CH 63

Chapter 63: In my house, what I say goes

It was still raining heavily. The carriage trundled with difficulty on the muddy main road.

In his previous life, when he went to provide disaster relief, he had already received a secret report that the plague had begun to spread. However, under the urging and coercion of Yun Yi and the Virtuous Consort, he still entered the epidemic area. In this life, the carriage was still bumping along to the epidemic area, but his mood was completely different compared to the previous life.

The wound on his back had just healed and Yun Yi clearly knew that he had been seriously injured. Yet, he still insisted he go to the disaster relief zone. This life was the same as the previous one. He never treated him as a younger brother. The small favours he gave were just so he could ask more of himself, so that he himself would help him more wholeheartedly.

In Yun Yi’s eyes, perhaps he was more like a dog he was keeping. What affection? In that palace, that was just something used to confuse people’s hearts.

If he still could not see through it this life, then these two lives would really be in vain.

Brothers were like that, father and son. Was this not also the case between husband and wife?

After he ascended the throne in his previous life. In his imperial harem, even if there were not 3,000 beauties, there were at least 300. Yet, who could say they were true to him? In front of him, they were all dressed up to the nines and everything was fine in front of him. But what about behind his back?

Did these women really not know the fight they had to give birth to his offspring?

They all wanted to win his favour, wanting to be the mother of the future emperor. He deliberately would not do it. He watched with cool detachment as they used all kinds of methods to kill his unborn descendants. Hence, in his previous life, his interest in children was thin and until his death, he was accompanied by only one crown prince.

In his heart, he only had one son. He protected and educated his child very well.

Having experienced the brotherhood with people who wanted to kill each other, how could he want his son to fall into such a situation?

These women were so stupid.

The carriage jolted violently which made Yun Ke frown slightly. His face was still slightly pale from being ill.

“Your Highness, the carriage is stuck in the mud,” the guard’s voice came from outside the carriage. Yun Ke raised his hand and lightly lifted the curtain of the carriage. The rain fell from the sky like a curtain. The straw raincoats of the guard who came to report to him were dripping with rain.

“Oh it’s Du Xia.” Although the straw raincoat obscured half his face and onlyshowed  his clean and graceful chin, Yun Ke still saw who he was at a glance. Yun Ke said slowly, “Then this prince will get out of the carriage, you guys take it slow.”

“Yes, my lord.” Du Xia opened the umbrella and covered Yun Ke’s body. Then he raised a hand to support Yun Ke. Yun Ke dismounted then looked back at the carriage. Sure enough, the wheel of the carriage had fallen into a mud puddle in the road. No wonder it had shaken so violently just now.

Yun Ke stood by the side of the road and waited leisurely for a few guards to come and lift the carriage out of the mud pit with all their might. He set his eyes on Du Xia with interest.

In his previous life, Du Xia also followed him to Jiangxia when he first came out of the training camp. When he was terminally ill, Du Xia had always taken care of him and was not even afraid of life or death. So when Yun Ke recovered from illness, he deliberately began to cultivate Du Xia.

Du Xia was also a hardworker with military success. He stood out quickly among the hidden guards and was his most powerful help.

Since the last time he bought him from the human slave market and threw him to the elders of the secret guard for training, this was the first time Yun Ke saw Du Xia outside. It seemed that in this life, he was just like in the previous life and had finished his learning, so they had released him to perform tasks.

The secret guards were not always hidden in the dark. They also wore clothes of normal guards and followed their master to do things. It was just that they were very good at muffling their sounds and looked more ordinary than normal guards so they were not conspicuous.

Du Xia did not know why the master suddenly stared at him, but he still straightened his back and stood in the rain like a sharp knife.

Gu Yu Qi actually dared to compete with him for Du Xia!

The corner of Yun Ke’s lips twitched slightly. That damn woman, who knew what kind of heart she had. If Du Xia followed her, would he be able to become the Marquis of Weiyuan in the future? So childish and ridiculous!

Thinking of this, Yun Ke could not help but snort coldly in his heart. He had found Gu Yu Qi’s whereabouts on the fourth day after she left the capital. She had not gone back to Jiangnan but had instead headed north. What was this woman up to? Going to the Rouran people? Simply ridiculous! He had sent someone to follow her. Speaking of which, Gu Yu Qi was being cautious. If it were not for the elites he sent to track her, it was likely it would have been difficult to find traces of her.

Gu Yu Qi in her previous life kept saying that she loved him. However, when he had fallen sick with the disease in Jiangxia City, what was she doing? On the contrary, Zhang Wan Yi had found the prescription by searching day and night and saved his life. Later, she shamelessly said that she had read the prescription from a book. Since she had seen it, why had she not brought it out sooner? If she had really seen it, with her personality, how could she not have offered it to gain credit? Maybe once he was moved, he would really pay attention to her. She gave no effort beforehand but came afterwards to stir up enmity and transfer to herself the credit given to others. She had no sense of shame and was really brazen enough to do so.

Right, with her temperament, she even dared to defy the imperial decree. What did this matter?

In this life, she actually became even worse. Yun Ke actually felt that Gu Huai Zhong expelling such an unfilial daughter out of the family was an understatement. If it were him, he would have strangled her to death with his own hands. She was even suspected of murdering her own mother. 

He really did not understand why he still cared about her for decades after her death in his previous life!

He thought she would become a lady in this life and follow the rules. He had not expected that in these few years, she would make such a mess.

Now the Ding Yuan Marquis’ residence had become a joke in the eyes of the nobles in the capital. Everyone looked gloatingly at Gu Huai Zhong.

How unfortunate the family was to have such an unfilial daughter.

“My lord, please board the carriage.” Du Xia saw that the other guards had carried the carriage out of the mud pit, so he lowered his eyes and spoke to Yun Ke.

“Alright.” Yun Ke took Du Xia’s extended hand for support and stepped slowly towards the carriage. “Du Xia, do you still remember what happened when you were a child?” He seemed to ask unintentionally.

Du Xia was slightly taken aback, but still replied respectfully, “This servant does not remember much about it.”

A charming figure appeared in his mind and he felt a slight warmth in his heart. However, he still restrained his mind and focused on helping Yun Ke get into the carriage.

“Really?” After Yun Ke got into the carriage, he looked at Du Xia with a half-smile. Those cold eyes seemed to see into his heart.

“My lord is asking this servant about childhood, this servant really does not remember much about childhood.” Du Xia raised his eyebrows and said, “Just remember being resold and constantly resisting, then finally my lord saved this servant and gave a place to this servant. That’s all this servant can remember.”

He spoke neither humbly nor overbearingly. Yun Ke nodded secretly. As expected of the future Marquis of Weiyuan. These few words were watertight, but he also knew Du Xia was hiding something.

Du Xia slowly lowered the curtain which cut off Yun Ke’s sight.

What he concealed was the memory of Gu Yu Qi. Yun Ke took a deep breath and his eyes darkened. Yun Ke did not believe that Du Xia did not remember Gu Yu Qi back then. He asked himself, if his and Du Xia’s identities were switched, he would never forget the girl who had once given him a glimmer of hope. Let alone what kind of heart Gu Yu Qi had, but in such a situation, what she left to Du Xia must be an immortal memory.

Yun Ke suddenly remembered something. In his previous life, when Gu Yu Qi married into the palace, in order to break Gu Yu Qi’s arrogance, he asked Du Xia to perform the wedding ceremony in his stead.

Yun Ke’s brows were slightly raised, showing some intrigue.

In the slave market, it would have been impossible for Gu Yu Qi to not recognise Du Xia, so she deliberately fought with him for Du Xia. The reason? She knew that Du Xia would become the Marquis of Weiyuan in the Qi dynasty in the future. Du Xia only married one woman in his life and was loving to his wife. So, she wanted a substitute for the real thing? Did she want to strike first?

An inexplicable anger rose from the bottom of Yun Ke’s heart. His face became more and more stern. This made sense! Why Gu Yu Qi kept avoiding him was to get away from him and not repeat the mistakes of her previous life.

Not only did she want to start with Du Xia. She was still thinking of changing her life against the will of the heavens, leaving the capital before becoming his concubine and fleeing north.

Gu Yu Qi, great job! After the anger passed, Yun Ke’s brows slowly relaxed. He wanted to see if she could escape from his palm!

To hide from him, she even had the guts to set fire to the Marquis’ residence. What a ruthless and cunning woman!

Gu Yu Qi vigorously led Run Ying to inspect the farm she had built herself. After a few days of making arrangements, there was strength in numbers and the magnificent residence had undergone tremendous changes.

The courtyard wall had been heightened and reinforced by Zhang Lan and the others with their own barbed wire. There were many bells hanging on the barbed wire which acted as alarms. Zhao Wu would recruit Zhang Lan and the others into the team of guards and organise shifts, constantly patrolling the residence.

The 20 or so villagers living in the front courtyard were also living in an orderly manner under the leadership of Zhang Lan. The ground in the gardens had been turned over row by row and rapeseed seeds had been sprinkled on them. It was raining too much and the villagers were afraid vegetables would not grow in the fields, so they built a simple shelter using oilcloth. It was very much like a modern vegetable greenhouse, but it was just much simpler. They had also spontaneously tidied up all the drains in the residence. Now, the courtyards would not flood and water immediately flowed down the culvert at the foot of the walls.

The lotus leaves in the fish ponds had exposed their sharp edges. Gu Yu Qi did not let them pull up the lotus, after all, lotus root was also a kind of vegetable. Gu Yu Qi asked them to catch all the koi fish in it and take them to sell in the city. There were still people in Jiangxia City who were lovers of arts and culture, but not long after when food was in short supply, they would not spend money on such boring things. The lotus pond was now full of edible freshwater fish.

***

Gu Yu Qi also thought about whether it was not that good for her to do these things, but she quickly dismissed the idea. She had done no harm and had not forced others to buy them either. It was not her fault that those people did not have foresight. Besides, she never felt like she was the Virgin Mary who wanted to cover the entire Qi dynasty in her holy halo.

Everyone had their own destiny. In her previous life, all her thoughts had been on Yun Ke and she had not cared about other people’s lives. In this life, all she wanted was peace and stability, and happiness and good fortune for her mother. As for the life and death of others, those were not under her control.

No one stipulated that people who travelled through time had to save all sentient beings. When one was in trouble, it was more realistic to protect oneself.

Just like how she knew the heavy rain would cause the downstream dyke to burst and tens of thousands of lives would be lost, she just let it happen. For one thing, she was no saint and even if she went all over the world to declare that there would be a flood, who would listen to her? Secondly, her abilities were limited and she could only protect the small group of people around her. That was enough for her.

After patrolling the yard, Gu Yu Qi was very satisfied. The warehouse in the back courtyard was already full of food and other necessities.

Now, Gu Yu Qi needed to solve the problem of having clean water.

This issue troubled her to the core.

As someone who had previously travelled through time, although Gu Yu Qi was a rich girl who had no worries about food and clothing in the modern times and all she did all day was travelling, eating, and posting photos, she was a well-educated person after all. She knew the reason why the plague ran rampant in the ancient times was one, because there were poor medical conditions in ancient times and two, because of the poor sanitary conditions.

After every catastrophe, with the outbreak of the plague, water quality was always the problem at the end.

Gu Yu Qi had already improved the toilet in the courtyard, but the problem of potable drinking water was giving her a headache.

There were four large wells in the house so she was not worried about running out of water. What Gu Yu Qi was worried about was whether the water would be clean.

After the plague broke out, the water in the affected areas would definitely be problematic. Although the water in the well was groundwater, who knew if it would be polluted? There was no special equipment to inspect it. Although she had a prescription to deal with the plague, it did not mean everyone would not get other diseases. So having clean drinking water was her biggest problem right now.

Gu Yu Qi wanted to make a water purification device which could at least filter it. After she finished her inspection, she took Dai Mei to the kitchen.

“Can you burn charcoal?” Gu Yu Qi asked directly. Dai Mei was confused.

“What does Young Miss want charcoal for?” Dai Mei asked.

“自然是有用啊。”顾雨绮笑着说道。

“Naturally it’ll be useful,” Gu Yu Qi said with a smile.

“I have charcoal, is wood charcoal alright?” Dai Mei said as she pulled out some black charcoal from the bottom of the cabinet and showed Gu Yu Qi.

“Alright, alright.” Gu Yu Qi’s eyes lit up. She took the charcoal and asked Dai Mei to help her. They crushed the charcoal and poured it onto a clean cotton cloth, then put it in the steamer. Then they added water below to steam.

Dai Mei obeyed Gu Yu Qi’s orders and steamed the charcoal in the steamer, but she did not understand why Gu Yu Qi did this.

“Young Miss, are we going to eat the charcoal?” She asked with a smile.

Gu Yu Qi laughed, “Do you think charcoal is edible?” She asked rhetorically.

“Of course it isn’t!” Dai Mei shook her head. “I’ve heard of people who eat soil but never charcoal.” When she finished speaking, her expression turned dark, “As a child, there was a famine in our hometown and everyone was so hungry that they would dig up a kind of white clay to eat. My family couldn’t support me anymore so they just sold me. Fortunately, Young Miss bought me.”

Gu Yu Qi saw Dai Mei’s desolate expression and her heart felt a little uncomfortable. She walked over and gently hugged Dai Mei’s shoulders, softly consoling, “Alright, stop thinking about the past. The important thing is that we’re living well now, aren’t we?”

“Mhmm.” Dai Mei gently wiped the tears out of her eyes and took a deep breath, “Yes, so this servant girl will follow Young Miss for the rest of her life.” She was inspired in the moment and there was a firmness and warmth in her eyes as she looked at Gu Yu Qi.

“Tsk, stop bluffing. If you meet a young man who makes you fall in love in the future, it’s likely I’ll be forgotten in the blink of an eye,” Gu Yu Qi deliberately joked. She lifted her hand to tickle Dai Mei’s armpit. The hurt Dai Mei suddenly jumped away from Gu Yu Qi’s side. She blushed like a cooked shrimp, “Young Miss!” She said angrily, but in the end she could not help but laugh.

It was good to smile. Gu Yu Qi breathed a sigh of relief. The life and death of outsiders had nothing to do with her, but the people around her must live happily.

“By the way, Young Miss, how long does it take to steam charcoal?” Dai Mei asked. As the two of them talked and fought, time flew and after a while, a thick water vapour appeared from the steamer.

Gu Yu Qi was stopped by this question, She scratched her head. She had accidentally seen the manufacture of activated carbon in modern times. It was just that it needed to be steamed with high-temperature steam, but it was not mentioned how long it needed to be steamed. Her memory was super powerful but she was lazy back then. She glanced generally at everything and now she was stumped.

“Steam it!” It did not matter, Gu Yu Qi said, “Steam it until the charcoal looks different!”

“What can charcoal become?” Dai Mei asked, puzzled.

“It… will be more delicate than charcoal looks and will look even brighter.” Gu Yu Qi scratched her head. There was a whine from the bottom of her heart, why did other time travelling girls have it smooth sailing when they did all kinds of things?! But when it came to her turn, why was it so difficult?! Really, when it came to applying learnings from books, one wished they would have read more. If she had known she would time travel, she would have memorised a large set of encyclopaedias. This half-hearted knowledge was really uncomfortable.

Gu Yu Qi steaming charcoal was seen by the village women who came to the kitchen to cook. It was spread out and after everyone had eaten, they came to the kitchen to look at the Young Miss steaming charcoal. Gu Yu Qi knew that she could not make the high-quality activated carbon of modern times with this indigenous method. Yet it did not matter, as long as it had a filter function, it would be fine.

Charcoal was continuously activated by the steam and gradually changed. Although the pressure of this steamer could not meet production requirements, Gu Yu Qi steamed for long enough and the surface layer of the charcoal particles became very lubricated and shiny.

It was probably almost ready. Gu Yu Qi took out the charcoal pieces and rinsed them with clean water, washing off the layer of ash on the surface. Those carbon pieces became moist and clean.

Gu Yu Qi used the bamboo tube that Zhang Lan had prepared to block one end of the cotton yarn that had been sterilised by high temperature. Then she wrapped the charcoal with gauze and poured it in. The other side was covered with a gauze and this was repeated over several layers. Alright, done! Gu Yu Qi made several such simple water filters in one go and when she was doing this, the others watched silently.

After Gu Yu Qi was done, Dai Mei could not help asking, “Young Miss, what is this for?”

“Let’s do an experiment.” Gu Yu Qi smiled and said. She asked Run Ying to bring two big bowls over with water in them. She poured some ink into the first bowl then poured some sand into the second bowl and mixed it up. Then she brought the simple water filter over and first poured the bowl of water with the sand into it. After a while, water slowly flowed out of the other end of the bamboo tube.

“The water is clear!” Dai Mei said in surprise and joy.

“Yes.” Gu Yu Qi was very satisfied with the results of the first experiment, proving that her water purification device had no issues filtering out some impurities.

Not only was Dai Mei pleasantly surprised, other onlookers thought it was amazing. The water just flowed through this bamboo tube and became clear! Everyone looked at each other, then looked at Gu Yu Qi again and there was already a bit of admiration in their gazes.

The maids and guards who followed Gu Yu Qi saw the admiration shown by the villagers who had joined later, and felt very proud from their hearts.

The second bowl of water had ink added. Gu Yu Qi really felt a little uneasy when she poured it. She added another bamboo tube under the first bamboo tube. After a while, the water that had been filtered twice slowly flowed out of the lower end of the second bamboo tube. Those present erupted in amazement. This unremarkable thing could turn ink into clear water.

Some villagers already wanted to bow down to Gu Yu Qi. Was this not a legendary sorceress? So talented.

Seeing that the water with ink turned into clear water, Gu Yu Qi was really relieved now. Her water filter was really successful.

She handed over the water purifier to Zhang Lan for safekeeping and told him from now on, when water is drawn from the well, it must be placed into a water storage tank to stand still. Then the bamboo tube should be used to draw water from the water tank and filtered through the water purifier before it could be used for cooking and making tea. They could not drink water directly. Gu Yu Qi had observed them. The men from the village liked to drink directly from the water tank. This bad habit must be corrected.

When they heard that Gu Yu Qi forbade them from drinking unfiltered water, a bit of displeasure appeared on the faces of the men.

“You city people are overly particular about things, why can’t we drink that clean water?!” Someone could not help but shout. “Drinking hot tea is too troublesome! You still have to wait for it to cool down, how can it be as satisfying as drinking it directly?” When he finished, several people around him nodded in agreement.

Gu Yu Qi’s face darkened. Naturally, she would not say anything to these people about bacteria and microbes. Here, these people must obey her words unconditionally.

“What? Do you have an opinion?” She spoke in a low voice, scanning the crowd with her eyes, “Don’t forget, in my house, you have to listen to me. If you don’t want to, then just leave!” Gu Yu Qi’s tone was heavy. The men who were talking shrank back and dared not speak.

“I know you might feel dissatisfied in your heart.” Gu Yu Qi sneered and continued, “But there’s nothing to be dissatisfied about. Either be better than me, or listen to me!”

As soon as she said this, the faces of those men turned serious and they stood up straight. Then they saluted respectfully, “Yes.” They bowed their heads together.

Gu Yu Qi saw that they were convinced. Only then did she slowly reveal a smile, “Don’t let me see you drinking unfiltered water again. Even if I see it just once, better watch your skin!”

“Don’t dare, don’t dare.” Those men saw Gu Yu Qi smile and her dark expression dissipate. If they had some contempt for that little girl Gu Yu Qi at the beginning, then after getting along with her these few days, they were all convinced by Gu Yu Qi. So when Gu Yu Qi said to either be better than her, they all became respectful.

They had already seen Gu Yu Qi’s martial arts. In the past few days, they had never felt more at ease than under her arrangements and protection. How could they not accept Gu Yu Qi?

Days went past one by one. On this night, Zhang Lan came back from shopping outside and in a panic, he ran to the study and knocked on Gu Yu Qi’s door.

“Young Miss, not good, just as you expected, the downstream dam has burst!” He wiped the rain off his face and looked at Gu Yu Qi in horror, “I heard that many people have died. A large number of refugees have poured in and the governor of Jiangxia City has ordered the city gates to be closed!”

Gu Yu Qi was slightly taken aback. She gave a deep sigh, “The inevitable had to happen.” Refugees have already flocked to Jiangxia City, which meant the dam burst a few days ago.

She looked up at the dark night sky outside. “He should already have come too,” she said silently in her heart.