Surviving in the General's Mansion - Chapter 27: A New Look

Chapter 27: A New Look

Xia Heng wanted to go out and call for help, but she was afraid the man would hurt Qiulin-or do something else to the account books.

Cang Chuli realized he had fallen for a trap the moment he reached the rear courtyard. He had been so focused on the calculations that his brain had gone stiff, and for a moment, he simply had not thought of it.

Just as he was about to rush back, more than a dozen black-clad men charged out from who knew where and entangled them in a fight.

“They’re trying to stall for time,” Zhang Qiang said in a low voice. “End this quickly.”

Cang Chuli sent one black-clad man flying with a kick.

By the time Cang Chuli and the others finally cleared out the attackers and fought their way back to the study, they saw Qiulin locked in fierce combat with a black-clad man.

Beside them, another “monkey” was hopping up and down, shouting at the top of her lungs while occasionally throwing things at the black-clad man.

Her technique was excellent. Nearly every throw landed dead on target. Her posture, however, was not exactly elegant.

Xia Heng felt like she had rediscovered the state she had been in back in primary school when she used to pelt people with sandbags. Left hand, right hand-she showed no mercy.

Mercy? Not a chance! This bastard had actually gone for the face!!!

Qiulin’s face had been hit, and her left arm had taken one of his punches head-on. Just looking at it made Xia Heng’s teeth ache.

The black-clad man was fighting two against one, yet for a while, he still could not be taken down.

But once Mo Qing and Mo Bai joined in, the battle instantly turned into a complete steamroll.

Before long, the black-clad man was outmatched and tried to flee.

Mo Bai thought: If we let him get away, Zhang Qiang will laugh at us for a whole year.

With a sweeping kick, he knocked the black-clad man to the ground. Mo Qing immediately stepped forward and executed a standard arrest hold.

Cang Chuli glanced at the spotless desk and floor, and the space between his brows twitched.

“Where are the account books?”

Xia Heng limped over to the two trunks, looking smug.

Her knee had hit the ground earlier too, so walking now felt… not great.

“Ta-da-da-da!”

“They’re all here! Not a single one missing! I put them all away! Those few over there were the ones he threw out just now, and I blocked them all!”

She jutted her chin toward the account books she had just flung out of the battlefield, her tone dripping with disdain.

Cang Chuli, Mo Qing, and Mo Bai looked at the only two injured people in the entire room-

Qiulin, who was holding her left arm, her face bruised and bluish-purple, yet entirely expressionless.

Then they looked at Xia Heng, whose chin had lost a layer of skin and was still oozing blood, but who remained completely unaware of it as she stood there proudly like a little rooster.

“…”

“General, he swallowed poison and killed himself.”

Mo Bai felt the man beneath his hand go still. After checking him, he frowned and reported.

Xia Heng was badly startled.

“This subordinate was incompetent.”

No sooner had Mo Bai finished speaking than Deputy General Zhang came in from outside to report that all the black-clad men they had captured had taken poison and died.

Death warriors again.

“Bury them. In any case, they were after the account books.”

Death warriors like these had no identity and were extremely difficult to trace, which was why noble households loved using them.

Cang Chuli checked the account books. When he turned back and saw Xia Heng fussing over Qiulin with concern, he fell silent for a moment.

“…Go apply medicine first.”

=============

“Pfft!”

Mo Qing failed to hold it in and burst out laughing.

Qiulin stopped reading from the account book.

Xia Heng also looked up at him.

Mo Qing was shaking with laughter, still trying hard to turn his head away so they would not see.

Qiulin’s arm had been somewhat dislocated. In order to help it heal faster, the old military physician in the manor had fitted it with a splint. As for all the bruised and battered areas, he had applied medicine for injuries from falls and blows.

Xia Heng’s chin had been scraped raw over a large area when she had passionately slid and pounced across the floor.

At first, she had not felt it, but later, when the medicine was applied, it hurt so badly her eyes filled with tears and she kept sucking in sharp breaths. Her knee had also been treated with medicine.

There was no medical tape in ancient times, so after applying the medicine, the military physician could only wrap bandages around her head to secure it.

Aside from being an eyesore, it did not affect normal work or daily life.

The problem was that these two people-one with a bruised and battered face, an arm in a splint and suspended in bandages, and the other with her head wrapped up like a ball-

not to mention the strong smell of injury medicine clinging to both of them…

And yet these two still had perfectly serious expressions, one reading and the other writing.

The one writing was afraid she might hear wrong, so with great difficulty, she had even dug her ears out from under the bandages…

Mo Qing truly felt he had done his best. It was genuinely hard to stay serious in a scene like this.
When he saw the two of them looking his way, he had no choice but to grit his teeth with all his might and run through every miserable thing that had happened to him lately.

Off to the side, Mo Bai hurriedly took a strategic sip of water. In no time at all, he had already drained two whole pots.

Xia Heng narrowed her dead-fish eyes at the last person, the one dressed in a moon-white robe, and lifted the ledger in front of her higher and higher until it gradually covered her face.

Go on, laugh. Hmph. She really wondered whose fault it was that the two of them had ended up like this.

Who would have thought that she, Xia Heng, would one day sacrifice herself to protect “public” property…

She was tainted now. No longer a qualified corporate drone.

By the time the sun slowly rose in the east, the group had finally worked together to finish checking the account books in one chest.

Candle wax had run all over the candlestick.

“Go back and rest first. We’ll check the rest after you’ve recovered.”

Cang Chuli had to admit that these “Arabic Numerals” and this “addition and subtraction” were truly convenient and efficient.

In just one night, they had completed at least a week’s worth of work.

If this were implemented in court and in the army,

who knew how many parasites would be forced out of office, and how much their administrative efficiency would improve?

Used together with the “Multiplication Table Song,” one could quickly calculate large numbers even without an abacus.

Xia Yun, that old scoundrel, had such a useful book and never mentioned it?

Was it because he could not understand it, or because he had never read it at all?

His gaze shifted to Xia Heng, who was wrapped up like a pig’s head.

Forget it. As long as she behaved herself, the General’s Mansion could still tolerate her.

Before that,

Xia Heng had limped back to their residence with Qiulin, the two of them supporting each other.

The ledger in Cang Chuli’s hands rose higher and higher again.

It was hard not to laugh. Truly.

==========

“Hahahahahahahahaha!”

Zhao Die laughed so hard at their new appearances that her eyes narrowed into slits.

Zhao Siyan was a little more restrained, but even she had a mouthful of rice stuck in her mouth and could barely swallow it.

“You stayed up all night, and you ended up like this?!”

Chuqing felt sorry for them as she helped put food into Qiulin’s bowl.

Qiulin struggled to hold her chopsticks in her right hand, fighting to deliver rice into her mouth.

Yes… it was her left hand that was injured… but she was also left-handed…

Seeing how miserable she looked, Xia Heng simply picked up some food and put it straight into her mouth.

Qiulin froze, dumbfounded by the sudden mouthful of vegetables. Once she reacted, she closed her mouth and slowly chewed.

Chuqing saw this and immediately followed suit, holding a spoonful of porridge to the side and waiting.

“I can see your little tongue.”

Xia Heng deadpanned.

Zhao Die laughed until tears came out. There was no other reason.

This kind of look was truly rare among the women of the inner household.

From childhood until now, what she had seen were all verbal sparring matches, or victories won without bloodshed.

This was the first time she had ever seen anyone genuinely “hurt down to the bones” and bandaged up like this.

“You’re way too unlucky, aren’t you? Last time you ran into assassins, and this time it was you again?”

Xia Heng sighed. Even she felt her luck was terrible.

Anything that could happen somehow happened to her. Was this the transmigration benefit the system had talked about?

Still, at least the account books had not been lost. She just did not know whether the Left Prime Minister would pull any more tricks.

Thinking of that young man who had knelt before Cang Chuli, kowtowing and crying until his face was covered in tears,

she hoped this would help him a little.

“Maybe this is what they call a life of hardship?” Xia Heng asked back.

“Why don’t you go to a temple and pray? Ask for a peace talisman or something?” Zhao Siyan suggested. As soon as she finished, she thought of the bloody experience they had all gone through at Putuo Temple last time and pursed her lips.

“Never mind. Pretend I didn’t say that.”

“All right, hurry back and rest. Siyan and I have work to do. The houses in the rear courtyard burned down last night, so we have to help clean up today. Later, we still have to boil water.”

After Zhao Die finished the steamed bun in front of her, she dragged Zhao Siyan off in a rush.

“Then I’ll be going too. I have to pick up the general’s clothes from the Washing Workshop later.”

Xia Heng and Qiulin nodded.

Chef Xiang came out carrying a soup bucket, intending to see who was still short on soup so he could ladle them some of the “bottom of the pot.”

The moment he entered the dining hall, he saw the two “disabled people” helping each other.

After asking a question or two, he waved his large hand and served each of them another bowl of egg-drop soup.

In the name of nourishing them with eggs…