Body & Soul 🇰🇷 Part 1

Chapter 172: Seo Yeon/ Kim Chun-Ae

After that whole debacle of marriages, I soon took over their imaginary role as the first wife which I had relinquished since I wanted to stay at home more and spend quality time with my children. But they were old enough now not to need me so much so I used it for the first time in all my married years, undermining their precedent in her home in order to tend to guests and servants alike. As usual, I felt my husband's eyes on me the whole time but it was different this time...it was more...intense. I guessed he really liked me taking up my role as the main wife. He kept me in close proximity which was unusual in these types of gatherings but it was a successful night. He left the other concubines in their home with no servants so they had to start takin care of themselves for once. Chun-Ae should be ok although the situation took a serious toll on her ego. Seeing how badly she reacted to the situation which I'm sure she had no knowledge of only showed me how tightly she controlled the others.

Both girls were becoming more unbearable as time passed in the palace, especially Da-In who had no conception of work at all. But I made sure to put her under the strictest supervision I could find for new maids. Her wails and screams could soon be heard all around the palace and soon enough she was even punished and bullied by all the important ministers and royalty alike. And I had it on very good authority that since the Queen is so determined for my husband to loose favour with the King she has actually been humiliated non-stop with these so-called concubines so she had her own torture methods for them both especially Da-In who she let everyone in the palace bully them both non-stop. I still was far from her favourite as well but I hadn't done anything to her and we both knew it so she had no reason to come at me, especially since things had been quiet in the palace for sometime now. But I did notice that she would occasionally send them to my husband's office to serve him.

I was beyond grateful to Seon-Ho for repaying my love for him the way he did. He was absolutely faithful to me, even before he realised his feelings for me. I could take his possessive nature and terrible jealousy for the rest of my life as long as he stayed that way. But I was still curious what exactly was it about him that deluded these noble women when he was only half-noble. No matter how much I thought about it I couldn't make any sense of it. So I would hide ins office when I saw any of them come to serve him since i had their schedules handed to me from their superiors. And this time it was Da-In. She was looking around at how to best to place the food without even shuffling his important papers out of the way before he walked in and almost got the shock of his life "who the hell let you in here?" He asked with a drained look on his face "what do you think I'm doing here? Im giving you lunch" she replied to him slowly as if he was hard of hearing. "That woman had kept you from us all this time for all of these years. You never visited us even once. So this time I'm got to serve you whilst she's at home minding the children. I've reheated it so many tines since you were busy so I hope it's still good to eat. Or do I not even have that right anymore?" She asked him irritably but he just looked how she felt, but of course she couldn't take a hint and edges closer to him "look, if you just give me a chance then I'll be however you want me to be ok? But don't avoid me for a lowlife who doesn't know anything about our childhood memories." He collapsed onto the floor, already exhausted by her clinginess. "There is absolutely nothing about you that I want at all. You do not know how to take care of yourself with your own hands so how will you be able to look after me?" He turned around to look for some papers but she had already ruined them with the food. He chased her away before she could say another word as he called for me. The look on her face was priceless when she saw e come out from my hiding place, even more to when she saw that he wasn't surprised at all.

Later on that day I last next to him, covered in nothing but our blanket. I rested my arms around his shoulders, waiting for him to wake up so I could give him the good news. I kissed my old man awake who kept trying to sleep but I just kept climbing on top of him playfully as our daughter would until I got his attention "Do you think you're a child or something?" He grunted in his sleep "Let me, rest woman, you've already used up all of my energy today." I just laughed at him and kept tickling and kissing him until he practically threw me off the bed. I just rolled my eyes and got dressed, stomping into the kitchen; letting my creativity inspire me into telling my man the news that I had waited for a couple of weeks but didn't want to say anything until I was sure.

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We had been stuck in an empty house with no servants, no food provided to us, no luxury and no man. I had to work for all of those things twice as hard as I was working when I should have been living with him instead of opposite my dream man for over a year. But she placed too many obstacles for any of us to have made a successful move to lure him to our home. But after what I witnessed in the office, it was soon clear to me that mindless brat was the one who was making him run away from us and I was here waiting in the home for her to give her a mouthful. "What the hell did you think you were doing in his office today? Are you really so brainless that you couldn't even place his document aside before you had to ruin them? And you...you do not even pay me your respects as your senior concubine" I sully had her under my thunk but I couldn't help but notice how she had changed towards me ever since she returned from god-knows where, as if I didn't have her life in my hands with the Queen's command.

"Senior concubine? Are you serious? Please remind me of the last time you fulfilled your duties as concubine? Ever?" This bitch had nerve to laugh in my face as she tried to make her way towards her room. "What the hell have you got to be arrogant about! He wasn't touched you either! And you have the nerve to be deliberate disrespectful to me?" She laughed in my face once again as I almost strangled her. "Really? Are you sure he hasn't touched me? Because I'm sure that he did...in the war." My blood boiled before I could fully digest her words...there was no way that happened...I couldn't even get him to touch me and I copied everything the women he was obsessed with but he would sleep with her?"Ok fine, let's see how you like to talk without ever thinking of the consequences" and with that I burned her clumsy hands with water I had just boiled in the pot in the kitchen. She screamed on the spot and tried to do everything she could to let go of my grasp but no sooner as she had reached for the door I had a series of flashbacks of all of my failed attempts of getting to Seon-Ho, and bringing in all of Yeon's enemies had given me nothing but grief and humiliation over and over again...the torture I had been subjected to by the Queen was something else entirely...it was almost what I had experienced in the gibang...and before I knew it I had poured boiling water all over her face until she had stopped screaming and struggling.

Once I was sure she was dead, I sat on the stool in the kitchen and thought about this plan I had that was already falling apart after barely a year. Hyo-Sonn was supposed to torture Yeon, so much so that she would leave Seon-Ho, but instead they got rid of her by giving her her dream man. The Kang sisters were supposed to show their true colours by scaring him away and inadvertently push him into my arms. But he was so devoted to that bitch he had even uncovered the secret of 'my son'. I drank the water she poured for herself, completely unaware of what she put into it as I savoured my revenger against my so-called cousins who put me in the gibang in the first place.
I looked around the home, remembering that there were no servants around. I looked over at the home opposite us and I noticed that in the chaos of dealing with Da-In that his carriage wasn't at their manor. Maybe he took them somewhere either in the market or the palace. But for the first time it actually served a purpose for me as I had written a letter to the one person who had supported me throughout my journey as I asked him for help again...just like how he got me into the palace, how he got me in a high position amongst the maids so quickly that I could actually work under the queen in just a few years...and just like how he had fathered my bastard son, and took away his useless life once he had served his purpose...after he did what his father did to me in the gibang all those years ago, it was the least he owed me...