The Lustful Young Master starting with Holy Maiden.-Chapter 35: A mother’s garden, son’s shame.

Within the inner pavilion of the Zhao ancestral courtyard, where phoenix lamps burned with spirit flame and silken curtains danced to the rhythm of suppressed sobs, Zhao Yung stood motionless.

His robes were torn, his knees bruised and his pride was long dead, buried under jade fragments.

Before him sat his mother, Lady Zhao Mingyue, also known as Concubine Zhu, the once-renowned Snow Orchid Fairy of the Northern Lands and Nine Tail Fox clan, now the lady of the Zhao clan.

Her cultivation was deep as shadows, her bearing proud, and her eyes sharp as a celestial sword.

She poured tea with slow grace, her fingers steady. But beneath that tranquility, a storm brewed.

"...Speak, Yung’er," she finally said.

"Why did you ask for a private audience so early in the morning? Your aura is unstable. Your Dao is fractured... And you have the fake breath of a nascent soul realm cultivator,"

Zhao Yung clenched his fists. His nails dug into his palm, drawing blood.

But it was not the pain he feared. It was the words he was about to speak.

"Mother..." he choked, voice hoarse, "I need your help..."

Mingyue’s brows furrowed faintly, but she said nothing.

Then Zhao Yung knelt.

And not in the way a son shows filial piety. No.

This was the kneel of a dog begging for scraps from the hand that once cradled it, shameless, disgraceful, and unorthodoxy.

"I need... I need you to dual cultivate with Zhao Fan," He said as shamelessly as the summer wind peeking at the jade maiden across all nine realms.

The teacup froze mid-air.

Spirit flames flickered.

Silence reigned, not just empty, but suffocating with a tense air, that makes one conscious heavy.

Zhao Mingyue did not move. But her spiritual pressure surged in a silent wave, cracking the stone beneath her feet.

"Say it again, child," she said quietly.

Zhao Yung trembled, and tears fell, his forehead touched the floor.

"If I don’t... he will destroy what’s left of my Dao heart. My soul won’t survive. He has the recordings of my plan to kill him... He controls everything now. This... this is the only way he will let me live..."

He lifted his head, and for the first time in years, looked into his mother’s eyes not as a proud young master... but as a broken boy.

Mingyue stared at him for a long moment. She said nothing.

No rebuke, no curse, and no outrage, just an exhale, that was long, slow, and tired.

"I warned your father once," she said softly, "that we should never have allowed sons to grow beneath the same sun... They will ultimately go against each other,"

Then she stood, her robes flowing like cold moonlight.

"To bed the son of my husband... To spread open my Yin garden to the young one, don’t you feel ashamed to carry such words to me,..." Her voice didn’t tremble, it chilled.

How can her own son bring such vulgar words to her?

She turned her back to Zhao Yung.

"Do not come to me again. I will make my decision..."

Before he could respond, her spiritual form vanished in a burst of frosted plum light.

Zhao Yung collapsed to the floor, sobbing into the silence.

He had delivered the words, the shame was now hers to carry.

But deep within him, a voice whispered:

You are no longer her son. You are merely the courier of your clan’s disgrace.

* * *

Outside,

The light of dawn spilled gently into the Orchid Pavilion, illuminating the carved jade pillars and mortal tapestries in hues of soft gold.

While, Concubine Zhu remained seated in a small seing made from imperial jade and demon-slaying silver.

It was a place of quiet prestige, neither gaudy like the main wife’s palace, nor modest like lesser residences.

The wives and concubines of the Zhao Family didn’t have much difference, as everyone was treated with equal respect.

As her weight was carried by the swing, the words still rang in her ears, as if whispered by the wind.

Dual Cultivate with Zhao Fan.

Mingyue closed her eyes.

Her breathing remained steady, not spiritually weak, but controlled, like a still lake suppressing the fury of a dragon beneath.

"He would dare utter such filth... to me?" She felt disgusted like drenched in a mud water.

"No... Not to me but using my own son to say those words to me, that is the greater cruelty..."

The humiliation was not hers alone. It was meant to infect Zhao Yung’s marrow, twist his pride into ash, and stain his soul with unhealable disgrace.

She had known Zhao Fan since he was a boy. Known the stillness in his eyes.

The way he spoke as if reciting scripture carved in stone, and the way the heavens bent a little too close whenever he passed, that brat is a monster in a human flesh, not even scared of his own father.

And now?

"He wears that ancient cruelty like a silk robe... effortless, elegant, fatal... Gosh, why did my son even provoke such a demon,"

Mingyue stepped forward, her reflection rippling in the water. She dipped her fingers into the cold pond, right in front of the swing, and began to cleanse her face in silence.

It felt like a purification to her mortal body. Not that she believed she was impure just by mere words.

He wishes to humiliate me. No... to break Yung’er by sullying his roots. But I am still a mother. And even if the heavens mock me... even if this act becomes my legend of disgrace... I will not let my son vanish from this world

You want my Yin garden?

Then I shall bring it to you with dignity intact, and shatter your plans by robbing you of the shame you seek.

She is an educated woman, as such, she fears Zhao won’t keep his word and merely using her son as bait.

He will use the leverage again and again, to have his way with her, if she shows fear or submits.

Furthermore, if she submits even once fearing her son’s life, he will gain another leverage against her.

Zhao Fan is sharp, able to utilize anything available for his own gain.

She went to the dressing room,

She selected robes not like those seduction silks, but of ceremonial blue and white, robes of ancestral petition worn when a matron knelt before the clan’s Divine Ancestor to beg for mercy.

She fastened a single jade ornament to her hair the token passed to her by Yung’er when he first formed his Dao root.

It shimmered faintly.

As she stepped out into the early morning air, the Zhao clan disciples and servants bowed deeply in her presence.

Some glanced up with confusion, Concubine Zhu rarely left her quarters at this hour.

But none dared question her.

...

In the depths of the main peak,

Within the vast hall of obsidian stone and floating calligraphy, where faint celestial thunder rolled above the cloud tiles, the current patriarch of the Zhao family, father of Zhao Fan, and husband of Concubine Zhu.

It seems the eastern winds are trying to challenge the vast gate of heavens.

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