Painter Wu has been taking advantage of his job to accept bribes in recent days.
My pockets are full and I am very happy.
The greasy-looking man touched his sleeves, which were full of stuff.
He thought that he would collect more money in a few days and then find a beautiful palace maid with a poor background to report to his superiors.
He not only enriched his own pockets but also passed on his duties to his superiors. He thought he was really smart and did things thoroughly without leaving anything out.
Complacent and self-satisfied, he sat in the pavilion and imagined the luxurious life in the backyard of his mansion with his beautiful wife and concubines in his arms.
Money, lots of money for him to squander.
At this time, a palace maid with a beautiful face and graceful posture came running over in small steps.
She did not sit directly on the chair opposite Painter Wu. Instead, she slowly approached the man amid his greasy smile, as if she did not dislike his shifty and greasy look at all.
Painter Wu, who was in a sweet dream, looked up but did not have time to see the woman's appearance.
Then he saw the woman who came close to him holding a purse and her eyes fell on the purse. Painter Wu smiled and took the purse.
After weighing it over several times, he was very satisfied with the palace maid's behavior.
He looked up at the pretty little palace maid, a look of understanding flashed in his eyes, and then he pointed to the chair opposite him.
"You want me to draw you ugly, right? Sit there."
As he spoke, he raised his chin nonchalantly, motioning Ping'er to sit over there obediently.
The painter, who was used to stuffing the purse tightly into the sleeve, thought of making the little palace maid's cheeks thinner to make her look mean.
After all, it takes a lot of effort to draw something beautiful, so isn’t it easy to draw something ugly?
Unexpectedly, Ping'er did not sit over, and the little palace maid was still standing beside Painter Wu, as if she didn't notice his gesture.
Ping'er looked around alertly and, seeing that there was no one around, whispered a few words to the painter who was looking at her with a puzzled look.
The painter looked a little impatient at first, but later, after hearing what Ping'er said, his brows relaxed, and in the end he even nodded happily, as if he had found a good solution.
Painter Wu didn't expect that it would be such a coincidence. Just when he was worrying about where to find the unlucky guy, someone came along and provided the best candidate.
"That maid in the cold palace is weak and quite pretty. If the painter finds her portrait and gives it to the Empress, I'm sure she will be very pleased. She will definitely be promoted and given a higher rank in the future."
The painter was a little tempted by the provocation. He stroked the goat beard hanging from his chin, and a calculating look flashed in his shrewd eyes. He also weighed the matter in his mind.
Being weak means being easy to be bullied. You don't have to worry about having someone backing you up. You just feel like a sinner because you are ignorant and clueless.
Moreover, the northern barbarians are rude people who eat raw meat and drink blood. I heard that the women there are as rude as the men. I guess they have never eaten anything good.
To put it another way, even if the maids in the cold palace are not as beautiful as this woman said, as long as they have whiter skin and are gentler and more considerate.
Still, those barbarians who had never seen the world were treated as treasures as if they had found a fairy.
The more Painter Wu thought about it, the more excited he became. However, despite Ping'er's encouragement in his ears, he did not show much excitement on his face.
From that day on, Ping'er hated the adulterous couple for no reason.
Yan was not doing this because her lover had rejected her mercilessly, hurting her heart and embarrassing her.
Ping'er had never suffered such a great humiliation. She had been holding a grudge and wanted to wait for an opportunity to take revenge. After thinking it over again and again, she finally came up with a vicious method.
Don’t you, Mr. Yan, like her? I will let your sweetheart marry far away, and the lovers will be separated by thousands of miles and will never see each other in their lives.
Ping'er gritted her teeth. Seeing that she couldn't persuade the greedy painter, she rummaged through her sleeves and took out another gold hairpin.
Painter Wu's eyes lit up when he saw it. He suppressed his greed for money and watched the little palace maid carefully hand over the hairpin.
Without waiting for her to react, the greedy painter's expression of persistence lasted less than two breaths, and he instantly reached out and snatched it away.
Ignoring the shocked look of the little palace maid, he put the hairpin in his hand into his arms, and then spoke slowly.
"Ahem, ahem, I, Wu, always keep my word. Just go back and wait for good news from me!"
After hearing this, Ping'er, who didn't care about the pain and only wanted revenge, bowed slightly and slowly retreated.
Ping'er, who turned from love to hate, only imagined the painful expression on the man's face when he learned the news that his beloved woman was marrying far away.
An inexplicable sense of joy arose in her heart, and a vicious emotion always surrounded her heart.
She thought that as long as she took revenge, the hatred that lingered in her heart would probably disappear with the passage of time.
Early the next morning, the painter who was ordered to work in the palace had a clear goal this time. He carried boxes on his shoulders and went straight to the deserted cold palace.
With a goal in mind, he walked very quickly. Occasionally, when he met palace servants he knew, even the lowest-level eunuchs and palace maids, he would ignore them.
If it was a guard serving in the imperial court, he would stop and greet them politely.
The patrolling guards looked straight ahead and ignored him completely, and the man didn't get angry.
The good temper he showed in front of these superiors who were higher than him had no limits.
Staggering all the way to the cold palace, Painter Wu stood still and looked at the dilapidated gate. His shifty eyes raised a look of obvious disdain.
"This shabby place is deserted, so unlucky!"
He muttered to himself, his face not looking good, and kicked the door with an arrogant attitude.
"Open the door quickly, open the door quickly, is the person inside deaf? Come and open the door quickly."
The servants in the palace have always bullied those below them and feared those above them. Painter Wu is no different from others, and may even be more snobbish.
It was a nice and sunny spring day. Thinking that it was uncomfortable to stay cooped up in the house all the time, Yuer begged her sister to let her come out and sit in the sun.
The cold palace is very large and has many courtyards. They live in the northernmost corner. Normally, not only no one comes here, but even mice don't come here.
Most of them disliked the cold palace as being unlucky, and would be very secretive about it even if it was mentioned casually, so today was strange.
There was a loud stomping sound outside the door. Yu'er heard it, and Meng'er naturally heard it too. They looked at each other and felt that the person outside the door had bad intentions.
Meng'er hesitated for a moment and pushed her sick sister into the house. Then she ran to open the door under Yu'er's worried look.
The door creaked open, and the painter Wu with slicked-back hair and powdered face came face to face. Seeing that he looked unfamiliar, Meng'er stepped back slightly and kept a distance from him.
"Who are you?"
Painter Wu was the best at putting on airs when he was out in public. He looked at Meng'er, who had delicate features but only regular eyebrows and eyebrows, with disdain, and bowed to the sky in a pretentious manner.
"Who am I? I'm here on the orders of His Majesty to paint for you palace maids. Do you understand?"
Painter Wu was very familiar with this job of using chicken feathers as a token of authority. At least Meng'er, who had come out of the cold palace, saw this and hurriedly welcomed the person outside the door in.
Painter Wu walked ahead and asked in a swaggering manner.
"Are you the palace maid Yu'er?"
The cold palace was desolate, and Painter Wu, who was used to acting pretentiously, felt that it was unlucky.
Staying any longer would be a blasphemy to his identity. All he wanted to do was finish the painting quickly and leave.
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