Chapter 94 Slap in the Face (First Update)
Gu Jiao was taller than Gu Jinyu, and even though Gu Jinyu was wearing thick-soled embroidered shoes, Gu Jiao could still look down on her in an oppressive manner.
Gu Jiao said indifferently, "If you don't even have this much sincerity, then don't try to persuade me to go back."
Gu Jinyu's eyes were slightly red as she said, "If you want to get rid of me..."
Gu Jiao said coldly, "I don't care. Take whatever you want, just don't bother me."
This is the most Gu Jiao has ever said to strangers, even though she is only this patient with people she cares about.
Next, Gu Jiao demonstrated what it means to treat Gu Jinyu like air.
Gu Jinyu forced himself to burn all the paper money, but in the end, he couldn't bring himself to call Gu Sanlang and his wife "father" and "mother" in front of Gu Jiao.
Gu Jinyu's legs were numb from kneeling for so long that it was her maid and nanny who helped her up.
She bowed slightly to Gu Jiao and said, "I'll be going now. I'll come to visit you again when I have time."
She hadn't been gone long when Xiao Jingkong came skipping and hopping over from another path: "Jiaojiao!"
He spotted Gu Jinyu not far away and asked in confusion, "Huh? Who are they?"
Gu Jiao said, "Stranger."
"Oh." Strangers, huh? Then Xiao Jingkong doesn't need to pay them any attention.
"Why did you come here?" Gu Jiao asked.
Xiao Jingkong said, "I went home, but you weren't there. My aunt said you came to visit the grave!"
Every morning, Xiao Jingkong does his morning prayers, practices his martial arts, and misbehaves the village children. He had just finished misbehaving when he got home and found that Gu Jiao was not there, so he asked his great-aunt where Jiao Jiao had gone.
"Whose grave is this?" Xiao Jingkong asked, his eyes wide.
Gu Jiao looked at the two old graves and said, "These are my father's and my mother's graves. This is my father, and this is my mother."
Little Jingkong put his hands behind his back, tilted his head and thought for a moment: "If they are Jiaojiao's parents, then they are also Jingkong's parents!"
As Xiao Jingkong spoke, he knelt down and kowtowed several times to Gu Sanlang and Madam Xu.
He kowtowed with great devotion, his head even burying itself in the ground, and he called out to his father and mother.
His voice was childish and sweet, but his little face was solemn. His small body knelt at the desolate grave, which brought tears to one's eyes.
If an adopted child can behave like this, while her own biological child can't even call her "father" or "mother," Gu Jinyu felt a lump in her throat, as if she had been slapped in the face.
"Miss, are you alright?" The maid noticed that Gu Jinyu was acting strangely.
Gu Jinyu closed her eyes briefly: "It's nothing, let's go back to the manor."
"yes!"
Gu Jinyu and his entourage boarded the carriage and returned to their residence.
On the other side, Gu Jiao and Xiao Jingkong finished clearing the weeds from the grave and walked back together.
"Jiaojiao, are you feeling better?" Xiao Jingkong asked, holding Gu Jiao's hand.
"Okay, all done." Gu Jiao nodded.
The high fever has subsided, which is good for her.
As for the scabs forming and falling off, that's just everyday occurrences, nothing to worry about.
When Xiao Jingkong heard Gu Jiao say that she was cured, he believed that she was really cured and cheered excitedly: "I just talked to my parents!"
"Oh? What did you say?" Gu Jiao did hear the little guy muttering to himself while she was weeding, but she didn't know what he was muttering.
Little Jingkong raised his chin and said proudly, "I asked my parents to bless Jiaojiao so she won't get sick again! My parents must have heard me, that's why Jiaojiao got better!"
Gu Jiao: You can do that?
Xiao Jingkong firmly believed that it was the spirits of Gu Sanlang and his wife from the underworld who had appeared to him, and that he himself had clearly made them appear. Therefore, it was actually his doing, not the medicine that his bad brother-in-law had brought back!
—You could say he's a little monk who's constantly vying for his brother-in-law's affections!
After leaving the village, Gu Jinyu hurried back to the manor. Upon arriving in town, she discovered something was missing. "Stop."
She gave the order.
The coachman stopped the carriage by the roadside, and Huang Zhong, riding his steed, asked, "Miss, what happened?"
Gu Jinyu carefully searched her sleeve pockets and purse, frowning as she said, "I lost my things."
"What fell?" Huang Zhong asked.
“A letter,” Gu Jinyu said.
"Then I'll have them come over and help you look." Huang Zhong called over the maid and nanny from the carriage behind to help Gu Jinyu search inside the carriage.
Despite searching high and low, the group couldn't find Gu Jinyu's lost item.
"Is it a very important letter?" Huang Zhong asked.
"Mm." Gu Jinyu nodded.
That was a letter from Consort Shu to her. There was a question in it, which was originally intended for the princes, but Consort Shu's son, the Fifth Prince, couldn't solve it, so he sent the letter to Gu Jinyu.
Gu Jinyu was exceptionally intelligent, far superior to the Fifth Prince's other study companions. From childhood to adulthood, she had been secretly solving problems for the Fifth Prince, and after solving them, she would claim that the Fifth Prince had done them himself.
The emperor, unaware of the truth, actually believed that the fifth prince was smarter than the other princes.
The emperor's favor towards Consort Shu was not unrelated to his high regard for the Fifth Prince, which is why Consort Shu held Gu Jinyu in high regard.
This question was set by His Majesty himself, and it is said that it stumped all the princes.
Everyone in the entire Zhao Kingdom knows that their emperor does not like poetry, songs, or the eight-legged essay; he loves to study arithmetic and astronomy.
In her letter, Consort Shu repeatedly instructed Gu Jinyu to help the Fifth Prince solve the problem, and to do so as quickly as possible.
Whoever can solve this problem first will win His Majesty's favor.
Gu Jinyu carried the problem with her every day, and would do the calculations whenever she had a spare moment.
But the question His Majesty set was far too difficult; she racked her brains for many days and only managed to solve half of it.
Even if it was only half, it was the result of a tremendous amount of calculation, and today we have lost all the results of all that hard work.
Gu Jinyu felt extremely upset.
If you asked her to calculate it all over again, she'd probably go crazy.
Gu Jinyu pressed her hand to her chest and said, "Could it have fallen into the village? I was kneeling there burning paper money just now; maybe it fell out of my sleeve pocket then."
Xiao Jingkong, holding Jiaojiao's hand, skipped and hopped home.
Gu Jiao went to cook, while he went to feed the chicks, and also shoveled chicken droppings and cleaned the chicken coop.
However, before he even started, he discovered something.
"Huh?" He looked down at the thing stuck to his heel, blinked strangely, and bent down to pick it up.
It turned out to be a small, folded envelope.
There was no name written on the envelope.
He opened the envelope and took out the "letter" inside.
The letter still had no name or signature; it was just a large sheet of white paper filled with numbers.
"This seems to be a question." Xiao Jingkong looked a little confused.
This was a field he had never studied, so he didn't know what to do.
More importantly, why did it appear at his feet?
He was absolutely certain that his shoes were clean before he went out.
"Could it be... that my parents gave it to me?"
The more Xiao Jingkong thought about it, the more convinced he became that it was true. His parents must have heard his prayers and responded to him!
He pondered for a moment, then stuffed the letter into his pocket, ran into the kitchen, and squatted down to examine the soles of Gu Jiao's shoes.
Gu Jiao was completely confused by his gaze: "What are you looking at?"
Xiao Jingkong shook his head like a rattle-drum: "Nothing! Nothing!"
Her parents didn't leave a letter for Jiaojiao, they only left one for him.
Because Jiaojiao didn't speak to her parents just now, only he did.
As the thought flashed through his mind, Xiao Jingkong became even more certain that the letter was written to him by his parents in the afterlife!
However, because he did not tell his parents about his academic level, they overestimated his abilities.
In order not to disappoint his parents, Xiao Jingkong decided to ask for outside help.
Xiao Jingkong returned to the kitchen with paper and pen: "Jiaojiao, I can't do this problem!"
When Xiao Jingkong went down the mountain, he brought with him a lot of Buddhist scriptures and some strange questions that were said to have been given by his master. Some of these questions were half-finished by his master, while others were completely unfinished by his master.
When Gu Jiao saw this question, she didn't think much of it, assuming it was just another question left by her master.
The crispy pork is frying in the pan at just the right temperature—not too tender, not too overcooked.
Gu Jiao took some time to solve the problem for him, and then took a pot of crispy fried pork out of the pot. The whole process took less than a minute.
Xiao Jingkong took the solved problem to the grave of Gu Sanlang and his wife.
Xiao Jingkong is an honest child and did not hide his question about Gu Jiao.
At the same time, he recited the Buddhist scriptures he had learned to Gu Sanlang and his wife, hoping that they could use these scriptures as the basis for their next test.
"Then you two get some rest, Mom and Dad. I'll be going now! I'll come see you again another day!"
Xiao Jingkong placed the solved problem in front of the grave, and to prevent it from being blown away by the wind, he even found a small stone to weigh it down!
Gu Jinyu and her group arrived at the village entrance again.
"Miss, wait in the carriage, we'll go find it," the nanny said to Gu Jinyu.
Gu Jinyu is of noble birth; it would be best if she did not frequently appear in such lowly places.
Gu Jinyu pondered for a moment, then did not refuse.
The old woman, the maid, and Huang Zhong and the others searched along the way.
"You guys go this way, Liu'er and I will go check on the graves." After saying that, the old woman led the little maid to the graves of Gu Sanlang and his wife.
The little maid suddenly pointed to a stone on the ground: "Granny! Look! There's something under that stone!"
The old woman's eyes lit up, and she hurriedly stepped forward to remove the small stone, only to find that underneath it was just a pile of burning ashes and a piece of unburnt paper money.
—That's right. On the way back, Xiao Jingkong suddenly remembered something: the paper money for his parents had to be burned before they could receive it, and the same goes for the question!
So he went back and burned the completed problem!
That way, Mom and Dad will receive it!
"I'm such a clever little devil!"
Xiao Jingkong: Praise me! Praise me! Praise me!
o(*￣︶￣*)o
(End of this chapter)
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