The Origin of Rong Jinzhen

This thread follows the violent and complicated family circumstances that determine Rong Jinzhen’s birth, rejection, and eventual adoption into the Rong household.

increasingBearing stren­gth in each eventdecreasing

A Genius’s Fatal Labor

A Genius’s Fatal Labor A dangerous childbirth Rong Youying endures an exceptionally prolonged labor while relatives and doctors wait in dread. Old Lillie insists that the child will be born, though medical prospects are grim. Mother’s death An emergency Caesarean saves the baby but not the mother. The family remembers her death as a cruel reversal of her achievements and a defining wound in its history.

The Killer’s Legacy

The Killer’s Legacy A violent inheritance Rong Youying’s son, known as Killer, grows into a criminal whose gambling, violence, and exploitation drain the Lin family’s fortune. His conduct stands in bitter contrast to his mother’s brilliance. A child left behind After Killer is murdered, a pregnant woman arrives claiming to carry his child. The family rejects her, but her pregnancy continues and the child’s future remains unsettled.

A Shelter Won by a Story

A Shelter Won by a Story An appeal to compassion Young Lillie brings the pregnant woman to Mrs Rong, knowing the claim of her connection to Killer will likely invite rejection. He recasts her pregnancy as a miraculous conception after a pilgrimage to Putuo Mountain. Admission without certainty Mrs Rong spends a sleepless night weighing belief against duty, then allows the woman to stay. The invented account opens a temporary refuge, though it cannot erase the complicated circumstances behind the child’s birth.

Jinzhen’s Birth and Rejection

Jinzhen’s Birth and Rejection A second maternal death The woman gives birth to a boy and dies from hemorrhage. His resemblance to Killer reveals the deception that had secured her shelter and gives the family a reason to resent the child. A name that excludes People call him the Grim Reaper and then Duckling, while the household largely refuses to acknowledge him as kin. His survival depends on a faint resemblance to his grandmother and the intervention of Mr Auslander.

A Name and a Family

A Name and a Family From Duckling to Jinzhen After Mr Auslander dies, Young Lillie takes the boy from the Pear Garden, chooses the name Jinzhen, and places him in school. The change marks a passage from hidden childhood to a visible life in the city. Belonging by choice Rong Yinyi and Mrs Lillie later accept him into the family after the death of another child. Jinzhen becomes a son and brother through care, even though his biological origins remain painful and obscure.

1914, before Rong Jinzhen’s birth

the decade before 1914

around 1932, during the mysterious woman’s pregnancy

around 1932, in Tongzhen

1944 to the late 1940s