Glory

She had practiced martial arts since childhood and was highly skilled. However, Ye Yaming's martial arts training was from her previous life. Although this body was much healthier than when she first acquired it, even if her consciousness kept up, her physical abilities couldn't match. Guan Ting quickly overtook Ye Yaming and arrived behind Yang Chuzhi.

Seeing the two people in front still talking, the pink bubbles in the air were palpable even to Guan Ting, who was from ancient times and had never seen such things before.

Hesitating, she stopped and was about to turn to ask Ye Yaming whether to continue when suddenly, the railing Ye Yaqing was leaning against broke. Her body fell backward into the lake.

Startled, Guan Ting leaped forward, tapping her foot lightly, and caught Ye Yaqing in her arms just before she touched the water.

After grabbing her, Guan Ting felt despair.

If she were alone, she could tilt downward first and then upward, using the force of her twist to barely make it back to shore.

But now she was holding someone in her arms. Even though Ye Yaqing was petite, she still weighed dozens of pounds. With no leverage under her feet, the outcome would be both of them falling into the water.

Unexpectedly, the next moment, her hand was grabbed by someone. Instinctively, she pulled with the force, immediately halting her descent. With another exertion, she flipped over with Ye Yaqing and landed on the shore.

Only then did she see clearly that the one who had pulled her was Ye Yaming, while the man named Yang Chuzhi was staring at them dumbfounded.

"Push him into the water," Ye Yaming winked at Guan Ting, quickly pulling over the terrified and disoriented Ye Yaqing.

When Ye Yaqing fell into the lake as expected, Yang Chuzhi showed neither panic nor urgency. He merely feigned alarm and made a gesture of reaching out to pull Ye Yaqing.

He planned to wait until Ye Yaqing had fully fallen into the water and even swallowed a mouthful or two before jumping in to rescue her.

But unexpectedly, two people suddenly appeared and ruined his plan. By the time he reacted and hurriedly tried to express concern for Ye Yaqing to salvage the situation, the maid who had been holding Ye Yaqing suddenly stepped forward and kicked him hard. With a "splash," he fell into the water.

Even though he was a skilled swimmer, caught off guard, he still swallowed a large mouthful of water.

Moreover, it was the depths of winter. Although the temperature in Jiangnan wasn't as cold as in the north, the lake water was still bone-chilling.

He had intended to pretend to be drowning to gain some advantage in the ensuing unfavorable situation, but the icy water quickly made his body stiffen, and the thick cotton robe he wore dragged him down like death itself.

In his daze, he heard Ye Yaqing's trembling voice: "S-sister, save him quickly."

"He can swim; he won't die. Let's go, we'll find someone to judge this," Ye Yaming said coldly.

This merciless voice reminded Yang Chuzhi that his plan had failed. If he didn't get ashore, he might die, and the matter would blow up. Blowing up would bring him no benefits.

The best solution now was to get ashore immediately, beg Ye Yaqing pitifully, and use reason and emotion to turn a major issue into a minor one, and a minor issue into nothing.

Although the time was short, he had clearly seen that the two rescuers were young women—one a mistress and the other a maid. The mistress was likely Ye Yaqing's younger sister, Ye Yaming.

Two young girls were always easier to fool than others.He immediately began moving his limbs to save himself.

Fortunately, he knew how to swim and was a young man who appeared thin but was actually strong and robust. The reason he dared to set up this scheme was because he was skilled in swimming and had even jumped into the water to test it a few days prior. Although he had removed his thick cotton robe when he tested it, today he planned to take off his outer garment before rescuing anyone.

Now, with the heavy cotton robe dragging him down, he struggled for a while but eventually surfaced and slowly swam toward the shore.

When he finally dragged his waterlogged clothes to the shore, he was dismayed to find several people running toward him.

"Miss, Miss..."

"Over here, quickly."

"Miss, are you both alright?"

"We're fine," Ye Yaming said. "Quickly, pull him out of the water and tie him up. Take him to the back gate. Someone will be waiting there." For today's events, Ye Yaming had prepared several contingency plans. As soon as she discovered Yang Chuzhi's malicious intentions, she immediately rescued Ye Yaqing and took her away from the scene to prevent anyone from using her for their schemes.

As for this Yang Chuzhi, he would be sent to the authorities under the pretext of being a thief.

After speaking, Ye Yaming tried to pull Ye Yaqing away.

Unexpectedly, Ye Yaqing stood rooted to the spot as if nailed to the ground. "Save... save him, sister, please save him."

Her behavior made Ye Yaming want to slap her.

Could she still not see the situation clearly at this point?

Meanwhile, Mama Lin and Granny Liu noticed that Yang Chuzhi's face was pale and his lips were blue, clearly suffering from the extreme cold.

They couldn't let him die. If he died, the trouble would be immense.

Just as they were about to pull Yang Chuzhi out, Su Rou suddenly ran over with a maid, calling out anxiously as she approached, "What happened?"

Her voice was loud and filled with panic, as if she wanted to attract attention. "Ah, Miss Ye, are you alright?" After shouting this, her eyes scanned the crowd, searching for Ye Yaqing.

When she saw Ye Yaqing standing safely beside Ye Yaming, while Yang Chuzhi was being dragged out of the water like a dead dog by two sturdy women, she stared wide-eyed, her mouth agape in utter astonishment.

At that moment, a group of young girls, drawn by the commotion, rushed over and asked, "What happened?"

"What's going on?"

Mama Lin used her body to block the crowd's view and quickly slipped something into Yang Chuzhi's chest.

By this time, Yang Chuzhi was so frozen that his limbs were stiff, and his teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Although he knew someone had stuffed something into his chest, his body was completely beyond his control. His limbs were rigid and immobile, leaving him at the mercy of others.

Just then, he heard a woman's voice say, "I don't know. We were standing here enjoying the view when we heard an old woman shouting 'catch the thief.' Then this man rushed straight over, couldn't stop in time, and fell into the lake."

Granny Liu immediately straightened up and announced to the crowd, "This old servant saw him steal a noble's jade pendant at the banquet and chased him here. I apologize for disturbing the young ladies' enjoyment. I will take him to the authorities now."

With that, she and Mama Lin each grabbed one of his arms and dragged Yang Chuzhi toward the back gate.

Among the group of young girls was the Chen family's daughter. As the host responsible for entertaining the young ladies, she naturally felt obliged to take charge of the situation.She frowned as she looked at Yang Chuzhi’s pale face, then turned her gaze to Mama Lin and Granny Liu. Noticing they weren’t servants of the Chen family, she was about to ask when a gentle voice sounded beside her.

"Miss Chen, I know during this New Year period, your family surely hopes the banquet will proceed smoothly without any mishaps, so that the coming year may be fortunate and everything goes as wished. But with so many people around, such incidents are unavoidable. Who can guarantee that nothing will go wrong when hosting a banquet? Isn’t that right, sisters?"

The speaker was none other than Ye Yaming.