Chapter 67
The group was leaving Lishengmeng. Compared to the grand welcome they had received upon their arrival, the farewell procession seemed a bit shabby. Only the eldest and second masters of the Tao family, accompanied by their respective families, saw them off. The eldest and eldest grandmother smiled with a forced smile and wished them a safe journey. The second master's two children reluctantly clung to Yueming's hand, refusing to let her go. It took the second grandmother a while to persuade them to leave.
Yueming bowed to Mr. Tao and Mrs. Tao and said, "Uncle, aunt, I'm leaving now. I'll come visit you next time I have the chance. If you have time, bring your brothers and sisters to Yunxiang to see me."
Mr. Tao was not good at speaking. He had a lot to say to his niece, but after thinking for a long time, he could only come up with one sentence: "Take care of yourself!"
When passing by Uncle Tao, Yueming hesitated whether to pretend to say goodbye, but Yunkai, who was waiting impatiently, dragged her into the carriage.
When Li Yang returned to Yunxiang, he heard that Han Tusi and Yin Tai had also returned to the mansion. He didn't care that he was still covered in dust and winked at Yunkai who was holding Yueming's hand.
Yunkai understood and said softly to Yueming, "Go back and wash up and rest first, and then go to the mistress's room for dinner tonight."
Yueming had been riding in the carriage for two days and was extremely tired. He nodded as a sign of agreement to take Yehu and Ai Ye back to his yard.
In the study, Tusi Han was reading a letter from Lan Yingde. Seeing his two sons looking exhausted, he smiled and said, "Why are you in such a hurry? Can't you go back to your rooms, freshen up, and rest for a while?"
Li Yang said nonchalantly, "After taking a shower and taking a nap, it's time for dinner. There are some things that are hard to say at the dinner table, mainly because I'm worried that you'll be waiting anxiously."
Chief Han placed the letter on the table and motioned for Butler Tao to stand guard outside the door. Yun Kai stopped him and said, "First, give me a cup of tea. I'm so thirsty that my throat is smoking."
Butler Tao personally carried the teapot and poured tea for the two young masters, and closed the door when he left.
Tusi Han asked Li Yang, "How is the matter going?"
Li Yang wanted to laugh when he thought of his brother's furious look: "The task was accomplished, but my second brother suffered a not insignificant loss."
Han Tusi raised an eyebrow. To be able to make his second son suffer, this Li Shengmeng is really a capable person! He asked with great interest: "Who is so bold as to dare to provoke our Tianmoxing?"
Yun Kai tutted impatiently: "Let's talk about serious matters, don't make fun of me."
The more he tried to stop her from talking, the more Li Yang insisted on talking. He smiled and said, "I've told that old sly guy Taotou twice, both openly and secretly, but he kept denying it. He said this was a serious matter and he needed to think about it again. I didn't expect that there would be a heroine in his family who would flirt with our second young master..."
Li Yang beamed with joy as he recounted the events of that night to Han Tusi. Han Tusi laughed heartily as he listened, and still not satisfied, he pointed at Yun Kai and commented, "You're a useless fellow. What are you afraid of when someone comes to your door? Just sleep with him. If I don't agree, Li Shengmeng will have to swallow this loss."
Yun Kai's face flushed red, and he felt that he could no longer live under the same roof with his biological father. He stiffened his neck and asked angrily, "Are you guys going to talk about business or not? If not, I'm going back to my room to take a shower and go to bed."
Seeing that he was about to get angry, Li Yang comforted him and said, "Isn't this the part where we talk about your wisdom and bravery?"
Li Yang gave Han Tusi a thumbs-up, praising his younger brother. "Our Second Young Master was quite clever. He managed to spin the story that the Fourth Young Lady was ordered by Madam Tao to assassinate him. He frightened the whole family, and Old Man Tao had no choice but to agree to provide a hundred able-bodied men." At this point, he glanced at Yun Kai with a half-smile. "I thought the Second Young Master was clever enough in calling a horse a zebra, but I didn't expect him to actually negotiate with that old sly fellow at gunpoint, saying he'd give the Tao Mansion ten guns if only he could write Lan Yueming's name on the family tree and make her a legitimate daughter of Li Shengmeng. I was stunned to hear that. You had promised to give us those guns, and you promised us twenty, and he actually cut them in half. The key is that that old fox, Tou Ren, actually agreed."
Han Tusi also wanted to give his second son a thumbs-up. "I'm already shameless enough, but you're even worse!" But he couldn't show any sign of favor, or else the boy would get carried away and start running rampant. But he thought his son's tricks were truly beautiful, so he could only lift the lid of the tea bowl and blow on the steaming tea to hide his admiration.
Yun Kai rolled his eyes at his brother. "You married Miss Xiangkan from the Tusi Mansion. What if she takes advantage of her status to bully Lan Yueming in the future? Can we two brothers actually argue and fight over a woman?"
Chief Han was just looking for an excuse to beat him up, so upon hearing this he slammed his tea bowl down on the table and sternly scolded him, "How dare you talk to your brother like that? You're being so unrestrained and disrespectful. Has it been so long since you've been spanked that you're itching for a beating?"
Seeing his brother being scolded, Li Yang quickly said, "Master, why are you so angry? There is nothing we can't say to each other. What he said makes sense, isn't it?!"
Seeing the master angry, Yun Kai was still afraid. When the mistress said she wanted to beat him, she could spend an hour looking for a stick. When the master said he wanted to beat him, there was no need to choose a weapon in particular, just whatever was at hand. He quickly admitted his mistake: "Brother, I'm sorry, I was rude!"
Tusi Han loved to see brothers in harmony and joy, so he waved to them with satisfaction and said, "You can go back and rest first. We can discuss other matters after dinner."
Li Yang was about to leave when he saw Yun Kai still lying on the chair. He asked curiously, "Why aren't you leaving yet? Aren't your thighs sore after riding a horse for two days?"
Yunkai looked at Han Tusi hesitantly, wanting to say something, but said nothing.
Han Tusi impatiently picked up the letter on the table and said to him, "I know, I know. Lan Yingde will be home in two or three days. I'll tell him about it as soon as he gets back, okay?"
"Okay, of course." Yun Kai said goodbye to Li Yang cheerfully.
After the brothers left, Han Tusi sat alone in his study, rejoicing for a long time. Then, feeling lonely without anyone to share his joy and pride, he headed for the Yintai courtyard. This kind of thing was more interesting when he told it to his wife.
Arriving at the Yintai Courtyard, she was deciding on the dinner menu. The chieftain winked at her, and she told Tonglin to leave the menu behind while she led the maids out.
As soon as they left, Han Tusi eagerly recounted Li Yang and Yun Kai's performance in Lishengmeng. After he finished, he sighed, "These two children, Li Yang is powerful, and Yun Kai is intelligent. If I leave them to them, I can rest in peace after a hundred years."
"Yeah, yeah, just don't worry!" Yin Tai agreed absentmindedly while taking a wooden pen dipped in ink and crossing out the dishes that Yun Kai didn't like.
"Put down your crappy menu, I'm talking to you!" Han Tusi was unhappy. He came here specially to share with her why this woman didn't take it seriously!
Yin Tai put down the menu in his hand helplessly: "You say."
"I said... I said everything I wanted to say! I've said it all!" He complained dissatisfiedly, "How can you, as a mother, not care about your son at all?"
Yin Tai snorted softly: "They are all my children, I don't know how capable they are."
Han Tusi was choked by Yin Tai's calmness. Scratching his head, he could only start a new conversation: "I promised the second brother today that I will propose marriage as soon as Lan Yingde returns. You should prepare."
Yin Taizhen was speechless about these silly men at home. After enduring for a long time, she couldn't help but say, "What are you preparing for? Lan Yingde won't agree."
Han Tusi was shocked: "He doesn't agree. Why doesn't he agree? He even dislikes my son?"
Yin Tai was furious: "Their daughter has been staying with us for a few months, and as soon as she came back, she rushed to propose marriage. Her father even thought our son had done something inappropriate to Yueming!"
Han Tusi was amused when he heard this: "You women are always so devious. Okay, just get ready."
Amidst a torrential downpour, a caravan of horses struggled mightily along the muddy mountain roads. Wearing a conical hat and raincoat, Changsheng rode his horse, gazing at the impenetrable veil of rain and the flood-like mountain waters. Wiping the rain from his face, he turned and shouted to Lan Yingde, "Master, the road ahead is blocked. Why don't we take a detour? It would be disastrous if we ran into a larger flood."
The road ahead was washed out by the mudslide from the mountain, leaving a foot-wide ditch. The flood covered with mud and gravel rushed down like a waterfall. Lan Yingde raised his eyes to look at the dark sky. There was no sign of clearing up. He controlled the reins, took out a telescope from his raincoat and looked at the mountains ahead. He found that there were only two sections of the road with mountain water rushing down, and they were not big. He said to Changsheng: "Keep going. There will be a dam after crossing this mountain. If you turn back, you won't be able to get out of the mountain before dark, which is even more dangerous." After that, he raised his voice and asked the horse headman behind him: "Lao Liu, can the brothers still hold on?"
Yang Laoliu was only wearing a raincoat and no hat, so his mouth was immediately filled with rainwater. He spat a few times before shouting, "What a damn thing! We're almost home, and yet it's raining like this. Master Lan, you have the final say. If you say stop, we stop. If you say go forward, we go forward."
Lan Yingde nodded: "Then let's work harder. Once we get over this mountain, we can have a hot meal and don't have to eat dry food in the rain."
The flood was quite urgent, so Yang Laoliu asked two people to help Lan Yingde lead the horse to prevent the horse from being frightened by the gravel brought down by the flood when crossing the ditch.
Before nightfall, the group finally reached the dam that Lan Yingde had mentioned and found an open area to dismount and set up camp. A bonfire was lit, and Changsheng brought a bowl of bacon noodle soup to Lan Yingde.
Lan Yingde held the noodles and sighed with a smile: "Fortunately, I can get home tomorrow. I am really afraid of eating this stuff."
"If you don't want to eat, don't eat. I'll get you some snacks." Changsheng pretended to rummage through the oilcloth-wrapped bag.
Lan Yingde stopped him and said, "That's for Yueming. I came back over a month late and she's already mad about it. If she knew I ate her dessert, she'd probably be so mad she'd walk back to Kunming." He winked at Changsheng and said, "You'd better tell her the truth when you see her. I'd rather eat these disgusting noodles than touch a single one of her desserts."
Changsheng was at a loss for words: "Why are you doing this? She'll only be happy when you go back, so she won't mind you coming back late." Seeing Lan Yingde's trouser legs covered in mud, he added: "Change your clothes after dinner and I'll wash them for you. Don't go back to see Junior Sister so sloppily."
Lan Yingde gave him a look that said, "What do you know?" "Only if I go back looking dirty and weather-beaten will your sister feel sorry for me and not settle scores later. Alright, alright, leave me alone! Go eat quickly, or there won't even be any soup left." He shook his head and murmured in confusion, "Why are people still rushing to eat noodles this bad?"
Changsheng went to the pot and scooped a bowl of noodles for himself, thinking to himself, why not go back to see his junior sister as dirty as his master, otherwise his junior sister would definitely take her anger out on him because she couldn't bear to punish the master.
The next day was a beautiful day. Yang Laoliu looked at the lush green grass illuminated by the sun and said to his men who were packing up the tents, "Such a nice day! Finally, we don't have to take a shower while traveling."
Changsheng was putting the saddle on his horse when he heard this and laughed, "That's not necessarily true. A bright sunny day on one side and pouring rain on the other is a characteristic of the West. I've seen the sun shining brightly all around, while just beneath a cloud, there's a strange sight of heavy rain pouring down."
Yang Laoliu smacked his lips and said, "This West is just weird. The mountains are full of food. It's completely different from us in the East. If we had such beautiful mountains and such good water over there, we wouldn't have to eat potatoes every meal."
"My master said that people are shaped by the land and water they live in. It's just too easy here, so we're not as aggressive as you guys back east. This time, I finally got to see how ruthless you Zhaotong people are. No wonder so many officers in the army are from Zhaotong."
Yang Laoliu laughed heartily. "We Zhaotong people have two characteristics: one is that we are not afraid of death, and the other is that we care about our companions. There's no other way. With such a poor and remote environment, how can we survive in Zhaotong if we don't act ruthlessly and stick together?"
Lan Yingde came back from washing his face at the stream. Seeing that the work was almost done, he bowed to everyone and said, "Brothers, please bear with us for a while. We will reach Yunxiang after noon. After we go back, everyone should have a good rest. I will ask Changsheng to buy a sheep, kill it and treat you all to a drink."
A group of people cheered and mounted their horses, whipping their horsewhips.
When they arrived at the city gate, the gatekeeper saw Lan Yingde leading the caravan back and hurried to report the news to the Tusi Mansion. When Lan Yingde and his party arrived at the Tusi Mansion, Han Tusi and Yin Tai were already waiting for him by the horse-tethering stone at the entrance of the Tusi Mansion.
He dismounted and saluted, then glanced around at the people who had come to greet him but couldn't see Yueming. Feeling panicked, he couldn't help but ask, "Where is my daughter Yueming?"
The second housekeeper Feng hurried forward and bowed, saying, "I didn't know you were home today. The second young master took Miss Yueming out to play."
Lan Yingde was secretly surprised. Weren't they supposed to be on bad terms? How were they hanging out together? He was about to ask more when from the alley next to him came the clanking of bicycles on uneven stone slabs and a man's chuckling voice: "Hold on steady! You can't control the bike like you haven't eaten. Didn't you just have a bowl of rice noodles?"
A girl breathlessly agreed, "You're as heavy as Marshal Tianpeng about to be released. I've carried you like Yugong moving a mountain, and you're still dissatisfied? If you have the guts, come down and walk on your own!"
As soon as he finished speaking, everyone saw Yueming riding a bicycle, sweating profusely, pedaling hard. On the back rack sat the second young master Han, looking very happy, his long legs swaying as they spread apart.
Yin Tai closed his eyes with a look of dismay. He treated the daughter of a man like a coolie in front of her father, and still wanted to propose marriage? It was simply a dream.
Yueming was initially surprised at the number of people standing at the door. He recognized that the man standing next to the horse, whose tan was as tanned as Bao Guosheng, was his father. He hurriedly jumped out of the car, opened his arms and ran towards Lan Yingde.
She ran and cried for her dad.
She suddenly let go of her hand, which scared Yun Kai. If he hadn't had long arms and legs and quick reaction to steady the handlebars, he would have fallen to the ground with the bike.
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