Gongshu Wu stroked her pale-gold hair, tied up in two little buns.
After a long while, he told his mother what he had in mind and earnestly asked for her opinion. "Mother, I'd like to take Yimamusong with me and raise her. What do you think?"
"This... this... how could that be?" Old Madam looked at Yimamusong, then at her second son. "Yimamusong really is adorable, well-behaved, gentle, and filial. Anyone who meets her would like her. But you're a man—how would you know how to raise a girl?"
Gongshu Wu hadn't thought that far ahead.
"There are Female Soldiers in the Army. I can entrust Yimamusong to them when we're fighting. If the battle gets too intense, I'll send her to Capital Fengluo. She won't interfere with anything important. Yimamusong... Yun Chi entrusted her to me on his deathbed. I promised I'd take care of her, and I won't break my word." Gongshu Wu paused for a long moment. "It's good to be filial, but she doesn't need to be so well-behaved and gentle. I'll find a way to change those traits. Before they died, both Yun Chi and the child's birth mother hoped she could live with dignity as a proper person. But in these troubled times, being well-behaved and gentle only suits a plaything. To live as a person, you first have to beat the inhuman beasts into submission. Otherwise..."
Gongshu Wu left the rest unsaid.
But everyone present understood.
At that, Old Madam stopped trying to dissuade Gongshu Wu.
Yimamusong gathered her clothes. She had spent the whole night forcing herself to accept that a skeleton could talk and was about to become her adoptive father. Yes, adoptive father. To protect Yimamusong, her Clan Genealogy listed Gong Cheng as her father, but publicly she was said