange but said nothing, waiting for Old Man Fan to continue.

“Your father wasn’t my biological son, but he was my brother’s child. During the famine that year, your real grandfather went with the villagers to raid the government granary and was shot dead by the soldiers. Your grandmother left all the family’s stored grain to your father to eat, starving herself to death. Before she died, she entrusted your father to me…”

As Old Man Fan spoke, tears shimmered in his cloudy old eyes. “I wanted to raise that child as my own flesh and blood, but during the famine, people were so desperate that some even resorted to cannibalism. The Guanyin Clay was also all taken by looters. With one more mouth to feed, everyone had to share their food with your father. Your two aunts, whom you never met, the older one was only thirteen and was given to a wealthy squire as a concubine in exchange for half a bag of rice and flour…”

Old Man Fan’s voice trembled, tears streaming down his face. “Later, that squire moved to another prefecture. Decades passed, and my wife and I never saw that child again. We don’t know if she’s alive or dead. The younger one was only eight and was sold to human traffickers for three hundred wen, and there’s been no news since. At that time, the only children left in the family were Daniu, Erniu, and your father, but even that wasn’t enough to fill our stomachs. Your father was the same age as my Erniu, but Erniu was weak and caught a serious illness while fleeing the famine. To pay for Erniu’s treatment, I had no choice but to sell your father to human traffickers…”

“Your father was sensible even as a child. When he was bought by the traffickers, he kowtowed to me three times.” At this point, Old Man Fan choked up and couldn’t hold back his sobs. “The five hundred wen they paid for him has been a source of guilt for me my whole life… Erniu was unlucky. Despite several rounds of medicine, he couldn’t be saved. I thought I’d never see your father again, but sixteen years ago, he came back to this town with your mother.”

“The two daughters who were sold, your father spent years trying to find news of them. He never found the older one, but he did find out about the younger one. She married into a military household but later died in the chaos of war. Famine and war—every life was as cheap as grass…”

Fan Changyu hadn’t expected that his father’s disappearance back then was shrouded in so many hidden truths. His mind was a whirl of emotions, and after a long pause, he asked, “After my father came back, why did he use your second son’s name?”

Old Man Fan replied, “When your father returned, he told me he had made enemies while escorting caravans outside and asked if he could live in town under Erniu’s identity. How could I say no? So, to everyone else, he was the Erniu who got lost during the famine. Old Woman Fan has resented your father all these years, blaming him for the two daughters being sold. After your parents came to town, she often came to cause trouble, always claiming she sacrificed her two daughters for your father and demanding benefits from your parents. Later, when your mother gave birth to your younger sister who was left with a lingering illness, and seeing your family had no male heirs, she thought of adopting Daniu’s second son to your father so he could inherit your father’s estate.”

Old Man Fan sighed heavily, shame written all over his face. “She was obsessed. Even if she hadn’t taken your father in during the famine, those two daughters… most likely wouldn’t have survived either. All the children were lost one by one, leaving only Daniu in the end. She kept spoiling him, which is why Daniu turned out so badly. It’s also my fault—I wasn’t capable of supporting such a big family in those early years. Later, even knowing she was wrong, whenever she cried over the two daughters, I couldn’t bring myself to discipline Daniu harshly…”

Fan Changyu had always disliked Old Woman Fan, thinking she was sharp-tongued and harsh toward his family. After hearing Old Man Fan’s story, he felt that even pitiful people have their hateful sides, but his opinion of her didn’t change much.

As Old Man Fan said, in the end, even selling off her own father couldn’t save Erniu. How could Old Woman Fan be so sure that if she hadn’t taken your father in, her two daughters and youngest son wouldn’t have left her?

His father just happened to become the scapegoat for Old Woman Fan’s bitterness.

Fan Changyu said, “What’s done is done. As long as you don’t come to my house to cause trouble anymore, I’ll treat you the same way my father treated you before.”

Old Man Fan said, “I’m telling you this not for that. Before your parents met their fate, your father came to see me.”

Fan Changyu’s face showed surprise.

Old Man Fan, filled with guilt and embarrassment, said, “He had already arranged how to divide your family’s property and shops. He even wrote a will, saying the pork shop could go to your eldest uncle, and the rest would be left to you and your sister. I asked him if the enemies he made back then had come looking for him, but he wouldn’t say more—just told me to protect you two sisters from then on. Unexpectedly, that old woman was a blabbermouth. After your parents passed away, she leaked this to Daniu. Over the years, Daniu picked up a gambling habit and got worse and worse. He even stole that will and burned it, trying to seize all your family’s property. This old bone of mine is useless—I couldn’t control him at all…”

When Fan Changyu heard that her parents might have prepared everything before meeting their fate, her hands trembled uncontrollably in her lap, clenching into fists without her realizing it, her lips turning pale. “You mean to say my father might have known before that he and my mother wouldn’t live much longer?”

Old Man Fan hesitated, then nodded.

Fan Changyu felt a chill all over, her mind in chaos.

According to the authorities, it was bandits searching for the treasure map who found her father and came demanding it.

So why would her father think that if he died together with her mother, the bandits wouldn’t come back to kill anyone else in Changning?

Unless… the bandits already got the treasure map.

But her family was attacked twice more afterward, which clearly meant the bandits still hadn’t gotten it.

However, those later groups of bandits obviously didn’t know her family—they only targeted them after getting information from Fan Da.

Fan Changyu could only think of one possibility: the bandits who killed her parents and the bandits who came to her home looking for the treasure map were not the same group.

The first group got the treasure map but still killed her parents, perhaps because her parents knew some secret and had to be silenced?

Fan Changyu originally thought that after the authorities wiped out the bandits, her parents’ great grievance had been avenged. But now she suddenly felt that the killers of her parents might still be at large.

After all, news had recently come that the treasure map had surfaced in the hands of rebels in Chongzhou, and those rebels had recruited many nearby bandits and outlaws. The bandits who killed her parents might well be under the rebels’ command.

On the way home, Fan Changyu was weighed down by heavy thoughts.

As she entered the house, she heard Xie Zheng’s calm voice from inside: “Wood, Yao, wood, and below them a big character—put together, it’s the character ‘Fan.’”

Changning said miserably, “I don’t want to learn to read anymore. I want to learn to slaughter pigs like my sister.”

“Your sister who slaughters pigs can read too.”

Changning sniffled, on the verge of tears.

Hearing the door open, he immediately scampered out on his short legs, threw his arms around Fan Changyu’s thigh, and looked up at her, his face scrunched into a tight little ball. “Sister, why do you have to learn to read if you’re just going to slaughter pigs?”

Fan Changyu was still lost in thought but reached out to gently pat the little tuft of hair on Changning’s head. “Mother used to say that learning to read helps you understand the bigger picture and grasp what’s right and wrong. That way, in life, you won’t make careless mistakes.”

Changning looked a bit blank, clearly not grasping what that meant.

Xie Zheng raised his eyebrows slightly and chimed in, “I don’t see you all that fond of reading either.”

There was a teasing edge to his tone. Normally, Fan Changyu would have snapped back, but today she just replied wearily, “You’ll learn it slowly over time.”

Xie Zheng finally noticed something was off in her expression and asked, “How come you look like you’ve been hit by frost after just coming back?”

Fan Changyu sat down by the hearth and let out a soft sigh. After telling him everything Old Man Fan had said, she said dejectedly, “If my parents weren’t killed just because of the treasure map, then I have to find out the real reason behind their deaths.”

After hearing this, Xie Zheng’s eyes darkened. If her father had anticipated this and even prepared for it, that meant the people who took his life might have met him beforehand.

Her guess wasn’t unfounded. But what those people were after wasn’t the treasure map—it was a letter that Wei Yan valued greatly.

The killers got their hands on that letter. Since she and her sister knew nothing about their parents’ past, maybe that’s why they were spared?

Xie Zheng had once served as a blade for Wei Yan and knew well that Wei Yan’s style was to wipe out all threats completely.

If they let the sisters go, perhaps it was because of some connection to their parents? Considering they had met her father before killing him, this theory seemed more plausible.

Later, when Wei Yan’s assassins came to her home to kill and seize something, and Governor He Jingyuan suddenly sent troops to Lin’an Town, it was truly something to ponder.

Most importantly, with Wei Yan’s iron-fisted methods, he should have been furious after losing so many assassins in Lin’an Town, yet he remained calm, which was unlike him.

If He Jingyuan was protecting the two sisters, and given the northwest battlefield situation where only He Jingyuan was reliable under Wei Yan, maybe the two had reached some kind of agreement. That would explain everything.

Fan Changyu looked up and saw Xie Zheng staring at her with a deep, serious gaze. She asked, “What’s wrong?”

Xie Zheng asked, “Do you want to avenge your parents?”

Fan Changyu nodded. “Yes.”

She then noticed the headband tied around Xie Zheng’s head—the one she had bought for him earlier. It seemed this was the first time he had tied it on.

The indigo color made his sharp features look even colder, giving him a distant air.

Xie Zheng said, “What if everything the authorities said when they closed the case was a lie? What would you do?”