Chapter 379: Concubines
Editor: Atlas Studios
In Qi Haoran’s impression, Mu Yangling was strong-willed and had never cried before. So when she started crying, he panicked and hurriedly wiped her tears with both hands. In the end, he gritted his teeth and said, “I promise you, I won’t have concubines or handmaids, nor will I want anyone other than you. Stop crying. It breaks my heart to see you cry.”
Mu Yangling got up and kicked Qi Haoran to the side. She lost her temper and snapped, “Your heart aches, but doesn’t mine? We’re not even married yet, and you’re already thinking of taking concubines and handmaids.”
Qi Haoran felt that Mu Yangling was maligning him. He had never expressed this intention, but he did not dare to defend himself in front of the furious Mu Yangling.
Mu Yangling kicked him and felt much better. Only then did she calm down and say, “A person’s heart is only so big. Am I not enough to fill it? How many women can your heart contain?”
Qi Haoran immediately said, “I didn’t say that I was going to put them in my heart.”
Mu Yangling sneered. “In other words, you’re just cheating on me physically, but your heart is still with me?” Mu Yangling tilted her head and said, “Then if I only have you in my heart and sleep in the same bed as another man, you wouldn’t mind too, right?”
“How dare you!” Qi Haoran jumped three feet high and said with a ferocious expression, “It was just a casual mention. I didn’t even say that I wanted to get a handmaid. Do you have to resort to angering me with this?”
Mu Yangling glared back without flinching and pressed on step by step. “Can you guarantee that you’re just saying that and won’t do that in the future? Qi Haoran, let me tell you, if you dare to get a handmaid or visit a brothel in the future, I’ll dare to raise a gigolo.”
Qi Haoran was so angry that his chest heaved up and down. In the end, under Mu Yangling’s unyielding glare, he had no choice but to soften and mutter, “I won’t.”
Only then was Mu Yangling satisfied. She grabbed Qi Haoran’s hand and said, “I’m doing this for our future happiness. It’s not like you want to quarrel and fight with me every day, right?”
Recalling the incessant quarrels between his aunt and uncle every few days, he shivered and hurriedly shook his head.
“A family can only be built by two people working together. Haoran, I hope that you can come back from work to a warm family. I also hope that my future husband can let me rely on him wholeheartedly. But, if you have another woman.” Mu Yangling paused, and there was a hint of vulnerability in her eyes. “Perhaps I won’t really find a man to anger you like I said, but I’ll definitely remove you from my heart. We’ll still be family on the surface, but in my heart, you’ll no longer be family to me.”
Looking into Mu Yangling’s eyes, Qi Haoran knew that what she said was true. His heart ached. Just thinking about it made him unable to take it, let alone if it really happened. Hence, he hugged Mu Yangling and held her tightly in his arms. After a while, he said in a hoarse voice, “I won’t. Don’t kick me out of your heart.”
Mu Yangling quietly leaned against his chest and nodded slightly.
The two of them leaned against each other on the hill. In the end, Qi Haoran only let go of her when his limbs went numb. Mu Yangling considerately massaged him.
Qi Haoran felt that it wasn’t a huge loss for him to agree to such a condition.
However, Mu Yangling heaved a huge sigh of relief in her heart. To be honest, she had been skeptical about her marriage with Qi Haoran initially.
She knew that Qi Haoran liked her and even loved her. In the future, he would definitely dote on her and respect her. However, this did not mean that she could live a good life.
This was because she wasn’t sure if she could still tolerate the other party sleeping in her bed if he went to sleep with a concubine when she was pregnant or on her period.
She could not even guarantee that Qi Haoran would not have a concubine in the future, so she was a little pessimistic about their marriage.
This was because concubines and handmaids were legal in this world. At a certain level of wealth, even if a man did not have a concubine, he would definitely have a handmaid.
Unless she married a farmer who was so poor that he could barely eat his fill and dress warmly. However, she was rich. According to the laws of this era, if she married, her money would belong to her in-laws. With money, men would want to get themselves handmaids and concubines. This was almost inevitable.
Most importantly, Mu Yangling was a proud person. She couldn’t marry a low-quality man just because she didn’t want her husband to take in a concubine. All that considered, she might as well not marry and live a good life by herself.
Actually, this had been Mu Yangling’s plan from the beginning. She originally wanted to push back her marriage indefinitely and persuade her parents to let her stay at home as a nun when she was too old to get married.
She had money and property, and there were also female-head households in this era. If Bowen’s and Bosi’s wife didn’t want her to stay at home because they found her an eyesore in the future, she could just spend some money to register as a female-head household and live a carefree life. It was just that after her death, there might be no one to see to her funeral. However, she felt that she would be dead by then and wouldn’t know about those things. There was no need to worry at all.
Anyway, it wasn’t as if Bosi and Bowen would stand by and watch her corpse be exposed in the wilderness. They would definitely find a coffin to bury her. As for whether there would be anyone to sweep her tomb in the future, she was even less worried.
However, she accidentally got involved with Qi Haoran and agreed to get married to him. Although she hesitated, she was not vexed. Mu Yangling did not deny that she was not resistant towards this marriage, but she was now even more confused about the future.
However, she had never been a girl to wallow in sadness. Hence, from the moment the two families tacitly agreed to this marriage, Mu Yangling began to guide Qi Haoran and told him that it was best not to leak his primordial yang before the age of 18. Otherwise, not only would he have a short life, but he would also have a kidney deficiency. He should not go to places like the brothel, because the ladies and customers there were too dirty, and all kinds of dirty illnesses lurked there.
She even inadvertently told him stories of the wives fighting with concubines, creating chaos in the family. By doing this, she wanted to leave an impression in his mind that wives and concubines could not get along in peace. Concubines would harm legitimate wives, and legitimate wives would also persecute concubines. In the end, the innocent children would suffer. She had to make Qi Haoran be repulsed by the idea of taking concubines.
However, she did not expect that before they were even married, this brat already had the thought of getting handmaids. This must not happen.
The two of them bid farewell warmly. It was just that Qi Haoran was a little dejected when he returned. It was only on the way back that it occurred to him that if he was the only one without a handmaid, wouldn’t everyone think that he was henpecked?
Even Qi Xiuyuan, who led an honest and clean life, had two handmaids.
At this moment, Qi Xiuyuan was also thinking about the issue of handmaids after learning that his younger brother had gone to the brothel in Xingzhou Prefecture. He had already heard about this when Qi Haoran returned to Jingzhao Prefecture. He did not know the deeper reason, and only thought that his younger brother had grown up. So, he only pondered behind the desk for a while before getting someone to buy a few delicate-looking girls with clean backgrounds.
He said to Rong Xuan, “It’s time to arrange a handmaid for Haoran.”
After returning home, Qi Haoran’s expression changed drastically. Before Qi Xiuyuan could continue, he shook his head like a rattle-drum. “Big Brother, I don’t want a handmaid.”
Qi Xiuyuan only thought that his younger brother was embarrassed. Smiling, he said, “I, too, had a handmaid at your age, and it was arranged by Uncle. What’s there to be embarrassed about when this is perfectly normal? I’ve already asked the butler to choose a few suitable girls. They’ll probably be sent over tomorrow. Choose someone you like and have her stay by your side.”
Drenched in cold sweat, Qi Haoran was insistent on refusing. “Big Brother, I really don’t want a handmaid. I don’t like handmaids.”