Old Gu Residence is the Gu family’s senior ancestral house and one of the most important domestic stages in Shen Tang’s early life after transmigrating into the novel. Although Shen Tang initially understands her marriage to Gu Huaian as a practical contract—one requiring occasional family dinners and the appearance of affection in exchange for substantial financial support—the residence turns that apparently simple arrangement into a public social role. Inside its halls, the couple must be seen not merely as signatories to a marriage agreement but as husband and wife under the eyes of an influential family.

Arrival and Setting

Old Gu Residence is located in Heishan, a detail Shen Tang does not know when Gu Huaian summons her there. After receiving an unexplained message telling her to come to Heishan at night, she assumes it is a scam, blocks the number, and deletes it. She is therefore caught off guard when Gu Huaian arrives in a tailored designer suit and reveals that he sent the message. He gives her only thirty minutes to prepare before taking her to the old residence, turning the journey into an abrupt transition from private domestic life to formal family obligations.

The house immediately appears more luxurious than Shen Tang expects. When she and Gu Huaian enter the hall, dozens of eyes turn toward them at once, making the architecture function as an arena of observation rather than a neutral home. The residence gathers the family into a single visual field: Shen Tang’s nervousness is intensified by the number of people watching, while Gu Huaian’s presence and clothing help establish the couple’s public image before any formal explanation is offered.

Family Authority and Public Performance

At the head of the hall sits an old man who angrily strikes the floor with his cane and rebukes Gu Huaian for finally returning. The gesture places seniority and authority at the center of the house. Gu Huaian answers by addressing his parents, while Shen Tang sits beside him, entering a family structure whose rules and emotional history predate her arrival. The residence thus gives physical form to the pressure behind the marriage agreement: the couple’s arrangement may have been negotiated privately, but its consequences are administered in a collective and hierarchical space.

Gu Huaian loops Shen Tang’s arm through his and walks in with her, creating the image of a handsome married couple even as both the setting and the watching relatives make the performance difficult for her. The action is small but decisive. It converts contractual obligation into visible bodily solidarity, and it allows Shen Tang to occupy the house not as an outsider arriving alone but as Gu Huaian’s chosen companion. The residence repeatedly tests this distinction between inner uncertainty and outward unity.

Old Madam Gu and Old Master Gu’s attitude toward Shen Tang also determines how other relatives respond to her. Their acceptance is not merely personal kindness; it acts as a social signal throughout the household. Because Old Madam Gu treats Shen Tang with unusual intimacy and introduces her to several important elders, other family members take note of her position. The house therefore operates through an informal chain of recognition: senior approval travels downward, making Shen Tang’s status more secure among people who might otherwise have regarded her with suspicion.

Departure and Continuing Connections

Shen Tang and Gu Huaian leave Old Gu Residence early the next morning after spending only one night there. The brief stay suggests that the visit is a concentrated family appearance rather than a permanent relocation, but it has lasting consequences. The house has made the marriage visible to the Gu family, and Old Madam Gu has reinforced that visibility by arranging piles of large and small gifts for Shen Tang before her departure. Shen Tang feels somewhat embarrassed by the generosity, which contrasts the residence’s formidable wealth with her own initially transactional understanding of the arrangement.

The visit also becomes part of Gu Huaian’s uncertainty about Shen Tang. After only one night at the old residence, he is left wondering whether he truly transmigrated and whether the events of his past life were real, since the person before him seems to have changed so dramatically. The ancestral house consequently becomes a point where past and present versions of identity are measured against each other. Its family rituals do not simply confirm continuity; they expose the instability of memory, personality, and fate.

Domestic Space and Narrative Significance

Old Gu Residence embodies the difference between a marriage’s written terms and its lived social meaning. The marriage agreement promises Shen Tang money, paid living expenses, limited duties, and a settlement of two hundred million when the two-year term ends. Yet the residence imposes another kind of obligation: the couple must sustain an appearance before relatives whose judgment affects their place in the family. The house transforms a financial contract into a ritual of belonging, with entrances, introductions, gestures, gifts, and senior relatives serving as its visible mechanisms.

Its significance extends beyond the first visit. Later formal gatherings continue to reproduce the same spatial logic. At a more prestigious banquet, Shen Tang again enters arm in arm with Gu Huaian, and he introduces her publicly as his wife. The repeated image links the old residence to broader family and social spaces: wherever the couple is observed, their relationship must be staged before an audience. In this pattern, Old Gu Residence is the original domestic theater of their union, the place where Shen Tang first learns that the contract cannot remain private once the Gu family has accepted her as part of its visible order.