Chapter 260 A Brilliant Plan (First Update)
"This servant greets Princess Ning." Eunuch Huang bowed and paid his respects.
The young palace maid also hurriedly knelt down and kowtowed: "This servant greets Princess Ning."
Xiao Liulang bowed to Princess Ning with a composed demeanor and an open expression.
Xiao Liulang was dressed in the robes of a top scholar, making him easily identifiable. However, Princess Ning had never met the young Marquis Zhaodu, and recently, Consort Zhuang had kept quiet about the outside world so that she could focus on her pregnancy. Therefore, she was unaware of the rumors circulating about this newly appointed top scholar.
Princess Ning nodded politely. After all, he was an outsider, and she didn't want to have too much contact with him. Her gaze fell back on the little palace maid kneeling on the ground: "I remember you are a palace maid by the side of the Sixth Prince of Chen. Has something happened to your prince?"
The young palace maid sobbed, "Reporting to Princess Ning, the Sixth Prince is ill, and no imperial physician has come to treat him. This servant is worried that if this continues, the Sixth Prince will become seriously ill..."
Princess Ning gently touched her belly, a complex emotion flashing in her eyes, and said, "You should go back first. I will inform my mother about this matter."
It's fine if you don't encounter this kind of thing, but if you do, it's not right to ignore it. Besides, you can also consider it as doing good deeds for the child in your womb.
"Yes! Yes! Thank you, Princess Ning!" The little palace maid kowtowed several times, expressed her gratitude, and then got up and went back.
Princess Ning also left the Imperial Garden accompanied by palace maids.
"Respectfully seeing off Princess Ning." Eunuch Huang bowed, and only after Princess Ning disappeared at the end of the path did he straighten up, smile at Xiao Liulang, and say, "Scholar Xiao, this way please."
Xiao Liulang nodded and continued towards the East Palace with Eunuch Huang.
Xiao Liulang noticed that when passing by the tall banyan tree, Eunuch Huang glanced at the tree intentionally or unintentionally, as if searching for something, but there was nothing on the tree.
Xiao Liulang withdrew his gaze. For some reason, he had a strange feeling that he had escaped a calamity.
After Princess Ning returned to the palace, she reported to Consort Zhuang about her encounter with the young palace maid from Chen. Consort Zhuang deeply resented the hostages from Chen because members of her Zhuang family had been hostages in Chen and suffered greatly there. She wished that the hostages from Chen would also experience the suffering that Prince An had endured.
However, she only thought about it in her mind; she wasn't that foolish to actually do it.
Consort Zhuang went to the Imperial Study and told the Emperor about the serious illness of the hostage prince of Chen. The Emperor then instructed Eunuch Wei to arrange for an imperial physician to go there.
The Liu family residence.
Under the bright sunshine, Liu Yisheng sat on a small stool in the front yard twisting hemp rope, while Anu and the old woman wove baskets beside her. This was the family's main source of income; a basket could be sold for ten copper coins, and a hemp rope for one copper coin.
If they were lucky, they could weave four baskets and twist ten hemp ropes a day, which would earn them fifty copper coins. However, because Liu Yisheng was often bullied, he couldn't guarantee that he could work every day.
Two people were sitting opposite Liu Yisheng: Gu Jiao, who was petting a white cat, and a young man in a blue robe.
The man's eyebrows and eyes bore a slight resemblance to Liu Yisheng's, though it was not immediately obvious.
The man was handsome, though less refined than Liu Yisheng, he was still a refined and dashing man.
His luxurious clothes clashed with the dilapidated courtyard, and he seemed completely out of place with the down-on-his-luck Liu Yisheng.
Yet this very person sat in a rattan chair, leisurely chatting with Liu Yisheng while playing with a fan in his hand.
"You finally contacted me," he said with a smile.
Liu Yisheng was sweating profusely as she twisted the hemp rope, and it was unclear whether she was too busy to pay attention to him or simply too lazy to bother with him.
The young man wasn't angry. He opened his folding fan, fanned himself elegantly, then snapped it shut. He looked at Gu Jiao and asked, "Who is she?"
"Doctor," Liu Yisheng finally spoke, his eyes fixed on the hemp rope in his hand. He didn't look at the person he was talking to, but he could tell that he was asking about Gu Jiao.
The young man tapped his palm with his folding fan and said meaningfully, "These days, are there still doctors willing to talk to you? You must be more than just an ordinary doctor."
Between the lines, it is clear that he is fully aware of Liu Yisheng's situation.
Gu Jiao was happily petting the cat when she heard this. She turned her head and glanced at the young man indifferently: "Of course I'm not an ordinary doctor, I'm a miracle doctor."
Young man: "..."
Do all the women of your Zhao Kingdom love to embellish their own reputations like this?
"Do you know who he is?" the young man asked Gu Jiao this time.
"Liu Yisheng." Gu Jiao continued petting the cat.
The young man smiled and pointed at Liu Yisheng with his folding fan: "He is my cousin."
"Hmm?" Gu Jiao blinked.
This young man was none other than the sixth prince of the Chen Kingdom, who had just feigned illness in the palace.
Gu Jiao originally planned to sneak into the palace on her own, but Liu Yisheng said that she couldn't get in, but her messages could be sent in.
Not long after, the man who claimed to be the sixth prince of Chen Kingdom came to find Liu Yisheng with the white cat he had caught.
Gu Jiao looked at Liu Yisheng: "A Chen State person?"
Hmm, is it really okay to tell her something so important?
Gu Jiao's reaction was calmer than the Sixth Prince had imagined, but considering that she wasn't too surprised when he revealed his identity, the Sixth Prince felt relieved.
She's just a calm and collected young girl.
Gu Jiao continued petting the cat.
"Aren't you leaving yet?" Liu Yisheng said to the Sixth Prince.
The Sixth Prince smiled and said, "It's rare for you to contact me, how can I not come over and stay a while? I almost thought you would never contact me again in your life."
As he spoke, he turned to look at Gu Jiao, making no attempt to conceal his relationship with Liu Yisheng, "I came to Zhao Kingdom as a hostage so that he could persuade me to come back with me. He won't listen to me, so why don't you help me persuade him?"
Gu Jiao: I really don't want to know so much...
"Anu, see the guests out!" Liu Yisheng issued the order to leave without even looking up.
Anu put down the basket she was weaving halfway through, got up and went to the Sixth Prince's side, bowed to him, and gestured for him to leave.
The sixth prince, who was even kicked out of this run-down place, was speechless.
The sixth prince patted the rattan chair helplessly, sighed, and left.
The white cat was so cute, chubby and with soft, shiny fur. Gu Jiao petted it with great satisfaction.
The white cat was also very comfortable being petted, lying on Gu Jiao's lap with its paws in the air, exposing its most vulnerable belly to Gu Jiao.
Liu Yisheng didn't ask Gu Jiao to leave. He twisted the hemp rope for a while longer, then suddenly said, "My mother is from the Chen Kingdom."
"Hmm?" Gu Jiao paused in her petting of the cat and turned to look at him.
Liu Yisheng lowered her head and twisted hemp rope. Her hands, which were originally long and beautiful, were calloused and bleeding from the wear and tear of life: "I am a sister to Yuan Tang's mother."
Oh, so that prince of Chen was named Yuan Tang.
Gu Jiao understood. One of the sisters entered the palace as a concubine, while the other went to an enemy country to become a spy. The family that could raise these two beauties must not be simple.
"Does the Emperor know?" Gu Jiao asked.
Liu Yisheng shook her head: "I don't know if he knows."
When the Liu family was convicted, Liu Yisheng was too young. No one told him what had happened to the Liu family. He watched as the Liu family's property was confiscated, some were beheaded, and some were exiled. In the end, only he, a young child, and a frail old woman were left.
Anu was found along the way.
Liu Yisheng thought for a moment and then said, "They probably don't know, but it doesn't matter anymore, I'm already a stray dog."
"Why aren't you leaving?" Gu Jiao asked.
Liu Yisheng said self-deprecatingly, "Where to go? To Chen? In Zhao, I am a stray dog, it will be the same if I go to Chen."
He had half Zhao blood flowing through his veins, and in the eyes of Chen, he was unclean.
Gu Jiao didn't try to persuade her any further.
Everyone has their own life and their own choices. Gu Jiao put down the white cat, stood up and said goodbye: "I'm leaving."
Looking at the bewildered white cat on the ground, Liu Yisheng asked her, "Aren't you taking the cat with you?"
“You can keep it,” Gu Jiao said, before he could say that she didn’t have the money to keep a cat, she took out a money bag and put it on the table, “Its food expenses.”
After saying that, she stepped out of the courtyard.
Liu Yisheng didn't understand. She had been petting the cat for an hour and clearly loved it, so why did she want to keep it here? Couldn't such a big clinic keep a cat?
Of course, he only wondered about it in his mind and did not go to Gu Jiao to ask. He didn't even ask Gu Jiao why she went to the palace to catch a cat, so why would he ask this?
Some people can trust each other even though they don't know each other well.
The white cat had been petted all afternoon, but suddenly no one was petting it anymore. Feeling lonely, it jumped onto Liu Yisheng's lap, begging for a pat.
Liu Yisheng didn't have time to pet the cat, so he ignored it and continued twisting hemp rope.
"Do you know what the consequences would be if we hadn't caught this cat in time?"
It was Yuan Tang's voice.
Liu Yisheng turned around and saw that Yuan Tang had actually come out of the main room, apparently having entered through the back door.
Liu Yisheng frowned: "You haven't left yet?"
“I told you you went to so much trouble to come all this way, I should stay a little longer.” Yuan Tang lay back down on the wicker chair where she had been lying, toying with a folding fan in one hand and resting the other behind her head, continuing the previous topic, “If we don’t catch this cat in time, the new top scholar will be hit by it, the cat will frighten the scholar, and the scholar will frighten the cat. In the end, the frightened cat will knock down Princess Ning, who is passing by. Princess Ning is pregnant, and the child will most likely not survive. The new top scholar, Princess Ning, and the cat’s owner—three birds with one stone, what a brilliant scheme!”
Gu Jiao was going to catch the cat, and Liu Yisheng genuinely just wanted to catch the cat. He looked at Yuan Tang in confusion: "How did you know?"
Yuan Tang waved to the white cat.
The white cat disdainfully jumped down and reluctantly jumped onto Yuan Tang's lap.
Yuan Tang stroked it and said, "Because this is my cat. Someone tricked my cat away with dried fish."
As he spoke, he picked up the white cat and said in a chilling tone, "You stupid thing, you almost got me into trouble. If you get kidnapped so easily next time, don't blame me for stewing you into a pot of cat meat!"
Gu Jiao's dream was only related to Xiao Liulang, but she did not see the fate of the white cat and its owner.
"Meow~" the white cat meowed guiltily.
Yuan Tang poked the white cat's belly. The cat, feeling guilty, obediently let her poke it: "Instead of being curious about how I knew, shouldn't you be more curious about how that girl knew? I guessed it afterward based on the situation at the scene, but that girl seemed to have anticipated it all along."
Liu Yisheng suddenly fell silent, seemingly lost in thought.
Yuan Tang smiled mysteriously: "Should I go and investigate that girl?"
Liu Yisheng said seriously, "You'd better not."
Yuan Tang asked, "What's wrong? Are you angry?"
Liu Yisheng lowered her eyes and twisted the rope: "I have nothing to do with her, why should I be angry? But if you investigate her, it will cause her trouble if you are exposed. At least she helped you by accident."
Yuan Tang thought for a moment and nodded, "That makes sense." He glanced at the sky, "It's getting late, I really should go now, here, take this."
Yuan Tang took out a few silver notes and placed them on the table.
Without hesitation, Liu Yisheng said, "Take it."
Yuan Tang had a toothache. He gasped and looked at him in confusion: "You take things from me, but you don't want them when I offer them to you? You'd rather go hungry than accept my charity. Do you really not want anything to do with the Chen Kingdom?"
"You really want to give it to me?" Liu Yisheng asked him.
"Yes!" Yuan Tang nodded, her eyes wide.
Liu Yisheng said, "Leave that cat here, take the rest with you."
Yuan Tang: "..."
Yuan Tang ultimately took the silver note with him, because he knew that if Liu Yisheng said she didn't want it, then she would rather throw it away than keep it.
He kept the white cat.
After everyone had gone far away, Liu Yisheng put the cat on the table, and at the same time, her gaze fell on the money bag.
He hesitated for a moment, then picked up the money pouch, opened it, and found that it contained not only a few silver ingots, but also three hairpins.
The Eastern Palace.
Xiao Liulang met the Crown Prince.
The crown prince stared blankly at the young man in the scarlet brocade robes of the official residence before him, remaining silent for a long while.
He stood up, walked up to Xiao Liulang, circled him, and scrutinized every single hair on his head.
After scrutinizing him for what seemed like an eternity, he finally found his voice: "You...you're the new top scholar? That candidate surnamed Xiao?"
"Yes," Xiao Liulang said without looking to the side.
Compared to the Crown Prince's agitation, he appeared much more composed. After all, it wasn't his first day in the capital, and there were some things he would have to face sooner or later. He had imagined it many times during countless sleepless nights and had long since learned to remain calm.
The crown prince returned to his seat in disbelief, his gaze fixed intently on the face that resembled so closely from his memory. He opened his mouth and asked, "What's your name?"
"Xiao Liulang".
"Why would someone have such a simple name?"
Xiao Liulang said, "My elders in the family are illiterate. I was born on the sixth day of the month, so I was called Liulang."
The prince asked suspiciously, "You said your birthday is the sixth day of the month? What month?"
Xiao Liulang said, "November."
“My cousin is on New Year’s Eve…” the Crown Prince murmured, fidgeting with his fingers, his gaze falling on his cane and leg, “What happened to your leg?”
Xiao Liulang: "I was slightly injured a year or two ago."
Crown Prince: "Is it hopeless?"
Xiao Liulang: "I don't know."
Being a cripple isn't exactly perfect, the Crown Prince cleared his throat and asked, "What is your relationship with the Marquis of Xuanping's household?"
"It's alright," Xiao Liulang said calmly.
He doesn't resemble my cousin at all.
My cousin isn't that cold. He respects him a lot and always seems happy when he sees him. His smile is warm, unlike this guy who's cold all over.
This face is so similar, seeing him is like seeing my cousin come to life, the only difference is that he's missing the beauty mark under his right eye.
The crown prince's face was somewhat pale.
Eunuch Huang whispered, "Your Highness, are you alright? Perhaps... this servant should take Scholar Xiao away first? You can summon him for questioning another day."
The Crown Prince waved his hand, signaling Eunuch Huang to step back, and then looked at Xiao Liulang seriously, asking, "Do you like chestnuts?"
“I like it,” Xiao Liulang said.
My cousin doesn't like it.
The prince then asked, "Do you like spicy food?"
Xiao Liulang said, "Eat."
The crown prince gestured to a palace maid, who then brought over a bowl of spicy dried meat.
Xiao Liulang glanced at the dried meat sprinkled with chili, without even lifting his eyelids, and slowly ate a small piece with his jade-like, slender fingers.
The crown prince stared at him intently, not missing a single reaction.
My cousin can't eat spicy food. Even a little bit of spice will make him stick out his tongue. This level of spice would make him turn red in the face from the heat.
However, Xiao Liulang ate with great ease.
The crown prince couldn't explain why he felt relieved.
Xiao Liulang left the palace.
As dusk settled, the imperial city was enveloped in a warm, orange glow.
Liu Quan's carriage stopped near the palace. Xiao Liulang walked over with his cane. As soon as he got into the carriage, he found Gu Jiao sitting inside waiting for him.
Gu Jiao leaned against the car wall, her eyes slightly closed, as if she were asleep, quiet and obedient.
Xiao Liulang's gaze swept over her soft lips, intentionally or unintentionally. His Adam's apple bobbed, and he quickly looked away and got into the carriage.
The carriage swayed slightly, and Gu Jiao woke up. She opened her eyes, saw him, and her eyes lit up instantly: "You've come."
"Hmm." Xiao Liulang sat down on the bench opposite her.
Liu Quan cracked his whip, and the cart wheels began to turn.
When the old chief priest first bought this carriage, he didn't consider giving it to a second person, so the space wasn't large. The two of them sat in the carriage, and their breaths quickly intertwined.
It was really hot at the end of April.
Xiao Liulang thought to himself.
“Last night… I drank too much,” he said.
"Hmm." Gu Jiao didn't seem to care.
Xiao Liulang composed himself: "It won't happen again."
"Huh?" Gu Jiao looked at him, puzzled.
Xiao Liulang didn't look into her eyes, but clenched his fist on his lap and said seriously, "I won't drink too much again... and do that to you."
"Oh." Gu Jiao said disappointedly.
Seeing the hint of disappointment that flashed across her eyes, Xiao Liulang felt a sudden surge of emotion: "It will happen when I'm sober."
Gu Jiao: "Huh?"
Xiao Liulang was stunned after he finished speaking. He swore that this was not what he originally meant to say! He intended to tell her that he would not do anything rash or frivolous to her again when he was out of his mind, but how did the words turn into something else?
It will happen when I am sober.
Is this something a human being would say?
That's too reckless! It's a waste of your time to study the classics!
Xiao Liulang's face suddenly turned bright red, and he wished he could find a crack in the ground to crawl into.
"I...I didn't mean that, I...I didn't mean to..." Xiao Liulang found it really hard to say those two words.
Gu Jiao spoke up for him, "Didn't you want a kiss?"
Xiao Liulang replied awkwardly, "Hmm."
Gu Jiao thought for a moment, then pointed to her finger and said, "So, you want to sleep?"
"Hmm..." Xiao Liulang's body trembled, and he shook his head violently, "No!"
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com