As I watched my wife walk away from me in full confidence that she could restore her reputation, she had left me in a state of elation that I simply could nougat over. Thad been a long while since i was alone with my wife and even though we had been silent with each other, we had never abandoned each other and we had been the best parents that we could be to a pair of twins who could not have more different personalities even if they tried. Time really did begin to heal us both as we planted our peach trees for happiness, longevity, riches and honour and the pear trees for our children to symbolise their grace and nobility in their bloodline that they carried on my behalf. I was resolves to give Yeon a little more freedom, but I still wasn't as ease to let her go alone anywhere without me, if it wasn't for the village relying on my help to find them a new place to locate, then I would have surely gone with her. It must have been harder for her to leave our children behind, even if it was only for a few hours, and I understood why she had to do it, but this was not easy on me either. Even when we were distant with each other, she had never failed to take my feelings into consideration before and I wasn't going to let her do it now. She had birthed my 2 children for me and she still appeared to be as youthful and bossy as she was when we met again for the second time after my father's roof in his yangban. She still made my heart race every single time I saw her, even from a distance and she had that effect on most people…make our marriage was not enough to keep her safe from the prying eyes of other men? Even the married and respectable ones? What kind of trick would she pull to restore her reputation? Would she be the centre of attention once again? When it was her family who needed her attention now more than ever? No, I trusted her, but I also knew how far she would go to protect me, including keeping secrets such as she did with news of our firstborn. That news had really cut me deeply, to the point where it become a new obsession of mine to reclaim justice to my family once again. My wife was still a powerful figure in her own right and when she was in the kingdom alone, she needed help even fi she wished for me to keep my distance from her.
The first thing that I did when I woke up was to check on my twins who were sleeping rather peacefully on the other side of the room. My daughter looked like a little doll made out of silk when she slept so peacefully, but my son on the other hand had the same habit my brother did, which was putting his arms above his head when he slept. I never thought that I would see this again and I almost had to restrain myself from throwing up when I saw it all over again. The perilous journey that I took from being my own father's hostage in his home to now being a family man had healed me from my trauma of him, but my brother was something else. My brother, my master and my bully who always put me in my place when it suited him because he knew that despite all of his talents, he had less ambition compared to myself. My brother was more of a one trick pony and constantly afraid of letting our father down, hence his constant bullying and shaming me to make himself look better. Buy my children were never going to learn about these 2 losers in the face of our history, not until it was time to tell them about their family tree, and I had a good few years until then to come up with a person of my family clan that suited their paths in life.
Due to the overwhelming task of taking care of 2 babies at the same time, we had some new hired help, and even though my wife had no idea about this, I had specially hired a young girl who was in her pubescent years and would be easy to control. I know I had no right to do this, but not all of the families in this village were good people, despite that fact that the Seo Sibling turned a blind eye to. I wasn't simply going to eradicate corruption in the kingdom alone, I would have to be the one to carry out the job here also so that we could cultivate a perfect village full of people with potential to lead the next generations of Koreans to fend for themselves and become a democracy at best, although I was still having a hard time figuring out exactly what the difference was between that and The Royal Family.
"My Lord Nam? Do you have a moment so that I could speak to you? This will only take a few minutes of you do not mind…" "Very well girl, come into my office and tell me what it is you wish to discuss with me?" "My Lord, I wish to know if you have thought about bringing my sister along to work alongside me?" "Ah yes, about that issue…it may look like I will need some more help here, although I would have thought that she could earn her father's favour more in your absence. Anyone who works in my home does need a higher level of education than most, so she needs all of the opportunities that she can get before coming here, doesn't she?" "Well…I suppose so…very well, thank you for your time…" "…to allow a young girl to grind her Master's ink with her red sleeves naturally adds relish to delight, but you still must have enough ability to exert yourself with physical appropriateness…" "Excuse me Master?" "Never you mind, I am just going over my wife's favourite poetry book. Grinding ink that is not uneven and not dried out brings out the gloss of well-made ink. The creator of this ink would be impressed if he ever saw you in real life." "Master over-praises me, I have been doing this for all of my life for my father." "Practise make perfect." "I simply do not wish to embarrass this family for my lack of skills…" "How can that be? You are good with my children and that is all I need…for now, anyways." "No servant would betray their Mistress for glory and riches, not in this village anyways." "Even of that is exactly what they get? Glory and riches?" "Well…I means, we have all lived in poverty for so long now…" "And you remembered to make my favourite jade white cream cakes from the communal kitchen…" "But i just brought over what your wife left for you…" "The fact that you remembered my favourite things and carried out your chores diligently enough is more than enough for me girl." "My Lord Nam?" "How is your home life, girl?" "As you know My Lord, I have my parents, my brother, my sister and…someone else who I cannot even see because they work all day long." "And who is that, may I ask?" "It is someone…who does't matter anymore; they will never look at me due to my family's poverty anyways." "Is this person married?" "Well…he will be soon. But like said, it really doesn't matter anymore…" "And what if I gave you more responsibilities here? So that you could earn more for yourself and your family and build up some prestige of your own?" "Prestige?" "Class, I mean. Who knows, if you get the job done, you may even have a team of servants trailing you around and waiting on you hand on food instead of the other way around." "Really? What do I have to do then?" "You shall bring your sister here into my home to be my wife's personal and most trusted servant. I know that she personally doesn't like to have any of them around but…I need to fulfil my duties towards here by protecting her, even when she isn't in my sight. Do you understand me?" "Very well, I shall do my best to gain her favour in some way or another…but she isn't the most easiest person to let her guard down…" "Tell me about it; if only she stopped with all of er excuses to keep going into the kingdom without me, then it would work out for us all to keep my wife at home with her family, don't you agree?" "Well…she is a powerful person here, and it is true that I can only reach to a higher level if she is around…" "Her every action, every word and even tone of voice must be reported back to me. I shall even hire someone here to give you calligraphy lessons so that you can give me reports, how does that sound?" "Oh yes! Thank you Lord Nam!"
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"What is going on with you wife? Why are you staring out of the window so late at night?" "I am simply observing your best friend loosing his mind without your sister as per usual." "Good god, what is he up to now?" "It looks like he is roping in a maid to becoming her servant, why else would he be spending so much time with her? And in Yeon's absence as well?" "Leave it wife, I cannot get involved in their marital issues, no matter how close we are. You don't see them meddling with us, do we?" "That is because your sister practically handed me off to you." "She knew how to choose a partner for me and she chose well, didn't she? Village Chief's wife? Mother of 2 sons with hopefully a daughter on the way for me as well?" "Husband…" "I promise you if we have a daughter I shall let your body rest and not get you pregnant…for a while at least." "Just keep your heat with mine and we shall carry on, husband…" "Mother! Father! Come on, get into bed now before Geom wakes up!" "Goodness boy, don't you think it is time for you to sleep on your own as a big boy now?" "Nope; aunty said I can get whatever I want until I turn 10 years old and I only have a few years left, so you cannot deny me either father…" "Aunty said this, aunty said that; it is as if she has corrupted you just for me to deal with!" "She only loves me, what is wrong with that?" "There is a difference between love and spoiling someone rotten boy; just you what until her own children are grown enough and I shall repay the favour for her…"
"Get dressed first Chul, then we shall all get into bed together my son." "Ok mother, I am waiting…" "You will not tell my sister about it, will you?" "She isn't blind husband and she never has been,; she will work it out eventually and it will be up to her to decide how she will proceed I guess." "And what do you think about this maid that he has chosen?" "She is in per pubescent years so he as chosen wisely I guess; a gold digger who can even scheme to steal away the love of another if it meant getting out of poverty." 'Really?" "Husband, you know he has been complaining about some of the families here and you have been turning a blind eye to the issue, what exactly did you expect from him? That he will sit on his hands and do nothing about it?" "Goddamned him and my sister, these 2 scheme as if they breathe and they are perfect for each other that way, no wonder he gets paranoid about her." "Husband!" "What? You know I do not mean it, but they frustrate me so sometimes and there isn't a single thing that I can do about it!" "You have me and your family, fret not husband." "I…do need my sister here a lot more to help me out anyways. As usual; his motives are justified…but his methods are not. I will let this go for now, but I shall count on you to watch and report back to me wife." "As you command, husband." "Father! Come on!" "I'm coming, I'm coming!"