Chapter 21: The Lady of the Main Line Cleans House

"Line up! Stand straight!"

The atmosphere in the council hall was stifling. Dozens of stewards stood in two rows, each wearing an arrogant expression, their eyes veiled with thinly disguised contempt.

Ye Qingyan strolled in leisurely. She walked straight to the main seat, but instead of sitting, she propped one foot on the armrest and crossed her legs, swinging them back and forth. Glancing casually at the mountain of ledgers piled on the table, she let out a yawn, her demeanor utterly slack and insolent.

"My, there certainly are a lot of ledgers here," she said lazily, her tone drifting.

This move predictably drew a chorus of sneers. The stewards exchanged glances, more convinced than ever that this young mistress was indeed a piece of trash that could not be molded.

Ye Qingyan frowned as she looked at the stacked books. She knew these ledgers were riddled with deceit, but uncovering the evidence quickly was no simple task. It wasn't that she was truly ignorant, but extracting the truth from such complex accounts required time and energy she didn't want to spend.

Just as a headache began to throb, a voice echoed in her mind.

[Rebellious subject, you are too weak!]

The system’s voice carried its usual arrogance, yet held a hint of frustration at her perceived inadequacy.

[A ruler should perceive everything across ten thousand miles! Are you truly stumped by mere mortal accounts? I grant you 'Eidetic Memory!']

As the words faded, a cool sensation flooded Ye Qingyan’s brain. Everything before her eyes became exceptionally sharp; the dust motes in the air, the tiny scratches on the corners of the table, and even the varying depths of ink on the pages were visible in agonizing detail.

However, while the power arrived quickly, the side effects were equally abrupt.

*Buzz—*

A hum resonated in her mind. Where the ledgers had once been a chaotic pile, they now appeared to her as a collection of deeply asymmetrical, crooked, and misaligned objects. She saw the cover of one ledger with a slightly curled top corner, while the bottom corner was as flat as new—the discordance made her skin crawl.

She grabbed a ledger, her obsessive-compulsive tendencies flaring. She noticed a digit on one page where a "one" was written slightly thicker than the others, and a "seven" where the final stroke had a tiny smudge of excess ink. These minute discrepancies were magnified infinitely in her vision, driving her to the brink of madness.

"This purchase amount is wrong!" Ye Qingyan blurted out, her voice laced with uncontrollable irritation. She pointed to a line in the book. "Why is there an extra zero at the end? It's killing me!"

The steward in charge of procurement turned pale, cold sweat beading on his forehead. That was a trick he had pulled just recently; he never imagined it would be spotted at a single glance. He feigned composure and stammered, "Young Mistress, this... this was a large-scale procurement, so the numbers are naturally higher..."

Ye Qingyan ignored his sophistry and pointed to another ledger. "And this one! The ink tone on these two pages is different! It’s unbearable!"

The registrar responsible for the books felt his body shudder, cold sweat streaming down. He had hired someone to forge a page at the last minute to cover a deficit, thinking it was flawless, yet it had been "seen" through just like that.

"And this!" Ye Qingyan slammed the table, the vibration making the stewards' hearts jump. She pointed to a page number. "Why is this page number a 'four'? 'Four' is so unlucky! Change it to an 'eight' for me!"

While she spoke such "nonsense," her hands moved with lightning speed. Using ridiculous reasons like "it looks displeasing," "the number is unlucky," "the layout is maddening," and "the ink is uneven," she precisely pinpointed every loophole and act of embezzlement in the ledgers.

"This sum of silver—it is clearly only one hundred taels, so why did you write one thousand?"

"The paper thickness varies on these pages! My OCD is acting up! Tell me, did you secretly swap the paper to hide the original entries?"

"This string of numbers just looks wrong—it’s not symmetrical at all! Did you change one of the digits?"

The stewards went from initial contempt to shock, and finally, to sheer terror. They looked at Ye Qingyan as if she were a monster. She spouted bizarre reasons, yet she pointed out every one of their shady dealings without a single error. Beads of sweat poured down their faces like rain, their legs turned to jelly, and their complexions turned deathly white.

"Spare me, Young Mistress!"

"I was wrong! I will never dare do it again!"

"The Young Mistress is truly sharp-eyed! I deserve to die!"

Pleas for mercy rose one after another. The stewards, unable to hold on any longer, collapsed to their knees, trembling violently, wishing they could bury their heads in the ground. They finally understood that the young mistress before them was not the fool they had imagined.

She was terrifyingly capable and had come to clean house!

Ye Qingyan watched the kneeling stewards with cold, pitiless eyes. She tossed the evidence she had gathered, along with the problematic ledgers, right in front of the Old Matriarch.

The Old Matriarch looked at the loopholes Ye Qingyan had exposed through her "frivolous" antics, then at the groveling stewards. Her eyes were filled with shock, but even more so with an incredulous sense of delight.

"Good! Good! Good!" The Old Matriarch repeated the word three times. She knew Ye Qingyan’s success wasn't just luck. Her granddaughter truly possessed real talent!

"From this day forth, the management of the Ye household's internal affairs is officially handed over to Qingyan! Whoever dares to defy her openly while opposing her in secret is an enemy of the Ye family!"

That very day, Ye Qingyan dismissed several key stewards, casting them and their families out of the Ye estate, never to be hired again. She did not stop there; she quickly promoted several young men from humble backgrounds whom she had observed for some time and knew to be of clean character to fill the vacancies. These new stewards were fiercely loyal and deeply grateful to Ye Qingyan.

"Thank you, Young Mistress, for your patronage!"

She not only punished the corrupt but also increased the monthly wages and food standards for the servants, promising to reward them based on their labor. In a short time, the perception of the former "foolish" young mistress changed drastically throughout the Ye estate, and the hearts of the staff were quickly won over.

"The Ye estate is truly thriving now!"

Ye Chengzong looked at the revitalized household, where accounts were clear, servants were diligent, and efficiency had soared. He had to admit that Ye Qingyan had indeed put the household in perfect order. He looked at his daughter with newfound respect, but still believed she had simply been lucky—a blind cat stumbling upon a dead mouse—and had coincidentally found some "clever tricks."

Watching Ye Qingyan act with such decisive force, however, a sense of unease grew within him. She was too sharp, too difficult to control; she was essentially a "hot potato." He began to scheme, intending to marry her off and be rid of her. This way, he could use her "good fortune" to climb the social ladder for the Ye family while simultaneously disposing of this "trouble."

...

A few days later, a luxurious invitation was delivered to Ye Qingyan’s desk. It was decorated with paintings of magnificent pavilions and blooming peonies.

"Qingyan, this is an invitation to the flower-viewing banquet hosted by the young duke of the Duke of Anguo's estate," Ye Chengzong said with a smile, his tone carrying an uncompromising command. "This is a 'good marriage' arranged for you. A daughter cannot be kept at home forever!"

Ye Qingyan picked up the invitation, her fingertips lightly tracing the gold-stamped characters. The young duke of the Duke of Anguo's estate—the city's greatest playboy, famous for his debauchery and notorious reputation.

Was this the "good marriage" Ye Chengzong spoke of?

"Tch, a deadbeat dad is a deadbeat dad. He plotted against my mother, and now he’s starting to plot against me!"

Suddenly, a voice rang out.