Rebirth: The Journey of an Heiress novel Chapter 1159

Chapter 1159: Chapter 1153: Murder

Bai Qingyan turned her head to look at Wei Zhong.

Seeing Bai Qingyan’s interest, Wei Zhong continued, "This old servant heard... Minister Sima made some foolish decisions when he was younger, indulging in the pleasures of the world. Later, he fell seriously ill, and the Imperial Physician said he could no longer have children, so he adopted a child from the clan... The child’s father had passed away early, and the mother was about to remarry to return to her maiden home."

Sima Ruodan wiped her tears with her sleeve, bowing her head in shame. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

"Who knew, six years later, Madam Sima got pregnant and gave birth to the Imperial Censor, so the Imperial Censor should be the second child in the family," Wei Zhong glanced at Sima Ruodan and chuckled.

Bai Qingyan looked at Bai Qingqi and saw that Bai Qingqi was lowering his gaze, as if he had already investigated the matter thoroughly.

"Chun Zhi, help Miss Sima up..." Bai Qingyan smiled at Sima Ruodan, "Sit down so we can talk slowly."

Sima Ruodan was flattered, knelt and bowed to Bai Qingyan, but declined Chun Zhi’s offer to help her up. She said chokingly, "This citizen woman is guilty of deceiving the emperor; Your Majesty, please let me continue speaking on my knees! Since my uncle was born, my father has been in a very awkward position within the Sima family. Originally, my great-grandfather wanted my grandfather and grandmother to send my father back to his original family, but my father’s biological father had already died, and his biological mother had remarried. So, my grandfather sent him to live on a manor when he was ten, and from then on, the Sima family paid no heed to my father, acting as if he did not exist."

When she was seven, her father fell ill... she sneaked away from the manor to plead for help from her grandparents but was beaten and thrown out by the Sima family’s servants, who claimed there was never a young master.

When her father saw Sima Ruodan covered in bruises, he was filled with tears and only said she should never go to the Sima manor again.

At that time, Sima Ruodan felt full of resentment towards the Sima manor, but her father always said not to forget the favor of the Sima family. Regardless, her grandparents had raised him without worry about food and clothing and had not mistreated him at the manor...

So, over time, Sima Ruodan felt more grateful towards her grandparents whom she had never met, thinking that it must be the servants who looked down on her, and her grandparents did not know she had tried to see them.

After her father became ill, her mother worked even harder to pay for his medicine, but even then her father didn’t make it through the second summer and passed away...

Bai Jinzhao opened her mouth slightly, suppressing herself from interrupting Sima Ruodan’s words, but how could people behave this way? Because they couldn’t have children, they adopted one, and now that they have their own child, they send the adopted child away as if he didn’t exist!

It was then that Sima Ruodan learned that her mother had once been a proper young lady of an official family but the family had been ruined by the mother’s of the bewitching concubine’s family back then, and it was her father who pleaded with the Sima family to save her mother by exchanging the condition to remove his name from their records and never enter Sima manor again.

"Later, when the exams were retaken, Xue Renyi couldn’t participate due to Uncle Xue’s sudden illness and returned home to care for him, yet... Xue Renyi had already demonstrated his talents before the exams, and everyone who read Xue Renyi’s writings said he would have placed top three had he participated. Though he couldn’t take the exams, he entered the Imperial College, and the emperor plans to hold the exams this year to select talents for Zhou! Now, the Sima family set their sights on the engagement..."

Tears streamed down Sima Ruodan’s face, "The Sima family knew of my engagement with Xue Renyi, they invited me back to the Sima manor, and said to my mother... Grandmother was angry at my father for leaving home for mother back then, so she didn’t like my mother. But I am my father’s daughter... In the future, Xue Renyi will surely be on the list, and marrying out from the Sima manor would add glory to Xue Renyi-considering his ancestors were in commerce!"

"Mother also thought if I were to return to the Sima family and marry out from there... it would make up for Father’s leaving home for her," she choked on her words, trembling, "Initially, I was unwilling, having never met Xue Renyi, I didn’t care whether I could marry him in the end, but I couldn’t bear to trouble my mother and felt grateful to Uncle Xue, so I followed the nanny to the Sima manor; who knew they would let an illegitimate daughter pose as me to meet Xue Renyi and I would be framed with the crime of debauchery, planned to be sent to Yongzhou to marry an old widower!"

When Sima Ruodan spoke of this, her gaze became fierce, as if harboring immense anger that couldn’t be quelled, desiring to kill.

"I escaped and only when returning home did I learn... The day after I left, my mother had been forced to death by them! They said my mother was the daughter of a criminal of the past that slipped through, and how could the mother-in-law of a future Top Scholar originally about to be sent to a brothel be the daughter of a criminal..."