Chapter 66: Clan Assembly (2)

  Zhao Yun's hesitation has gone on for too long, and some of the clan members are getting impatient: "What's going on? We're all being kind-hearted, but he's treating us like fools. I'd rather get rid of him from our clan as soon as possible, but if he leaves, we'll never get any compensation from him again. How can we swallow this?"

  Others of his tribe chimed in: "What he said isn't bad. In any case, he should apologize to everyone."

  "Yes, yes, apart from the couple themselves, there's also his in-laws and his parents and siblings who are all victims. We can't blame them for this, it's only right that the culprit should apologize to everyone."

  The eldest son of the Eighth House suddenly stopped struggling, a cold smile spreading across his face as he stared at Zhao Jing with an ominous glint in his eye.

  The old man didn't seem to have heard Zhao Jing's boastful words and calmly said, "Let's just go along with everyone else's idea."

  Zhao Yun became even more embarrassed, at this time, his father Zhao Da also spoke up.

  Master Rui is now always at home enjoying his life, not paying much attention to the rumors in the clan, and even less concerned about the aftermath of the eighth house affair. He doesn't know what's bothering his son. Seeing that his son hasn't taken action for a long time, he becomes impatient: "What are you staring blankly for? Hurry up and have someone take away the thing in his mouth! Everyone is waiting for him to apologize!" After saying this, without waiting for his son to speak, he called over his grandson Zhao Yuan and had him remove the cloth from the mouth of the eldest son of the eighth house.

  Even if family matters are now handed over to his son, Zhao Ye is still the head of the clan. The younger generations should only follow his orders! What does the eighth old master mean? Even if the generation is older, it shouldn't jump over the clan and speak first! Is this a scholar? Not understanding any etiquette at all, just relying on age to bully others.

  Zhao Yuan vaguely knew about the rumors and clearly understood what his father was worried about, but he had been instructed by his grandfather. He couldn't disobey, so he looked at his father Zhao Xuan, who shook his head helplessly. Only then did Zhao Yuan step forward to take away the cloth. Grandfather Rui felt extremely displeased in his heart, thinking that even his grandson didn't put him in his eyes anymore.

  The legitimate eldest son of the Eighth House, as soon as he was free to speak, began to shout: "What compensation? I don't agree! I just made a small mistake for a moment, my father is not dead. My brother seized the family business, and no one in the clan lost any money. Why should I be expelled from the clan?! The Second House had committed the ugly crime of murdering their mother and brother, and the eldest son of the Zong House was also an accomplice. They were never expelled from the clan. Why should I be punished so severely for this small mistake? The Zong House is not clean itself, do they have the face to deal with me?!

  Old Master Eighth House was supported by his second and youngest sons, sitting in the master's seat of the Eighth House with a haggard face. Upon hearing this, he was already so angry that he couldn't speak properly: "Bastard... bastard!"

  Mr. Wei was still grumbling in his heart about his sons and the Eighth Old Master, but now he was stunned. It wasn't until this moment that he understood why his son had been so hesitant to remove the cloth from the man's mouth. He didn't want him to say these words. Unfortunately, he couldn't appreciate the kindness of his children, and now it was too late to say anything. The incident five years ago, which had almost been forgotten by everyone, including Xia'er, was brought up again by this scoundrel, leaving Mr. Wei with no face left.

  The gaze of the crowd made Wei Da Ye sit uncomfortably, and as soon as he felt uneasy, he began to lose his temper. He suddenly retorted: "What nonsense are you spouting?! In the past, I was also deceived by Zhao Jiong in the matter of the second house, how did I become an accomplice? Don't spit blood at people here! Today's public discussion is about your unfilial and unrighteous behavior, colluding with outsiders to cheat our clan members out of their money. What are you doing dragging up other unrelated matters?"

  "Ba Fang's eldest son, Lang, sneered: 'Uncle Rui is trying to shirk responsibility, does he think people are fools? He thinks that the good deeds he did back then are unknown to anyone? How can they be unrelated? He himself is not clean, his mistakes are more serious than mine, what right does he have to sit in the position of Patriarch? It's only fitting that he should step down! His son having a father like him, a criminal, doesn't even qualify to be the heir anymore, so stop putting on airs and scolding me!"

  He turned to Old Man Ba and changed his tone, speaking in a flattering manner: "Eighth Master, you have always been the most impartial. You have deep-seated grudges with the Zong family, how can you let them continue to show off their might?"

  The old man glanced at him lightly: "No matter who is in the position of Zong Zhang, your crime is also real. The public discussion within the clan has already decided to expel you. Why bother to stir up trouble and harm others without benefiting yourself?"

  The eldest son of the Eighth House was stunned for a moment, and then his face turned angry. He turned to Zhao Xiu: "Eighth Grandfather is old and muddled. Good sister, you're young and must understand things better than them. You're the victim, you tell me, am I right? Wei Da helped Zhao Jiong harm your parents, shouldn't he be expelled from the clan?"

  Zhao Xun glanced at him and turned to the Eighth Old Master: "Eighth Uncle, let him continue speaking, it's not a big deal. The matter back then, my niece was indeed the victim, can't you let my niece speak?"

  Old Master Zhao looked somewhat displeased: "What do you want to say? Are you really going to expel Zhao Yu and Zhao Jiong from the clan? They both have children, and Zhao Jiong is already dead. If we really expel them, it will cause trouble. Your grandmother never said anything like this before. You're just a child, don't be stubborn at this time."

  Zhao Xuan smiled slightly: "Don't worry, old sir, your niece isn't that foolish." She looked at the relatives below: "Today's discussion only concerns one matter, and other things are irrelevant. You uncles, elder brothers, and brothers just need to decide whether or not to expel the eldest brother of the Eighth House from the clan. Other matters can be discussed on another day."

  Everyone doesn't want to bring up what happened with Er Fang that year either. Zhao Xuan, as the victim, has already spoken out, so they naturally don't have any objections.

  The eldest son of the Eighth House, seeing this, was dissatisfied and continued to shout: "You are just acting according to the wishes of the head of the clan! You are all bullying the weak and fearing the strong. Uncle Rong has made a mistake, you don't dare say a word against him, but you're pushing me to death!"

  Zhao Xun asked him: "To expel you from the clan was originally your father's proposal, why do you instead resent Shang Zong Fang and his son?"

  "Why don't I hate him? It was just a small matter, he pretended to be kind in front of me and even sent silver to help me pay off my debt. But then he turned around and brought the bailiffs to arrest me. He didn't want to lend me money, so why did he pretend to be generous? I admit I made a mistake by cheating him out of his money. The most I should have done was return the money to him. Why did he want to harm me, drag me into court and get me kicked out of the clan? My father was just angry for a moment, but afterwards he calmed down and still acknowledged me as his son. But the clan insisted on making a big deal out of it, holding a clan meeting, clearly with the intention of driving me to desperation!"

  Zhao Yun's face turned red with anger: "Nonsense! Nonsense! I was trying to help you, how could you be so viciously abusive?!"

  Old Master Ba cried: "Big nephew, it's me who wronged you! This scoundrel is talking nonsense, don't take it to heart, I understand very well. You are a good person..." His second son beside him also looked ashamed. It was he who had discovered that his elder brother was not right and sought help from Zhao Jue, which led Zhao Jue to bring the officers to catch the man, but unexpectedly got splashed with dirty water instead.

  Zhao Xun saw the situation and directly said to the eldest son of the eighth house: "It seems that you only remember hating Zong Fang, and don't think you are guilty. If so, why not let the whole clan vote on it? Zong Fang has only one vote and cannot cover the sky with one hand. Your own family also has a vote, just to see if you can really get their forgiveness. Are the other clansmen really not blaming you?"

  As she saw the other side about to shout again, she called out to Zhao Yuan: "Brother Yuan, plug his mouth again, anyway he won't apologize." Zhao Yuan hastily complied, and the eldest son of the Eighth House was gagged again, his eyes wide with anger, but all he could make were "muffled" sounds, unable to say anything else. The crowd suddenly felt much quieter, and Master Rui also secretly let out a sigh of relief.

  The old man did not comment on this, but instead asked Zhao Xun: "How to vote for a public decision? One house one vote?"

  Zhao Xun thought for a moment: "It's still best to have one vote per household. In the future, if our clan wants to make another public decision, we can use this method again. If it's one vote per branch, maybe each branch will also have different opinions."

  The old man frowned again: "But in this way, if the public discussion of things in the future is related to a certain house, and this house has many children and grandchildren, and there are many people in the collateral branches, isn't it taking advantage of the situation? If you're worried that the opinions of various branches under one house are not unified, at most, let each branch vote once before voting."

  It's really worthy of being the most learned Eighth Elder in our clan, to have thought of this solution so promptly. Zhao Xiu hastily smiled and said: "Uncle-grandfather has thought it through thoroughly, but what if we encounter a situation like ours, where the two branches are divided into smaller houses with opposing opinions? Who should we listen to then?"

  The old man was reminded that there were many small households with two or more doors in the clan, and each household had its own contradictions, making it difficult to unify opinions. He could only say: "Let's just go with one vote per household then. Although it's not entirely fair, it's not bad either."

  He thought to himself: Although the inner three houses have fewer people, the outer nine houses are more numerous and have many descendants. If they vote by household, the inner house will be at a disadvantage. Once the outer house people unite to overthrow them, they may suffer losses. However, the outer nine houses have different backgrounds and thoughts, so it's not easy for them to unite. After today, he would discuss with Zhao Jue again and come up with a plan to stipulate that if two votes from the inner three houses oppose, the public decision cannot be passed. In this way, even if the outer nine houses want to rebel, they won't be able to do anything to the inner three houses.

  He thought to himself, and Zhao Xun added another sentence: "If any family has something they want to bring up for discussion in the clan, as long as they can get three households to support them, the ancestral hall will convene a meeting to discuss their proposal."

  It's also good this way. The old man nodded in agreement with the suggestion, thinking that building a family school would be easier and that he could use this method to find Zhao Yunxiao later without much trouble.

  It seems that things have been decided, the eight old men have spoken, and other family members did not expect such an important matter to be settled just by listening to Zhao Xiu's opinion as a little girl. How unreasonable is that? They expressed their own views on today's agenda, most of them were in favor of expelling him.

  The eldest son of the eighth house, although his mouth was blocked, did not forget to glare fiercely at everyone. Whoever said they wanted to expel him would be met with a fierce stare and a loud roar. The clan members were somewhat intimidated by him, and some began to worry: "If we vote to expel him from the clan today, what if he takes revenge on us later?" Some thought further ahead: "If in the future all matters are decided by public voting, who knows which family will be offended, and the two families will become sworn enemies. What can be done then?"

  Everyone looked at Zhao Xuan together, wanting to know if she could think of a solution in her little brain.