Mu Wanwan was just about to ask Bai Shuiyao what exactly had happened when several more people entered from outside.
The one leading them was Fuliu, with three or four maids following behind her.
Fuliu looked at Bai Shuiyao, who was tightly gripping Mu Wanwan’s hand, and slowly raised an eyebrow.
“You still have fifteen minutes to pack your things.”
Bai Shuiyao’s face turned ugly under her gaze. She clutched Mu Wanwan’s hand and said, “Miss, Wanwan, you have to save me. You’re the only one who can help me. I don’t want to be punished and sent away for hard labour.”
She cried miserably, but Fuliu and the maids behind her all scoffed in disdain.
Fuliu sneered, “What are you crying for? Lord Ao Qin only punished you to do hard labour. He didn’t ask for your life. He even allowed you to pack your things and take them with you. Why are you still not satisfied?”
Fuliu looked at Bai Shuiyao, her tone full of mockery.
“You took advantage of the guards changing shifts at dawn and had Qingye help you escape. Now that you’ve been discovered, you still have the face to cry. You really are impressive.”
“I only wanted to go outside and take a look. I didn’t want to run away.”
Bai Shuiyao sobbed, looking at Mu Wanwan with tearful eyes, putting on a fully wronged appearance.
A maid beside Fuliu couldn’t bear to watch anymore. Who knew whether this little maid liked Qingye or not, but her face flushed red with anger.
“You vixen! You bewitched Lord Qingye until he lost his senses. He had his cultivation crippled by Lord Ao Qin and was driven out of the residence because he helped you escape, but you haven’t even mentioned him once!”
Bai Shuiyao choked. Then she cried even harder, as if trying to prove through her sobs that she was not a heartless woman.
After hearing this much, Mu Wanwan finally understood.
So after Bai Shuiyao had stormed off in anger yesterday, she still had not given up on escaping. She had tried to sneak out of the residence at dawn while the patrol guards were changing shifts, only to be discovered by Ao Qin. Qingye, who had helped her, had his cultivation crippled and was thrown out, while Bai Shuiyao herself had been punished to do hard labour.
Overall, it still matched the original text. It was just that Bai Shuiyao’s escape had shifted from last night to this morning, and the plot where Ao Qin forcefully kissed her and took a liking to her had gone off course into being punished with hard labour.
Had Bai Shuiyao’s female-lead halo weakened?
Mu Wanwan secretly guessed, but she had no intention of getting involved with Bai Shuiyao, and even less intention of pleading for her.
This was Bai Shuiyao courting death on her own. Not only was Mu Wanwan under no obligation to care, even if she wanted to, she did not have the ability to.
After the tyrant’s defeat, Ao Qin had used the excuse of helping his friend look after the residence to seize Mr. Dragon’s power. He had thrown Mr. Dragon, a vegetative dragon, here and left him uncared for. His attitude toward Mu Wanwan, the bride brought in to bring good luck, was terrible too.
She and Mr. Dragon could barely protect themselves. If she went to plead for Bai Shuiyao now, their days might become even harder. It was entirely possible that Ao Qin would throw her and Bai Shuiyao together to do hard labour.
“Miss, say something. Don’t ignore me. Ying…”
Bai Shuiyao clung to Mu Wanwan’s sleeve and refused to let go. Beside them, Fuliu and the group of maids watched the scene coldly.
Fuliu had already prepared herself. If Mu Wanwan tried to protect Bai Shuiyao, she would use force and drag Bai Shuiyao away. In any case, both of them were only first-rank and terribly weak.
Mu Wanwan sighed and slowly pulled her hand free.
“Yaoyao, how could you do something so foolish? If Father found out, he would definitely be very sad.”
Bai Shuiyao hurriedly apologised, “I know I was wrong. I’ll never dare to do it again.”
Mu Wanwan made a troubled expression.
“Yaoyao, I believe you won’t.”
“Listen to me. I want to help you too. I really do.” Mu Wanwan looked extremely sincere. “But I’m currently confined here. I can only go out once every ten days. Only if I stay outside can I occasionally go see you and bring you some food and necessities.”
Bai Shuiyao wiped her tears weakly. By now, she also knew that she probably could not escape. She murmured, “Then… then why don’t you switch places with me? Father loves me the most. He definitely won’t bear to let me go.”
Mu Wanwan was shocked by her shamelessness and almost suspected she had misheard.
Switch places?
Was Bai Shuiyao joking?
Bai Shuiyao looked at Fuliu with tears in her eyes.
“Sister Fuliu, can you let Mu Wanwan go in my place? She was the one who told me to run away! It’s all her fault. I didn’t want to go myself!”
Mu Wanwan was so angry she was almost beyond temper.
Bai Shuiyao had already reached this point, yet she still wanted to drag her down and make her take the blame. How could someone be this shameless?
A person like this was actually the original book’s female lead, spoiled and fought over by Ao Qin and Mr. Dragon. Was Mr. Dragon blind? Was Ao Qin blind? Or was she, Mu Wanwan, the one whose brain was broken?
“It was all Mu Wanwan who told me to do it. Sister Fuliu, don’t take me. Take her to do hard labour instead. I can replace her and take care of that useless dragon! I still have treasures here. I can give them to you. You know this too: the tyrant has already been abandoned. Lord Ao Qin won’t care who the tyrant’s wife is.”
Bai Shuiyao had already stopped caring about face. She was wholeheartedly determined to drag Mu Wanwan down with her.
“At worst, I’ll pay a little price and change into her appearance. Lord Ao Qin won’t discover it.”
Fuliu’s brows shifted slightly, as if she were considering it.
After all, in this other world, changing one’s face at some cost did not seem like anything too difficult.
Mu Wanwan was infuriated by Bai Shuiyao’s desperate struggle and could no longer be bothered to pretend. She gave a cold laugh.
“Bai Shuiyao, although you and I are master and servant, I have always treated you as a sister. Now that you’ve made a mistake yourself, you actually want to slander me. Do you really think Fuliu is stupid? You say you have treasures, so you have treasures? You say we should switch people, so we switch people? Why didn’t I know you had any treasures?”
“Father gave them to me.”
Bai Shuiyao was furious. She glared at Mu Wanwan with her beautiful eyes.
“How would an abandoned piece of trash like you have any? Trash! Lowly—mmph!!!”
Before she could finish cursing, her mouth was roughly stuffed with something.
Mu Wanwan forcefully ground the half-packet of seeds she had shoved into Bai Shuiyao’s mouth and revealed a smile.
“As a younger sister, you should respect me. As a servant, you are even less qualified to slander me.”
She originally had not wanted to offend Bai Shuiyao. After all, Bai Shuiyao was the female lead, and offending her would be very troublesome later on.
But now that Bai Shuiyao was already jumping around on top of her head, what ghost was she still enduring for?
**Author’s note:**
Bai Shuiyao: “Father loves me the most. You’re just a lowly—ah!”
Mu Wanwan: *(backhandedly shoves a packet of seeds at her)* “What the hell are you saying?”
**
I saw some little darlings were a bit confused about the character relationships:
Tyrant = Mr. Dragon = the disabled tyrant from the original book = the pitiful dragon who was cuckolded in the original book.
Ao Qin = the friend who betrayed Mr. Dragon and seized power = the person who stabbed the female supporting character to death in the original book = the second male lead who cuckolded Mr. Dragon together with Bai Shuiyao in the first half of the original book.
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