She bowed three times and said, “Father, Mother, I am unworthy. I failed to live up to your expectations and let you down in life.”
“Yet what did I do wrong? Just showing my face has cost me my life!”
“In my next life, I’d rather be born an animal than live in this cursed dynasty.”
Then she drank the poison in one gulp. Soon after, she was writhing in pain and bleeding before she died.
After her death, I arranged for two people to handle her body. I was surprised to see that most of the women present had sympathetic looks, with very few showing indifference.
It seemed that the posters had made an impact. In the past, people would cheer and clap for the deaths of those on the platform, but this time, the applause was barely audible.
When I returned to Awakening Manor, Janet told me excitedly, “Emily, did you see? During my death on the platform, nearly seventy percent of the onlookers were women.”
I was surprised. “I’ve seen that in the past, when women committed suicide, the crowd was mostly men, with only a few women. This is a positive change!”
It was indeed a good sign! It showed that even these women were deeply unhappy with the current laws and yearned for freedom.
Janet, the rest of Awakening Manor, and I were all moved to tears. I hugged Janet and said, “You did an amazing job today.”
Using death to jolt people into action—that was Viola’s mother’s idea. Janet had agreed without hesitation, preparing meticulously for her role as the “deceased.”
The poison was fake, and the death was staged. Even the people handling the body were two strong women from Awakening Manor in disguise.
The eighth day came.
Viola’s family was running a fabric shop, a cosmetics store, and a bunch of other businesses. Anyone who shouted “Liberate Women!” inside would get a box of cosmetics or a roll of fabric as a reward.
At first, nobody dared to go in, but the folks from Awakening Manor took the plunge. Once they got their items, the crowd outside surged forward, filling the streets with cries of “Liberate Women!”
The chaos naturally caught the local government’s eye. Adam, who had organized the whole event, was quickly arrested.
We came up with this idea, but Adam took the fall for it. The dark circles under his eyes drove us all to act. “Kids, it’s up to you now. I can only stay with you this far,” he said.