The human trafficker grinned. "You got it."
Gu Qing grew frantic. "I was the first to ask for her! You have to sell her to me!"
The human trafficker held out his hand. "Sure thing. Give me twenty taels of silver, and you can take the girl."
Gu Fei frowned. 'I have silver notes in my space. If Gu Qing were just a bit closer, I could mentally place them on him.' But she hadn't arranged it with him beforehand. She worried that if he, dressed in his coarse clothes, suddenly produced such a large sum of silver, these people would grow suspicious.
Just then, Gu Qing suddenly dropped to his knees before the crowd. "Will some kind Sir or Madam do a good deed? Please, lend me twenty taels of silver! Once I've bought my—this girl, I'll trouble you to come with me to get the silver."
Gu Fei watched her older brother helplessly. 'Great. Now I definitely can't give him the silver notes.'
'He's already announced he has no silver. He can't turn around and pull out a two-hundred-tael silver note a moment later.'
Who would lend silver to a complete stranger for no reason?
Besides, twenty taels was no small sum. For many farming families, their entire yearly expenses amounted to only three or four taels of silver.
Gu Fei squatted on the stage, watching her brother kowtow desperately to the strangers. Her heart ached terribly.
The madam standing nearby suddenly smiled as she watched Gu Qing kowtow. "Young man, judging by your clothes, you don't look like someone who can produce twenty taels. Besides, even if you were marrying a wife, a betrothal gift of several taels of silver would be enough."
"You're so desperate to spend twenty taels to buy this girl... Don't tell me you two are related?"
Gu Fei's heart skipped a beat. She had deliberately pretended not to know Gu Qing, afraid the human trafficker would learn of their relationship and demand an exorbitant price.
'The way Gu Qing is acting now, anyone with half a brain could figure it out.'
Gu Qing gritted his teeth, turned, and kowtowed to the madam on the stage. "Ma'am, to tell you the truth, this is my biological sister. I'm begging you, please show mercy and let our family be reunited."
The madam stared blankly at Gu Qing for a moment, then suddenly sneered. "Family reunion? Wasn't this girl sold to the Marquis Mansion by her own family back then?"
"If that's the case, how could you have borne to part with your own flesh and blood when you sold her?"
A look of shame crossed Gu Qing's face, and he was rendered speechless.
Back then, his father had been gravely ill. The family sold their last few acres of land to buy medicine for him, but the silver still wasn't enough. Desperate, their grandmother made the decision to sell his sister, who was only six years old. A death contract was five taels of silver, while a live contract was two taels.
Their grandmother steeled her heart and signed the death contract; two taels of silver simply wasn't enough for the medicine.
Even now, Gu Qing remembered the day his sister was taken away. She had clung to the doorframe, refusing to leave, while their mother wept in the room until she fainted.
Their father lay in bed, already unconscious.
He and his two younger brothers had knelt on the ground, begging their grandmother not to sell their sister. Sanlang even offered to be sold instead, but their grandmother had said, "I can't just watch your father die. Sanlang is a boy; he has to carry on the family line and support the household. He cannot be sold."
After taking the medicine, his father pulled through and slowly recovered.
When he learned his life had been saved only by selling his only daughter, he was silent for a long time before finally saying, "My life was saved by my little girl. In this lifetime, as long as I have breath in my body, I will buy her back."
From then on, buying his sister back became a constant weight on the family's hearts.
For all these years, the family had saved every bit of the monthly salary that Jadeite sent home, intending to use it to buy her freedom. But she had been sold on a death contract. Even if they had the money, they were helpless if her master refused to let her go.
Now, a rare opportunity to buy his sister back had finally appeared. If he missed it, he feared there would never be another.
Gu Qing couldn't very well explain the family's private affairs now. The fact was, they had sold his sister. Ultimately, the family had wronged her.
He could only kowtow to the madam on the stage. THUD. THUD. THUD.