Tragic stories always begin deceptively gently.
There was once a wealthy old merchant who ruthlessly doted on his precious daughter, his only child.
One year, the young miss traveled to a mountain temple to offer incense. Trapped overnight by a sudden rainstorm, she encountered an impoverished scholar who relied on the temple's vegetarian charity meals to survive while he studied. The two fell deeply in love.
The old merchant, a practical man of commerce, cared nothing for aristocratic pedigree or matching social statuses. On the contrary, he was a very reasonable judge of character. He saw that the young scholar had fierce ambitions despite his poverty, and judged him a good man worth entrusting his daughter to.
Just as the old merchant had predicted, the couple was deeply affectionate after their marriage. The young lady truly believed she was the happiest woman in the world.
But fate was ruthless. The old merchant was kidnapped by bandits secretly hired by his business rivals, brutally tortured, and murdered.
The young scholar was forced to abandon his imperial examination path midway through to take over the business, struggling desperately to support the massive household. The failure depressed him, but he didn't dare confide in his wife—he was terrified that the woman who had been raised in the lap of luxury by a formidable father would look down on his incompetence.
Over time, the stressed scholar started visiting the flower houses, seeking comfort in their gentle, unjudging company.
A courtesan named Hui Niang quickly became his favorite. Although she wasn't nearly as beautiful as his legitimate wife, she had a tragically humble past that his wife had never experienced—a background that made her instinctively servile and adoring in front of the scholar.
The scholar would never admit aloud that what he secretly hated most about his wife was her unbending perfection. She was always high and mighty, flawlessly managing the estate, which made him feel fundamentally inferior. He hated it most when outsiders whispered that he was just a parasitic son-in-law who had gotten rich through his wife's family.
He didn't actually love money—he clung to his fragile scholar's pride. Only Hui Niang seemed to truly understand this. She was highly educated in the four classical arts—the zither, Go, calligraphy, and painting—yet she possessed the humility of a woman forced to degrade herself to survive. They bonded over the shared feeling of being misunderstood, suffering souls.
Despite the household's opposition, he brought Hui Niang home as a concubine.
The young wife was already pregnant, but she had been born with her merchant father's unbending pride and refused to lower her head to compete with a courtesan. In the ensuing cold war, she gradually lost her husband's heart entirely.
What kind of person was Hui Niang? After surviving for years in the ruthless entertainment world, she had countless venomous tricks to secure her position.
The young wife eventually gave birth to a son—who was completely blind.
The scholar was devastated by the flaw in his heir. Aside from paying to find doctors for the child, he couldn't bear to even look at his son anymore.
The young wife was heartbroken and cried until her own eyes nearly failed her. But she persevered, patiently and gently raising her son alone in their isolated courtyard.
The blind young master grew to be ten years old. He looked like a beautiful immortal child carved from snow and jade, extremely intelligent and eager to learn. Probably because he couldn't physically see the world's distractions, the young master was much quieter and gentler than his peers. By tracing carved characters with his small fingers, he could memorize a thousand texts a day.
The scholar was overjoyed—he believed his own neglected intellectual talent finally had a worthy vessel. Gradually, he started attempting to repair his relationship with the mother and son.
Although the mother remained stubbornly cold, the young master—who had rarely ever experienced a father's love—finally smiled with genuine happiness.
But Hui Niang wasn't satisfied with simply alienating the scholar from his legitimate son. She secretly began poisoning the young wife's food.
The young wife noticed her body weakening day by day, but for some inexplicable reason, she never exposed Hui Niang's deadly plot. She just quietly let the poison run its course. Less than two years later, the young wife died.
In her final letter, the young wife meticulously listed all the irrefutable evidence she had gathered against Hui Niang. She wrote that her heart had long been dead, and she simply hadn't wanted to live in that house anymore. She only demanded that the scholar aggressively protect and take care of their son, in consideration of their past love.
She left not a single word specifically addressed to the scholar himself.
She had given up completely—no hope, and no love, remained.
The blind young master never knew what the scholar felt when he finally read that letter—perhaps piercing regret, perhaps genuine grief.
But whatever he felt, the result was absolute: he had Hui Niang executed.
Hui Niang was dead—but the young master's mother was also gone forever.
With no one left in the inner courtyard to harm him, and with his father's suffocating protection, the young master finally grew up safely.
The scholar eventually remarried, taking as his second wife the aristocratic daughter of another scholar—the exact kind of refined, pedigreed background he had always dreamed of. He no longer had to deal with a first wife who permanently carried the vulgar stench of merchant copper.
The blind young master guessed his father must finally be happy.
This horrific past had been gradually sealed away in the darkest corners of Shen Er's mind, yet tonight, in the quiet lamplight, it was dragged back out into the open.
Hope you enjoyed today's chapter! ❤️
Can't wait to see how Yuan'er will comfort Shen Er after finally learning the horrific truth of his childhood? You don't have to wait for tomorrow! The FULL, 100% completed translation is already waiting for you in my VIP Library.
📚 Unlock the complete book here:
patreon[.]com/SleeplessTranslations
(Just delete the brackets to visit!)