Chapter 78 Part 1: Entering the Palace

Hello~~ I’m sorry for missing three weeks of updates! I’m back!

So did anyone go for tomb-sweeping day? I went two weeks in a row, one for my father’s side, then to my mother’s side. Both are out of town so it took a while to travel. It’s fun but dead tiring. I’m glad we could do it this year as we couldn’t do it for the previous 2 years.

Thankfully the chapter is slightly shorter now, so the parts are also less, yay!

“Li girl, tomorrow you are going to follow us and enter the palace together.” Old madam Jiang opened her mouth and said: “What you are lacking, what you need, just tell your mother. Your mother will prepare everything properly for you.”

Jiang Li nodded and replied agreeably.

“This is the first time you enter the palace since your return to Yanjing, you must not break the rules. If you don’t understand, just ask. If you don’t know what to do, just follow how You Yao acts.” Old madam Jiang instructed carefully, “The clothes and jewelry to be worn have been prepared for you. Tomorrow you will be representing the Jiang family’s face, I believe you can do very well.”

Old madam Jiang had unexpectedly praised her for the first time. Jiang Li smiled and nodded, yet her appearance didn’t show any excitement.

Her looking like this fell on Jiang Yu’e’s eyes at the side and made her feel totally upset. Soon after Jiang Li returned to the residence, her position started to improve little by little. No lack of people had hated and laughed at her, yet Jiang Li passed her days well. In Jiang Yu’e’s eyes, she was extremely unsightly, wishing Jiang Li would fall into hell overnight and pass her days worse than herself.

“Li girl is truly amazing. This time His Majesty is going to personally award her. Among the younger generation in our residence, only Li girl alone could accomplish this.” Lu-shi said with all smiles: “One heard that this year’s Imperial College’s top position is Ye Shijie. Ye Shijie is a member of Xiangyang’s Ye family. That’s to say, with our Jiang family, it’s also a relative. He’s also Jiang Li’s elder cousin.”

Ye Zhen Zhen had passed away for many years, the Jiang family also didn’t have any contact with Ye Zhen Zhen’s parent’s home. Lu-shi mentioning Ye Shijie at this time was naturally to annoy Ji Shuran. It was known that the nephew in Ji Shuran’s parents’ home didn’t make the Imperial College’s list of successful candidates. There wasn’t a need to even mention being the first.

When Jiang Li heard Lu-shi mention Ye Shijie, she sighed in her heart. She didn’t wish to involve the Ye family in the Jiang family’s muddy water. The Ye family was in Xiangyang, she wanted to return to Xiangyang someday in the future and offer sacrifice to Xue Huaiyuan. For that, she still needed to rely on the Ye family. Mixing the Jiang family and the Ye family together might not necessarily be a good thing for the Ye family.

She hoped that the Ye family would stay clean.

Ji Shuran smiled and looked at Jiang Li: “Yes, I also think that Li girl should move around with the Ye family’s young master. Although sister Zhen Zhen had already gone, in the final say, the two families are in-laws. If the Ye family’s young master enters the official career, our family’s master could also help once in a while. All are family, helping our own family is better than helping outsiders.”

Jiang Li heard and her eyes moved slightly.

Ji Shuran’s words could be said as very sincere. But could Ji Shuran really have this kindness? Even letting Jiang Yuan Bai to help Ye Shijie? This was absolutely impossible. Ji Shuran would only let people secretly suppress Ye Shijie. It’s not that Jiang Li deliberately assumed that people’s mind was dark, rather, after being in the Jiang residence for so many days, she was well aware of what kind of person Ji Shuran was.

At this moment, Zhou Yan Bang even brought up rescinding his engagement with Jiang You Yao and wanted to be with her. With all these things combined together, it would be weird if Ji Shuran mother and daughter didn’t hate and poison her.

But up to now, Ji Shuran mother and daughter were awfully quiet and hadn’t done any evil.

Jiang Li thought of this and looked at Ji Shuran.

Ji Shuran smiled virtuously like a truly affectionate mother. However, Jiang Li felt her sight resembled a poisonous python going around a branch, squinting its eyes and calmly sizing the prey, showing a cruel and dark smile while its fangs were dripping with poison juice.

She’s in the middle of planning something.

Jiang Li’s sight fell on Jiang You Yao.

In the end, Jiang You Yao was still young and not as good as Ji Shuran’s flawless expression. She also tried her hardest to show a genuine smile, but in her eyes, the hatred she had towards Jiang Li could not be concealed. In addition, there was somehow a trace of excitement.

That greasy and clammy sight was seemingly familiar to Jiang Li, yet within this short time, she couldn’t remember when she had seen this. However, one thing she could confirm was that the sight made her completely unwell. Her back cooled, letting her be alert within a split second.

Yang-shi didn’t have much weight in the Jiang family. Her shrewd eyes merely moved incessantly between Jiang Li and Ji Shuran.

Old madam Jiang didn’t say anything else, just explaining some matters when entering the palace. Actually, Jiang Li knew these already. At that time, she, as the wife of Shen Yurong, also followed in entering the palace. While the Jiang family, as the official assigned by the court, the rules were instead much more relaxed.

When old madam Jiang had finished explaining one by one, a long time had already passed. Thinking that they still had to go back and prepare, everyone immediately dispersed from Wan Feng Hall.

Jiang Li came out of the doors of Wan Feng Hall and directly walked towards her own courtyard. Fang Fei Garden was located in the corner of the Jiang residence, not in the same direction as Jiang You Yao and the others’ courtyards, so naturally they did not have to walk together.

But unexpectedly, she had only walked for a while when a person called from behind: “Second sister.”

Turning her head to look, it was actually Jiang Yu’e and Jiang Yu Yan, the two sisters.