Soon, the four great assassins begin to patrol the room, each choosing a separate path to walk by the desks.
Palace exam takes up almost an entire day. As it draws nearer to noon, it starts to get hot, and the maids go around setting out wooden cups on the desks, filling them full of tea, and putting down snacks on the edge of each desk from their trays.
Duan Ling is really thirsty, but he daren’t take a drink. A pair of warrior’s boots stop by his side, and its owner bends over to put a new cup of water down on his desk, taking away the cup that had been set down earlier.
Duan Ling follows the man’s leg up with his eyes and when he sees that it’s Wu Du, he drinks the water.
Wu Du pours him one more, but out of fear of having to hold his pee, Duan Ling decides not to drink more and picks up his brush again so he can keep writing. As he writes he starts to lose track of time, his mind immersed in memories of the past and all those impressions the bygone days have left on him; Mu Kuangda’s memorials piled up like mountains in the study, the commoners he saw when he was on the run … all these images fight to overwhelm his senses.
His brush glides along the paper, and as the events he describes take a turn, his tears fall and drip onto the page, feathering the ink in the last character of his essay.
Lifting a sleeve, he wipes his tears, sets down his brush, and takes a deep breath. This palace exam essay seems to have sapped him of all his strength, every last drop of energy he’s saved up in his life so far.
His heart feels more tranquil in that moment than it’s ever felt, and he simply sits there in silence. He does not stir until the sun is beginning to set, casting a ray of red-gold into the room. Only once the fourth gong rings and the Grand Secretary comes to recollect their papers does Duan Ling feel as though a great weight has come off his chest, and he looks up to come suddenly face to face with Cai Yan. Cai Yan is sitting upon a raised dais in the hall, and Duan Ling has no idea how long he’s been there.
As their eyes met, Cai Yan had been staring at him, unblinking in his focus. The initial shock Duan Ling felt at first quickly dissolves, and once he recovers his composure, he gives Cai Yan a small smile. Cai Yan too, smiles back at him, his expression tinged with indescribable feelings.
“Good work, everyone,” Cai Yan says.
And now the examinees get up one by one to greet the crown prince, kneeling to kowtow. Duan Ling stands in a crowd of exam takers, meeting Cai Yan’s gaze. After the space of several breaths, Duan Ling brushes out the folds of his robe and without any hesitation at all gets on his knees and kowtows in Cai Yan’s direction.
“Rise,” Cai Yan replies, then he turns for the exit and is gone.
“Palace exam candidates,” says a eunuch, “please proceed to the other hall to have dinner before leaving.”
Once Cai Yan is gone, the examinees in the room finally relax. Duan Ling walks up to Zheng Yan and says to him, “Zheng Yan, I have something I’d like to see His Majesty about.”
“Wu Du already told me. Come to the imperial study later and I’ll take you inside.”
Duan Ling sweeps the room with his eyes, and when he notices that Lang Junxia hasn’t left yet, still talking about something with the Grand Secretary, he says, “Lord Wuluohou Mu, I have something to discuss with you. I’ll be waiting in the long gallery — please.”
Lang Junxia seems a little surprised, but as soon as Duan Ling finishes speaking, he leaves the Hall of Peerless Harmony behind, stepping into the winding gallery to the rear of the palace hall. Wu Du is sitting in front of the railing, drinking some water as he waits for Duan Ling.
“Want to get something to eat?” Wu Du asks.
“In a bit,” Duan Ling replies, and sits down next to Wu Du.
“How did you do?” Noticing that Duan Ling is looking rather sour, Wu Du thinks he must have mucked up his exam.
But Duan Ling is still immersed in memories of his past, not yet surfaced out of them. When he hears Wu Du say this, he gives him a smile.
“You told me,” Duan Ling says quietly to Wu Du, “that you’re going to take me lots of places.”
“Any time you want. Even if you want to leave tonight. So? Why are you saying that?”
Wu Du and Duan Ling look quietly at each other; from his eyes Duan Ling can read a sense of calmness that puts him at ease.
“I want to go to Ye,” Duan Ling says.
“Let’s go then. We leave tonight? I’ll go get things ready.”
Wu Du doesn’t ask him why, as though as long as it is something that Duan Ling has decided upon, it is a decision he’ll accept unconditionally.
“You’re not going to ask me why I got that idea?”
Wu Du smiles. “You were able to defend Tongguan, so of course you’ll also be able to defend Ye.”
Duan Ling, on the other hand, knows that it’s hardly going to be so simple. They’d only gone the last time to kill someone, and defending Tongguan largely depended on luck. Though he once spent time familiarising himself with strategy, to actually lead soldiers onto the battlefield is quite another thing altogether.
Lang Junxia comes out of the palace hall and approaches them through the gallery.
“He’s here,” Wu Du says.
Duan Ling looks up from his thoughts, staring at Lang Junxia.
He still looks the same as always, as though nothing has ever changed; radiant, handsome, graceful and comfortable in his skin, just like a flawless piece of jade. He’s the exact same man in Duan Ling’s memories.
Duan Ling rises to his feet, steps into the gallery, and walks towards him.
“What is it?” Lang Junxia says.
“I have something to say to you.” Keeping his voice low, Duan Ling slowly makes his way to Lang Junxia.
Time seems to solidify between them as they stare at each other in silence.
Lang Junxia’s lips quiver as though he’s about to say something.
But then Duan Ling is raising his hand, and he slaps Lang Junxia heavily across the face. It’s a crisp, loud sound, and it echoes through the quiet night around them.
Lang Junxia’s face is turned aside from the blow, his left cheek glowing crimson.
“Your clanswoman,” Duan Ling says quietly, “an old woman, taken to Xichuan, then brought to Jiangzhou. She can’t speak Han, and I’m sure she doesn’t normally speak to her neighbours either. She’s all alone in the world with no one to depend on, and the only one she has is you, but you ignore her for the most part — all you do is give her money and that’s it. You didn’t ask anyone to take care of her, get someone to keep her company so she’d have someone to talk to. Do you know how I could tell?”
Wu Du steps up to stand behind Duan Ling just in case Lang Junxia hits him back, but Lang Junxia hasn’t reacted at all. He simply stands there quietly.
“When it started flooding everyone living around her left.” Duan Ling says quietly, “No one took her with them. Why is that? It must be because everyone knows she’s your family, so they don’t want any trouble. That’s why they all leave her alone, am I right?
"She has no caretaker, no friends, no familial love, no social ties. And the reason for that is simple. It’s because you don’t want her to talk to anyone. You want her to keep everything to herself as much as possible. Am I right?
"That’s why I slapped you. Keep that in mind.
“I know you don’t want anyone to talk to her so that no one can get any information out of her.” Just before Duan Ling leaves, he says to Lang Junxia at last, “But I’m going to say this now — you best treat her well, otherwise when I join the imperial court as an official, the first thing I’d do is write a memorial to impeach you. Disloyal and unfilial, heartless and unjust; you’re unworthy of your role as an official of the court. Never mind that the one above you is someone you installed, even if you’re the emperor himself you’d be denounced by everyone in the land.”
The moon has risen, but Lang Junxia remains standing alone in the winding gallery.
They turn the corner around the imperial gardens. After slapping Lang Junxia, Duan Ling’s hand keeps on shaking. But Wu Du is saying to him, “Fuck, you’ve got some guts. I’m even stunned. What’s with the slapping him in the face?”
“I … I really just couldn’t stand it, I was so angry. Especially when I saw Miss Feilian all by herself, sitting alone on the balcony.”
Wu Du understands that reasoning, and Chang Liujun understands that also, but nobody wanted to say it. None of them likes Lang Junxia, and this is the reason why.
“He’s always been heartless and cold. So that …” Wu Du pauses to think, then changes the subject. “Hungry? There isn’t any food from Zheng Yan today. Mu Qing told me to take you to the empress’s for dinner. Let’s go.”
Duan Ling’s hand is still trembling imperceptibly, and it’s not until Wu Du takes it and wraps it in his own that he begins to calm down on the inside. He thinks of those words Wu Du swallowed, the half sentence he elected not to say — Lang Junxia is heartless and cold, so that the Duan Ling he’s brought up is heartless and cold as well.
But aren’t assassins supposed to be like that in the first place? In contrast, Wu Du is the one who doesn’t seem like an assassin at all. Duan Ling hasn’t seen Zheng Yan kill anyone yet, so he can’t exactly judge, but who knows, maybe Zheng Yan is also a cold and merciless man; when Chang Liujun kills, he doesn’t hesitate at all.
And yet, is Lang Junxia really cold and heartless? Duan Ling can’t help thinking back to that snowy night in Shangjing when he was still little, when Lang Junxia was heavily wounded and lying on the bed. Fragments of memories weave together into a tapestry that makes him believe that Lang Junxia too, is someone who has feelings.
The day his father arrived, the same day that Lang Junxia went away, Duan Ling even threw his arms around him, not wanting him to leave. In the blink of an eye so many years have gone by, and the slap he gave Lang Junxia earlier feels like it’s slapped away all the anger that has been coalescing inside Duan Ling for ages. Now that he thinks about it, when he looks inside himself now, he feels rather empty.
Someday, if I manage to regain everything that belongs to me, will I put an end to him and sentence him to death?
Duan Ling has never given any thought to this question before, but he can’t stop himself from thinking about it tonight. When the time comes, he won’t have to do anything himself, and Lang Junxia will have to die anyway; even if he chooses to spare him, the court’s officials would never let him get away with his crimes — and yet, he doesn’t want to see Lang Junxia die in front of him.
Even if someone were to kill him quietly without fanfare, and then come back to tell him that Lang Junxia has disappeared — he’s escaped, gone on the run — he’d feel somewhat better inside. It’s as though as long as he doesn’t see Lang Junxia die in front of his own two eyes, all those memories that have to do with him will still be there. That brief period of happiness and the new world he gained after leaving Xunyang wouldn’t seem like such a travesty.
“You must be Wang Shan.” Mu Jinzhi says unhurriedly, “Qing’er is always talking about you. He talks about you so much I’m getting calluses in my ears.”
Duan Ling rushes to bow at the empress.
“Those from the Mu estate don’t have to be so formal in front of me. Go eat your dinner. As soon as the exams were over Qing’er started complaining about a headache, so I just had him go get some sleep. He wanted you to wake him when you get here.”
“There’s no need to wake him,” Duan Ling replies. “Let him sleep some more.”
“That’s what I said.” Mu Jingzhi smiles sweetly and says to Wu Du, “You should go have your dinner too.”
Wu Du gives her a nod, but doesn’t leave. He stands next to Duan Ling, guarding him while he eats his dinner. Mu Jinzhi doesn’t try to force him either, and she sits back on the daybed, watching the palace maid paint a tiny little carousel lantern with ink.
“How are things at home?” Mu Jinzhi asks, “Is it flooded?”
Duan Ling replies, “Everything is fine, Your Majesty.”
“Whenever you have some free time you should advise your lord to eat his daily three meals on time. Now that Chang Pin isn’t with him nobody’s there to remind him anymore.”
Duan Ling answers, certainly, and gives Wu Du a glance with a raised eyebrow, as if to say, did you hear that? The one Mu Jinzhi meant was Mu Kuangda, but Duan Ling is always joking around with Wu Du calling him Milord, Milord all the time, so now he’s using this as a pretext to make him go eat dinner.
Thus Wu Du retreats to a side hall to eat his dinner, but while he’s eating, he keeps his ears peeled for what’s going on next door.
Duan Ling glances at Mu Jinzhi’s belly, but he can’t see anything out of the ordinary. Mu Jinzhi asks, “Are you married yet?”
Duan Ling knows that everyone wants to play matchmaker for young talented men like himself, and before he came he’s already come up with countermeasures. “The fortune tellers say I’m a hex on my kin.”
“Oh I can hardly tell.”
Mu Jinzhi scrutinises Duan Ling’s face, and suddenly laughs aloud, pfft! She gives the palace maid a gentle nudge with her circular fan and says, “Look at Wang Shan. Why do I feel like he looks like someone I know?”
The palace maid gives him a look too, and after thinking about it for a moment, she says softly, “The corner of his mouth does look a bit like the fifth princess’s.”
Duan Ling is quite astounded, his heart skipping a beat, thinking to himself her eyes are so sharp, but it’s probably going to be fine, right? All he can do though, is laugh hollowly along with her. Fortunately, Zheng Yan finally arrives now. He must have news, and he takes Duan Ling away.
Duan Ling suddenly recalls something from the conversation earlier — Chang Pin isn’t with Mu Kuangda? It does feel like it’s been several days since he’s seen him. Where has he gone? At a crucial moment such as this, where would Mu Kuangda have sent Chang Pin?
The lamps are lit in the imperial study as always, and several coughs come from within. Duan Ling is beginning to worry about Li Yanqiu’s body again; he’s always had a weak constitution and got sick often to begin with, and he’s been working around the clock of late. He just hopes Li Yanqiu doesn’t get sick. Once they have a chance, he must get Wu Du to take a look at him — they must make sure he doesn’t end up poisoned by either Mu Kuangda or Cai Yan.
A maid happens to come by to deliver a decoction just then, and an idea occurs to Duan Ling so he sticks out his foot to trip her. With a surprised gasp, she falls squarely onto Duan Ling and spills the medicine all over him.
“So sorry so sorry,” Duan Ling hastens to say.
The maid tells him no matter, and picks up the shattered bits of porcelain before she goes back to the kitchens to make some more. Duan Ling sniffs at the medicine spilled on his person, but he can’t tell if anything is suspicious about it. He raises his eyes to look at Wu Du, and Wu Du nods to let him know he understands.
“Who is that outside?” Li Yanqiu says.
“Your Majesty,” Zheng Yan replies. “It’s Wang Shan and Wu Du here seeking an audience.”
“Come on in.”
Duan Ling and Wu Du exchange a look and go inside.
“You haven’t even joined the court as an official yet,” Li Yanqiu looks Duan Ling up and down, “but you seem to come here more often than the Grand Chancellor himself.”
“As humble as my position may be, I dare not neglect matters of state.”2
“I read your exam essay,” Li Yanqiu says slowly, “Out of all these years of Great Chen’s civil exams, yours is the only essay that had me moved by sorrow, unable to restrain my emotions.”
As Duan Ling looks up at Li Yanqiu, he notices that Li Yanqiu’s eyes are rimmed red — it seems he really was moved.
I do not monetise my hobby translations, but if you’d like to support my work generally or support my light novel habit, you can either buy me a coffee or commission me. This is also to note that if you see this message anywhere else than on tumblr, do come to my tumblr. It’s ad-free. ↩︎
From a line in Lu You’s poem 病起書懷 Reading In Illness. ↩︎
Soon, the four great assassins begin to patrol the room, each choosing a separate path to walk by the desks.
Palace exam takes up almost an entire day. As it draws nearer to noon, it starts to get hot, and the maids go around setting out wooden cups on the desks, filling them full of tea, and putting down snacks on the edge of each desk from their trays.
Duan Ling is really thirsty, but he daren’t take a drink. A pair of warrior’s boots stop by his side, and its owner bends over to put a new cup of water down on his desk, taking away the cup that had been set down earlier.
Duan Ling follows the man’s leg up with his eyes and when he sees that it’s Wu Du, he drinks the water.
Wu Du pours him one more, but out of fear of having to hold his pee, Duan Ling decides not to drink more and picks up his brush again so he can keep writing. As he writes he starts to lose track of time, his mind immersed in memories of the past and all those impressions the bygone days have left on him; Mu Kuangda’s memorials piled up like mountains in the study, the commoners he saw when he was on the run … all these images fight to overwhelm his senses.
His brush glides along the paper, and as the events he describes take a turn, his tears fall and drip onto the page, feathering the ink in the last character of his essay.
Lifting a sleeve, he wipes his tears, sets down his brush, and takes a deep breath. This palace exam essay seems to have sapped him of all his strength, every last drop of energy he’s saved up in his life so far.
His heart feels more tranquil in that moment than it’s ever felt, and he simply sits there in silence. He does not stir until the sun is beginning to set, casting a ray of red-gold into the room. Only once the fourth gong rings and the Grand Secretary comes to recollect their papers does Duan Ling feel as though a great weight has come off his chest, and he looks up to come suddenly face to face with Cai Yan. Cai Yan is sitting upon a raised dais in the hall, and Duan Ling has no idea how long he’s been there.
As their eyes met, Cai Yan had been staring at him, unblinking in his focus. The initial shock Duan Ling felt at first quickly dissolves, and once he recovers his composure, he gives Cai Yan a small smile. Cai Yan too, smiles back at him, his expression tinged with indescribable feelings.
“Good work, everyone,” Cai Yan says.
And now the examinees get up one by one to greet the crown prince, kneeling to kowtow. Duan Ling stands in a crowd of exam takers, meeting Cai Yan’s gaze. After the space of several breaths, Duan Ling brushes out the folds of his robe and without any hesitation at all gets on his knees and kowtows in Cai Yan’s direction.
“Rise,” Cai Yan replies, then he turns for the exit and is gone.
“Palace exam candidates,” says a eunuch, “please proceed to the other hall to have dinner before leaving.”
Once Cai Yan is gone, the examinees in the room finally relax. Duan Ling walks up to Zheng Yan and says to him, “Zheng Yan, I have something I’d like to see His Majesty about.”
“Wu Du already told me. Come to the imperial study later and I’ll take you inside.”
Duan Ling sweeps the room with his eyes, and when he notices that Lang Junxia hasn’t left yet, still talking about something with the Grand Secretary, he says, “Lord Wuluohou Mu, I have something to discuss with you. I’ll be waiting in the long gallery — please.”
Lang Junxia seems a little surprised, but as soon as Duan Ling finishes speaking, he leaves the Hall of Peerless Harmony behind, stepping into the winding gallery to the rear of the palace hall. Wu Du is sitting in front of the railing, drinking some water as he waits for Duan Ling.
“Want to get something to eat?” Wu Du asks.
“In a bit,” Duan Ling replies, and sits down next to Wu Du.
“How did you do?” Noticing that Duan Ling is looking rather sour, Wu Du thinks he must have mucked up his exam.
But Duan Ling is still immersed in memories of his past, not yet surfaced out of them. When he hears Wu Du say this, he gives him a smile.
“You told me,” Duan Ling says quietly to Wu Du, “that you’re going to take me lots of places.”
“Any time you want. Even if you want to leave tonight. So? Why are you saying that?”
Wu Du and Duan Ling look quietly at each other; from his eyes Duan Ling can read a sense of calmness that puts him at ease.
“I want to go to Ye,” Duan Ling says.
“Let’s go then. We leave tonight? I’ll go get things ready.”
Wu Du doesn’t ask him why, as though as long as it is something that Duan Ling has decided upon, it is a decision he’ll accept unconditionally.
“You’re not going to ask me why I got that idea?”
Wu Du smiles. “You were able to defend Tongguan, so of course you’ll also be able to defend Ye.”
Duan Ling, on the other hand, knows that it’s hardly going to be so simple. They’d only gone the last time to kill someone, and defending Tongguan largely depended on luck. Though he once spent time familiarising himself with strategy, to actually lead soldiers onto the battlefield is quite another thing altogether.
Lang Junxia comes out of the palace hall and approaches them through the gallery.
“He’s here,” Wu Du says.
Duan Ling looks up from his thoughts, staring at Lang Junxia.
He still looks the same as always, as though nothing has ever changed; radiant, handsome, graceful and comfortable in his skin, just like a flawless piece of jade. He’s the exact same man in Duan Ling’s memories.
Duan Ling rises to his feet, steps into the gallery, and walks towards him.
“What is it?” Lang Junxia says.
“I have something to say to you.” Keeping his voice low, Duan Ling slowly makes his way to Lang Junxia.
Time seems to solidify between them as they stare at each other in silence.
Lang Junxia’s lips quiver as though he’s about to say something.
But then Duan Ling is raising his hand, and he slaps Lang Junxia heavily across the face. It’s a crisp, loud sound, and it echoes through the quiet night around them.
Lang Junxia’s face is turned aside from the blow, his left cheek glowing crimson.
“Your clanswoman,” Duan Ling says quietly, “an old woman, taken to Xichuan, then brought to Jiangzhou. She can’t speak Han, and I’m sure she doesn’t normally speak to her neighbours either. She’s all alone in the world with no one to depend on, and the only one she has is you, but you ignore her for the most part — all you do is give her money and that’s it. You didn’t ask anyone to take care of her, get someone to keep her company so she’d have someone to talk to. Do you know how I could tell?”
Wu Du steps up to stand behind Duan Ling just in case Lang Junxia hits him back, but Lang Junxia hasn’t reacted at all. He simply stands there quietly.
“When it started flooding everyone living around her left.” Duan Ling says quietly, “No one took her with them. Why is that? It must be because everyone knows she’s your family, so they don’t want any trouble. That’s why they all leave her alone, am I right?
"She has no caretaker, no friends, no familial love, no social ties. And the reason for that is simple. It’s because you don’t want her to talk to anyone. You want her to keep everything to herself as much as possible. Am I right?
"That’s why I slapped you. Keep that in mind.
“I know you don’t want anyone to talk to her so that no one can get any information out of her.” Just before Duan Ling leaves, he says to Lang Junxia at last, “But I’m going to say this now — you best treat her well, otherwise when I join the imperial court as an official, the first thing I’d do is write a memorial to impeach you. Disloyal and unfilial, heartless and unjust; you’re unworthy of your role as an official of the court. Never mind that the one above you is someone you installed, even if you’re the emperor himself you’d be denounced by everyone in the land.”
The moon has risen, but Lang Junxia remains standing alone in the winding gallery.
They turn the corner around the imperial gardens. After slapping Lang Junxia, Duan Ling’s hand keeps on shaking. But Wu Du is saying to him, “Fuck, you’ve got some guts. I’m even stunned. What’s with the slapping him in the face?”
“I … I really just couldn’t stand it, I was so angry. Especially when I saw Miss Feilian all by herself, sitting alone on the balcony.”
Wu Du understands that reasoning, and Chang Liujun understands that also, but nobody wanted to say it. None of them likes Lang Junxia, and this is the reason why.
“He’s always been heartless and cold. So that …” Wu Du pauses to think, then changes the subject. “Hungry? There isn’t any food from Zheng Yan today. Mu Qing told me to take you to the empress’s for dinner. Let’s go.”
Duan Ling’s hand is still trembling imperceptibly, and it’s not until Wu Du takes it and wraps it in his own that he begins to calm down on the inside. He thinks of those words Wu Du swallowed, the half sentence he elected not to say — Lang Junxia is heartless and cold, so that the Duan Ling he’s brought up is heartless and cold as well.
But aren’t assassins supposed to be like that in the first place? In contrast, Wu Du is the one who doesn’t seem like an assassin at all. Duan Ling hasn’t seen Zheng Yan kill anyone yet, so he can’t exactly judge, but who knows, maybe Zheng Yan is also a cold and merciless man; when Chang Liujun kills, he doesn’t hesitate at all.
And yet, is Lang Junxia really cold and heartless? Duan Ling can’t help thinking back to that snowy night in Shangjing when he was still little, when Lang Junxia was heavily wounded and lying on the bed. Fragments of memories weave together into a tapestry that makes him believe that Lang Junxia too, is someone who has feelings.
The day his father arrived, the same day that Lang Junxia went away, Duan Ling even threw his arms around him, not wanting him to leave. In the blink of an eye so many years have gone by, and the slap he gave Lang Junxia earlier feels like it’s slapped away all the anger that has been coalescing inside Duan Ling for ages. Now that he thinks about it, when he looks inside himself now, he feels rather empty.
Someday, if I manage to regain everything that belongs to me, will I put an end to him and sentence him to death?
Duan Ling has never given any thought to this question before, but he can’t stop himself from thinking about it tonight. When the time comes, he won’t have to do anything himself, and Lang Junxia will have to die anyway; even if he chooses to spare him, the court’s officials would never let him get away with his crimes — and yet, he doesn’t want to see Lang Junxia die in front of him.
Even if someone were to kill him quietly without fanfare, and then come back to tell him that Lang Junxia has disappeared — he’s escaped, gone on the run — he’d feel somewhat better inside. It’s as though as long as he doesn’t see Lang Junxia die in front of his own two eyes, all those memories that have to do with him will still be there. That brief period of happiness and the new world he gained after leaving Xunyang wouldn’t seem like such a travesty.
“You must be Wang Shan.” Mu Jinzhi says unhurriedly, “Qing’er is always talking about you. He talks about you so much I’m getting calluses in my ears.”
Duan Ling rushes to bow at the empress.
“Those from the Mu estate don’t have to be so formal in front of me. Go eat your dinner. As soon as the exams were over Qing’er started complaining about a headache, so I just had him go get some sleep. He wanted you to wake him when you get here.”
“There’s no need to wake him,” Duan Ling replies. “Let him sleep some more.”
“That’s what I said.” Mu Jingzhi smiles sweetly and says to Wu Du, “You should go have your dinner too.”
Wu Du gives her a nod, but doesn’t leave. He stands next to Duan Ling, guarding him while he eats his dinner. Mu Jinzhi doesn’t try to force him either, and she sits back on the daybed, watching the palace maid paint a tiny little carousel lantern with ink.
“How are things at home?” Mu Jinzhi asks, “Is it flooded?”
Duan Ling replies, “Everything is fine, Your Majesty.”
“Whenever you have some free time you should advise your lord to eat his daily three meals on time. Now that Chang Pin isn’t with him nobody’s there to remind him anymore.”
Duan Ling answers, certainly, and gives Wu Du a glance with a raised eyebrow, as if to say, did you hear that? The one Mu Jinzhi meant was Mu Kuangda, but Duan Ling is always joking around with Wu Du calling him Milord, Milord all the time, so now he’s using this as a pretext to make him go eat dinner.
Thus Wu Du retreats to a side hall to eat his dinner, but while he’s eating, he keeps his ears peeled for what’s going on next door.
Duan Ling glances at Mu Jinzhi’s belly, but he can’t see anything out of the ordinary. Mu Jinzhi asks, “Are you married yet?”
Duan Ling knows that everyone wants to play matchmaker for young talented men like himself, and before he came he’s already come up with countermeasures. “The fortune tellers say I’m a hex on my kin.”
“Oh I can hardly tell.”
Mu Jinzhi scrutinises Duan Ling’s face, and suddenly laughs aloud, pfft! She gives the palace maid a gentle nudge with her circular fan and says, “Look at Wang Shan. Why do I feel like he looks like someone I know?”
The palace maid gives him a look too, and after thinking about it for a moment, she says softly, “The corner of his mouth does look a bit like the fifth princess’s.”
Duan Ling is quite astounded, his heart skipping a beat, thinking to himself her eyes are so sharp, but it’s probably going to be fine, right? All he can do though, is laugh hollowly along with her. Fortunately, Zheng Yan finally arrives now. He must have news, and he takes Duan Ling away.
Duan Ling suddenly recalls something from the conversation earlier — Chang Pin isn’t with Mu Kuangda? It does feel like it’s been several days since he’s seen him. Where has he gone? At a crucial moment such as this, where would Mu Kuangda have sent Chang Pin?
The lamps are lit in the imperial study as always, and several coughs come from within. Duan Ling is beginning to worry about Li Yanqiu’s body again; he’s always had a weak constitution and got sick often to begin with, and he’s been working around the clock of late. He just hopes Li Yanqiu doesn’t get sick. Once they have a chance, he must get Wu Du to take a look at him — they must make sure he doesn’t end up poisoned by either Mu Kuangda or Cai Yan.
A maid happens to come by to deliver a decoction just then, and an idea occurs to Duan Ling so he sticks out his foot to trip her. With a surprised gasp, she falls squarely onto Duan Ling and spills the medicine all over him.
“So sorry so sorry,” Duan Ling hastens to say.
The maid tells him no matter, and picks up the shattered bits of porcelain before she goes back to the kitchens to make some more. Duan Ling sniffs at the medicine spilled on his person, but he can’t tell if anything is suspicious about it. He raises his eyes to look at Wu Du, and Wu Du nods to let him know he understands.
“Who is that outside?” Li Yanqiu says.
“Your Majesty,” Zheng Yan replies. “It’s Wang Shan and Wu Du here seeking an audience.”
“Come on in.”
Duan Ling and Wu Du exchange a look and go inside.
“You haven’t even joined the court as an official yet,” Li Yanqiu looks Duan Ling up and down, “but you seem to come here more often than the Grand Chancellor himself.”
“As humble as my position may be, I dare not neglect matters of state.”2
“I read your exam essay,” Li Yanqiu says slowly, “Out of all these years of Great Chen’s civil exams, yours is the only essay that had me moved by sorrow, unable to restrain my emotions.”
As Duan Ling looks up at Li Yanqiu, he notices that Li Yanqiu’s eyes are rimmed red — it seems he really was moved.
I do not monetise my hobby translations, but if you’d like to support my work generally or support my light novel habit, you can either buy me a coffee or commission me. This is also to note that if you see this message anywhere else than on tumblr, do come to my tumblr. It’s ad-free. ↩︎
From a line in Lu You’s poem 病起書懷 Reading In Illness. ↩︎
