"My Lady, what are you doing! If this news spreads, then The Village Head will only be angrier at you then he already is!" "It was for his sake that I put my pride aside to please him! But he just will not accept me no matter what I do for him! I have never been denied anything before, so how can I possibly accept this now!" "But you still shouldn't ruin the clothes like that with those scissors…" "JUST WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING! WHO TOLD YOU TO MESS WITH THOSE CLOTHES!" I hadn't felt myself drowning in such anger since my days living my father's roof, and it was hot enough to start burning on the inside when I saw the embroidery ladies hard worm of making my embroideries on such short notice going to waste on a female that my brother=in=law had been avoiding for a very long time now. But the idiot was too soft to deal with an ever=cunning creature like her as was his wife who was already being stretched thin as it twas. But I would much rather spend my retirement days dealing with domestic issues such as theses instead of keeping up in the palace anymore. "My Lord Nam? What are you…" "You…wore and ruined the embroidery pieces that the women of the embroidery house made…." "My Lord, there seems to be a misunderstanding; The Madame Seo was the one who hid these luxury pieces in her pile…" "THOSE PIECES WERE PUT IN HER PILE ON MY ORDERS! They were to be tributes for The Emperor as he ordered them…what on earth have you done! WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO TELL THE EMPEROR NOW!" "The Emperor? What do you mean? Why haven't I heard of this before?" "Well what the hell do you expect when you isolate yourself from the rest of us here in the village! What have you done! Answer me! Who gave you the gall to ender the embroidery house in the first place! Don't you know that this can ruin all of us!" "I didn't know…" "Tell me! Who made you do this! What contacts do you have on the outside! Who are you still in touch with in the kingdom?" "My Lord! Please calm down and stop touching me like that!" "Do not tell me that it was HuiJae!" "My Lord, who are you talking about!" "Then why did you do this! Tell me!"
"Why did I do this? The Village Head has been ignoring me since the day he married his precious wife, even though my family were responsible for this village long before all of you came along! He choose a spoilt prepared noble woman instead of a woman who was dedicated to his father's village for him!" "And yet you and your family have silently profited over his name and association ever since, haven't you? So you wouldn't have suffered too much after his marriage, isn't that right?" "He would still visit me every now and then, that is why…" "He would visit your entire family, not just you singularly." "And it is all because of his wife! I waited for him to visit me on my birthday and…" "Hwi is the worst when remembering details like that, that is why he has a woman to carry out these tasks for him!" "And his son! His son means the world to me, but I can already see that you want him all to yourself, don't you My Lord! You want to hold him into a little version of yourself! I will not let you kidnap him and…" "What I do to that boy is none of your business at all! You on the other hand, have been hoarding a physician when you know damned well that this village was in dire need of one long before we came along? Can you refute these claims at all?" "What does that have to do with the issue at hand?" "For your act of defiance, cruelly and envy, you are hereby charged of decay of morality…" "What are you talking about? We have no such rules in place…" "Are you forgetting that I was once an Inspector General? Everyone will obey the major rules of the kingdom at least before we establish our own here. So you will be slapped by your own servants 40 times…" "40 times! But my face shall be destroyed!" "You are still unmarried, so what do you care about that? You have become entirely too arrogant because of that factor and you offended your superior because of it! You will then also be taken out of this village and live in exile away from your dying family! You also hid the physician, so you punishment for that crime will be to compensate this entire village of the luxurious items that you have hidden away from the rest of us! And on top of that you will pay another hefty fine and…" "But how will I…?" "Don't you worry about that, you can serve in the brothel in the kingdom that is under my name…" "A brothel…!"
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"…respect this decree from Their Majesties; The Nam Family is to present their works to the newlyweds…" "Forgive me, but hasn't this decree come earlier than the expected deadline?" "It is all thanks to The Senior Scholar that you will get the chance to present your works first compared to everyone else in the waiting list. This is an honour in itself and should be greatly appreciated; and as The Princess's Eunuch, I will need to preview the works first personally." "Very well, my wife shall be the one to explain to you the embroideries that she herself has created." "Please follow me; I am aware that The Princess's mother has some educational links to China, so I have crafted out national version of The 4 Divinities; which include The Vermillion Bird, Black Tortoise, Azure Dragon and The White Tiger." "Connections to China? What on earth do you mean…?" "What do you mean what do I mean? This is something that The Senior Scholar himself told us when my husband was assigned this project in the first place, how else could we have known about this? But I am not so insensible sir, I told her we have made this a Korean version with our animals and it can be used for fending off evil and praying for good fortune." "The Senior Scholar…the very same who bought on this gift showing earlier than usual…" "Excuse me?" "Never you mind, but this is some exquisite embroidering indeed, especially with the Phoenix in the centre. The picture overall holds auspicious meaning to the newlywed couple and you have chosen rather unusual colours that are not too tacky at all. The ideas and techniques are comparable of that with our own embroidery girls in the palace."
"Good morning, I have come here with a report to the eunuch of the Princess…" "Oh really? And what is this report about, may I ask?" "The Name unfortunately cannot exhibit these items to The Princess r they nephew." "Even after you were the one to asked me to summon them into the palace myself? This early?" "I am just now finding out that The Nam's committed to bringing in 10 items of embroidery and yet there are only 9 pieces on display here. Are they not committing the act of cheating His Majesty?" "Madame Nam? Would you like to clarify this matter before I take it up with The Princess?" "Submitting 10 pieces was the original plan, but a talk with my nephew ensured us that as long as we submitted more than 6 pieces, then The Princess wouldn't mind, since that is the number of pieces that she wishes to add onto her personal collection. We even had a document sent onto him with our signatures on it that this was more than just a verbal agreement." "Excuse me? What did you mean by that?"
"Have you suddenly become hard of hearing, Senior? We even have the document with us to prove this of us…but…" "But what? Why are you looking at me like that?" "Forgive me, but it was just the way that you brought up this issue with the eunuch, it was as if you already knew that we couldn't submit the 10 pieces due to an unfortunate accident that we had with our last piece." "What exactly are you accusing me of, Madame Seo?" "Isn't it already clear of you? You send a poisoned bowl of soup to my home knowing that it could cause me a miscarriage and now this? I should be the one asking you what exactly it is that you are planning about my family after all. Tell me clearly, was it you who asked your lover, The Mistress Han to rip apart our very last embroidery piece before the deadline, on the day that we were asked to present our pieces, Senior?"
"Madame Nam, it indeed looks like this Senior Scholar is charged with the crime of meddling into his neighbour's matters incessantly and framing them to cheat The Emperor himself, into using his position to extort private gains such as his new harem in his luxury yangban which can almost surpass for some rooms here in the palace." "Forgive me, but…!" "You shall be caned 60 times whilst The Nam's are free to leave for now." "No! I am loyal to His Majesty, I always have been! He trusted me enough to escort his third son into exile! And I have never used my position to covet what is not mine!" "Husband…" "Well done wife, our battles are almost over now." "It was a good thing that we returned to the kingdom just in time, come, let us please return home now and get some rest husband." "Very well wife, I apologise for having to leave so early…" "It wasn't your fault that the embroideries were sabotaged wife, and I am all the more sorry to Chul who could barely hide back his tears when we left so suddenly like that." "So what happens now then?" "Hopefully The Princess will like our work enough to boost your embroidery business, which will start to out do the rest just like it did the first time. And when the Nam ones fall, then I shall be the one to save them myself." "Let us return home now…" "Very well, but they will expect you to constantly pay your respects to them in the morning, which makes me think that we should stay with them for the time being." "Absolutely not husband, I do not wish to show my belly to them at all!" "Very well then, we also need to work on removing that obstacle as well." "And how will we do that?" "I will tell you after a big breakfast and a nap afterwards, because I need you to be refreshed for this. I shall take on the majority of the work and hopefully my family would have cleared out before you are due to give birth."
