Murong Lian/History

## Murong Lian

* Novel (ENG)
* Novel Chibi (CN)

## History

### Early Childhood

Murong Lian was born to the late Wangshu-jun Murong Xuan and Zhao Susu. Due to the death of his father, his mother went to labor early and he was born prematurely at seven months. He grew up under his mother's strict parenting, and over the years, began to act almost like her. Despite his young age, he would be covered in expensive accessories and clothing from head to toe.

Eventually, a slave named Gu Mang would appear in Wangshu Manor. Murong Lian hated him, as he thought he was *"very stupid and always going against his wishes"* and looked *"shady and rat-like."* One day, he came across Gu Mang, who had fallen asleep on his swing set. He instantly pushed Gu Mang off, berating him for having the nerve to touch his belongings because he was a "dirty slave," and then called for his attendants to tear down the swing set and use it as firewood.

When Gu Mang sat up and Murong Lian took notice of his bleeding forehead, he froze and became frightened when Gu Mang proceeded to burst into tears. He shakily told him that he deserved it, but seeing more blood come out of his forehead, Murong Lian ran away. Feeling slightly bad for injuring Gu Mang, he would later go to the House of Delicacies to buy sweets, and then decide whether he was going to apologize by giving Gu Mang the desserts. Though embarrassed, he had to pay with his own money as he did not want to put it on his mother's account, and was not given a lot pf money for his allowance. When he arrived back at Wangshu Manor, he asked his closest attendant about Gu Mang's status and whereabouts, and discovered that he was well and should be resting in Auntie Lin's house.

Murong Lian dismissed the attendant, and then flipped a coin to determine whether or not he was going to apologize and give Gu Mang the desserts; heads for yes, and tails for eating the entire box of desserts himself. The coin landed on heads, and so he reluctantly walked to Auntie Lin's house to find Gu Mang. However, before he could knock on the door, he heard his mother's voice coming from the other side, rebuking Auntie Lin for not taking care of Gu Mang properly. As he eavesdropped, Murong Lian was stunned when he heard his mother say that if nothing else, Gu Mang was also a child of the Wangshu line. Afterwards, his mother stormed out of the house with a sleeping Gu Mang in her arms.

Murong Lian's sudden appearance startled Madam Zhao, who questioned him why he was there but forbade him from responding before slamming the door. Gu Mang remained in her left hand as she dragged Murong Lian to her room with her right after getting into another small fight with Auntie Lin. As soon as she entered, she dismissed the servants, threw Gu Mang onto the bed, and demanded to know how much Murong Lian had heard.

Murong Lian started to tear up and asked if he was not her real son and if he was adopted. He burst into tears. Annoyed, Madam Zhao slammed her hand onto the table and said that *"someone as divinely beautiful as her could not give birth to such an ugly, stinky brat."* She proceeded to tell him that although Gu Mang wasn't her son, he was still a child of the Murong Family. She beckoned him to come closer and admitted that he would've found out about this secret sooner or later. After making him promise to keep this secret buried deep inside his heart, she left a sigil on his palm. Murong Lian cried out in pain, and Madam Zhao told him that it was only the pain of the sigil. With the sigil down, Murong Lian would not be able to speak of any of the secrets that he heard of that day until he became the master of Wangshu Manor. According to her, if he were to say something wrong, agony much worse than his current pain would make sure to keep his mouth shut.

Madam Zhao revealed that her relationship with Murong Xuan was not as good as Murong Lian had thought. Murong Xuan was not in love with Madam Zhao; instead, he had already given his heart to a maiden surnamed Chu who hailed from Lin'an. It was just that Miss Chu was a commoner, and so Murong Xuan wasn't able to marry her and had to marry Madam Zhao, a woman who was a match for his status, instead.

Despite this, Madam Zhao hoped for him to become someone like his father. She dismissed Murong Lian's interests and natural talents and insisted on a certain path for him: to become someone exactly identical to Murong Xuan. Murong Lian loved illusion techniques and would often sit in Wangshu Manor's courtyards, filling the scenery with colorful butterflies and swaying flower petals. However, Madam Zhao didn't allow this, thinking illusion techniques were useless. She would frequently compare him to his father, who was good at musical cultivation and techniques. She also compared him to Fuling-jun's son, the young Mo-gongzi Mo Xi, who was as competent as his father.

He would buy illusion technique scrolls against his mother's wishes, and she would threaten to rip them apart. After being beaten and cursed at over and over again, eventually, the butterflies and flowers that Murong Lian would make disappeared without a trace from Wangshu Manor. Madam Zhao constantly told him to learn well from his father's example and not bring shame to Wangshu Manor, continuing to mold him into a perfect copy of Murong Xuan. He received a vicious scolding from his mother whenever he failed to meet her expectations in any aspect, and once, Murong Lian even exclaimed:

This earned him his mother's vicious fury, and it was the first time that Murong Lian was ever beaten so badly. Eventually, he went from resisting his mother's wishes to silently enduring what was being put on his shoulders. The treatment that Murong Lian received in his childhood made him extremely vile and hateful, and he resorted to using dirty and deceitful tricks against his opponents. He continued to bully and humiliate Gu Mang, such as when he stained his face with oil paint and forced him to stand motionlessly while holding a bowl filled with water over his head for a full shichen. If even a drop of water were to spill from the bowl, Gu Mang, along with the rest of the slaves in Wangshu Manor, would be denied their dinner for the night. After seeing that Gu Mang had actually stood still for a full shichen, he still took away his meal for no reason, even if the other slaves were given theirs.

Every success that Gu Mang achieved and every improvement he made was also a threat to Murong Lian's position. His mother would remind him that the two of them are successors to the bloodline, and if Murong Lian didn't work hard enough, Wangshu Manor would sooner or later be Gu Mang's. Murong Lian was reminded over and over again that he couldn't lose to a "commoner brat" and to treat Gu Mang like a sword over his neck to make sure that Gu Mang wouldn't be able to steal his rank in case there came a day where Gu Mang learned about his lineage. This made him feel inferior to Gu Mang in many aspects. A bit after his mother's death, he stumbled into Gu Mang trying on Murong Xuan's Hero's Ribbon. Enraged and yet panicked, he snatched the ribbon off of Gu Mang's forehead, yelling at him and telling him that the ribbon was something that belonged to his family, questioning him if he was even worthy of having it.

Years later, when he entered the Cultivation Academy, he chose Gu Mang and Lu Zhanxing to become his study attendants as well, and they were brought to the academy with him.

## References

2. ↑ Mainland Chinese Edition, Exclusive Extra Part 1: Chosen Excerpt From Murong Lian's Childhood Diary
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Novel, Chapter 133: Fourteen Years of First Love
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Novel, Chapter 156: Murong Lian's Memories (Part 2)
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Novel, Chapter 134: Murong Lian's Childhood
6. ↑ Novel, Chapter 120: This Oath in Life and Death
7. ↑ Novel, Chapter 157: The Hero's Ribbon He Could Never Wear
8. ↑ Novel, Chapter 11: Slave Collar