Quickly wear salted fish, she won by lying down

Without further ado, Linlang entered the manor, learned a little about the situation, and then went to find the old Duchess.

The old Duchess was surprised to see her arrive, after all, they had just eaten together that morning. Why was she here again?

Linlang didn't beat around the bush and went straight to the point, saying in a coquettish tone, "I came to see Grandmother because of a little thing. Grandmother, I'm thirteen years old (by Chinese reckoning), and I'll be getting married in two years. How come I don't know anything about managing a household? What will I do if I don't know how to manage a household after I get married? I just want to use Mother's dowry to practice, is that alright?"

When the old Duchess heard that Linlang wanted to take back her mother's dowry, although the income of the Chengen Duke's Mansion was not as good as when the Empress Dowager was in power, it was not so bad that it had to use the original owner's dowry to make up for the deficit. So the old Duchess readily agreed and said, "That's fine. You can practice first. If you don't understand anything, just ask your grandmother."

The reason why she readily agreed to Linlang's request was mainly because her daughter-in-law, the daughter of the Duke of Chengen, was only one year older than Linlang and had already been learning household management from the Duke of Chengen.

However, since Linlang was an outsider, it was inappropriate for her to ask the Duchess of Chengen to take Linlang along and learn from her. So, when Linlang said that she wanted to practice with her own dowry, the old Duchess thought that this was a good idea and agreed.

Then, she knew that if Linlang didn't know something, she definitely wouldn't be able to find the Lady of Cheng'en, so she asked Linlang to come to her.

Linlang saw that the matter had been accomplished, and faced with the old Duchess's request, how could she refuse? Even if she didn't know the answer, she would find something to ask the old Duchess and cultivate a relationship with her. After all, if she wanted to choose a better family in the future, she might need to accompany the old Duchess to various banquets.

It was practically impossible for the original owner's aunt, the Duchess of Cheng'en, to take her there. Firstly, the original owner's mother was the youngest daughter, and when the original owner's aunt entered the family, the original owner's mother was still unmarried and was the most favored by the old Duchess. As a result, the original owner's aunt didn't like the original owner's mother very much—this was the gossip that Linlang had just overheard while her little bee flew around the mansion. Secondly, the original owner's aunt, like the female lead, was also worried that the old Duchess would let her precious son marry the original owner, so she didn't give the original owner a good look either.

The reason she didn't give her a friendly look was twofold: first, to make sure the old Duchess understood her meaning, lest she be too affectionate and the old Duchess misunderstand, thinking that she liked the original owner and wanted her son to marry her; second, because she disliked the original owner's mother, she naturally disliked her children as well.

Given this, it was impossible for Lady Chengen to take her to various banquets, so Linlang had no intention of finding a suitable family to marry through Lady Chengen.

In the original world, the original owner was unaware of this, so she was confined to the Chengen Duke's mansion for many years and had not been to many places. As a result, she could only meet some young talents by holding banquets in the mansion. How could she find a suitable husband? In the end, the female protagonist felt that the original owner was after the heir of the Chengen Duke and wanted to marry him, so she kept making trouble for the original owner.

Leaving aside the discord between Lady Cheng'en and the original owner of this body, let's just say that Linlang, having retrieved her dowry, began to organize it with her maids and nannies. It's important to note that the original owner had never seen or heard of this dowry, so naturally, Linlang wanted to personally check what was included. When the original owner's mother married, the Cheng'en Duke's mansion was flourishing, and as the late daughter of the old Duke and Duchess, she was doted on by them. Therefore, the old Duchess was generous with her dowry—a full thirty thousand taels of silver.

Besides the usual items, there were fifty sets of various jewelry alone, worth over ten thousand taels of silver. There was also five thousand taels of silver in a chest, two estates covering about four hundred acres, worth about four thousand taels; two shops, worth about six thousand taels; and countless sets of various fabrics and clothing. The total of thirty thousand taels was real, unlike some families who inflated their figures. This shows how much the old Duke and his wife loved their youngest daughter.

Thanks to the efforts of the original owner's mother and the old Duchess over the years, although not meticulously maintained, its value has increased from 30,000 taels to 40,000 taels.

The number of shops in the manor remains the same, but the number of sets of clothes and jewelry has increased, as has the amount of silver stored in the chest.

Seeing that the grain delivered by the estate each year was worth a decent amount of silver, Linlang concluded that the estate manager was someone the old Duchess and her original mother trusted and were reliable. Therefore, she didn't sell the estate. Instead, she bought a house in the capital, which would be closer and easier to manage. She only planned to sell the 10,000 taels of silver she had saved up, as well as some flashy but valuable jewelry, and then use her honeybee to investigate which houses in the capital were being sold at low prices, buy them, and rent them out to make money from money.

Leaving aside the fact that Linlang and the maids and nannies were counting the original owner's mother's dowry, let's just say that when the Duchess of Cheng'en heard that the old Duchess had given the dowry to Linlang, since the mansion was not yet in dire straits at the time, she didn't say anything. After all, it was Linlang's stuff, so returning it to Linlang was perfectly reasonable.

However, she knew that the Chengen Duke's Mansion was prosperous back then, and her original mother received a lot of dowry. Now the Chengen Duke's Mansion is declining. Her daughter will get married in two or three years, and her dowry will probably not be as much as Shen Linlang's. She felt a little unhappy, thinking that why her dowry was not as much as her sister-in-law's back then, and now it's her daughter's turn. A daughter of a duke, she doesn't have as much dowry as Shen Linlang, an orphan.

Thinking of this, Lady Chengen's impression of Linlang worsened. She thought that Linlang was living in her own home, eating her own food, drinking her own drinks, and wearing her own clothes, but she still wanted to take back her dowry. After all, if she didn't take it back, she could choose some of her own dowry to make her daughter's dowry more substantial. Also, when her son proposed marriage in the future, the betrothal gifts he gave to the bride's family would be more generous.

Fortunately, Madam Chengen did not dare to go to Linlang and say that she ate, drank, and wore food from the Chengen family. Otherwise, Linlang would definitely say that it was all the old Duchess who paid for her, and what did it have to do with her? When the original owner entered the manor, the old Duchess was afraid that her daughter-in-law would be unhappy to be raising her granddaughter, so she specifically said that all the expenses for raising the original owner would be paid by her private funds.

At that time, the Chengen Duke's Mansion was in the presence of the Empress Dowager, enjoying immense prestige and having more money than it could ever spend. The Chengen Duke's wife would never have cared about having an extra person in the household. So she even laughed and said that the old Duchess was slapping her in the face. A little girl, how many bites could she eat? Adding a pair of chopsticks to the mansion was not something the old lady needed to take responsibility for.

Fortunately, the old Duchess insisted, so the manor is no longer as prosperous as it once was. That's why the Duchess of Cheng'en doesn't dare to scold the original owner for using so much of the manor's money, since it was the old Duchess who was in charge. (End of Chapter)