"I bow in respect before The Mistress Jeong." "Rise up; Noble Lady Nam? I wonder why you are so late to the morning assembly today?" "Forgive me Mistress; I simply slept in..." "What is the matter? Are you showing off the fact that His Lordship handle lets you sleep when you service him? Do you already need a reminder of the taste of my whip?" "I dare not Mistress...but I dare not defy His Lordship either." "Very well, I understand that you have been busy with His Lordship, but that isn't the same for The Noble Lady Jung? She seems to have so much free time on her hands lately, that she should be able to transcribe 'The Analects for Women' for the entire harem, isn't that right, Noble Lady? I hope it will remind all new concubines to keep their good manners and etiquette and remind them of their ranks here in The Imperial Harem, lest anything go awry." "I will do so with great pleasure, Mistress." The most beloved concubine here was also the most resented one; the concubine were inextricably intertwined with the powers at The Imperial Court. It will be more and more difficult for his lordship to administer State Affairs family if The Imperial Harem was plagued with strife. But the neglect of the concubines will also bring in complaints about the fickleness of The Royal Family. There were simply too many factors to consider in this tangled web of the harem that I had no idea how to navigate this all on my own. There were simply more women in all harems than there were flowers in the gardens with their own rank and political background to consider, which The Mistress Jeong was completely overlooking at the moment, or had she been from the start? We were all little ubiquitous wild flowers who were unaware of their own potential to bloom until the last minute. Yes; we can all get pregnant and promoted whenever, but just as The Mistress Jeong was the answer to her own self-destruction, I needed the rest of these concubines to keep themselves in line or burn in the same way...
"My Mistress, pardon for the interruption, but we have information that His Lordship has requested for the new Attendant Han to serve him tonight..." "Very well, he can have her serve him whilst I take The Noble Lady Jung into my quarters since she will have plenty of time on her hands. I myself will also make my way to the temple in the evening to make prayers that The Attendant Han will bless our nation with an offspring to catch up on the favour that you ladies have attained alone." The temple? What business did a proud mistress such as herself have any business going to a temple? And for what? I could not trust all of my servants yet since half of them were still loyal to the palace and the other half that were sent by The Seo's had to already be meticulously careful in whatever they did. How could I pull this off to have them tail everyone here? No, the only way that is was going to work out in my favour was if I had enough silver in my coffins to bribe most if not all harem servants in my favour. And as for the rest of these concubines, I was going to have to figure that out later. I already seemed to have His Lordship under mat thumb when I suggested him to be serviced by as many concubines as possible to keep The Princess happy and The Mistress Jeong away from my business. But I needed to be surrounded by my own people as much as possible and I needed to find a way to write to my parents to release the funds of this so-called counterfeit silver to me so that I could climb to the top so much quicker.
"Noble Lady Nam, your physician is waiting for you in your chambers for your routine check-up after service." "Very well, tell her that I shall be there shortly. I leave you with my greetings, Mistress Jeong." Bo-Geom! They really sent Bo-Geom to me! Sweet innocent little Bo-Geom who did all she could to soak up her rich uncle's attention in her childhood? And the head of our village? She was beloved before Hana was even born and afterwards she never really lost her charm. She threw herself into helping raising everyone's children as the oldest girl in their social circle and followed her father everywhere to learn his trade whilst I had to help my parent's farm their fields. Looking back on it; maybe Seo Hyuk also looked down on me? Is that he chose someone a decade over me? Bo-Geom, do not think that you will escape my wrath on the day that I take everything from the people that abandoned me here!
"Peace and greetings to..." I hit Bo-Geom with a slap across her face with such force that it made her loose her balance and fall straight onto the floor which resulted in her hat flying away and her long hair being exposed. Luckily for her, I had already dismissed all of the servants for her visit, but that still did not give her the freedom to dress according to her true sex in the palace. "Kim Yeong..." "It is Nam Yeong now, thanks to you and your friends!" "Will you just let me explain..." "Explain what? How you stole the life that Hana had set me up for? You took the man that I was always in love with and practically the entire village knew about it, including you! So why did you..." "I had no intentions of taking away anything from you! I didn't even know myself that I liked him back until he proposed to me...!" "Shut up! You must have seduced him! He is the firstborn son of The Lord Nam! You must have always wanted to be as close to that family as possible!" "Noble Lady Nam! I am going to have to insist that you regain you're senses and you remember the etiquette lessons that Seo Hans invested in you!" "Invested? She invested in me..." "...I am simply here to see if there is anything that you need from your home and..." "My home? What home? You brought my parent' silence! You isolated me away from my entire family before I knew it! How can I ever hope to talk to my parent's again!" "You can still pass on messages via myself since I always return to the village at least once a week and you know this!" "How can you stand there and not accept any responsibility for your part of this! Did our friendship mean that little to you? Or nothing at all!" "Yeong, I can promise you with everything that I have in me that I did not know what Hana was planning for you! I was not even with you all for half the time that you were! I was studying, remember!" "Enough! We are clearly not going to agree anytime soon and I need to keep your visits short! You will wait here whilst I write to my parents! And don't you dare even think to betray me in this matter, especially after all you have done! The Seo''s will never intercept these messages, will they!" "Of course not, Noble Lady!" "My Lady? Pardon the interruption, but I have an update about His Lordship and The Attendant Han..." "Tell me from outside the door." "His Lordship had entered her lady's residence, but immediately started insulting her as loudly as possible, to the point where everyone in The Imperial Harem could hear it!" "What on earth? Why would he go against my advice like that? What exactly did he complain about?" "First it was her awkward standing, then her robes which were the wrong colour and the greasiness of her food that she had made for him." "Attendant Han is the daughter of a minister who was in favour with the previous Crown Prince before he met his end when he came into contact with The Lord Nam..." "...and he took down anyone who was involved with is own paternal clan, isn't that right?" "My Lady?" "It is nothing; do not report back to The Seo's and bring your husband to see me as soon as possible! I have an important message that I need to pass onto him in person." "My Lady! I have just revived word that His Lordship is making his way over here!" "Get our of here Bo-Geom! And do not even dare to think that i will let a lowlife backstabber like yourself work for me! I shall outsource mown physician!" "My Lady? I hear that The Mistress Jeong is practically making Noble Lady Jung learn the housekeeping rules in the dark! She keeps blowing out candles every 10 minutes and is making her redo them all as we speak" "Very well, send the physician to her quarters instead and keep her far away from my line of sight! Right now!"
"...did you hear The Mistress Joeng? She loudly proclaimed that Noble lady Jing's handwriting isn't what is expected of an educated woman from a respectable family!" "Really? I also heard that she had to transcribe everything in the dark in the end!" "She is annoyed that she is offering His Lordship advice due to her quick grasp on day spending, so she countered that she is just being frugal by saving all of the candles even if they are halfway melted!" "What a witch! She really is the worst of the worst here in the palace!" "She also said that the most educated person can even write blindfolded! And that the lack of lighting was not a sufficient excuse at all!" Blindfolded? This was all that the servants could whisper about right outside of my quarters as I waited for His Lordship to arrive. Who could write blindfolded? One would practically have to be a saint or a genius to write blindfolded...but someone like that would certainly be an asset to my goal to educate His Lordship on his own away from prying eyes. No wonder he was only a thrill seeker and nothing more; I could not even begin to imagine all of the pressure that he was facing to succeed his adopted father and yet was being discouraged to beat his brothers and cousins and uncles and so on and so forth. "Servants; change my robes, do my hair and makeup and get me my zither. I shall practise until His Lordship gets here. Also draw him up a bath and get his bed ready with a few bottles of his favourite alcohol. Now, how should I bring up this issue to educating him myself without scaring him off and thinking that I was controlling him? The Mistress Jeong has already taking managing the household out of his hands, The Third Prince has someone read out memorandums for him and he has delegated Seo Chul to take over his private armies. This idiot has already given his power away, what could I possibly do to make him just as ambitious as the man that we shared our name with? The Lord Nam was infamous for not even hesitating to exploit his own wife for his gaols despite his deep devotion to her. He was technically a Prince and depended on the luxury that tis position gave him to acted how he pleased, right? So what if there was something that indeed threaten him or made him feel like he was about to loose it all? The Seo's were surely not the only people that had the power to manipulate anything and everything right? Yes, I would need to hie spies in The Royal Harem so that I could catch someone doing something that they shouldn't, and I needed to showcase my own talents that His Lordship was unaware of, so what could that be? He was a womaniser that has probably seen every little trick known to man, so what could I do that was so special?
"Why isn't His Lordship here yet? The food is going cold!" "My Lady, there has been an accident! The Noble Lady Jung has been founded in the small pond right outside the courtyard of The Mistress Jeong! Please take haste and meet him there..!" "What? NO! I needed him all to myself tonight! I needed him now more than ever...wait, where was she found? In whose courtyard?" "The Mistress Jeong..."