Not Your Typical Villianess

Chapter 98: The calculating servants

Ningzhuo's governor's house 

After the introductions were made, Chief Ning from the provincial ministry of works left. Steward Meng as the steward in charge of the upkeep of the governor's house was sufficient enough to handle getting the New master and madam of the house settled. His presence wasn't needed as such, he had already relayed his master's instructions to these old servants, they knew what to do.

The majority of the servants in front of her were all essential to the proper working of the house. Since each of them oversaw various sections of the servants, it wasn't good for them to be held up for too long chaos could be unleashed by their underlings.

While it was necessary for all the servants in the resistance to introduce themselves to her. There were still other chances, Su Liya was exhausted from the long journey and just instructed Steward Meng to bring the servants in batches to her pavilion the next day for tge necessary instructions.

Su Liya dismissed the rest of the servants and instructed them to return to their posts while Matron Bao led her to her Quarters. The governor's house was huge, it would take a full day to see all the courtyard present. Considering the new madam's long journey here, matron Bao suggested that a thorough tour of the residence would be done on another day.

However, Matron Bao pointed out a few places on the path to the main courtyard. Such as the governor's receiving room, the banquet hall and the library which doubled as a schoolroom for children. There was an open-spaced pavilion with small false lakes, fountains, flowers and trees where house parties for ladies could be hosted.

The governor's residence was widespread and richly decorated as expected of a provincial leaders residence if not a little bit over-decorated. The previous Governor liked the finer things of life.

This kind of blatant show of wealth from the provincial head of a rumoured underperforming province was suspicious and screamed of various financial crimes punishable by the law. How can a mere provincial Governor's house rival the palace in splendour?

One could tell that he poured in a lot of money in this residence. Every corner of the yard cried money from the beautiful landscape comprising of flowers and trees to the stone sculptures and fountains, the false hills and small lakes. Made for a beautiful picture of wealth and arts. 

The main courtyard was a wide small compound that took a large mass of land. As per the usual design, there were two large pavilions on different ends of the courtyard, divided by a small garden with a false lake that housed some small fish. 

The more she saw of this residence the more exhausted she got, this really seat well with her but she made sure not to let her true feelings show and just acted calmly. She took Zhu Fengyin's last word before she left the capital to heart, so there wasn't much said about Lu Yaozhu's stat in Ningzhuo in the original novel since he was not the male lead.

The author only glossed over it without saying much but based on what she knew of Emperor Zhong and the sixth prince, she suspected some foul play. She needed to look into the previous governor and his financial activities before bringing up her suspicions to Lu Yaozhu but she still wanted to sound him out and find out his thoughts on everything. 

Matron Bao led her through the small garden to her pavilion. The main courtyard was called the Fangxi pavilion, Lu Yaozhu's quarters was the biggest in the house with very spacious rooms. The study, which took up a majority of the space. A small library next to it, a bathing room with a steam bath. A living room, a dining room and a spacious bedroom.

While Su Liya's waiter though big only contained five rooms, the biggest room was her bedroom. Next to the bedroom was a huge bathroom with a hot bath. There was a living room and dining room and a big nursery, which wasn't going to be in use since Su Liya and the general just got married and didn't have a child yet. There was a storeroom at the main courtyard, most people build those to have their smaller valuable closer to them while the main store held the bigger ones 

Before leaving the matron led the maids stationed at Fangxi pavilion to pay their respects to the new madam. She didn't bother introducing the courtyard maid in charge of sweeping and keeping outside clean since they wouldn't have much interaction with the madam and only introduced the three inside maids who served inside her waiters.

The maids were introduced to her as Ah Mei, Ah Li and Ah Fan. The first thing she noticed on seeing the maids was that they were all pleasing to the eyes. They were the standard pretty girls with sweet innocent features men liked. Even their voice sounded nice, it was soft and sweet to the ears that is if you liked to train your ears to hear whatever they said.

Which most men in ancient times liked since it made them sound innocent and young Although she wasn't born in this era, she had read enough historical romance books to know what scheme was brewing. After living in this time Su Liya had concluded that the men just liked Lolitas which might be due to being too chanced.

She glanced at the serene expression on Matron Bao's face and rolled her eyes. She glanced at Baozhai as she said "I will leave them to your care Baozhai" then to the three conspicuous maids she said, "I don't have many rules just perform your duties properly and don't cause any trouble" she waved them away and caught Baozhai's eyes.

Baozhai led them to the side rooms, Su Liya travelled with a few of her hands including matron Gu from the palace so she left Baozhai to introduce the three Ah's ( as Su Liya dubbed the three new fixtures by matron Bao). While she pretended to not notice the little moves made by Matron Bao, she made plans for them.

Everyone in this residence was guilty until proven otherwise most especially those 3 fixtures, they could easily become spies for the officials or worse the palace. Whoever is behind them may have fixed them into the courtyard in hopes that one of them if not all would become a Fei for the new governor.

(A Fei or a concubine of a nobleman, is a class below a Ce Fei and is a common concubine title given to maids or common girls that are favoured by a nobleman. In most noble families, this title usually preferred to be given to a maiden that has given the master a son.)

Su Liya introduced Matron Gu to Matron Bao, at the mention of the fact that Matron Gu served at the palace, Matron Bao's expression changed. It became noticeable dull, the visible change surprisingly gladdened her heart. It was pleasing to see the previous smug smile knocked off her face.

Her obvious pleasure in her success in pushing in her fixture was irritating, thought of she was asked what irritated her exactly. Su Liya couldn't tell, it can not be that they were aiming for Lu Yaozhu because while they were married, she didn't plan on staying here long. 

Once she was successful in the mission set up by the Jade Goddess, she was out of here. Since this wasn't long term she had decided not to pay any attention to Lu Yaozhu's private life. If he decided to get a concubine, she would just support his decision, she wasn't interested in playing house.

She was okay with anything as far as he doesn't disgrace her or go over the top. However, that didn't mean she was alright with someone blatantly trying to push women at her husband. Matron Bao must have assumed that her job was being threatened because she did a complete 180 and started acting so respectful. 

Su Liya wanted her to suffer a little more and instructed matron Gu to follow Matron Bao and get acquainted with the servants in the estate. Rong Rong held herself from laughing at the scene in front of her, she waited until the Matrons were out of sight before bursting into laughter.

Su Liya just smiled as she pulled the veiled hat off her head and kept it aside, she gazed at Rong Rong over her shoulder, "glad to see that you found that amusing, come be of use to me. Don't just stand there laughing like a fool and help me get out of this monstrosity, "she gestured to the formal travelling dress she had had on.

Rong Rong walked forward to help her up, still grinning. She couldn't get matron Bao's expression off her mind. "You pull one on that old which, it knocked the smug look off her face. I expect her and the rest of the old servant's to start coming around"

"Good, that would put them on their toes. Have the servants in charge of our valuables and money moved over divide everything in two and keep a majority of them in tge storeroom at Fangxi Pavillion. Most especially the valuables however have them keep the gifts from the palace in the main storeroom."

Rong Rong paused for a second and asked "mistress if you suspect that the steward steals why are you keeping the Emperor's gift in the main storeroom?"

Su Liya's lips tugged up and she replied, "because I want to catch a snake and to do that, I need bait".