PNB Chapter 133 Gu Yan
Chapter 133 Gu Yan
When they finished a whole pot of tea and Bai Zhi began to feel the urge to pee, she realized that they had been chatting for a long time, so she stopped talking without saying a few more words and prepared to say goodbye.
You can’t fill yourself up with just one meal, there will always be plenty of time to chat later.
Lu Jiliang's expression suddenly became very serious: "Bai Zhi, I don't know how you know King Jing, but listen to my advice, you must be careful of him."
Bai Zhi laughed: "What do you mean?"
"King Jing knew that you were the third wife of the Marquis Xuanping's mansion, but he still wanted to marry you. Don't you think... don't you think he has other intentions?"
"Well……"
How to answer this?
Bai Zhi scratched her eyebrows and said, "Don't worry. I have been in contact with King Jing for a long time. If he...if he had any ulterior motives, I would have seen it long ago. I am not stupid. He is actually a very kind person."
Lu Jiliang gritted his teeth and said, "To tell you the truth, His Majesty sent us here to investigate..."
"Lu Jiliang."
Bai Zhi suddenly interrupted him and shook her head slowly, saying, "Don't say anything you shouldn't say. Since you are an official, you must abide by your duties. You are in the center of the storm now. If you take a wrong step, all your steps will be wrong."
What's more, he was here to monitor King Jing, and King Jing himself already knew about it, so there was no need to create more trouble.
Lu Jiliang seemed to be deflated all of a sudden, he closed his eyes and covered his forehead: "Even if I serve as an official for another ten years, I will not be as good as you."
"Don't underestimate yourself, Imperial Envoy." Bai Zhi smiled again, "Most things in the world are not difficult, but there are no shortcuts. Three years ago, you still thought it was difficult to pass the imperial examination, but now you have become an Imperial Envoy. No matter how you got there, you can do much more now than before."
“…But I still don’t know if this is the path I should take.”
"We'll see after we leave. Follow your heart, Your Excellency."
Finally, Lu Jiliang just nodded and said, "Your hairpin is quite simple and honest."
Bai Zhi smiled and said, "It's not as good-looking as the hairpin on King Jing's head, right?"
"Yes." Lu Jiliang also laughed, "Prince Jing really doesn't know how to choose a hairpin."
At this moment, Prince Jing, who was chatting with Fang Zhiheng in the study, sneezed twice.
Fang Zhiheng asked with concern: "Your Highness, the weather has been cold recently, have you caught a cold?"
"It's nothing serious. Maybe I caught a cold from drinking last night." Chu Yunchuan rubbed his nose, frowned, and picked up the letter on the desk again. "These barbarians are just chatting and drinking with the examinees, saying they want to make friends? Is it that simple?"
"Your Highness, that's true. If the examinees disagree, they won't bother them anymore. But not everyone in the Thirteen States hates the barbarians. Besides, the barbarians are generous, so some people will agree to make friends." Fang Zhiheng said, "It's just a friendship, the government has no right to interfere. Your Highness, in my opinion, is it unfair to secretly remove all these examinees from the list?"
Chu Yunchuan sighed lightly and pressed his knuckles to his forehead: "No news yet on Ge Zhen and the patterned handkerchief?"
"No, according to your Highness's order, the arrest warrant was only posted in Weizhou and several surrounding states, and secret guards were sent to search secretly in all thirteen states. But strangely, Ge Zhen seemed to have evaporated from the face of the earth. As for the patterned handkerchief, it was even more bizarre. The secret guards secretly checked in the twenty-two tribes of the Southern Barbarians, and no barbarian had ever seen such a pattern."
"Twenty-two tribes?" Chu Yunchuan asked in confusion, "I remember there were twenty-three tribes in the Nanman."
"The missing one is the Sharama tribe, the main force that invaded the territory of Dayan during the Thirteen States Rebellion. They were almost completely slaughtered by the Dayan army. According to investigation, all the female relatives were incorporated into other tribes. Now they are considered to be exterminated."
"Go and check the women of the Saraswati clan and their children."
Fang Zhiheng was stunned: "Your Highness, the Nanman are not like the Thirteen States who value women. Throughout history, I have never heard of any Nanman woman who could cause trouble."
"Zhiheng, there is no greater disaster than underestimating the enemy." Chu Yunchuan raised his hand and put the long tassel hairpin hanging down from the sick plum hairpin behind his head, and looked at Fang Zhiheng, "Women in the world are all the same. Ge Zhen was originally a lady from a noble family. She is just cruel and ruthless, but not very smart, which has caused such a big trouble now. What if someone like Bai Zhi is our enemy?"
Being an enemy of someone like Bai Zhi? Fang Zhiheng scratched the back of his head in confusion: "Your Highness, Miss Bai... although she is smart, she is not as troublesome as Ge Zhen, right?"
Chu Yunchuan closed his eyes and chuckled twice: "Then you really misjudged her."
Fang Zhiheng said "Oh" and did not comment.
Chu Yunchuan thought for a moment and asked again: "Is Gu Yan still there?"
"Yes, Your Highness." Fang Zhiheng said bitterly, "Master Gu is clinging to you and won't leave even if he asks you to."
"That's good." Chu Yunchuan nodded, "I'll go meet him and come back in a few days."
"Ah? Your Highness, you must go and come back quickly, as there are only a few days left before the imperial examination."
"Do not worry."
Among the thirteen states, Quzhou is the least populated, and Gu Yan lives there.
The distance from Weizhou to Quzhou was not short, so Chu Yunchuan and Bai Zhi took turns riding horses and riding in carriages. Three days later, the two entered the territory of Quzhou in a carriage.
There was only the bumpy sound of a carriage on the official road. Chu Yunchuan was in the front seat, whipping the horse and driving the carriage, his sleeves fluttering in the wind, and he said loudly: "Bai Zhi, we have entered Quzhou. We should be there in another three or two hours."
In the front window, Bai Zhi poked her head out to get some fresh air, and said with her dying breath, "That's great. I'm going to sleep for ten hours when we get there."
Traveling is really not a job for humans.
"We're almost there, why don't I drive slower?"
"No, no, it's better to suffer a short pain than a long one, you should hurry up." Bai Zhi found a more comfortable position to lean against, closed her eyes and blew the wind, "Gu Yan is really a strange man, he is willing to confine himself to such a small place, he is not afraid that you will silence him as soon as he leaves the door, right?"
"Even if he goes among the people and tells them everything, no one will believe him. I don't need to silence him. I've already told him that."
"If he doesn't leave, then you still have to support him. How much money will it cost per year... It depends on how you behave in the Marquis' Mansion. Gu Yan should spend money like water, right?"
"Hahahaha, just as you expected, there was actually no expense."
"No expenses?"
The carriage continued its long journey, and when it arrived at Gu Yan's courtyard, Bai Zhi finally understood what it meant to have no expenses.
A bamboo fence surrounded a small farmyard. Next to it were two large plots of land, one for growing vegetables and the other for raising pigs, chickens and sheep. Gu Yan, dressed in coarse farmer's clothes, was squatting in the vegetable field picking radishes. When he saw Chu Yunchuan entering the yard, he raised a radish and waved it, shouting happily: "Brother Chu! You came at the right time. I'm going to kill a chicken today. Come and eat with me!"
It's so natural, as if welcoming neighbors to visit.