002. Mysterious Black Cauldron
The moment the cauldron entered into her body, her hand felt like it had been bit by a small snake.
By the time Ye Ling Yue came back to her senses, the strand of cauldron had already completely disappeared.
Ye Ling Yue once again took a look at her hands, she had found on that on her hand, there was now a mark of a small tiny cauldron on it.
The cauldron mark was only the size of a fingernail, but it looked exactly the same as the large cauldron.
After the ancient cauldron had entered in Ye Ling Yue’s body, it became like a birthmark on her palm, no matter how she tried to wipe it off, it still wouldn’t come off.
There were too many suspicious things, but for the time being Ye Ling Yue wasn’t able to deal with it yet, and she decided to first return home.
After leaving the ancestral hall, Ye Ling Yue relied on the body’s reflexive habits and headed towards the courtyard behind the ancestral hall.
The northern manor of the Ye family consists of the ancestral hall and a back courtyard.
Ye Ling Yue and her mother as well as an old servant who has been serving them for a long time lived in the back courtyard, relying on a meagre monthly allowance to survive.
Some low and short buildings appeared in the direction ahead. Looking at the appearance of the buildings, they looked like it had been reformed from storage rooms.
Some chickens and a bright green vegetable garden were at the front of the buildings, aside from these, there was nothing else. This is the place where Ye Ling Yue lived.
“Small Young Miss, you’re back.” An old woman with a face was full of wrinkles came out from inside. She was coughing incessantly, but after seeing Ye Ling Yue, she happily came up to greet her.
This old woman is her mother’s loyal servant, Liu-ma[1].
For all these years, Liu-ma had taken care of the Ye family mother and daughter all along.
“Liu-ma, you still haven’t completely recovered yet, why did you get up already?” Ye Ling Yue remembered, Liu-ma is usually the one responsible for cleaning up the ancestral hall.
But recently, Liu-ma fell sick, and “Retarded Girl Ye Ling Yue” didn’t want her to overwork herself, so she insisted on wanting to replace Liu-ma to go to the ancestral hall to clean up, that’s why she encountered Wang Gui and those people, and was beaten to death.
It was a very casual question, but when Liu-ma heard it, it was like a sudden clap of thunder had struck down onto the ground, her eyes were filled with disbelief.
“Small Young Miss, you’ve recovered?” Liu-ma excitedly grabbed onto Ye Ling Yue’s hand, and thoroughly inspected her.
There was a clear and bright light in Ye Ling Yue’s eyes, just like any other normal person would have.
Liu-ma was so happy she began to cry. She hugged Ye Ling Yue and began to cry.
“Liu-ma, don’t cry. The wind out here is strong, let’s go inside first.” Ye Ling Yue’s heart was filled with ruefulness. A retarded girl has a retarded girl’s advantages, at least when she’s acting like she lost her memory, no one would suspect anything.
After going back inside the room, Liu-ma noticed that Ye Ling Yue’s body was covered in filth. She hurriedly brought in hot water, and had Ye Ling Yue wash up and get changed first, then promptly went and to prepare something for her to eat.
Ye Ling Yue took the chance to size up her surroundings while Liu-ma wasn’t here.
The room the three people stayed in wasn’t very large. There were only a few coarse and crude furnishings placed inside, a dining table, some long benches, and a mirror beside the table.
She walked over, and in the mirror, reflected “Ye Ling Yue”’s appearance.
It was a face which still possessed the innocent look of a child. Although she appeared a bit malnourished and sickly, her eyes however were like crescent moons. Her eyelashes were long and were raised upwards, her facial features were all very exquisite. She actually already showed a little inkling of a natural born beauty.
After putting down the mirror, Ye Ling Yue caught sight of two books used as wobble-stoppers under the table. She casually picked them up. On the covers of the book, had [Record of Da Xia] written on it and the other, [Introduction to Martialists].
The two books hadn’t been read in a long time. Thick layers of dust had covered the top of the books.
She picked up one of the books, and flipped through it. Ye Ling Yue got a rough understanding of the world she lived in.
She rebirthed in a country named Da Xia. In Da Xia, there were many different administrative areas. The Qiu Feng town the Ye family was located at in is located at the northern most point in Da Xia.
The topography inside Da Xia’s borders was very complicated. There were mountain ranges which were difficult to get to, and deep within the valleys, were many savage and fierce wild beasts.
In Da Xia, no matter if you were an ordinary citizen or from a noble family, eight or nine out of ten people would learn martial combat. There are different ranks for each martialist’s different cultivation levels. It is divided into the nine ranks under the constitution cultivation domain, lower celestial, and upper celestial.
The difference between a normal person and a martialist lies in the dan-tian in a martialist’s body. They can condense together inner force, and so called inner force is actually vital energy.
Vital energy?
Ye Ling Yue was slightly taken aback. She could feel that in her dan-tian, there was a faint and weak energy that was currently moving around.
Could it be, was this little retard girl also a martialist? Having vital energy in the dan-tian was exactly like what the book had described a rank-one constitution cultivator to be like.
“Small Young Miss, what did you take the books used as wobble-stoppers for?” Just as she was thinking, Liu-ma’s voice filled with curiosity broke Ye Ling Yue’s train of thought.
“Liu-ma, have I ever had training in martial combat before?” Ye Ling Yue put down the book.
She can be positive that although that energy in her dan-tian is weak, it was exactly the vital energy aforementioned in Introduction to Martialists.
“When you were young, you learned a few moves from Young Miss.” Liu-ma placed the bowl and chopsticks in place.
Just a few moves and she could already cultivate vital energy, could it be that this body of the predecessor’s wasn’t a retarded girl, but actually a martialist genius?
Ye Ling Yue felt puzzled, then she looked at the top of the table. There was a bowl of brown rice and a dish of dry and dull vegetables.
“This is what we usually eat?” No wonder Ye Ling Yue’s body was so skinny and small.
“Small Young Miss, we don’t have any more money, housekeeper Wang and his son embezzled more of the north manor’s monthly allowance.” Liu-ma sighed.
Housekeeper Wang is precisely Wang Gui’s father, he is in charge of managing the north manor’s affairs in the Ye family.
The Ye family mother and daughter pair are not favoured at all in the Ye family, even servants could bully them, and deduct their monthly allowance.
“Mother doesn’t care about the situation with the monthly allowance?” Ye Ling Yue’s mother is third daughter of the Ye family’s family head. She’s the dignified Third Miss of the Ye family, how did she fall into such a situation like this.
Bang ——–
The door was kicked open; a youth clustered around by some servants had strutted in.
“So what if she did try to take care of it. A retarded girl is a retarded girl, you still think that your mother is the Ye family’s genius who everyone respected back then? She’s only a good-for-nothing now, who would care about a good-for-nothing’s life and death.” The youth with fancy clothing raised his head up, his nose facing the sky[2]. He had the appearance of a calf, and had an indescribable unbridledness to him.
This overbearing youth who burst in was Ye Ling Yue’s older cousin, Ye Qing.
After Wang Gui and his crew had beat Ye Ling Yue to “death”, they developed fear only after the event, and hurriedly went to look for their master to death with the aftermath.
Ye Qing had looked around the ancestral hall, but hadn’t seen Ye Ling Yue’s corpse, so he knew she hadn’t died yet.
Ye Qing came to the back courtyard, and just happened to have heard Ye Ling Yue and Liu-ma talking. He didn’t think that the retard girl not only didn’t die, but after she had bumped her head, she actually became cleverer.
“Sixth Young Master, how can you say that about Third Young Miss, she is your blood-related paternal aunt after all.”
“What paternal aunt, you think she fits to be my aunt? She’s only a good-for-nothing who was divorced and sent back home[3], losing all of our Ye family’s face.” Ye Qing pah-ed in disdain.
“What did you say, say it one more time!” Ye Ying Yue’s eyes turned cold like iron. Inside her body, the newly developed vital energy began to wriggle around because of anger.
“I can repeat it a hundred times. Retard girl, let me tell you, because of another woman, your mother was kicked out by your father, and was even critically injured, losing all of our Ye family’s face. You two are both b*tches who no one wants, shamelessly lazing around in the Ye family while leeching free meals and not paying rent.” Ye Qing and the group of servants all started to laugh loudly.
Ye Qing and his crew of people would say these words every time he bullied “Ye Ling Yue”.
During those times, after “Ye Ling Yue” heard them, she would only cry while begging for forgiveness, but everything was different today.
From the bottom of Ye Ling Yue’s heart, hatred rushed out like a volcanic eruption. This hatred, had already been deeply hidden for thirteen years.
Ye Ling Yue pushed aside Liu-ma, she stamped her foot backwards and violently lunged towards Ye Qing.