Chapter 3: A webnovel

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The day started with her doing chores left and right. Lane was used to chores. She did that many times with her grandparents, that wasn’t the annoying part. The annoying things were that there were some people deliberately messing with her. How could she not grow angry? She, however, restrained herself. People’s identities should be considered here. Laws apparently didn’t cover servants that much from what she gathered from the gossip and the maids' ends. It definitely wasn’t her previous world where there were people vouching for equal rights between men and women; don’t talk about gender equality, if she could have others look at her, not as an instrument or a tool, it would be considered good. Under those premises, she could only tread cautiously, trying to reduce her sense of existence as much as possible and hold in the bubbling annoyance deriving from malicious people around her waiting to see 'Fu Bin''s joke as the very until she could adapt to the concept of living here. 

However, as much as she was trying to gather as much information as she could about the place she suddenly woke up to, it was true that she knew too little about her whereabouts. So, she stopped trying to just learn through others' conversations and straight-up started asking for clarifications. Jing Lu was amiable enough to answer without sneering or laughing at her. It was a good thing that 'Fu Bin' was a new recruit here while Jing Lu had been here for quite a time now, previously used as an errand girl. They could both barely pass off as acquaintances and had yet to understand each other's personalities, thus no one could see that she was somewhat of an imposter.

They were in Zhang Manor, Zhang family lineage being quite famous, apparently. This courtyard was dedicated to the firstborn and also legitimate child of old official Zhang, the child of his main wife. Yeah, the man had way too many wives in Lane’s opinion. She tended to forget that polygamy was an existing notion.

“It’s him that we’re going to serve personally.”

“Serve you say, with so many others, one for his tea, for his food… just which serving would be left to us?”

“You don’t know?” gasped incredulously Jing Lu, as though Lane suddenly grew another head.

Lane had a foreboding feeling at this and grew impatient, suddenly finding the other’s pause too dramatic.

“You’ve talked so much, are you going to stop now? Out with it!”

The suddenly shy girl appeared to blush a little.

“...In bedroom matters,” whispered very softly the embarrassed and now red as a tomato teenager, fidgetting, suddenly seemingly uncomfortable with the topic. 

If she had something in her mouth, Lane would have liked to say that she would have dramatically throw it up, or choke on it, but those things were just too dramatic to really happen, and caught unaware, she could only cough.

What servant? Wasn’t she actually turned into a prostitute!

“Well, that’s if we’re lucky to be accepted.”

Girl, there is something wrong with your head! That's considered unlucky! She tried hard not to scrunch her face,

“And how many maids serving him are there?”

“This time around, only the three of us were selected. Since he is always refusing, the mistress isn’t insisting and only proposed for the sake of proposing recently.”

Lane left out a sigh of relief and started to ask more questions about Zhang's family. She couldn’t outright ask about this world, it would seem too strange, but since she’s actually a new maid here, she could ask about this residence first. And indeed, she learned many things.

This Zhang family, from the previous generations, used to be a military family. However, since the current head's grandfather's generations, this country had been at peace with its neighboring ones and military men weren't as glorified as they used to be. Couple with the fact that when came the now head of the family's generation's, sickness had taken the lives of the firstborns, leaving only the skinny and somewhat coward youngest son, who, as the youngest and the most spoiled one, hadn't really been forced to learn military arts as his brothers were. So, when misfortune fell upon the family, the little one, a young adult at the time, had too much of an aversion for weapons to pick up its learning, and anyway, he had already passed the imperial exams. With time, Zhang's family's glorious military achievements slowly started to turn into simple records with no heir to the family's arts. 

However, although it was true that the current old master Zhang had never been quite good with his hands and feet, his oldest son was said to be a genius in those areas. From a young age, he was personally instructed by his paternal grandfather, the latter hoping, even if it's only for this one grandson to not let their family forget its roots.

The current head of the family, Official Zhang, had one wife and five concubines. His main wife had two children: Zhang Shen the oldest son and Zhang Shui, the second miss who recently married the crown prince and became the crown princess. With his concubines, official Zhang had other children, but none of their names rang as familiar as the first two. This was when Lane contemplated the idea that maybe she didn’t transmigrate into a random world, but perhaps one that she should know about.

Since Zhang Shui seemed to be more familiar with her memories, like she could pinpoint who she was, she gave in to curiosity and asked more information about the other.

Zhang Shui married the crown prince last year for her sixteen birthday and became the crown princess. The crown prince, Wei Xing, besides this wife also had three concubines apparently, but he had yet to have a child.

Zhang Shen, for his part, was in the military troops since his thirteen years, coming back from time to time at the end of the year, staying until the new year to spend some time with his family before reporting back again. In that prospect, he was going to come back in some days. The man was said to achieve merits quickly and was climbing the ladders just as quickly. Even someone like Jing Lu was saying that he was certainly going to be a general in a couple more years. -Which was alarming to Lane. Climbing the ladders quickly meant he was given the possibilities to do so and for those possibilities to exist, didn't it mean that this country wasn't peaceful anymore? That was a frightening notion!-

General Zhang, Lane tested in her mind, it sure had a nice ring.

And suddenly, like a flash, that Deja Vue impression, suddenly got stronger and she finally understood why. That web novel, ‘The cold emperor’s pampered wife’ wasn’t there a general Zhang in there too? Not only that, there was also this famous imperial concubine Zhang! Goodness, was this really it? She was inside a novel? Of all things, it was something with palace intrigues. Not that in her position she would assist in those intrigues anyway.

If she remembered it right, and since it wasn’t that long since she read it, she was certain of the fact, that concubine Zhang and that general Zhang were bound to die. Their whole clan accompanying them. Well, well, well, the novel said nothing about the servants, but Lane sincerely hoped that servants were excluded in those bloody situations!

The offense had indeed been great! It wasn’t divulged to the public and had been passed as wanting to take the emperor’s life for the concubine, but since she was a reader, Lane had been privy to what really happened. At that time, the crown prince was already the emperor. He still had yet to have a child and wanting to secure her position, Concubine Zhang got pregnant by another. Once the matter was found, the general was implicated. The emperor killed her whole family and their nine generations.

What a scary time to be living in!

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