The Female Lead Decides to Act Wickedly

Chapter 70: Chapter 068 Extra Story (Two-in-One)_3

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No matter whether it was Kang Mo or He Yi, they both seemed determined to prove to everyone that theirs was True Love.

They had fought with He Tian for over a decade, not to make a jest of themselves.

Now, as lovers at last united, even though they faced countless scornful looks and laughter, when they were in public, they still acted like two lovebirds, inseparable.

But the rift between them only grew deeper.

Even Kang Mo, who was eager to achieve success and regain power, felt it.

Whether one likes a woman or not can perhaps be faked for a short while, but over time it becomes very hard to deceive oneself.

However, Kang Mo had not completely lost his conscience, or perhaps, he still held a sliver of affection for He Yi.

When he found himself attracted to other younger, prettier, and more innocent girls, Kang Mo thought, ”Don’t rush, wait until I have secured an imperial decree for Lady Xiao He, bestowing upon her the honor of being the Duchess, then I can take Xuexue into my household.”

Kang Mo secretly kept his new love in a golden house outside.

He convinced himself that he had made good arrangements and had not wronged He Yi.

He Yi, already suspicious, soon discovered Kang Mo’s ”secret.”

In that moment, He Yi thought she would be angry, would erupt, but instead, she felt a sense of ”as expected.”

As if a heavy stone hanging over her heart had finally fallen.

It hurt her deeply, yet it allowed her to see reality.

He Yi did not go into hysterics, nor did she expose the affair, instead she pretended as if she knew nothing.

She simply hastened Kang Mo’s steps to secure her the imperial decree, and in secret, she was laying the groundwork for her own son.

”...Brother Yuan is serving at the East Camp; our Brother Rui is also thirteen this year, and he isn’t much for his studies. It might as well be that he goes to the military camp too!”

The Brother Rui He Yi mentioned was the child she had borne for Kang Mo years earlier.

During the pregnancy, she had been scolded by the Marquis Yongchang and worried about her future. She had also, in hesitation and regret, once taken an abortion pill.

When the time came to give birth, she encountered difficulties, and it was only with great struggle that she bore a son, but her health was ruined in the process.

These years at the Taoist Temple, she feared having another child so much that she did not dare to properly care for her health but instead took contraceptives.

Now, He Yi had become the legitimate Duchess and could have had a legitimate child of marriage, but she could no longer bear children.

The son that Kang Mo took back to the Duke Mansion as his adopted child was He Yi’s only flesh and blood.

Her life was already ruined. All He Yi wanted now was a good future for her son.

She cursed He Tian for clinging to life and not dying, stubbornly waiting to see Brother Yuan marry and have a child, to see him secure his position in the military. With a stepmother now, he would not have to fear being harassed.

What was even more infuriating was that the Yue Family that He Tian had chosen for Brother Yuan was very supportive. Even Kang Mo did not dare arbitrarily strip Brother Yuan of his title.

As long as Brother Yuan did not make too great a mistake, he would be able to inherit the title of Duke Wei smoothly.

Why should it be so?!

Both were Kang Mo’s sons, but He Tian’s son could be Lord Duke while her son didn’t even have a title!

He Yi would not accept this. While Kang Mo still cared about maintaining face, she wanted to help her son gain as much advantage as possible.

But what He Yi never expected was that despite all her sacrifices for her son, bearing humiliation and heavy burdens, her son simply did not appreciate it.

”The East Camp? I’m not going! Mother, do you think I’m not disgraced enough?”

”What is the East Camp? It’s filled with noble children and descendants of the general, these people who are high upon their horses, proud and self-assured. I, merely an adopted son of the Duke Mansion, barely better than a servant, what right have I to go to the East Camp?”

Thirteen-year-old Brother Rui was at his most rebellious.

In the past, he didn’t know about his heritage, that he was an illegitimate child, an outcast to the world.

Brought back to the Capital City by his father, when he met his father’s true wife, Mrs. He, and saw that frail yet very beautiful woman, and overheard the whispers around him, only then did Brother Rui realize how disgraceful his existence was.

And what shameless and dishonorable acts his mother had committed!

Brother Rui was overwhelmed with shame; he became sensitive, self-loathing, feeling as if he was the embodiment of original sin.

Later, having lived for a time in the Duke Mansion, enjoying the riches of the wealthy family, and witnessing the dignified grandeur of his half-brother, Young Master Heir, his self-loathing turned into envy and jealousy, among other negative emotions.

Now, Brother Rui, twisted in his psychology and volatile in his emotions, filled with resentment towards the mother he once revered.

At this moment, when he heard He Yi making arrangements for his future, a sensitive nerve was touched, and he exploded, ”What am I? Huh? An adopted son! What status do adopted sons in the noble families of the Capital City have? Don’t you know?”

He Yi was shocked by her son’s outburst and inadvertently blurted out, ”Nonsense, you are not just any adopted son; you are the true born of your father and me!”

”Do you dare to say it? Do you and my father dare to repeat that in front of all the people in the Capital City?”

”You do not dare! Because an illegitimate child is more shameful than an adopted son. An adopted son at least can cover up the shame! But an illegitimate child, ah, spit on that, I’m nothing but a bastard born of sin, a bastard conceived without a marriage contract!”

”What future? Ha, with my sullied identity, who would want to be my comrade? Who would want to marry me?”

”Mother, why did you give birth to me at all? Why let me be born with such sin? Why? Was I your enemy in a past life, for you to wrong me like this?”

He Yi didn’t even know how she left her son’s courtyard; she only knew that her son hated her, her only son hated her.

Afterward, the petition for the imperial decree was continuously suppressed by the Emperor, the Southwest erupted in conflict, the Emperor employed a group of young generals like Brother Yuan, but left Kang Mo out in the cold.

His career failing, and not wanting to face He Yi, whom he resentfully saw as a shrew, Kang Mo simply stayed in the golden house outside.

His son turned against him, his husband took a new love, his mother-in-law and his family’s brothers and sisters-in-law all looked down on him... His perseverance over the past decade seemed like a joke.

He Yi secretly ordered someone to obtain poison, dressed in the clothes she wore when she first pledged her love to Kang Mo, and took her life alongside him.