Chapter 5

The moment the infant cried out, everyone around had been holding their breath, and now they all dared to breathe.

The stone in Lin Jiaojiao's heart fell to the ground. She was so exhausted that she didn't even have the strength to pick up the child. The wet nurse saw this and was the first to go up and take away the crying infant.

"He's alive!" The wet nurse showed joy and hurriedly carried the crying child to Su Wanqiu, looking like she was asking for credit.

Even the Old Madam and Pei Aosong couldn't help but lean over to look. Seeing the child's loud cry, Pei Aosong and the Old Madam looked at each other with satisfaction. The Old Madam even praised, "He looks like a strong and powerful good child."

There was a trace of expectation in Pei Aosong's eyes, as if he had already seen the loving picture of himself walking with the child in the morning sun, and he said with a heart-fluttering feeling, "Let's name the child Pei Zhaoyang."

"Very good, the name is very good." The Old Madam nodded approvingly, "In his generation, follow the Zhao character, and the Yang character has a very good meaning. Wanqiu, what do you think?"

She turned her face and found that Su Wanqiu was eagerly stretching out her arms, wanting to hold the child from the wet nurse's arms to her own arms to coax him, "Child, be good, don't cry, don't cry, come to mother's arms."

But the Old Madam ordered with a straight face, "Wet nurse, you take the child down first, call a few more people to watch him well, and don't let anyone swap him privately."

After speaking, she persuaded Su Wanqiu with a kind face, "Wanqiu, you just gave birth to a child, you still need to rest more, and it is important to take good care of your body."

"Yes." Su Wanqiu retracted her outstretched hands and lowered her head to answer, but her tired eyes still followed the wet nurse and the child.

The Old Madam saw this scene and understood in her heart: her brother's own daughter really valued the swapped child very much. Forget it, since Su Wanqiu likes this child, let her raise him well.

Although she had given up the idea of attacking the child, she still had an inexplicable malice toward the child's biological mother. She turned to look at Lin Jiaojiao, who was slumped on the ground, pale, and bleeding from her forehead, and scolded with dissatisfaction, "Seductive vixen, who are you pretending to be miserable for."

The more she stared at Lin Jiaojiao, the more she felt that this woman was base, and she was also someone who knew witchcraft. She had the witchcraft to bring the infant back to life, so it was no wonder her son was so devoted to her. It was estimated that he had been cast with some kind of charm Gu, and the Pei Mansion couldn't keep such a person.

If she wasn't eradicated in time, who knows when she would overturn the entire Pei Mansion!

But she couldn't take action in front of her son and daughter-in-law for the time being. When she was in confinement, she would add something to the decoction to make her die unknowingly. At that time, she would say it was caused by confinement illness, and no one would suspect it.

The Old Madam was calculating in her heart, but Pei Aosong ignored Su Wanqiu, who needed care, walked to the pitiful Lin Jiaojiao, picked her up directly, and took her back to her room without saying a word.

The Old Madam watched Pei Aosong's back as he carried Lin Jiaojiao away, and her determination to get rid of her became even firmer.

A trace of sorrow arose in Su Wanqiu's eyes, and in the end, this sorrow could only turn into a helpless sigh.

Lin Jiaojiao was having a high fever, and the hot air she exhaled puffed onto Pei Aosong's face. Only then did he realize that the woman in his arms was quite ill.

"A Yan, you go quickly and call Liu Dafu to see the concubine."

Lin Jiaojiao was very ill, plus that kneeling, and being pressed by the nanny to knock her head against the ground, her head was splitting with pain. She really didn't have any feeling of heart-beating for this husband who cared about her.

But Pei Aosong had a face full of ambition and hesitation, as if he wanted her to be grateful to him.

And House Liu Dafu, after receiving the order, followed out from Jinxiu Garden. He kept recalling the scene of Lin Jiaojiao rescuing Yang Ge'er just now, seemingly wanting to find the medical principle, and as a result, he accidentally bumped into Bai Zhi, who was rushing back with medicine. The medicine bag fell to the ground in a mess.

He hurriedly helped Bai Zhi pick up the medicine bag, thinking that in the past two days, except for the medicine for miscarriage prevention and childbirth assistance opened for Madam Su Wanqiu's Jinxiu Garden, no medicine had been grabbed in other courtyards, so he asked, "Bai Zhi, whose medicine is this?"

Bai Zhi answered without raising her head while picking up the medicine bag, "This is the medicine the concubine asked me to grab."

Liu Dafu was a little confused when he heard this answer: he didn't prescribe medicine for the concubine, so he opened the medicine bag and looked carefully at the prescription inside, "Angelica, white peony, rehmannia, ligusticum wallichii... isn't this the Four-Substance Decoction?"

The Four-Substance Decoction is mainly used for nourishing blood and conditioning, and nourishing Qi and blood. It is suitable for those with empty Qi and blood after childbirth. What makes him feel most strange is that this Four-Substance Decoction also added a medicinal herb for fever reduction, and the ratio of various medicinal herbs is even more exquisite than the one he, the house physician, gave to the Madam in Jinxiu Garden.

As an old house physician with ten years of experience, Liu Dafu secretly admired the prescription of Lin Jiaojiao, the concubine. There is really a mountain beyond a mountain, and there are people beyond people.

"Liu Dafu? Liu Dafu!" The servant A Yan called him several times, and Liu Dafu finally came back to his senses and replied, "Hey."

A Yan urged, "The master is waiting for you to see Concubine Wang."

"Good, good, good." Liu Dafu said good three times in a row, then followed A Yan into the room to take Lin Jiaojiao's pulse.

During the pulse taking, Lin Jiaojiao opened those watery apricot eyes. She seemed to have figured out some things, and a pitiful expression appeared on her face. She did this to make Pei Aosong feel distressed and guilty, so that he would agree to the request she was about to make.

She had never thought that she, a straight girl, would need to use the things her best friend used to flirt with men.

"Showing weakness to men is not a green tea, on the contrary, it can arouse their protective desire and exchange more resources for yourself," her best friend said while applying nail polish, "Straight girls won't work. If they treat you as a tomboy, all the dirty and tiring work will be thrown to you."

Thinking about it now, her best friend's words were not wrong at all.

Because Pei Aosong's eyes now revealed pity and guilt. He held Lin Jiaojiao's hand tightly and gently wiped the blood from the corner of her forehead, "Jiaojiao, you have suffered today."

Lin Jiaojiao tried hard to squeeze her eyes, wanting to shed some tears, but she couldn't squeeze out a single tear after several times. She could only learn to smile miserably and squeeze out a tone of swallowing all grievances: "It's not bitter, it's all for the child."

On the surface, she was miserable, but Lin Jiaojiao kept rolling her eyes in her heart. Thinking of just giving birth, having her child swapped, being forced to kneel by the Old Madam, and being slapped fiercely by the old nanny, how could she not have hatred in her heart?

But for now, she could only grit her teeth and swallow the hatred in her heart.

If I don't take revenge for today's hatred, I am not Lin Jiaojiao!

Lin Jiaojiao figured it out. The body is the capital of the revolution. Now she must sit well in confinement. Only by conditioning her body can she take revenge for herself!

And the husband she picked up in front of her seems to really have some feelings for her.

Since there are true feelings, then this feeling should not be wasted.

Under Lin Jiaojiao's weakness, Pei Aosong agreed to the several requests Lin Jiaojiao made: hiring a wet nurse for her child and allocating ten more taels of silver every month.

Thinking that Lin Jiaojiao had made a contribution to saving the child, Pei Aosong rewarded her with a tea shop in the West City.

After they finished "the man and the concubine," Lin Jiaojiao felt that the transaction was reached and was ready to start driving people away, but the reluctance on the surface still had to be there, "Husband, if I wasn't still having a fever, I would definitely have to serve you well today."

Pei Aosong remembered that she was still having a fever, so he asked Liu Dafu about Lin Jiaojiao's condition.

Liu Dafu answered truthfully: "Concubine Wang has a deficiency of Qi and blood after childbirth, and there are a few external injuries on both knees. She needs to rest for more than ten days to recover."

Pei Aosong couldn't help but frown, "What external injuries?"

When Lin Jiaojiao heard this, she lowered her head and wiped away the non-existent tears, pretending to absolve others of their crimes: "It's okay, husband, the Old Madam didn't mean it... This is all Jiaojiao's own fault, husband, don't look at it..."

The more she said this, the more Pei Aosong wanted to see the external injuries on her knees. It didn't matter if he didn't look, but when he looked, he gasped: these knees were swollen out of shape and were all bruised.

Pei Aosong knew this was his mother's handwriting, but he was helpless. To compensate Lin Jiaojiao, he took off the Double-Fish Jade Pendant from his waist and stuffed it into Lin Jiaojiao's hand.

The corners of his eyes were a little red, "Jiaojiao has been wronged, I will find my mother to explain and tell her not to make things difficult for you anymore."

During the conversation, the sound of the old nanny Qingyin coughing lightly came from the door, "Concubine, the Old Madam is grateful that you saved the young master, and specially rewarded you with a decoction to nourish your body."

Pei Aosong replied, "Come in, thank you, Nanny Qingyin."

Nanny Qingyin brought a bowl of black decoction into the room and signaled Lin Jiaojiao to take the medicine, and did not forget to remind Pei Aosong, "Master, the Old Madam told you to go see the Madam when you have time."

Pei Aosong replied expressionlessly: "I know."

Lin Jiaojiao looked at a bowl of medicine and immediately smelled a large amount of safflower. She knew that she absolutely could not drink this bowl of decoction, otherwise she would collapse and die at any time.

What a vicious old woman! She clearly had no grievances with her, but she wanted to kill her every minute!

But she couldn't reject the "good intentions" of that dead old woman in front of Pei Aosong, so Lin Jiaojiao could only reach out to take the medicine.

"Splash," just as Lin Jiaojiao took it, her hand lost strength, and the decoction spilled in front of Nanny Qingyin, and even more than half of it spilled on her clothes.

At the same time, the bowl containing the decoction fell to the ground, making a crisp sound, and was immediately shattered.

Nanny Qingyin stepped back several steps and shouted sharply, "Presumptuous! You are so bold! How dare you pour out the decoction given to you by the Old Madam!!"

Lin Jiaojiao said weakly, "Nanny, I'm really sorry. After I gave birth, I haven't eaten a grain of rice. My body is so weak that I didn't expect that I didn't even have the strength to hold the bowl and take the medicine."

Pei Aosong was surprised again and again, "What, you haven't eaten since you gave birth?"

Her stomach made a gurgling sound, and Pei Aosong suddenly felt that the bitten hand hurt. He instinctively stepped back a few steps to prevent himself from being bitten by Lin Jiaojiao, who was starving.

He turned to Nanny Qingyin and said sternly: "Forget it, this is not her fault. Please go back and report to my mother, just say that Jiaojiao has already taken the medicine."

When Pei Aosong said this, there was a trace of undeniable master's majesty in his eyes, and Nanny Qingyin had to reply "Yes" unwillingly.

After Nanny Qingyin left with hatred in her clothes full of soup and water, Pei Aosong called the servants to clean up the decoction spilled on the ground, and at the same time ordered the servants to deliver food to her.

"Jiaojiao, I have to go see Wanqiu." Pei Aosong's face was a little tired. Even if he didn't like Su Wanqiu anymore, she was the Madam who gave birth to a child for him, so he had to go see her anyway.

"Yes, husband." Lin Jiaojiao wished he would leave quickly. If he didn't leave, she would vomit.

"I will come back to accompany you, Liu Dafu, help me take good care of Jiaojiao." After Pei Aosong left this sentence, he left Jiaohua Garden.

Liu Dafu replied: "Yes, master."

At this time, Bai Zhi brought her brown sugar rice porridge. Lin Jiaojiao smelled it and confirmed that there was no abnormality, so she relaxed and began to drink the porridge in small sips.

Lin Jiaojiao drank all the brown sugar rice porridge, and her body sweated a little, only then did she feel that she had recovered a little strength.

Liu Dafu still stayed in the room and didn't leave. He pretended to be packing up the medicine box and kept lingering in the room.

When Lin Jiaojiao was ready to lie down and rest, she looked up and saw that Liu Dafu was still not leaving. She knew in her heart that he had something to say, so she asked directly, "What else is there? Say it."

Seeing Lin Jiaojiao asking, Liu Dafu showed a struggle on his face, but in the end, he hardened his heart and bowed solemnly to Lin Jiaojiao, "Concubine Lin, your medical skills are above mine. I, House Liu Dafu Shouyi, have a request—"