Touch of Riches Chapter 7

Under Nathan Xiao's half-command, Wanyue opened her heart to a stranger for the first time. She talked about how her father was an upright businessman, how her mother who died young was gentle, beautiful and loving, and even how grateful she was to her uncle and aunt who abused her, saying that without them, her father's family business might have been gone long ago.

She burst into tears as she spoke. Beneath her seemingly calm surface, she actually had too many emotions accumulated that she was unable to vent.

"Wanyue, from today on, no one will bully you anymore. No one will force you to do anything you don't want to do. I just want you to be yourself, to raise your head and look at the wider sky." Nathan Xiao put his hand on her shoulder, "This world is not just about the three obediences and four virtues you learned from the Women's Classics."

"Young Master...?" Wanyue raised her head, confused but shocked.

"I promise you." Nathan Xiao wiped her tears, "You will get all the fun and happiness in life."

Wanyue's cheeks quickly turned red. She stared blankly at this handsome and elegant young man. For the first time in her life, she felt an inexplicable feeling deep in her heart.

It's just this sentence.

"I will also tell you what kind of person I am." Nathan Xiao said, "I am the thirteenth young master of the Xiao family. My father is a cruel and cold-blooded man, and my mother died very early. When I was a child, I lost a leg in an accident. You will soon find that people don't have a good opinion of me. They say that I am a drunkard, but you have to believe what you see with your own eyes."

"I believe in Thirteenth Young Master." She said firmly, "I am Thirteenth Young Master's woman, I believe in you."

Nathan Xiao smiled slightly and was about to say something when there was a commotion on the street downstairs and the sound of hurried horse hooves.

After a while, a servant knocked on the door breathlessly and shouted, "Thirteenth Young Master! It's bad! The master has suddenly returned home! Tell all the young masters to quickly return to the old house and gather!"

"I'll leave right away." Nathan Xiao responded. This master is really weird. It's just a return home, why is it so necessary to make such a fuss, as if the emperor is returning to the court and all the ministers are paying homage.

Sure enough, the servants of the Xiao family quickly got busy packing up, and the Seventh Young Master didn't even bother to take care of the servants, who came trotting over to invite him to get in the carriage.

Nathan Xiao also called Wanyue along.

"You are such a playboy. You never forget to bring women with you wherever you go." The Seventh Young Master complained, but it was too late. He urged the coachman to drive immediately.

When the carriage arrived at Xiao's house, they still went through the side door. Wanyue was taken to his yard by a servant, while another servant carried Nathan Xiao on his back and ran to the main hall.

The main hall was quite far away. Everyone in the mansion was very nervous. Servants and maids could be seen running everywhere. Nathan Xiao also had the opportunity to truly feel the structure of part of the mansion for the first time. This mansion was more than enough to be called a palace. Fortunately, it was during the Republic of China. If it were during the Qing Dynasty, building such a large and luxurious mansion would be an act of usurpation and a capital crime!

This family is too pretentious.

The main hall of the Xiao family is very large, more than enough to accommodate hundreds of people. It still has an ancient traditional layout and a high roof, but it makes people feel inexplicably depressed. The red lanterns in the hall are all powered by electricity, which makes it look even more gloomy.

All the young masters stood trembling on both sides of the hall. On the back wall of the main hall hung a huge portrait of the Yellow Emperor. No one knew what the master's hobby was. Under the portrait was a luxurious altar and the master's main seat.

Nathan Xiao was standing at the back of the young masters, leaning on his crutches. In addition to the young masters, there were also some elders from the clan and the side branches. The whole family was quite large, and everyone had a solemn expression on their face.

Nathan Xiao whispered to the Seventh Young Master beside him: "Seventh Brother, what happened?"

The Seventh Young Master wiped his sweat with his handkerchief and said, "I don't know what happened, but I heard that the Third Young Master broke the rules."

At this time, the servants outside the door shouted one after another: "The master is here! The master is here!"

Then no one in the hall dared to whisper anymore and everyone kept silent.

After about ten minutes, a man wearing luxurious black fox fur walked in, surrounded by servants.

The man had a stern face and walked briskly. It was obvious at first glance that he was not a good person and had a bad temper. The aura he exuded made people tremble. He was wearing a hat inlaid with jewels and was about 40 or 50 years old. When he came in, everyone knelt down to pay him respect.

Even Nathan Xiao, who had lost a leg, needed the support of the Seventh Young Master to kneel down.

Everyone shouted, "Welcome back, Master! May Master be safe and sound!"

This scene is truly like the emperor himself coming, full of momentum.

Nathan Xiao only felt that this master was a psychopath. Only a very confident and arrogant man could formulate such etiquette. Even in the feudal era, wealthy families did not dare to do so. This was completely a posture of rebellion and becoming emperor.
 
The master walked through the crowd with his head held high and his hands behind his back, and sat on his gold-inlaid chair. That chair represented authority, and anyone who dared to sit on it without permission would be guilty of a capital crime.

He stretched out his hand with several gem rings on it and motioned everyone to stand up. He said nothing, but tapped the armrest of the chair with his fingers. The butler, who was standing with his hands hanging down, stood up and announced: "The master summoned everyone here tonight to enforce the family rules. The master said that after so many years of not punishing the people in the mansion, I'm afraid everyone in the mansion has become lax. Tonight's family discipline is for everyone to see and remind themselves."

After saying that, he changed the subject: "Third Young Master Liam Xiao, while the eldest master is not at home, you violated the family rules and will be dealt with according to the family rules. Everyone present is a witness."

After saying that, he clapped his hands, and saw a servant carrying a man outside the door. That man was the Third Young Master! He was stripped of his shirt, tied to a wooden frame, and stuffed with cloth in his mouth. He struggled non-stop, making a whimpering sound.

The eldest master finally spoke, his slow voice revealing an inexplicable viciousness: "Third brother, I handed this family to you for a few days. It was a sign of my trust in you, but you turned against me. Butler, what is written in the family rules? How should we deal with him?"

He spoke slowly, but every word he said was terrifying.

The housekeeper wiped the cold sweat with his sleeves, and said in a trembling voice: "According to... family rules... you should... chop off your limbs... dig out your eyes, pull out your tongue..."

Everyone was shocked when they heard this, and they all started shaking.

The eldest master made a gesture, and the housekeeper ordered someone to pull out the cloth from the third young master's mouth. The third young master howled, "Dad!! You can't do this to me!! I'm your own son!!"

"I've said it before, there is no favoritism in front of family rules." The eldest master picked up the ginseng tea on the table and sipped it. He looked extremely calm, and he didn't feel at all that the person who was about to be executed was his own son.

"Dad! You can't do this to me! How can you be so cruel!" The third young master begged in vain and suddenly became furious, "Do you really not care about the father-son relationship? I have been working like a slave for you for so many years! You are not a human! You are a demon! Don't think I don't know what you have hidden in the back garden..."

As soon as he said this, the butler quickly made a gesture, and the group of people immediately blocked the third young master's mouth again, preventing him from continuing to speak.

"First, cut off his extra tongue for me." The master raised his eyes and said slowly, "If anyone behaves like him in the future, I guarantee that you will be ten times more miserable than him."

The back garden! It is indeed a taboo in this family!

What is inside?!

Nathan Xiao clenched his teeth.

Obviously, the third young master took advantage of the eldest master's absence to secretly try to peek at the things in the back garden, but he was caught. No wonder he came to ask me what I saw in the back garden a few days ago.

That night, Nathan Xiao felt that he was suffering great mental torture. It turned out that watching the torture itself was also a kind of torture for the onlookers.

The Third Young Master's screams echoed throughout half of the Xiao family mansion. Some of the elders in the clan couldn't bear it and fainted on the spot, while others were so scared that they wet their pants.

The blood not only flowed all over the floor, but also splashed on the faces and clothes of the onlookers. All this showed that this was simply hell on earth.

With just one sentence, a person's life or death was rashly decided, and the person was slowly tortured to death in the most horrific way.

The third young master eventually died on the way to torture. He loved torturing women so much that he probably never thought that he would be tortured to death.

From this perspective, Nathan Xiao felt that his death was not unjust at all.

However, this was not the end. The Third Young Master had an accomplice in his plan to enter the back garden. It turned out that the First Master had sent several guards with good martial arts skills to guard the back garden, but the Third Young Master gathered people to kill those guards. His accomplice was not much better and was directly executed by the First Master.

Still following the so-called horrible house rules.

The torture lasted until almost dawn. The huge hall was flooded with blood.

After the last accomplice was executed, the master yawned and asked, "Is everything resolved? Are there any remnants?"

The housekeeper reported with a cold sweat on his forehead: "I heard that the Third Young Master... also looked for the Thirteenth Young Master..."

When Nathan Xiao heard this, he felt as if he was struck by lightning!

And the Seventh Young Master's expression also changed!

The people around him walked away one after another, leaving Nathan Xiao exposed to everyone.

Is he going to be killed by that damned Third Young Master? !

Nathan Xiao gritted his teeth, forced himself to calm down, and then stood up with a cane.

He knelt down on one leg with difficulty and said, "Third brother... did come to see me... but he just said some insignificant, everyday things. I didn't know anything, nor did I know what he meant. He was unhappy and left."

He deliberately omitted the words "back garden" because it must be a taboo in the Xiao family.

A deathly silence began to brew. He didn't raise his head, but he knew that the master was observing him.

Nathan Xiao is a modern man who has been baptized by science. He has seen many mummies with horrible death appearances when participating in archaeological sites. Therefore, he was not very scared of the scene just now. He knelt there and appeared very calm.