183, Night Visit to the Imperial College
183, Night Visit to the Imperial College
What Lu Mingfei didn't expect was that his first visit to the Imperial College would be late at night.
At this time, Zhao Lang brought him to the attic of the Imperial College's library. Looking down from the attic window, he could see half of the Imperial College.
But it was the middle of the night and there was nothing to see here, so he looked away after taking a few glances and turned to look at the man who was leaning against the window frame, drinking a small bottle of wine from somewhere.
"Do you often come here alone?" he asked the man.
"Would you like a sip?" Zhao Lang asked, handing over the bottle of wine.
Lu Mingfei hesitated for a moment, but still took the small bottle of wine handed to him by Zhao Lang. He leaned in to smell it and found that the smell was not too strong. After confirming that it was not strong liquor, he tilted his head back and poured a little wine into his mouth.
The wine is refreshing and has a light floral scent.
"Is it delicious?" Zhao Lang and Lu Mingfei have known each other for so many years, but this is the first time he has seen Lu Mingfei drink. He knew that this must be Lu Mingfei's first time drinking.
"Hmm, not bad. What kind of wine is this? It smells like flowers." Lu Mingfei said as he returned the bottle to Zhao Lang. In fact, he had drunk alcohol in his previous life, but it was beer, which was completely different from white wine.
He smacked his lips and thought the liquor tasted quite good.
"This is osmanthus wine." Zhao Lang raised his head and took a sip of the wine. He looked into the distance before answering Lu Mingfei's previous question: "It's quiet here. I sometimes come up here to sit for a while."
Hearing this, Lu Mingfei nodded with some understanding and said, "It's quite nice to read here." He knew that Zhao Lang didn't necessarily come here to read, but he might come here alone when he was in a bad mood.
"Next time you want to come up and sit here, take me with you. But I may have classes during the day and don't have time to come to your place. We can come here at night when there are not many people around to enjoy the breeze, appreciate the moon, and chat. What do you think?" Lu Mingfei turned his head to look at Zhao Lang and met Zhao Lang's gaze.
The two men looked at each other, and his gaze fell on Zhao Lang's face. He found that since some time, the young master he knew had shed his childish appearance and grown into the tall and handsome young man in front of him.
Time becomes concrete in a person. The time it takes for a person to grow from childhood to adolescence is not a short one.
For nearly ten years, Zhao Lang has been living alone in Kyoto Prefecture. His parents and family live in Beijun, far away from Kyoto Prefecture.
Lu Mingfei knew that as Zhao Lang grew older, he would understand more and more things and have more ideas of his own. He would definitely become less and less satisfied with being controlled in Kyoto Prefecture.
Other children of officials could still become officials in the court through the protection of their ancestors or by taking the imperial examinations, but Zhao Lang and his group of hostages who came to Kyoto Prefecture could forget about it.
As long as the imperial court refused to release them, they would be nothing more than useless idlers in Kyoto. Because only useless idlers could pose no threat to the imperial court and the country. If one of these hostages emerged as a talented young man, becoming a threat to the imperial court and the emperor, their death would likely be imminent.
These are principles that an ordinary person like him understands, and young masters like Zhao Lang who grew up in wealthy families must understand them even better.
Therefore, if one's ideals cannot be realized and one is monitored by the court people all day long, anyone would feel depressed, let alone someone with a personality like Zhao Lang.
Zhao Lang took a steady look at the young man in front of him and replied with one word: "Okay."
After thinking about it, Lu Mingfei reminded Zhao Lang: "You are still young, don't develop a drinking habit. We have a long life ahead of us, and everything will be fine." He had said this to Zhao Lang more than once, and he hoped Zhao Lang would listen to him. Don't develop the bad habit of drinking to relieve boredom just because you are in a bad mood.
Zhao Lang put the cork back into the bottle cap and gave the bottle to Lu Mingfei.
Lu Mingfei took the bottle of wine and couldn't help but smile. He said to Zhao Lang, "Let's study together in the future. We are still young, so it's definitely a good idea to read more."
"Yeah." Zhao Lang knew that what Lu Mingfei said was right.
The two of them didn't stay in the attic for too long that night. Lu Mingfei had to get up early to go to class the next day, so he asked Zhao Lang to take him home.
After Zhao Lang left, Lu Mingfei lay alone on the small bed in the dormitory, thinking about something in his mind, and finally couldn't help but sigh.
Let’s put these unsolvable issues aside for now and go to sleep first.
***
Maybe because he was living in a strange place, he woke up very early the next day. After waking up, he couldn't fall asleep, so he got out of bed.
Unexpectedly, as soon as he opened the door, the door of Ye Zhuoran's next door also rang.
The person living next door to him is Ye Zhuoran, and the person living next door to Ye Zhuoran is Zhang Lingxuan.
The other person who got up early like him was Zhang Lingxuan. The doors of the other two rooms were closed and there was no movement inside. It seemed that the people inside were still sleeping.
After the two of them came out of the yard, Lu Mingfei lowered his voice and greeted Zhang Lingxuan: "Good morning, how come you woke up so early?"
"I'm not used to sleeping on the bed in the house." Zhang Lingxuan said.
"How about asking your housekeeper to move your bed over here?" Lu Mingfei gave Zhang Lingxuan a bad idea with a smile on his face.
"No need. I'll get used to it after a while." Zhang Lingxuan could see that Lu Mingfei was making fun of him.
The two of them got up early. It was still dark outside and everything was quiet. It seemed that everyone around them was still sleeping and there was no sound outside.
Fortunately, there was a well in the courtyard where they lived, so it was not difficult for them to wash up in the morning. The two of them drew water from the well in the courtyard to brush their teeth and wash their faces.
After washing up, Lu Mingfei discussed with Zhang Lingxuan, "There's rice, flour, and eggs in the kitchen. I'll make some egg dumpling soup for us to have for breakfast." The canteen was quite far from where they lived. They didn't know if it was open this early in the morning, so it would be quicker to just cook something here. After all, they already had a kitchen.
"Is it troublesome? How about I go out and buy some food?" Zhang Lingxuan asked.
"It should be faster than us going out to buy breakfast." Lu Mingfei said and walked into the kitchen.
That day he had someone put a cabinet in the kitchen to store things. The cabinet contained eggs, flour, sausages and bacon he brought from home, and some miscellaneous items.
Afraid that mice would come in and steal food, he closed the cabinet door but did not lock it.
There is also a rice jar next to it, which is filled with a large jar of rice.
Lu Mingfei placed the lantern on the table, took a look, rolled up his sleeves, opened the cabinet, found a large bowl and put eight eggs in it. As he was about to put flour in the bowl, he noticed Zhang Lingxuan standing there with nothing to do, so he asked, "Can you get me a bucket of water?"
Zhang Lingxuan took the wooden bucket handed to him by Lu Mingfei and went out to fetch water.
Lu Mingfei also had two small stoves built in the kitchen and a chimney for exhaust smoke.
As long as they didn't cook anything with a strong smell, it wouldn't affect the people around them. Since it was still early, they could light a fire and cook. No one should see smoke coming out of the chimney.
They have already bribed the dormitory manager. As long as they don't make too much noise, no one will report it to the dormitory manager.
On their second day living here, they wondered if anyone would cook here. ... Maybe not? Even if they did, it wouldn't be many. After all, these days, it was said that a gentleman should stay away from the kitchen. Most men wouldn't cook in the kitchen, let alone study at the Imperial Academy.
Maybe people like him are the odd ones out among scholars, Lu Mingfei thought to himself while kneading the dough.
After the water in the pot boiled, he pinched a ball of dough and threw it in to cook.
After Zhang Lingxuan came back from fetching water, he had nothing to do, so he stood aside and watched Lu Mingfei cook.
"You seem to be able to do anything."
"Haha, you can learn it. No one is born knowing everything. If you want to learn, I can teach you." Lu Mingfei said with a smile.
What he didn't expect was that Zhang Lingxuan actually nodded.
Seeing that Zhang Lingxuan was willing to learn, Lu Mingfei was not reluctant to teach Zhang Lingxuan his half-baked cooking skills.
Zhang Lingxuan, who was learning to cook from Lu Mingfei at the time, would never have dreamed that the cooking skills he learned would come in handy a few years later.
By the time Ye Zhuoran and Fu Boming got up, their breakfast was already ready.
Lu Mingfei had forgotten to ask for a table, so that morning the four of them each ate standing in the courtyard, each holding a large bowl. He was thinking of asking someone to bring in a table later so they wouldn't have to eat standing up.
This bowl of dumpling soup contains a lot of ingredients, including dumplings, eggs, diced bacon and sauerkraut. The soup is flavored with pepper and salt.
"Mingfei, you're such a great cook." Ye Zhuoran drank the soup in his bowl. While feeling touched that his friend got up so early to make breakfast for them, he also felt that it was too much trouble for his friend, so he said, "It's just that it's too much trouble for you to cook. Next time I go home, I'll bring some more snacks from home so that you don't have to get up so early in the morning to make breakfast for us."
"Well, that's true. Next time we go out, let's bring back some more dry food as food." Fu Boming also agreed with this.
"It's okay for me to cook once in a while." Lu Mingfei said with a smile.
After the four of them had breakfast, they went out to class together.
But this Imperial Academy was not like the small private school they had attended before, with only two classrooms and two teachers. This place was very large, with many rooms and many teachers.
Moreover, there is no strict teaching system and grade system here.
This means that the teaching here at the Imperial Academy is completely free. There are teachers giving lectures every day. Students can just go into the classroom of whichever teacher they want to attend and sit down to listen.
Lu Mingfei actually quite likes this teaching method. This free way of choosing courses feels more interesting than when he was in college before.
So the four of them discussed it and decided to follow the direction where the crowds were. The place everyone was going to must be right, right? Author's words: Thank you Bole 9492239 (9492239) for your support, mua! To know more exciting content, please leave me a message on Liancheng Reading.
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