The weather was getting colder, and there were fewer people coming and going on the main street than usual.

  The northwest wind was howling, but the business of those lively teahouses was booming

  Tong Yingying, the daughter of Censor Tong, had not been as famous as Qiao Ruoyi in the past two years, but she had a good reputation among literati.

  Today, she wrote an essay on filial piety, which was widely circulated among literati.

  In the article, Tong Yingying praised the clan system

  At the end of the article, she criticized Qiao Jinniang for ignoring her clansmen for money and scolded other imperial censors for not impeaching Qiao Jinniang for fear of offending her.

  In the end, she questioned that if there were no clan system, what was the difference between Datang and the barbarians?

  If there were no clansmen, there wouldn’t even be an ancestral temple, and no one would worship you after your death.

  When literati read this article, they felt it was thought-provoking and all wrote poems and essays to criticize Qiao Jinniang for ignoring her clansmen.

  No matter how powerful Duke Anyuan was, he was a military officer, not a civil one.

  These literati always took maintaining feudal ethical code as their duty. Qiao Jinniang disobeyed the feudal ethical code, and they certainly wouldn’t allow it.

  Even Prefect Chang’an received a lot of complaints about Qiao Jinniang. This matter had caused the rage of literati. Even if Emperor Huilin wanted to help his son cover up for his future daughter-in-law, he couldn’t do anything about it.

  In the levee, he proclaimed a decree: “According to the ethical code, clan has existed since ancient times, and women shall not inherit her parents’ property. Now listen…


  “I ordered County Mistress Jia’an to return the Myriad Taste in Lin’an, which was left by her adoptive parents, to the Qiao clan and it shall be handed over to the adoptive son of Qiao Yu!”


  Lu Chen frowned but he didn’t stop it. After all, this was a rule that had been left down from the ancestors.

  However, he also knew what Myriad Taste meant to Qiao Jinniang.

  He remembered that one day after they got married, she had just read a novel about a man penciling his wife’s eyebrows. Because he didn’t paint her eyebrows for her, she complained that if it weren’t for Myriad Taste, she would definitely not marry an oblivious “wood” like him.

  At that time, although Lu Chen was annoyed, he knew that Qiao Jinniang had always longed to marry a man who she loved. Instead of a man like him, who she only knew a few days ago but had to marry to defend Myriad Taste.

  Qiao Jinniang could even sacrifice her marriage for Myriad Taste…


  Now that his father had issued an oral order, Qiao Jinniang must be extremely sad.

  But the rules that had been passed down for thousands of years couldn’t be broken at will! At least for now, when the clan system was still entrenched deep in everyone’s hearts, it couldn’t be broken.

  Otherwise, women who had no brothers wouldn’t even be able to find a man to marry into her family so as to inherit her parents’ properties after her parents death. Moreover, the parents might be directly murdered by her clansmen.

  When Qiao Jinniang received the emperor’s oral decree, she felt as if she had fallen into an ice cellar, and she couldn’t come back to herself for a long time.

  Zheng Xiao comforted her. “Jin’er, just return the Myriad Taste in Lin’an to those people, so that they can go back to Lin’an as soon as possible, and won’t be such an eyesore to you.”


  Qiao Jinniang shook her head and said, “No, Mother, you don’t understand what Myriad Taste means to me. I will never allow them to ruin Myriad Taste!”


  “I’m going to talk to Lu Chen. I’d rather find a new husband who is willing to marry into my family. I’ll never allow those people to get Myriad Taste!”


  The Crown Prince, who happened to come: “…”


  After seeing Lu Chen, Qiao Jinniang said with red eyes. “Why are you the Crown Prince? If only you were not!”


  “I will not give them my adoptive parents’ Myriad Taste. I am my parents’ adopted daughter. Their last wish was to give me the Myriad Taste. As long as I find a man to marry into my family, I will definitely be able to take back Myriad Taste.”


  Lu Chen said to Qiao Jinniang, “Find a man to marry into your family? Do you think it’s easy? What if that man doesn’t treat you well?” Qiao Jinniang said in a low voice, “Then can’t Xi’er continue to be the Xi’er of the Qiao family?”


  Lu Chen: “If you were Xi’er, are you willing to be my heir or a little shopkeeper of a restaurant in the South?”


  Qiao Jinniang was a mother, and she certainly wanted Xi’er to be an imperial grandson who could stay away from the fight for the throne.

  But now that he was already the Crown Prince’s heir, how could she let Xi’er be the shopkeeper of a small restaurant?

  Qiao Jinniang looked up at Lu Chen and said, “Can we have another child? And let that child be surnamed Qiao and let him inherit Myriad Taste?”


  Lu Chen said to Qiao Jinniang, “I’m afraid that won’t work either.

  “But don’t be anxious. Think about it, can those Qiao clansmen run Myriad Taste well?

  “All they want is to make quick money. When they can’t make ends meet, you can buy Myriad Taste back, right?”


  Qiao Jinniang said, “You don’t understand them at all. They will never do this. They will definitely threaten me with Myriad Taste, and threaten me to fill that bottomless pit!” It was not that Qiao Jinniang hadn’t seen something like this before. The same thing happened to one of her neighbors.

  Her neighbor married a silk merchant, and her adoptive brother was not able to manage the family business well, so he often forced his sister to use her husband’s money to subsidize him.

  There were many such examples. When the Qiao clansmen got Myriad Taste in their hands, they could do whatever they wanted. How could they be willing to sell it?

  Qiao Jinniang complained about Lu Chen. “I’d rather you were not the Crown Prince. Being the Crown Prince, you are subject to a lot of restraints and have to be extremely careful about everything.

  “Does those literati have nothing to do? Why don’t they pay attention to political affairs? Why do they keep picking on me?!”


  Lu Chen said, “Do you know why this matter has caused so much attention?

  “It’s not because you didn’t just touch the interests of the Qiao clansmen.

  “If you could inherit your parents’ properties as a woman, what if the other women in the world follow suit?

  “You have to know that although there aren’t many women who have no brothers in this world, there aren’t few.

  “Besides, even if a woman has brothers, if her brothers are incompent while she is capable enough, she may be able to inherit the family business.

  “If those women follow your example, or the parents prefer their daughters and give their properties to their daughters, what will the brothers think?

  “This is not just a dispute between you and the Qiao clansmen. Most literati are men, and they certainly would fight for their own interests.”


  After listening to Lu Chen’s words, Qiao Jinniang gradually calmed down. Chang’an was not Lin’an, and she was no longer a commoner. She sneered.

  “If the clansmen are capable, who would covet an orphan girl’s properties? They should help her instead!

  “They are nothing but a group of incompetent waste who shamelessly snatch others’ properties in the excuse of the ethical code that was passed down from their ancestors! It’s ridiculous.

  “And His Majesty always claims to be a sage emperor, but he’s actually stu…” Before she could finish speaking, Lu Chen hurriedly covered her mouth. Lu Chen always felt that his father had put his men beside him, perhaps his father was afraid that what happened back then would repeat itself…


  But who knew if these words would reach his father’s ears.

  Lu Chen whispered to Qiao Jinniang, “I know you’re angry, but it’s not that there is no other way. Even if they won’t sell Myriad Taste, there are so many Qiao clansmen, and they are not necessarily united. Did you forget how badly they fought to make their own sons to be your father’s adoptive son back then?”


  Qiao Jinniang shook Lu Chen’s hand away, blinked and said, “Yes, if I tell them that I want to personally choose my adoptive father’s heir, they will definitely have an internal strife first.”