Legend of Concubine's Daughter Minglan 知否知否 应是绿肥红瘦

C164. The First Three Days After the Wedding

The mansions of the nobility stood in great numbers in the capital, but only the ones which had been awarded to the founders of the state when those men had been knighted were able to occupy the whole street, like Marquis Xiangyang's mansion which were two lanes away on the south or Duke Ying's mansion which were three streets away on the north. After that, the scale of all the other mansions which had been awarded to the men with military merits or the members of the imperial house weren't able to compare to the former ones. For example, Marquis Dongchang's mansion and Marquis Fuchang's mansion which had been confiscated seemed quite luxurious, but actually only covered more area than the normal family.

Minglan understood that a lot. When the country had just been founded, it had had a vast territory with a sparse population. Thus it had been reasonable for the emperor to be generous. Later on the capital had gradually become thriving and prosperous, an inch of land might even valued an inch of gold. There were no other places to spare since the founders of the states had already occupied most of the land.

Of course, there were also miserable families like Hualan's husband's family. As the residence of a founder of the state, Marquis Zhongqin's mansion also occupied more than half of the street with its pavilions, terraces and towers. However, after Marquis Zhongqin had been involved in the mutiny case, the family's title of nobility had been deprived and the mansion had been closed down. Even though the family had been rehabilitated afterwards, they still couldn't get their previous mansion back.

As for the Gu family, several generations of Marquis Ningyuan had garrisoned the frontiers, therefore their mansion had only occupied the whole Ningyuan street which was not too long or broad.

However, all in all, there were always exceptions in this world. Like Guojiu Shen (T/N: Guojiu was the title of the brother of the empress), not only was he a relative of the empress, but he had also done lots of deeds of military merits. So his mansion, Marquis Weibei's mansion, was actually situated in the mountains and the forest with rivers surrounded, which was the most excellent place in the capital.

Minglan also understood that. There were lots of nobility being accused these years. After a few rounds of investigations, the properties which had been confiscated from those guilty families were countless. With plenty of money to spend, the new emperor would definitely grant a huge reward to his brother-in-law, eh, well as well as his followers, like Gu Tingye.

So when Minglan saw the grand and splendid Fuyuan Commander Gu's mansion, she was not so amazed. The only thing that surprised her a lot was that there was only half of a mountain forest and a manor of a convicted official which had just been confiscated between Commander Gu's mansion and Marquis Ningyuan's mansion.

"What do you think? Do you like it?" Seeing Minglan's shocking face, Gu Tingye smiled and asked that.

As Minglan watched the colorful and flourishing garden which had wooded mountains with flowers and trees all over inside, she almost opened her mouth. Only after a short while did she say, "Was it really necessary to argue for that long since our mansion is so close to theirs?" Minglan only felt it had been a waste of time to debate with Gu Tingye's families.

However, with his eyebrows raised, Gu Tingye said, " Whatever the distance between their mansion and ours, we are still an independent family now. No other people could get involved in our business."

With joyful look showed on Minglan's face, she thought inwardly, 'Does it... mean that, I don't need to get up early in the morning?'

The first day after their wedding she had already been busy the whole day, not to mention the aches all over her body still existed. Right now, Minglan was extremely exhausted. When they arrived at Commander Gu's mansion, it was getting dark already and she wasn't even able to see clearly what her new house looked like. After Danju had supported Minglan into the room, Minglan changed into the informal dress after she had washed herself, then she fell into sleep on the dragon phoenix pattern brocade red quilt at once.