Chapter 22 The Beating
My popularity in the camp was actually quite good.
Thanks to the excellent soups Su Chengyu had taught me to make and the spices my sister sent, I could turn any ingredients into eight hundred different dishes.
The soldiers loved coming to my kitchen.
Many things they were willing to tell me.
Even the little prince’s personal guards could not resist my eight-treasure pies and visited constantly.
Some time ago, with the Herchi King’s silent approval, the Eastern Consort had placed her own son in the command camp.
That was when I began the second stage of my provocation.
On the surface I smiled at everyone.
In the shadows I stirred trouble wherever I could.
I ruined the relationship between Herdanba’s men and the little prince’s men until it was beyond repair.
Their soldiers fought and brawled every single day.
The two masters naturally stood on opposite sides.
Yin Xiu withdrew her sharpness and yielded the position of favored consort to the Eastern Consort, giving her the chance to constantly whisper in the Herchi King’s ear.
In the royal tent the east wind now overpowered the west wind.
As Yin Xiu’s former servant, I naturally suffered as well.
The little prince was arrogant and tyrannical.
He often had me dragged over to be whipped and cursed.
"It was you, you cheap slave, and that cheap woman who stopped Father from entering Mother’s tent! I’ll beat you to death!"
I felt gratified that my contribution to the nation was as great as Yin Xiu’s.
Yet endless rage rose inside me.
I could only continue pretending to be a gentle, kind, fat cook.
I did not resist. I endured the beatings and insults.
Because this piece still had its uses.
I was not in a hurry.
Since childhood I had followed Butcher Wang to slaughter pigs and had never possessed an ordinary girl’s mercy.
Anyone who bullied me would receive payback a hundredfold.
The last person who beat me was my father. He had already been chopped into pieces.
This one, I planned to kill differently.
I kept a careful ledger in my heart and vowed that one day I would personally pickle him.