She pushed down all the doubts in her heart, and then heard Li Yue across from her say:
“What does it matter whether he is or isn’t? He’s my brother anyway.”
Li Yue was very open-minded about it. The Late Emperor had over a dozen sons and daughters, most of whom were not born of the same mother—so why should there be a requirement that they all had to be born of the same father? If he were the Late Emperor, he would absolutely have no face to make such an unreasonable demand.
In his heart, he knew that he had once heard such things from the mouths of the palace attendants. Since Meng Fu had lived in the palace for a long time, it was possible she would one day hear similar talk, so he figured there was no harm in saying these things to her now.
Seeing that Meng Fu didn’t speak, Li Yue continued: “If the Empress Dowager really is worried about that, then when you go back, just tell her—I don’t care.”
Meng Fu looked at Li Yue, who was already starting to shell peanuts. She finally understood—His Majesty really didn’t treat her like an outsider.
But she still felt that, being in Li Yue’s body, it was really too awkward to mention to the Empress Dowager whether the Ninth Prince was her biological son. Presumably, the Empress Dowager wouldn’t want to hear such things either.
Meng Fu suddenly felt a bit of a headache. For this emperor, these things might be easy to say, but she wasn’t him. For her to talk about such topics with the Empress Dowager was really pushing her too far.
Li Yue split the peanuts he had shelled and gave half to Meng Fu. He said to her:
“If you really don’t want to say it, that’s fine. I’ll talk to the Empress Dowager myself some other day.”
Meng Fu responded with an “mm,” but no one knew when the two of them would actually return to their own bodies.
The dishes they had ordered earlier were ready now. The waiter brought up the food and said “Please enjoy, honored guests,” then withdrew. But the cold-dressed pig’s trotters Li Yue had been thinking about—he only ate a few bites before putting down his chopsticks.
“Is it not to your taste?” Meng Fu asked him.
Li Yue rubbed his belly and sighed lightly. With deep regret, he said: “I’m full.”
He had eaten too many jujube pastries at Baima Temple earlier, so now—faced with a whole table of his favorite dishes—he could barely eat a few bites.
Meng Fu’s appetite was truly small. If this were his own body, those jujube pastries would’ve just whetted his appetite.
Seeing Li Yue’s melancholy expression, Meng Fu suggested: “Then later, have the restaurant make another portion—you can pack it to take back.”
Li Yue could only nod. And so, the dishes on the table went into Meng Fu’s belly. She couldn’t believe that one day she would actually be able to eat this much.
Li Yue, meanwhile, leaned against the windowsill, rubbing his stomach, staring idly at the street below where pedestrians came and went. Suddenly, among the passersby, he saw a familiar figure. He squinted his eyes and said to Meng Fu:
“Isn’t that Xie Wenzhao?”
Meng Fu put down her chopsticks and looked in the direction of Li Yue’s finger. She saw that Xie Wenzhao was standing in front of a small stall on the south side of the street that sold calligraphy and paintings. She nodded:
“That’s him.”
Li Yue gave a long, meaningful “oh,” then asked Meng Fu: “Then who’s that young lady beside him?”
Just now, he had clearly seen that Xie Wenzhao had come together with that young woman, only the girl was wearing a white veil hat, so Li Yue couldn’t see her face.
Meng Fu looked at the figure and back view of that woman and guessed that the one walking together with Xie Wenzhao at the moment should be her younger sister, Meng Yu. This wasn’t something easy to explain to Li Yue, so she only shook her head and said, “I don’t recognize her either.”
Li Yue tsk-ed and said: “He already has three concubines at home, and he still won’t behave?”
Meng Fu gave a little smile but didn’t reply. She could more or less guess what was in Xie Wenzhao’s mind, but there was no need to tell Li Yue—why dirty the ears of His Majesty?
Li Yue shook his head and said: “Just look at him—he brings women into his residence, then just leaves them there, doesn’t even sleep with them, and now he’s out hooking up again. Does he have some kind of illness?”
Meng Fu couldn’t help letting out a soft laugh. In the Xie household, she had always presented herself as virtuous and tolerant, never showing she minded Xie Wenzhao’s ridiculous conduct. But now, hearing someone scold Xie Wenzhao, she felt a certain joy in her heart.
In the next moment, Li Yue saw Xie Wenzhao turn around with that girl wearing the veil hat and head toward Yunxi Tower. Li Yue shifted position, the look on his face becoming even more playful.
At the same time, downstairs, before Xie Wenzhao had even stepped into Yunxi Tower’s main hall, he was preempted by another group. The one leading them was a well-known silken young master [纨绔 – slang for a rich, spoiled aristocrat], named Dong Feng, the youngest grandson of the Duke of Ying.
Back in earlier years, this young lord had been spoiled rotten by the women in his household, always hanging around the capital with a bunch of loafing friends, running wild and unchecked. Later, he made the Duke of Ying so angry that the old duke decided if he kept going like this, sooner or later the entire Dong family would be dragged down by him. The duke steeled his heart, ignored the women’s protests, and directly exiled Dong Feng and his gang to Beijiang, hoping they’d suffer a bit and gain some tempering.
When this young master first arrived in Beijiang, he still acted like a noble, bossing people around left and right. But his luck was bad—one day he blindly tried to order around Li Yue and got severely beaten. Even then, he didn’t behave, went home to complain, and got beaten up again by Li Yue when found out. After that, Dong Feng finally settled down and ended up becoming Li Yue’s follower/lackey.
He and his group of brothers fought several years of war in Beijiang under Li Yue’s command. After Li Yue ascended the throne, this group of former good-for-nothings all rose with the tide. Once they returned to the capital, they were immediately assigned official positions in court. But since the founding of Da Zhou, civil matters were valued and military ones suppressed, and coupled with their young age, even though they held positions, they were not taken seriously by other officials.
Worse, those officials were experts at passive-aggressive sarcasm, and Dong Feng’s group simply couldn’t endure it. Since the emperor didn’t really need them anyway, they just resigned their posts altogether and spent their days in the capital walking dogs, flying birds, living very free and easy lives.
But while they enjoyed their freedom, some people inevitably had to suffer. Want to go to the opera? The whole theater would be booked by them. Try to seek pleasure in a brothel? The courtesan would’ve been taken boating by them already. Even just going to a temple to light incense—they’d always snatch the first incense stick.
The young masters of many noble families in the capital gritted their teeth in hatred against them. Truly worthy of being the emperor’s subordinates—their tempers were as tyrannical as His Majesty’s.
Of course, His Majesty’s “tyranny”—how could it be called tyranny? That was overwhelming majesty!
Those noble family sons, fearing the group’s close relationship with the emperor, didn’t dare provoke them easily. Whenever they saw them, they’d avoid them as far as they could.
Fortunately, Dong Feng and his lot were still somewhat decent. They never bullied men or women, nor exploited the common people. At most, they just bullied those pretentious young lords who had mocked them in the past. If something got broken in the process, they’d also honestly pay compensation.
As soon as Dong Feng came over, he recognized Xie Wenzhao. This Marquis of Xuanping had been brilliant from a young age—talented, with an excellent memory, literary brilliance, and striking appearance. He was the object of affection for many young ladies in the capital.
What was even more infuriating was that, back when Dong Feng’s father scolded him, he always used Xie Wenzhao as the comparison—“Look at him, now look at you!” It was infuriating.
And every time they gathered, even though Xie Wenzhao’s status wasn’t higher than theirs, he always put on airs, acting as though he was above everything, looking at them like they were garbage.
With all that added up, there was no way Dong Feng would show Xie Wenzhao any kindness. Xie Wenzhao was shoved, stumbled a bit, and frowned—but didn’t speak.
Beside him, Meng Yu quickly held onto his arm and asked with concern: “Are you alright?”
“I’m fine,” Xie Wenzhao shook his head and said.
He was a refined person, naturally not about to lower himself to argue with these silken brats, lest he degrade his own status.
Dong Feng strode into the hall and shouted at the busy waiter: “Waiter, give us a private room!”
The waiter turned around and saw it was Dong Feng and the others. He thought to himself—damn, this is trouble. He had just assigned out the last private room. Quickly setting down the cleaning rag in his hand, he trotted over and said apologetically with a smile plastered on his face:
“Sirs, terribly sorry. That private room has already been given to another guest today.”
When Dong Feng heard this, his brows immediately shot up. He demanded: “Didn’t I tell you before to reserve that room for me?!”
The waiter bowed his head and quietly tried to explain: “You see, it’s just that Sirs haven’t come for a long time. I thought maybe you weren’t coming anymore…”
Back when business at Yunxi Tower had been slow, reserving a private room for them was no big deal. But now that business had picked up again and Dong Feng’s group hadn’t returned in a long while—nor left any silver to hold the room—the waiter naturally couldn’t turn down money from paying customers just for their sake.
Dong Feng sneered, “So it’s my fault, huh?”
The waiter quickly apologized: “No, no, no—it’s this lowly one’s fault, this lowly one’s fault.”
Before Dong Feng could speak again, one of the silken young masters behind him said: “Who is this lowly one?”
Everyone present: “……”
That joke wasn’t funny at all.
Dong Feng turned around and glared at that person, then turned back and said to the waiter: “Fine, I won’t make things hard for you. Give us another private room.”
“This…” the waiter replied awkwardly, “Replying to the lords, the private rooms upstairs really are all full.”
Dong Feng stared and said: “What, just because the tiger hasn’t shown its might for a while, you take me for a sick cat?” [a popular saying meaning “Don’t mistake my silence for weakness.”]
The shopkeeper, who had been calculating accounts at the back, saw that things were escalating and quickly came over. He raised his hand and gave the waiter a heavy smack on the head, scolding: “Useless thing—can’t even handle this properly. Hurry up and go ask the guests upstairs to give up the room for these lords.”
“B-b-b-but…” the waiter stammered for a while, unable to form a complete sentence.
“But what? Get going already!” the shopkeeper urged.
As the waiter hurried off, the shopkeeper called out again: “Tell the guests that today’s meal is on the house. And next time they come to eat at Yunxi Tower, they won’t have to pay either.”
Meng Fu and Li Yue had only noticed some commotion downstairs, not knowing exactly what had happened. After a short while, the waiter came upstairs. Since the room Meng Fu and Li Yue were in was exactly the one Dong Feng had wanted reserved, the waiter came straight to their door. He stopped outside, knocked, and explained his purpose: he hoped they could move downstairs to the main hall to eat.
In all his life, no one had ever dared ask Li Yue to give up a seat. Truly amusing.
He coldly spat out four words: “Tell them to scram.”
Outside the door, the waiter was so scared that his hands trembled. Hearing the tone of the guest inside, he realized this wasn’t someone to mess with. Just as he was about to go try asking other guests, Xie Wenzhao, who had just come upstairs, spoke:
“This guest, I’m willing to pay double the meal price—may I ask the two of you to move downstairs.”
Xie Wenzhao had brought Meng Yu with him. Naturally, he couldn’t let Meng Yu reveal her face in public. That earlier shove from Dong Feng, he hadn’t forgotten it either. Knowing that Dong Feng liked this particular private room, Xie Wenzhao of course wanted to provoke him a little.
At some point, Dong Feng had also come upstairs. Hearing what Xie Wenzhao said, he immediately raised his voice:
“I’ll pay three times the price!”
Xie Wenzhao countered: “Five times.”
Dong Feng: “Ten times!”
Inside the private room, Li Yue frowned and asked Meng Fu: “Are they all mentally ill?”
Meng Fu pressed her lips together, handed the veil hat to Li Yue, and said: “Possibly a little.”
Dong Feng was trained in martial arts and had excellent hearing. Li Yue hadn’t intended to lower his voice either, so their entire exchange was heard clearly by Dong Feng and his group. It had been years since anyone had dared insult them to their face.
Fuming, Dong Feng lifted his foot, about to kick the door open and storm in to see just what kind of woman dared to be so bold.
From inside the room, Li Yue said: “Roll on in, then.”