"Well well, is His Lordship with Attendant Nam in the gardens yet again?" "Let him be distracted whilst you carry on with these fertility treatments Mistress..." "Enough of this! Nothing is working and I do not have that much time! I need to kidnap a baby from the kingdom at this point or even from The Ihwaru Brothel itself! Nobody pays attention to those children there anyways! Find me one and prepare a placenta and umbilical cord when you do find one!" "Mistress? I have some news about His Lordship..." "what has he done now? Gotten someone else pregnant? Caused chaos within The Inner Court?" "His Lordship has severely health with The Companion Kang by throwing het into the cold palace after she insulted Attendant Nam and disregarded her status and rank altogether!" "And what did Attendant Nam do?" "She taught Companion Kang how to bow down to her and treat her respectfully according to her rank! And this was after Companion Kang got one of His Lordship's servant to crack walnuts for her with his bare hands!" "So that is another concubine gone already; it seems like I hardly have to put in any effort at all at this point, I just must find myself a baby and soon!" "But Mistress...that isn't all..." "Now what? I am the one who is held in the highest esteem here in the Imperial Harem! I am the one who has accompanied His Lordship throughout all of his trials and tribulations! What more can happen now?" "He...His Lordship... he upgraded her status to that of a Noble Lady! Without her having serviced him even once!" "From Attendant to Companion...she must be very capable after all...keep an eye on her movements and find out anything that you can about her! She must be the next concubine to leave this place before I find my child!" "He did gift her some rather expensive gifts though...more expensive than anything that you have, My Lady." "I have been given full authority over this harem, what can anyone in this place have that I do not!" "She has been gifted a pair of gold satchets, a pair of blue cloisonné bracelets, a pair of orchid gold hairpins, a pair of ruyi jade, a pearl curtain, 16 pieces of satin in various colours and...a pair of shu brocade golden shoes..." "Shu brocade? From China?" "Mistress, please calm down..."
"Do you have any idea how this harem that I have to manage look at me each and every single day? They look at me with pity and even disgust, knowing that they have to bow down to someone who is lower than them in status and noble rank. So it looks like I will have to do something about this now and set the harem straight. Quickly; call for an assembly without informing Noble Lady Nam." "But they are all currently in er quarters congratulating her for her new promotion...." "Then tell their servants to return to their own quarters so that they can share the news! Quickly! And go to collect our monthly stipend! It should be double the amount that we got this month!"
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"I see now that The Household Department is rushing to fix all of my furnishings after I have become a Noble Lady; power in the place I indeed such a fickle thing indeed." "They have also sent over some new servants for us, My Lady." "Spies more like from god only knows who; they can do menial jobs outside whilst the servants who have stayed by my side will continue to carry out personal tasks for me." "Peace be to Noble lady Nam; His Lordship will be dining here for lunch, so please prepare for it accordingly." "Doesn't he dine with The Mistress Jeong for lunch most days? Why is he going here?" "Er...My Lady...." "Very well, I shall do just that, thank you eunuch." "I know he would also appreciate you changing into one of the new robes that he has sent over to you, My Lady." "My Lady! The Mistress Jeong ha called for an assembly right now! It started 10 minutes ago and we are late! You must cease changing and attend accordingly!" "What are you taking about? How comes I wasn't informed? And on the day of my promotion as well!" "My Lady, you might be getting punished by The Mistress for being promoted as an exemption, you are even technically ranked above her..." "with her volatile personality, it is entirely possible. Very well, let us go and see what trouble she serves me with today."
"How dare you show up late to the afternoon assembly, Noble Lady Nam! Are you so deluded by your new title that you feel at ease to disregard all of the harem rules, all of a sudden? Did you also not hear that there would be a lesson for the Inner Court today? Where is your stationary set that was provided to you by The Princess herself on your first day here?" "Forgive me Mistress, but I was not informed of anything..." "Are you trying to give me an excuse? Without even apologising first? Very well, we will see how great you think you are when I make you recite The Instructions for Women Manual word to word. And if you make so much as a small mistake, then you shall be severely punished."
I knew it; she was deliberately punishing me for something that was completely out of my control. But looking back on the so-called generous education I was given, I wasn't to really expect more than this. The brothels alone were a cut-throat competitive place, so what did I expect The Imperial Harem to be like? And I had everything to loose since my entire identity was essentially fake. And in order to survive, I had to potentially suck up to the people in the highest level of rank here in the harem until i received instructions from The Seo's on how to navigate my way into the harem...and who I needed to take down if necessary. |
"First is fidelity, second is purity; a woman shall also know her place and when guests are present, she must speak quietly. But first and foremost, a woman must always remain chaste and secondly, she must always be pure and honest. She must stay indoors as much as possible and when the guests start to arrive, she must still speak in soft tones. She must speak no evil and hear no evil, and she must light candles when the sun sets..." what on earth was I saying? Seo Hana literally defied all of these rules and she still got everything that she wanted handed to her on a silver platter. She may be faithful, but there was a point where the entire village began to gossip and wonder if she really kept her virginity after that weekend away when she supposedly reconnected with her Cousins Chul since that was when she began to act so differently. For the very first time in her life, she had become almost an introverted as her brother was, to the point where he had to pick up her slack in the village. She did not leave her chambers for an entire month and there were some girls in the village who claimed to see Seo Chul sneaking into those very same quarters at the dead of night and sneaking out again at the crack of dawn. She wasn't pure, she wasn't quiet and she sure as hell was not a chaste woman. She always free-mixed with men in her close circle and did not mind talking to any and every man outside of our little village. And right now she was responsible for all of the evil that was happening in my life, and i will get my revenge on her one way or another...
"...you are with His Lordship almost every night and you still have the time to memorise the instruction manual? I would have forgiven you if you were unaware of the lessons; but for you to be entirely aware of them and you still had the audacity to be late is an unforgivable crime on your behalf and I will punish you for this. Servants! Strip this woman of her clothes once again and put her in morning clothes and lock her in the library with the kheshig watching over her! She will transcribe The Instructions for Women Manual 100 times in the library and will be deprived of both food and water until she completes her task! And this will teach all of you concubines that sometimes being in someone's favour can be worse than poison, and if you do not live to your new reputation, then you can die in the library for all I care as His Lordship can easily replace you in a second."
I had been placed in his harem for just over 4 months now and I was already more emotionally and mentally drained than I was living in poverty. It didn't matter how different I was to Seo Hana, she was always going to live a life that was completely different to mine; one that needed more courage to survive compared to easily surrendering to death. And if I wanted their respect, then I was going to have to show The Seo's that I could survive without them. But I realised as I was being stripped in front of everyone once again that I would need their help for now to climb to the top of the rank in this Imperial Harem and maybe change a few things around. I would need to put my foot down and only help them when they were willing to help me in return. Power; it was not a means to an end, but knowledge fed power and I needed as much of it as I could possibly gain during my time here in the palace. I would keep my own best wishes to Seo Hyuk and the rest to myself, but Seo Hana was a different obstacle entirely and I will expose her ways of incest and ill-breeding when the time was right. "Where is His Lordship? He was supposed to meet me for lunch today." "My Lady, he stormed off to the brothel when he found your quarters empty as the servants have been rendered silent by This Mistress Jeong." "Mistress Jeong; how does a mere brothel women amass so much power in The Imperial Harem without any official title or political backing at all? It just does not make any sense..." "Her uncle is the head of The Inspector General office, that is all we know." His Lordship, what a disappointment he is turning out to become: but I guess that if we taught men how to chase miracles like this impossible dream of becoming some sort of Prince, then they must be naturally weak and naive. And how weak do you have to be to dominate a kisaeng to the point of making her have delusions of grandeur that she can become some sort of Princess Consort or Empress? I did not think that The feared Third Prince would produce such chaos, but maybe he had a reason to do so? But what was it? What did he want? What did his daughter want when she came up with this plan of an experimental harem? What was the end goal? Who could I trust to feed me in information that I trusted? Who...
"Servant, please do me a favour; get a hold of Lee Gyum here in the palace and disclose to him that Shin Saimdang is making her way to Hanyang province...and tell him that he can write to me if he ever needs to talk about her, if he wishes to."