Chunliu didn't stay with them; she stood up with them: "I'll see you out."
Madam Ruan and Madam Qian each left the mansion and went home.
The next day, the gates of Shen Mansion displayed white banners, as Shen Ji's body had not yet been transported back to the capital. So, only a mourning hall was set up with an empty coffin, everyone in the mansion dressed in mourning clothes. It was unsettling that not a sound emerged from the mansion; there wasn't even a whisper of crying—quiet as if the house was unchanged, but for the mourning white seen everywhere.
Citizens gathered outside Shen Mansion, peering through its wide-open gates, as courtiers arrived one after another, all shocked by the strange atmosphere before them.
It seemed the entire city was enveloped in the grief of Shen Mansion, hauntingly silent.
