## 2. Spending Real Money

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Pan Yulian stood rooted to the spot like a wooden post, and it was not long before Pan Nianyao and Pan Fangyan took notice of her.

But before either of them could speak, Pan Yulian suddenly turned on her heel and bolted, vanishing from sight in the blink of an eye.

Pan Fangyan let out a disdainful snort at her retreating figure.

"As if anyone was eager to bother with her. She was always scatterbrained to begin with, and now look at her — drifting about day after day as though a ghost has run off with her soul."

Pan Nianyao was equally displeased by Pan Yulian's departure without so much as a word of greeting, though she held her tongue. She and Pan Fangyan exchanged a glance, then continued on their way to find their elder legitimate sister, Pan Wenjun, to settle the argument over the silk shawl.

Pan Yulian hurried along the path toward Ninglanyuan, her heart a tumult of anxiety, excitement, exhilaration, and vexation all at once.

Over the years, the balance of power in the inner quarters of the Pan household had been laughably transparent.

So transparent, in fact, that Pan Yulian, having played the role of a brainless cannon fodder for so long, had very nearly become brainless in truth.

To speak of the Pan household, one must first speak of the Pan patriarch — a man who had purchased his way into officialdom on the strength of a provincial examination degree, and whose highest achievement in a lifetime of service was the post of county magistrate.

Pan Yulian's father, blessed with striking good looks and an auxiliary jinshi degree, had managed to court and wed the third daughter of Lin Zhengdan, the Salt Transport Commissioner of the Liangzhe Circuit — a third-rank official of considerable standing.

She was a concubine-born daughter, to be sure, but a daughter of a third-rank official nonetheless.

The capital was vast, and making one's way there was no easy matter. Men of far greater ability than Pan's father were everywhere one looked. After years of careful maneuvering and cultivation of connections, he had risen only to the rank of a fifth-rank Bureau Director in the Ministry of Works. With his ambitions fixed firmly on climbing higher and his father-in-law's influence still indispensable to him, he could ill afford to cause offence.

And so, for all these years, it was Madam Lin who held undisputed sway over the inner household. The concubines and the concubine-born daughters alike kept their eyes lowered and their voices soft.

When Madam Lin had been with child, she had herself arranged for her personal dowry maid, surnamed Zhang, to be elevated to the status of concubine. Shortly after Madam Lin gave birth to the eldest legitimate son, Pan Ze, Concubine Zhang bore the eldest daughter, Pan Yunruo. Two years later, when Madam Lin delivered the legitimate daughter Pan Wenjun, Concubine Zhang followed suit with the third daughter, Pan Nianyao.

Pan Yulian was the fourth daughter. In this life, her birth mother was named Xu Shuzhi.

Xu Shuzhi's father, Xu Weizhi, had been a fellow townsman and private secretary to the old Pan patriarch, and had given his life to save him. Left alone in the world, Xu Shuzhi had entered the Pan household. Delicate and gentle in appearance, docile and compliant in nature, and having produced only a daughter, she posed no threat. Madam Lin, out of respect for the old patriarch's memory, had never subjected Pan Yulian and her mother to any particular hardship over the years.

The youngest in the household was Pan Fangyan, whose birth mother, Concubine Wang, had originally been a beauty acquired by Pan's father through some act of gallantry toward his superior. Somehow the matter had leaked out, and when the formidable wife of that superior learned of it, the beauty had been promptly offloaded onto Pan's father.

Through the years, the concubine-born daughters quarreled and bickered among themselves as they pleased, but toward the legitimate daughter Pan Wenjun, each one fell over herself to curry favor. Madam Lin regarded it all as useful practice for Pan Wenjun — a chance to learn when to stand aside and let things run their course, and when to intervene and mete out equal reproach to all parties. And so Pan Nianyao, Pan Yulian, and Pan Fangyan, the three concubine-born sisters, had formed their little alliance — a stable, comic trio of a most undistinguished sort.

It was not as though Pan Yulian had never considered adopting the persona of a serene, unworldly young woman, the kind who floats above earthly concerns like a chrysanthemum in still water, and simply lying low within the household.

The trouble was that persona already belonged to the female lead.

And who did she think she was — a voluptuous, brainless, coquettish piece of cannon fodder — daring to poach the female lead's defining trait?

That was a road straight to ruin.

Besides, Pan Yulian's particular... appearance was hardly suited to the path of the refined, loftily talented beauty.

---

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Pan Yulian swept into her room like a gust of wind, wasted no words on ceremony, and immediately sent all the maids out. Then she turned the room upside down rummaging through boxes and trunks until she unearthed her private treasury.

The monthly allowance for all the young ladies of the household was the same — two taels of silver apiece. Daily meals, snacks, rouge and powder, silk and clothing — all of it was charged to the household's common accounts. Of course, anything beyond one's allotted portion — say, a fashionable new hairpin spotted at some shop outside — had to come out of one's own pocket money.

Ever since the awakening of her memories from a previous life, and with the system always in the back of her mind, Pan Yulian had been extraordinarily frugal over the years. No matter how exquisite the fashionable hairpins and jeweled ornaments in the shops were, she forced herself not to even look at them. Fancy pastries and snacks that cost extra she almost never touched. She had saved with single-minded determination, kept almost no social obligations, and with the occasional gifts from her father and Madam Lin at festivals and the new year added in, she had accumulated, all told, one hundred and twelve taels of silver plus three strings of copper cash.

That was no small sum.

At this moment, the hands holding the small lacquered box that contained her entire fortune were trembling. Pan Yulian opened her mouth — and the first time, not even a sound came out.

She closed her eyes and began to breathe deeply, working hard to calm the suffocating anxiety pressing against her chest.

After a long moment, Pan Yulian said softly: "Deposit funds to activate the system."

[Welcome. You are logging into the welfare mini-game "Sovereign Favorite of the Six Palaces — Zero-Spending Edition."]

[Verifying login account — identity information confirmed and bound.]

[Game is loading. Loading may take some time. Please wait.....]

[Ding—!]

[Notice: System activation has failed.]

[Login failed. Please refresh and try again, or reinstall the game.]

"Deposit funds to activate."

"Deposit funds!"

"Activate the system!"

"Log in!!!"

......

Outside the room, Concubine Xu came walking over. Seeing all the maids standing outside the door, she asked what had happened — none of them knew a thing. She knocked, waited, and hearing no answer from Pan Yulian, pushed the door open and walked straight in.

After all, Concubine Xu knew her daughter's ways well enough. Pan Yulian spent her days trading barbs with her sisters in the household, and when she lost an argument she would come home to sulk.

"Yulian, Chungu said she saw you come rushing back in a panic, without even your maid following you. Has something happened?"

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Asking as she entered, Concubine Xu found Pan Yulian staring at the silver-clasped box in her hands, the rims of her eyes red.

At the sight of her daughter like this, Concubine Xu fell silent for a moment and said nothing. Then she turned and walked back out.

???

Snapped back to her senses, Pan Yulian was thoroughly bewildered by Concubine Xu's behavior.

"Mother — Mother."

Pan Yulian called out twice and rose to go after her, only to realize she was still holding the silver box.

She hastily pressed the lid shut and was reaching for the lock when Concubine Xu returned.

Pan Yulian set the box down and hurried toward her. "Mother, has something happened?"

Concubine Xu shook her head and drew five banknotes from inside her robe, laying them atop the silver box.

Looking at Pan Yulian's stunned expression, Concubine Xu reached out and gently stroked her hair. "Our Yulian is a grown young lady now. You ought always to have some silver on you for whatever you may need."

With that, she gave Pan Yulian a gentle nudge. "Now go and tidy yourself up for the midday meal. I had a soup put on to simmer in the kitchen when I came — I still need to go and check on it."

Concubine Xu turned and left before Pan Yulian could even think to refuse.

"Mother..."

Madam Lin had no patience for keeping a constant eye on the concubine-born daughters — she simply had them all live with their respective mothers. In any case, the personal maids who attended the young ladies in each courtyard were all chosen by Madam Lin herself, their bonds of indenture firmly in Madam Lin's hands. No one in this inner household could turn the world upside down under such conditions.

Afraid that one careless day Pan Yulian might let slip a familiar address and invite disaster, Concubine Xu had, for all these dozen-odd years, insisted that Pan Yulian call her only "Mother" — never anything warmer.

Pan Yulian looked down at the banknotes in her hands. Her nose stung, and warmth gathered behind her eyes.

"......Saved up all this time, and I can't even get a wretched deposit to activate a stupid—"

[Ding—!]

[Detecting that you are currently logging in and activating the system.]

[Please confirm whether you wish to proceed with your initial deposit to activate the system.]

Pan Yulian, teardrops still clinging to her cheeks: ......

She stared blankly up at the system hovering in the empty air before her, her expression wooden.

So it turned out — money truly could make even ghosts push the millstone.

......