The Duchess sized up Mu Wan Yun. "Her, replace Wanruo? How could such a fine match ever fall to someone like her?"
Mu Wan Yun could see the disgust for her in the Duchess's eyes.
'It wasn't at all like Mu Qingyun had said. He claimed Mother wanted me back, but all she has for me is utter disdain.'
'But she was the daughter of a concubine. It was only natural for the official wife to detest her.'
Mu Wan Yun said to Mu Qingyun, "Brother, forgive me, but I cannot agree to take Eldest Sister's place in this marriage."
"That is treason. If this matter is exposed, the Eldest Princess will only be even more furious with our Mu Family."
Mu Qingyun said to Mu Wan Yun, "Sister, I know you resent us for leaving you to fend for yourself all these years. And while you may be illegitimate, you are still a young lady of our Duke Mansion."
"If the Duke Mansion falls, we all share the Mu name. You won't escape the consequences either."
"The very survival of the Mu Family now rests on your decision. Marrying into the Princess Mansion in Wanruo's place will only benefit you. There's no downside."
Mu Wan Yun said coolly, "Eldest Sister Wanruo's fame fills Chang'an. Even I, out in the Yangzhou countryside, have heard that Empress Mu's niece is the greatest beauty in all the land."
"Eldest Sister Wanruo and I do not share a mother. Our faces are vastly different. How could I possibly pretend to be her?"
Mu Qingyun said, "But you're sisters, after all. You look remarkably alike. Even Mother can't tell you apart."
Mu Wan Yun was suddenly very curious. 'Mu Qingyun, Mu Wanruo, and I were all born on the same day.'
'The only difference was that Mu Qingyun and Mu Wanruo were the legitimate fraternal twins, while she was the illegitimate daughter.'
'If anyone should look alike, shouldn't it be the twins, Mu Qingyun and Mu Wanruo?'
'How could I be the one who looks identical to Mu Wanruo?'
Mu Wan Yun's tone was resolute. "I will not agree to this. Brother, as much as I've longed to return home, I cannot commit the grave crime of treason!"
Mu Qingyun's eyes filled with impatience, but he forced himself to maintain a gentle tone as he tried to persuade her.
"Sister, can you truly bear to see our entire family plunged into ruin because of you? Father and your own mother have been hoping for your return every single day..."
"You were willing to casually marry some nobody of a villager in the countryside. Prince Jian is of royal blood, the son of the Eldest Princess. How is this a raw deal for you?"
"If you stand by and watch your family be destroyed, how could you possibly live with yourself?"
Mu Wan Yun retorted, "It's not that I'm unwilling to marry. It's that if I do, it will be as Mu Wan Yun, not as a substitute for Mu Wanruo."
"The one who threw our family into this mess is my shameless, selfish Eldest Sister who eloped without a thought for the consequences. Why should *I* be the one with a guilty conscience?"
Just then, the Duchess raised her hand and struck Mu Wan Yun hard across the face. "Who do you think you are? You have no right to speak ill of my Wanruo!"
Mu Wan Yun clutched her stinging cheek.
'If I had known coming home would be like this, I never would have left my husband.'
'My husband may have been cold to me. I could say ten things, and Lu Jingxing might not even offer a single word in reply.'
'Whenever I wore brightly colored clothes, he would complain they were ugly, and he'd tear my new outfits to shreds the moment I put them on.'
'When we first married, I was illiterate. I asked him to teach me, but he was so dismissive, just tossing a calligraphy copybook at me.'
'At least I was determined enough to learn how to write the divorce letter.'
'In truth, I knew that deep down, Lu Jingxing looked down on me.'
'That was why I was so resolute about writing the divorce letter and coming home.'
'I thought coming home would be a new beginning, but I've just walked into a den of wolves. Life in the countryside with my cold husband was better than this!'
Mu Qingyun chided from the side, "Wanyun, how can you speak about Eldest Sister that way?"
"You've traveled a long way to get to the Duke Mansion. You should get some rest. We can discuss the marriage substitution another day."
"Someone, take the young lady to Feng Pavilion."
The Duchess immediately flew into a rage. "Feng Pavilion? Feng Pavilion is my Wanruo's courtyard! Is this girl even fit to live there?"
Mu Wan Yun said to Mu Qingyun, "That won't be necessary. I won't be staying at the Mu residence!"
With that, Mu Wan Yun lifted her skirts and tried to run out, but Mu Qingyun had already ordered the guards to surround her.
"Sister, where would you go? You don't know anyone or anything in Chang'an. If Feng Pavilion is unsuitable, then you can stay in Lv Wu Courtyard for now."
Flanked by guards, Mu Wan Yun knew she couldn't escape and had no choice but to let them lead her to Lv Wu Courtyard.
Lv Wu Courtyard had clearly been abandoned for a long time and was in a state of extreme disrepair.
Upon entering, four maids came to start tidying the rooms.
Mu Wan Yun lay on the bed, replaying the day's events in her mind. A tear trickled from the corner of her eye. 'So much for only being able to return to the Duke Mansion at seventeen. It was all a lie from Mu Qingyun.'
'I was so overjoyed at the time that I actually believed his nonsense.'
'If it were really true that I could only come home at seventeen, why hadn't they visited me even once in more than ten years?'
'I had waited for more than a decade, so why was there never a single letter from home?'
'When I was little, there were still a few servants. But after I turned ten, it was just my nanny and me, and we had to sell off pieces of the estate just to survive.'
'When my nanny was gravely ill, she wrote to the Duke Mansion, but the letter sank like a stone in the ocean. There was no reply.'
'Two years ago, after my nanny died, we ran out of money completely. I was so hungry I had to forage for wild fruit to survive.'
'Sister Xiao Fang got married, and there was no one left to take me from the village to the city to find work.'
'When I was on the brink of starvation, local thugs came to harass me. Thankfully, my husband saved me...'
'If the Duke Mansion had truly remembered their second young lady, how could they have let me suffer such humiliation?'
'How could I have been so stupid? Why didn't I figure all this out two weeks ago?'
'To think I just foolishly followed Mu Qingyun back to the Duke Mansion... I'm an absolute idiot!'
'I wonder what they'll do to try and force me to marry Prince Jian.'
'No matter what, I won't bear the crime of treason.'
'I wonder if my husband has seen the divorce letter yet...'
'I hope he hasn't. That way, I can go back to Yangzhou City and destroy all trace of it.'
...
In a small village in the Suburb of Yangzhou City, Lu Jingxing had just closed his eyes to sleep when the sound of a sword being drawn from its sheath jolted him awake.
His eyes snapped open to a flash of silver light.
Lu Jingxing caught the blade between two fingers, then flipped to his feet and kicked the assassin away.
Forcing the man to his knees, Lu Jingxing snatched the sword and pressed it to the assassin's throat. "Who sent you?" he asked in a voice of ice.
Just then, Ba Shan and the other Hidden Guards rushed in from outside. "Master, they're from Duke Wei's Mansion!"
"Duke Wei's Mansion? Then kill them all."
Lu Jingxing's expression remained impassive as he spoke, but a profound chill emanated from the depths of his eyes.
'Mu Wan Yun! So, not only did she cuckold me and abandon her husband after finding wealth, but now she wants to kill me to tie up loose ends. When I get back to Chang'an, she'll be the first one I make pay.'
'Tearing her limb from limb won't be enough to quell the hatred in my heart.'
Ye Yu urged, "Master, the men from Duke Wei's Mansion have found this location. We can't stay here long. His Majesty is gravely ill and has issued an edict restoring your position as Crown Prince. It is best we return to Chang'an as soon as possible."
Lu Jingxing's gaze shifted to the northwest, toward Chang'an. He had been away for five years without even realizing it.
It was time to go back to Chang'an.