Last night, when Xie Wenzhao realized he might not be able to escape from underneath Hua Xiaoling, his expression immediately changed—gentle as jade, his brows and eyes full of spring, and he spoke in a soft and tender voice. Hua Xiaoling was instantly dazed to the point she didn’t know which way was north.
Upon hearing this, Li Yue raised a hand to pinch the space between his brows and asked Hua Xiaoling, “Are you stupid?”
“But Marquis said he liked me~” Hua Xiaoling said shyly.
Li Yue nodded. Yeah—this really was a stupid one.
At that time, Hua Xiaoling had never seen Xie Wenzhao in such a state. She felt like she was about to get drunk and die in his pair of tender, affectionate eyes. Her whole person felt dizzy and dazed. When Xie Wenzhao asked to change position, she agreed. When Xie Wenzhao wanted a sip of water, she agreed. When Xie Wenzhao asked to change location, she also agreed.
The move that Li Yue had taught could only numb Xie Wenzhao temporarily; it couldn’t make him paralyzed for life. Relying on his excellent acting skills, Xie Wenzhao held out until his strength returned—and then dashed off like lightning.
This Xuanping Marquis was quite pitiful, too. Just think—he was such a refined and elegant young gentleman, and yet he had to flee half-dressed from his own concubine’s courtyard, nearly putting on a moonlit streaking performance. What bothered Xie Wenzhao even more was: he felt like every place Hua Xiaoling had touched on his body was dirty now. How could he still face Meng Yu? The more he thought about it, the sadder he felt. And because he was afraid the old madam would find out he had escaped from Linglong Pavilion, he didn’t dare return to his own courtyard. He could only sit all night in the pavilion behind the rock garden, facing the moon and letting the cold wind blow over him.
“The uglier a man is, the more he knows how to deceive people,” Li Yue shook his head and said to Hua Xiaoling. “You’re not very bright in the head. Take this as a lesson learned—it’s not too much of a loss.”
A man can be replaced, but a brain can’t. In this sense, Hua Xiaoling had actually come out ahead this time.
Hua Xiaoling pouted. She had come to ask furen for a solution, not to be scolded. Seeing that she was about to cry, Li Yue said coldly, “Go outside to cry.”
Hua Xiaoling sniffled and forced back her tears. At least this time furen didn’t tell her to get lost—clearly furen still had a place for her in her heart.
From now on, Xie Wenzhao would definitely be on guard against her. That trick probably wouldn’t work again. So what else could she do?
If only her two legs had moved a little faster last night, she wouldn’t have let Xie Wenzhao escape.
She took a deep breath, as though she had made some great decision, and said to Li Yue: “Furen, I will definitely follow you and learn martial arts properly in the future!”
If it takes a long time, then so be it. Sooner or later, she’s going to take down Xie Wenzhao!
Li Yue gave a soft “mm” in acknowledgment and said to Hua Xiaoling: “Then start by running twenty laps around Jixue Courtyard.”
Hua Xiaoling was a bit unwilling, but thinking of how she lost out last night because of her poor running, she obediently went out to start running.
Before long, Qingping came back from outside. She had heard that Xie Wenzhao had fallen ill this morning, had even burned all the poems he had written these past few days, and was staring blankly at the guqin on the shelf, not saying a word—he had made the old madam panic.
After hearing this, Li Yue let out a cold laugh and said only: “So dramatic.”
If he cared so much about that so-called beloved in his heart, then why go and provoke so many women? Taking in one concubine after another in the household—he made this mess, so let him suffer it properly.
It’s just that this marquis manor really isn’t a good place. Later, when he and Meng Fu switch back, will Meng Fu still have to live in this place for many years?
Li Yue’s mood, which had been decent, suddenly turned foul.
He stood up and looked in the direction of the imperial palace, but all he could see were towering walls—he couldn’t see anything beyond them.
—
Inside the palace, Meng Fu had just come down from the morning court. Today, she planned to go take a look at the Fengtian Study Hall.
Fengtian Study Hall was built at the southernmost end of the imperial capital. Many civil officials were gathered there to compile books. What they were working on was a grand classic that aimed to include all the books under heaven. This was an assignment given during the time of the previous emperor, but less than two months into the project, the previous emperor passed away. Later, when Li Yue ascended the throne, although it seemed like this emperor wasn’t interested in such affairs, he never ordered it to stop.
So they continued compiling—and compiled for several more years. The initial enthusiasm was mostly used up. The people who came to look at their results were always the same few. The things they said were also the same old lines. This job had no end in sight and no visible future. It felt like they would die of old age in this place. They had submitted many memorials to court, but the emperor truly had no interest in the book compilation, so this time, they didn’t even expect His Majesty to show up.
So many years had passed. All they wanted was to muddle through life, receive some salary, and support their families. Only a few younger men still had some drive, thinking that if they compiled this book well, they would be remembered in history.
But what a beautiful dream that was—there were hundreds of people compiling this book. Aside from the officials in charge of the project, whose names would even be recorded? Besides, no one knew when the book would ever be finished.
So muddle through, muddle through. Muddle along, and a lifetime would just pass like that.
They hadn’t expected that the memorial they submitted this time would actually get a reply—His Majesty was going to visit the Fengtian Study Hall!
What was this? This was “if you keep thinking about it, there will surely be an echo.”
However, most of the officials inside Fengtian Study Hall weren’t too optimistic about His Majesty’s personal visit. They didn’t feel that this meant the emperor had finally recognized their contributions—they feared His Majesty might be coming to dismantle the study hall and allocate it toward military expenses.
In that case, wouldn’t they all be forced into retirement and sent back to their hometowns?
Each of them had elderly above and children below—what were they supposed to do!
The officials were instantly anxious, and hurried to dig out whatever accomplishments they had made in this period, to prepare for the emperor’s questioning. But they had all been slacking off quite badly during this time, and hadn’t compiled many books at all. They could only drag out the works from the past few years.
Meng Fu had already reported this matter to the emperor yesterday, when she had the secret guards deliver the rabbit doll to him. In the letter, the emperor wrote that reading too many books made his head hurt, and told Meng Fu to handle it as she saw fit—she had full authority to manage anything within the Fengtian Study Hall.
Meng Fu knew—His Majesty was deliberately indulging her, probably hoping she would improve a little more.
When she arrived at Fengtian Study Hall and saw the mental state and mannerisms of the officials there, she could already guess that they had been living quite leisurely these past years. When she was young, she had the fortune to see all kinds of scholars who came to the manor to study. The ones who only wanted to rush through lessons so they could go home and play cards—these people looked exactly like that now.
Speaking of which, among these officials who were compiling the books, quite a few had been her father’s students.
“Speak. What have you compiled in the past two months?” Meng Fu sat at the main seat, and her gaze swept across their faces one by one.
Truthfully, they hadn’t done much work these two months. They had heard about this emperor’s temper—if they tried to deceive him, setting aside whether they lived or died, they’d definitely be carried home in a coffin.
Why did they just have to be so hands-y and insist on submitting a routine memorial to the emperor? Great, now they’d really brought the emperor down on them.
The official in charge of the book compilation quickly had people bring over the few volumes they’d worked on during the past two months. Meng Fu flipped through them roughly, one by one, and asked, “Just this much?”
This was compiling books, not writing new ones. With hundreds of people working for two months, they had only produced this much—it really couldn’t be justified.
That supervising official replied, “Reporting to the Emperor, it is truly because this scroll was more critical. Every article had to be carefully selected, every word and phrase deliberated, the classification thoughtfully considered, and the outlines meticulously written—so it took some time, and only this much was compiled.”
The official felt that this wasn’t exactly lying to the emperor—just a slight embellishment and exaggeration. His Majesty… probably wouldn’t see through it, right?
After all, they had heard that back in his youth, the emperor had studied for a few days with Meng Yanxing, and directly made the Grand Tutor to the Crown Prince so angry that his nose went crooked. After that, the tutor never cared about him again. Later on, when the emperor was sent to Beijiang by the late emperor, it was partly due to Meng-daren’s recommendation. As for the other princes’ teachers, before the emperor ascended the throne, they all used to shake their heads repeatedly whenever he was mentioned.
Seen from this perspective, the emperor probably hadn’t read much, and therefore probably wouldn’t understand any of this, right?
Meng Fu reopened the book and asked softly, “Deliberated the wording? Considered the classification? Wrote the outline?”
Her voice was very calm, with no discernible emotion. The official thought—he often heard people say the emperor, when angry, would curse out loud. Since His Majesty was speaking this way now, perhaps… he really believed what the official had said?
Sure enough, the emperor hasn’t read much.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” the official said.
Taking advantage of the moment when Meng Fu had lowered her head to look at the book, he quietly raised his hand to wipe the cold sweat from his forehead.
In truth, the books weren’t badly compiled—they were passable. Among these officials were some of Meng Yanxing’s prized students. Meng Fu knew well what kind of level they had. If this manuscript were handed to Meng Yanxing to look at, he’d probably break all of their legs.
She stretched out a hand and tapped the cover of the book, asking:
“Come then—where is the deliberation? And where is the classification? Say it all out loud so I can hear.”