“So this is the young master of the Yongning Marquis's household?” Madam Wang’s voice trembled, and she stared unblinkingly at Shi Huai’s face.
“Indeed, Madam. He is my son.”
Shi Yuanzhi promptly put on a proud smile and patted Shi Huai on the shoulder.
“Huai'er, greet Madam Wang.”
Shi Huai obediently bowed, his voice soft and sweet, carrying the clear, gentle quality unique to a young boy. “Shi Huai pays his respects to Madam. I hope you are well.”
That single word—“Madam”—made Madam Wang’s heart melt. She hurried forward, personally helping Shi Huai to his feet as she looked him up and down, murmuring all the while:
“What a good child. What a good child. He’s truly handsome—more handsome than anyone in a painting.”
All the female guests in the hall gathered around, praising him noisily.
Some said he looked like a celestial child descended to the mortal world. Others said he had the face of someone blessed with great fortune.
Someone else even remarked that he looked exactly like Shi Yuanzhi had in his youth, as though carved from the same mold.
Surrounded by everyone, Shi Huai wore a gracious smile. He was neither servile nor arrogant, neither flustered nor hurried.
He returned each greeting one by one and addressed everyone properly. His honeyed words soon had the ladies smiling from ear to ear.
“Ding! The passive effect [Basic Charm] has been activated. The favorability of those nearby is continuously increasing.”
Shi Huai smiled inwardly. The system might have arrived a little late, but it really was useful.
After the Chrysanthemum Appreciation Banquet, Shi Huai’s reputation grew even greater.
In less than a month, all of the capital knew that the Yongning Marquis’s household had a child prodigy who topped the examinations—and that he was so handsome he looked as though he had stepped right out of a painting.
“Ding! Current appearance rating: 75. Facial symmetry increased by 73%, skin smoothness increased by 70%, iris color intensity increased by 22%. Estimated time to reach 80 points—‘eye-catching’: five months.”
Shi Huai studied his reflection in the bronze mirror. Even he had to admit that this face was becoming almost absurdly beautiful.
His skin was so pale it was nearly translucent, and in the sunlight, the fine hairs on it could be seen. The lines of his features were growing sharper and more defined.
The most obvious change was in his eyes. Their color had deepened from dark brown to an almost inky black.
Around the edges of his irises was a faint ring of gold that shimmered slightly in the light, like two black jewels set into white jade.
Every day, when Qinghe combed his hair, she would stare at his face in a daze, leaving the comb motionless in her hand.
“Sister Qinghe, if you don’t start combing soon, I’m not going out today,” Shi Huai said with a helpless sigh.
“Young Master, is your face glowing? Why do I feel as though you look more handsome every day?”
Qinghe came back to herself and continued combing his hair, muttering under her breath.
Shi Huai thought to himself, That’s because you see me every day. Your eyes have grown accustomed to it. If you waited a month before looking at me again, you’d realize just how much I’ve changed.
In the spring of the year Shi Huai turned eight, two things happened.
First, the baby fat on his face finally disappeared completely, revealing the elegant bone structure beneath.
Second, Madam Liu could no longer restrain herself. On a dark and windy night, she had someone put a lethal dose of arsenic in Shi Huai’s late-night snack.
Nanny Zhou had spent thirty years establishing her network throughout the Marquis’s household. Her informants were everywhere.
The moment Madam Liu’s people took that bowl of lotus-seed soup from the small kitchen, word reached Shou’an Hall.
“Young Master, don’t eat it.” Nanny Zhou grabbed Shi Huai’s hand, her face ashen and her voice lowered to a whisper. “There’s something wrong with that bowl.”
Shi Huai set down his spoon and lowered his head to examine the lotus-seed soup.
The crystal-clear soup sat in a white porcelain bowl, with several red dates floating on the surface. It looked utterly harmless.
“How much?”
“A lethal dose.” Nanny Zhou’s hands and lips were trembling. “Enough to kill an ox.”
When Qinghe heard this, her legs went weak, and she nearly collapsed. She caught hold of the table before she could fall, tears streaming down her face.
“How could Madam... How could she dare...?”
Shi Huai picked up the bowl of lotus-seed soup, walked to the window, and pushed it open. With a tilt of his wrist, he threw the entire bowl into the flowerbed outside.
The bowl shattered, spilling soup across the ground. Under the moonlight, it glimmered with a strange, sinister red.
“Ding! Current appearance rating: 81. Facial symmetry increased by 82%, skin smoothness increased by 80%, iris color intensity increased by 35%. Special passive effect unlocked: [Intermediate Charm]—increases others’ favorability toward the host by 30%, and causes strangers meeting the host for the first time to instinctively feel trust toward him.”
Shi Huai smiled inwardly. The system certainly knew how to pick its timing.
It had taken an entire eleven months for his appearance rating to rise from 70 to 81. He had finally broken through the 80-point threshold and entered the “eye-catching” range.
The newly unlocked [Intermediate Charm] doubled the effect and added a “sense of trust” buff. That was far more useful than mere favorability.
“Nanny Zhou, don’t be afraid.”
Shi Huai turned around. Moonlight streamed through the window and fell across his face, making his skin look like the finest porcelain. His features were so exquisite that he hardly seemed real.
Nanny Zhou raised her head and looked at Shi Huai’s face. Suddenly, she froze.
She had served the Grand Dowager Lady for thirty years and seen countless beauties, but never had she seen a face like this.
It was not the sort of beauty that dazzled people for a moment before fading from memory. It possessed a magic that made people want to draw near, want to trust him, want to tell him every secret they had ever kept.
“Nanny Zhou?” Shi Huai tilted his head, his voice as clear and pure as a mountain spring flowing over a stone path.
Nanny Zhou came back to herself with a start. Just now, she had actually felt an urge to reveal every secret she had kept hidden for thirty years.
“This old servant is here.” Nanny Zhou lowered her head, not daring to look at Shi Huai’s face again. Her voice was tense.
“Young Master, what should we do now?”
Shi Huai returned to the table and sat down. “Nanny Zhou, where did that bowl of lotus-seed soup come from?”
“The small kitchen. The one in Madam’s courtyard.”
Nanny Zhou lowered her voice even further. “One of this old servant’s people saw Bitao carry it away from the stove.”
“Bitao?”
Shi Huai raised his eyes slightly. “Whose person is she?”
“She was purchased by Madam a while ago.”
Shi Huai nodded, the corners of his lips lifting faintly. In the candlelight, his smile appeared somewhat hazy.
“In other words, Madam can simply shift the blame onto Bitao and claim that the girl acted on her own, leaving herself completely uninvolved.”
Nanny Zhou let out a sigh. “Precisely. Madam may be impulsive, but she never gets her own hands dirty. Even if the investigation leads back to her, she can still wash her hands of the matter.”
Qinghe stood to one side, tears falling nonstop as she listened.
She was sixteen this year and had served Shi Huai for nearly five years. Long ago, she had come to regard him as the only family she had.
“Young Master, why don’t we leave?” Qinghe pleaded through her tears. “We could leave the Marquis’s household and return to the estate. It’s too dangerous here. Today, Nanny Zhou happened to arrive in time, but what if one day she doesn’t...?”
“We can’t leave.” Shi Huai shook his head. His voice was soft, but every word was perfectly clear.
“Second Uncle won’t let me go, and Father won’t either. I’m now the child prodigy who topped the examinations—the face of the entire household. They won’t let me leave.”
