Legend of Concubine’s Daughter Minglan
chapter-157

Chapter 157: Faces in Marquis Ningyuan’s Mansion (1) Translator: Iris

Only until midnight did they stop making out. Minglan who was already worn out and lay on the bed feebly with her eyelids drooping heavily, having no intention to move a bit even though she was covered with sweats. As for Gu Tingye who had spent years drifting about and already got used to living a tough life didn’t want to take a shower either. The only thing he would like to do now was kissing and hugging the sleepy girl in his arms.

Minglan had a very sound sleep. While she was in a trance, she felt that she had come back to her military training time in college when she had to stand at attention and take goose-step eight hours a day. At that time, she had always fallen asleep the moment her head had touched the pillow as if she had been beaten violently. Right now, her waist was limp, her legs were hurt, her bones seemed to be reinstalled and her head was in a completely mess. Maybe a reset button was necessary for her.

At dawn, Minglan was awake because she felt pressure on her body. Then she opened her mouth to exhale difficultly like a fish which had left the water. Having groped with her eyes closed, she found that a huge and strong leg was pressing on her belly right now. That made Minglan fly in a rage all of a sudden and only want to scratch the face of the man beside her. At the moment, Gu Tingye also woke up, feeling quite ready for a ‘morning exercise’.

However, Minglan lay flat on the stomach like a tortoise, burying her head in her pillow. Instead of turning the tortoise over, Gu Tingye just threw himself over Minglan and kissed the girl’s gentle and delicate back all the way down, his stubble making the fair skin pin in a minute.

Minglan was almost suffocated and fought hard to refrain from rolling her eyes. She turned her head back with great difficulty, “You…you get off me. I can’t breathe.”

Gu Tingye, chuckling in a great mood, rolled over and held his cute wife into his arms while lying down on the bed. Minglan started panting on his chest and seeing the man laughing in such a good mood, out of indignation, she thumped on the chest with her two little fists, only to be hurt by the hard muscles. Minglan couldn’t help but shout in pain, “Get your hands off me. I have to find some ointment.”

Gu Tingye said in a happy tone, “No worries, I don’t feel any pain.”

Minglan raged, “I do!”

As the man who had delved deep into the top two most unrestrained places, Jiang Hu underworld and military camp, and earned himself quite a name from both, Gu Tingye, as expected, took her wrong, “It won’t hurt soon in the future,” said Gu Tingye in a doting tone as he nuzzled against Minglan’s face, his eyes darkening.

It took Minglan quite a while to actually realize what he was talking about. Her face blushing scarlet, Minglan blurted out, some wrath in her tone, “Not there!”

“You…didn’t feel any pain?” Gu Yingye’s eyes lit up with some expectation coloring his tone as his hand groped down over Minglan’s thigh.

Minglan nearly choked. She pressed his hand with all her might, her whole body aching, and threw him an angry stare, “Don’t do it!”

The light of the morning sun beamed down through the curtain on them. So Gu Tingye saw Minglan’s face straightly by that light. There was a tired look on Minglan’s snow-white little face. The dark circles under her eyes were even more obvious but those eyes were still enchanting with so many expressions inside. Gu Tingye was so appealed to that, then he pulled her little hand to his mouth and started to blow on it with light flashing in his beautiful eyes.

After a long while, Minglan only uttered, “Well… Hmm…, we still have a life-time to spend together…” Her voice sounded lower and lower at last, which could be considered as a begging gesture.

Gu Tingye burst into laughter and held Minglan in his arms all of a sudden. After that he wadded her up and kissed all over her body while his chest shook due to his laughter.

Then, the maid outside called them behind the door, “Second Master, Second Madam, time to get up.”

It took Minglan quite a while to realize that the maid was calling her. Then she hurried to get up. However, Gu Tingye who was beside her was still chuckling. Minglan clenched her little fists and thumped on his strong and broaden shoulders while scolding him in a low voice, “Stop laughing! Someone’s here… Fine, you just won’t stop, right?… Stop it or I’ll call the Bu Kuai (T/N: Bu Kuai was the policeman in ancient Chinese) to catch you!”

Yao Yiyi had scared her four-year old nephew like this before. The original words were, “Stop crying, or I’ll call the policeman to catch you!” Now in the critical situation, she just let those old words slip out of her tongue.

Gu Tingye laughed even more loudly with his body trembling on the beddings. Minglan who was also lying between those brocade beddings was enveloped in the shadow of his huge figure. Right now, this angry girl was planning to bite the man like a little beast which had just grown teeth with threatening gestures. However, her movements looked not scary at all but only adorable. After Gu Tingye had teased her for a long while, he finally had enough and called someone to help them wash and get dressed.

Mama Cui who had already prepared for this brought Danju and Xiaotao in the room first. She then put on a large coat on Minglan and led her to the next room to have a bath. After that, Mama Cui asked the servants and maids who were holding the basins, the buckets and the towels at the outside to come in. Those servants were divided into two groups so they could serve Minglan and Gu Tingye separately.

Minglan came out after she had put on her underclothes and dress. Then she found that Gu Tingye had also finished washing himself while Xiahe was doing up his hair. After everything was done, a woman who seemed like the mama in charge came in to find the white silk handkerchief on their bed. Seeing the blood on the handkerchief, that mama smiled and put it in a red and golden carved wooden box.

The clothes the couple would wear on the first morning after their wedding should be treated seriously. Minglan was wearing a red peony pattern gold inlaid brocade coat, a large five phoenixes toward sun pattern gold hair pin with ruby inlaid, a pair of red coral earrings with gold tassels, a two fish bringing fortune pattern gold and jade necklace with a blessing lock and around seventeen or eighteen dragon and phoenix pattern gold bracelets. She was almost overwhelmed by those objects. Also, due to last night’s overwork, she felt all her muscles aching. Every time she tried to raise her hand or lift her feet, she showed a miserable look due to the pain. Mama Cui who concerned about Minglan a lot then looked at Gu Tingye with an unkind expression in her eyes when thinking of the bruises all over Minglan’s body.

Gu Tingye had also put on a scarlet festive coat with spun gold bat flower pattern brocade embroidered from the shoulder. There was also a rosin color belt inlaid with jade around his waist. He was standing in front of the full-length mirror at the moment to let Xiazhu tidy the lower hem of his clothes.

Minglan looked to his side and couldn’t help making compliments inwardly, ‘Such a strong red color like a raging fire always gives people a feminine impression. But when this tall and strong man with a straight back and wild shoulders wears that color, his manhood hasn’t been decreased a bit. Instead, he still has that imposing aura around him.

Seeing that Minglan was looking at him from the mirror, Gu Tingye turned around to have a look at her. Having sized her up and down, he smiled and said, “You look really pretty.” Minglan nodded with a naughty expression in her eyes but a serious look on her face, saying in a low voice, “You also look really pretty.”

Gu Tingye faked a scary look and glared at Minglan while the latter was smiling apologetically. In a second, they both smiled at each other spontaneously without any barriers between them anymore. Maybe there really were some people who could become intimate with each other over one night.

All the maids and servants were lowering their head without saying anything. However, they were all surprised deep down. The servants from the Sheng mansion thought, ‘Our lady became close to General Gu so easily.’ while the servants from the Gu’s mansion thought, ‘Never have I seen our Second Master being so kind to anyone.’ There were a few tactful maids shooting a glance at Minglan secretly and thinking, ‘Such a charming and gorgeous new madam will surely be favored by Second Master.’

According to the normal procedure, the things they would do on the first day after their wedding were kowtowing to the elders of the immediate family first, then greeting the collateral relatives. After that, they would go to Gu’s ancestral temple and write Minglan’s name in the family tree. They could eat the meal when they had time off during this procession. The situation in Marquis Ningyuan’s mansion was a bit special, so Minglan had already asked Gu Tingye about what they would do today. However, he had only answered, “We should pay our respects to our parents first.”

His words sounded too meaningful and ambiguous. First of all, his father had been dead for a long time. Second, his mother had died even earlier. At last, the one he called mother right now was actually his step-mother. And Minglan had heard that he had not been in a good relationship with his stepmother.

Minglan felt quite puzzled right now. Under the circumstances like this, how she was going to understand the implications in her new boss’s words?

As Minglan was wondering that, a mama in charge who wore a dark brown striped brocade coat arrived at the door. Then the maids by the door who opened the curtain for this mama gave their obeisances and said, “Mama.”

Mama Xiang was fair-skinned had a benignant look. After she had entered into the room, she gave her obeisance to Minglan and Gu Tingye and said with a smile, “Second Master, second madam. Old Madam has asked you to worship Old Master and Old Madam Bai in the ancestral temple first. She’ll wait you there.”

Gu Tingye smiled and replied, “Thanks for coming, mama. We’ll be there soon.” The smile on the corner of his mouth looked genial but didn’t reach to his eyes.

Minglan then ordered Danju to give a red packet to Mama Xiang. Mama Xiang took over her reword with a beaming smile and then bid farewell to Minglan and Gu Tingye. Perhaps Minglan had treated Mama Xiang too affably, Gu Tingye then took a meaningful glance at her. Then they both walked to the ancestral temple with people crowded around.

The ancestral temple was a place where all the memorial tablets of the ancestors being set out for the descendants to worship. In ancient times, one’s parentage was really important. It was said that the more memorial tablets a family had, the more honourable the ancestor in this family was. It also meant that the family had been of long standing and was a real notable family.

When Minglan had worshiped Sheng’s ancestors in You Yang, she had counted the memorial tablets of Sheng family carefully because she had been too bored while kneeling there. And the result——Aye! No wonder why the prestige and wealth of Sheng family were not able to make them the biggest family in their hometown.

According to Pinlan’s words, their ancestor, Great Grand Master Sheng had been a beggar and with no name. One day, he had heard the words from a part-time fortune-teller which had claimed, “The times of peace and prosperity will come soon.” When those poor beggars had heard that, they had suddenly arisen hope in their heart. And only because of that had Great Grand Master Sheng set his teeth to survive. After that, he had given himself the family name ‘Sheng’ and also a first name. (T/N: In Chinese, the word Sheng meant prosperity.) However, Pinlan probably had imagined ninety percent of the story. Because she had had no patience in kneeling in the ancestral temple, she had then decided to make up a story to let off her anger.

The real story was, although Great Grand Master Sheng had lost his parents in his childhood and become a beggar at a very young age. It was said that he had never forgot about his parents’ name. However, as for the previous generation before his parents, he hadn’t been able to remember anyone of them. Also, he hadn’t had the guts like commander-in-chief Wei who had asked his wife to fake all the names of the three generations of his family to report to the emperor in order to be granted as an official. Therefore, there were only a few memorial tablets in the ancestral temple of Sheng’s family . As a matter of fact, the number of their ancestors was not even enough to form a Hulu Brothers team. (T/N: Hulu Brothers are characters from a Chinese famous cartoon. There are seven of the brothers.)

As a result, when Minglan stood in the ancestral temple of Gu’s family, an inferiority feeling welled up in her heart immediately.

In the stately hall which had numerous tall pillars, the wall on the north had been entirely cast into a sacrificial altar. Those memorial tablets which were around eight or nine inches high had been arranged in seventeen or even eighteen tiers. Seeing the dense tablets, Minglan couldn’t help being short of breath.