Long Ancestral Residence.
The elders gathered together to speak with Long Tengfei and Long Hui at the compound's main wing. All of the elders were very displeased at the recent scandal of their Young Miss Xiulan.
The atmosphere within the meeting hall was so oppressive that Yang Jiahui wanted to bolt out of the place. However, she endured and stayed beside her husband to give him moral support. She had always been ill at ease with the Long elders. They only treated her as "barely acceptable" as the current madam of the Long family. She wasn't from a wealthy, aristocratic or influential family, but she was well-educated and had a modestly successful career before she married Long Tengfei.
This was the only reason that they weren't treating her like a complete sh*t, unlike how they treated Wei Lan, Iris' mother, and Long Tengfei's former mistresses, the mothers of his two illegitimate children.
Although this gathering pertained to their Young Miss's latest scandal, it wasn't their main concern. After all, they were already used to her being featured on the news all the time and "shaming" the Long family name again and again.
This time, everyone was more concerned about the inclusion of Long Jun, a.k.a. Little Jun, in the recent tabloid news.
"Hai! The Young Miss Xiulan only knows how to bring trouble to our family! Because of her, it's only a matter of time before the existence of Young Master Hui's bastard son is exposed to the public!" Long Meng complained.
She was the second most prominent elder in the clan. She was the cousin of Long Tengfei's father and the head of one of the branch families.
Long Hui's expression darkened when his son was called a bastard. Although it was true in the literal meaning of the word, the way Elder Long Meng said it sounded too offensive for him as a father. He was about to protest when Long Tengfei gestured for him to calm down. It was difficult, but he sat back and tried to control himself.
"Hmph! I've already said this a million times before. Xiulan will one day cause our Long family's downfall! She has always been the shame of our family. And now she is the reason why the newest shame of our family will be exposed for all the world to see! At this rate, our Long family won't have any face left to show other people!" Another Long family elder added.
"Newest shame? Are you calling my son a shame of the family, Granduncle Jufang?" Long Hui could no longer stop himself from speaking out. He stood up with a furious expression on his face.
"You dare speak and look at your elder like that, Little Hui? Perhaps being the heir has already gone to your head that you think that you can order your elders around and disrespect us?" Elder Long Jufang's sharp tone was like a whip.
Long Hui couldn't help but flinch a bit at the memory of the elder disciplining him in his childhood. The other family members in the meeting hall also had similar reactions to him. Elder Long Jufang was a frightening existence to most of them. Only Long Tengfei faced him without any fear.
"Well, Little Hui?"
"Son, Uncle Jufang. Both of you please calm down. This is not the time for arguments like this. Remember the reason why you all came and gathered here today," Long Tengfei spoke in a voice filled with authority.
Long Hui took a couple of deep breaths and returned to his seat. Elder Long Jufang was still disgruntled, but he listened to Long Tengfei and stopped reprimanding Long Hui. For now.
"So...let's hear what you want to do regarding this matter with my grandson, Long Jun," Long Tengfei said to start the discussion.
Before anyone could do so, Long Hui spoke up. "Father, I would like to make a public statement and claim Long Jun as my son."
"Absolutely not!" Elder Long Meng fiercely rejected the idea. The disapproval on her face was obvious to everyone. "Young Master Hui, if you do that, everyone will know that your firstborn is a bastard. Your heir shouldn't be illegitimate! It will be a great embarrassment to our Long family! And we would never accept a bastard as our next heir! We should keep the existence of your illegitimate child as a secret for now until you marry a nice woman from a good family. When you produce your first legitimate child and name the child as your heir, then it won't matter as much anymore for others to know the existence of your bastard son. We can just say that he was a mistake with a former mistress."
Both Long Tengfei and Long Hui felt angry at the words she uttered. The father and son didn't appreciate the elders repeatedly calling Long Jun as a bastard child. The two of them were similar in the sense that they loved their own children very much regardless of whether they were legitimate or not.
Long Hui was barely controlling his temper. The respect he had for these elders was slowly being chipped away every time they referred to his child as a bastard.
"You don't look like you want to listen to your elders' advice. We're only saying this for your own good, Young Master Hui," Elder Long Meng told him in a lecturing tone.
'For my own good? It's not for my own good but for your own sense of bigotry that you're spouting all of these bullsh*t,' Long Hui thought to himself. 'Now I'm beginning to see why my sister Xiulan can't bear to see any of you.'
Another elder spoke up and suggested, "If you really want to claim the child as your son in public, why don't you go and register your marriage with the child's mother? This way, your son will automatically become legitimate. Then we wouldn't have this problem anymore."
"I wish it's that easy. I already tried asking her to marry me many times already," Long Hui muttered.
"What a ridiculous idea!" Elder Long Jufang exclaimed. The disapproval on his face was even more intense than what Elder Long Meng wore earlier. "That woman is just a lowly bodyguard! There's no way that she's appropriate to be our Long family's next madam! What will the people say? That we, the Longs, are sleeping and breeding with our own servants? How shameful! We barely recovered from the black mark that…that gold-digging model…Wei Lan left when she became our madam for a short period of time. Such an embarrassment! Little Hui, keep that bodyguard as your mistress if you really want her, but she's not fit to be your legal wife!"
"Don't talk about Ying Yue like that!" Long Hui finally exploded. His expression was extremely ugly, his eyes blazing in fury. "She's a strong and intelligent woman! She's the mother of my child and as soon as she agrees to be my wife, I'll marry her in an instant! Nobody is allowed to insult her in my presence!"