The sweet feast’s most exciting moment. It was the moment where the main course and the side dish could be sampled by all. Liu Mang initially had no interest as he could only watch. However, this time was different.
“Brother Wang. Do you have an interest in one of those beauties?” Kuai Ran asked when he saw Liu Mang’s excited expression.
“Haha. Brother Kuai. Would you believe me if I told you I wasn’t interested?” Liu Mang laughed in reply. Everyone admires beauty. Who could not be interested in such beautiful women? The only people who wouldn’t care are real saints and eunuchs.
“Haha.” Kuai Ran laughed back understandingly. However, he had misunderstood Liu Mang.
“Brother Kuai. What box do you think the Huang cowards are sitting in?”
“The Huang cowards? Why are you asking?”
“Haha. We were invited to the sweet feast by them. Wouldn’t it be a shame for it to end peacefully?” Others went to a brothel to look at beautiful women. Liu Mang came for a good laugh.
Kuai Ran then called for one of the people working in the brothel. Due to how frequent he visited this place, that person recognized him. However, Kuai Ran paid that no attention and asked, “Which box did that family servant from earlier come from?”
“That person from earlier?” The young servant mumbled for and then replied, “Lord Kuai. You know about the rules of our brothel.”
“Brother Wang!” Kuai Ran looked back at Liu Mang and laughed awkwardly as he rubbed his pocket. Jia Xu then took out a piece of gold and handed it over to the young servant.
“Lord Kuai. I think your friends are in Sky 5.” The servant smiled when he saw the gold in Jia Xu’s hand. Either way, he did not break the rules of the brothel as he did not say where the Huang brothers were. He only said that Kuai Ran’s friends may be at Sky 5.
“Hmm, Sky 5?” Liu Mang repeated and waved his hand. The servant left smiling. “Brother Kuai. Let us wait and see.”
The brothel then promoted Luo Xiang again while the visitors bid on her. One merchant from the hall offered two hundred gold. Another then offered two hundred and one gold. To nobles, that three hundred gold was like a joke but merchants never saw the need to spend more gold than necessary to get what they want. The merchants had money but no status. The merchant, Fatty Liang, has had enough of wiping people’s ass and wanted the girl. He angrily raised his offer to three hundred and fifty gold.
The other merchant offered higher again. They repeatedly increased their offer for about fifty gold each time until it reached five hundred gold. All this while, Luo Xiang was feeling very happy. The higher the price offered, the more she earned. Even though she was no longer a virgin, she was still able to reach five hundred gold.
At this point, Fatty Liang started to lack confidence. Five hundred gold had already exceeded his budget. Going any further would affect his business. At this moment, a merchant friend beside him, Wu De, offered about four hundred gold to help cover the cost. He did this as a merchant keeping good relations. However, Fatty Liang happily accepted that money and raised his offer to six hundred gold. That instant increment of one hundred gold made Wu De’s heart ache.
The opponent raised the price to six hundred and fifty gold before Fatty Liang raised it to seven hundred and fifty gold. Fatty Liang’s actions of increasing the price a hundred gold instead of fifty gold is like saying he has money. As a result, he offended his opponent.
“You! Lowly merchants Fatty Liang and Wu De! I, Cai He, will remember you!” The opponent shouted from within Sky 10. Liu Mang could hear it all with his trained hearing. He could even hear glass breaking from within Sky 10. Cai He was indeed unable to put out more money than these two combined.
On the other hand, the two merchants started to regret when they heard Cai He’s name. The money was not an issue. The problem was that they had offended Cai He.
“Brother Wang! These two merchants seem to be out of luck. They have offended Cai He!” Kuai Ran said as he shook his head.
“Who is Cai He?”
“Brother Wang. Are you really a student from the Lumen Academy? Are you even from Jingzhou?” Kuai Ran asked skeptically as he looked at Liu Mang. Not recognizing Fatty Liang and Wu De was alright but Liu Mang should have been able to recognize Cai He.
Liu Mang did not know how to answer Kuai Ran. Fortunately, Jia Xu was there to save him.
“Haha. We will not hide this from Lord Kuai. My Young Master studied abroad. Although he is from the Lumen Academy, most of his time spent was not in Jingzhou!”
“I see.” Kuai Ran replied as he dropped his suspicion. It was normal to study abroad. In that time period, people loved to study abroad. Even great scholars and others who were unwilling to leave home would also have spent some time travelling.
“That’s right. Read ten thousand books and travel ten thousand miles.1” Liu Mang followed Jia Xu’s lead and pretended to be someone that studied abroad.
“Good. What a wonderful saying.” Kuai Ran replied in admiration. Kuai Ran also wanted to travel but his father would not allow it. After all, Kuai Yue only had one son and the world outside Jingzhou was too dangerous.
“This Cai He is the Cai Family’s Third Lord.” Jia Xu explained.
“That’s right. He is Military Advisor Cai Mao’s younger brother.” Kuai Ran added.
The Cai Family has three men and two women. The oldest amongst them was Cai Mao’s elder sister that had been married off to the Huang Family’s Huang Chengyan. She was also mother to the more famous Huang Yueying.
Cai Mao was the second oldest which is why he is the family head. Following him is the second brother, Cai Zhong who has a military post and the youngest was Cai He.
Cai He was not only the youngest. There was a large age difference between him and his other siblings. This is because Cai He was born from his father’s young concubine. He was also younger than Kuai Ran.
Cai He may not have talent but he was still the bossy Third Lord of the Cai Family. Nobody in Jingzhou dared to provoke him. Even the Huang brothers remained at a respectful distance. The reason why people in Jingzhou remembered Cai He was because Cai He holds grudges. Once, a farmer accidentally bumped into him. As a result, Cai He forced others not to buy vegetables from this farmer.
Fatty Liang and Wu De felt regret. They wouldn’t have continued to compete if they knew that the other person was Cai He. If they had offended Cai He privately, they could still beg for forgiveness. However, there were too many people here. If they were to beg for forgiveness, they would lose face. Either way, nobody would do business with them anymore.
In fact, Cai He did not even need to act personally. All he needed to do was speak and those under him would bring trouble to these two merchants. Not only will these two merchants lose their business but they may even implicate their family members. After all, citizens can’t fight against government officials.
Just as the two merchants were prepared to kneel down begging in their box, Liu Mang spoke up. “So what if they are merchants? Are merchants so lowly? Are the Cai Family so worthy that they don’t even need to do business? If merchants are lowly, the Cai Family would be amongst the lowest!”2
Nobles call merchants lowly but they themselves engage in business. The hypocrisy was nauseating.
“Who are you to speak half truths? Tell us your name!” Cai He spoke angrily. At first, two merchants offend him. Now another person came out to offend him.
“My name? Haha. I am Wang Shu, courtesy name Hanyang. Lord Cai. How exactly do you intend to hatefully settle things with me?” Liu Mang sneered in reply.
“You!” Cai He stood up angrily. “You must not want to live!”
“Brother Wang?” Kuai Ran smiled bitterly. This Wang Shu’s tongue was too poisonous, offending everybody he meets. They were not even done settling their scores with the Huang brothers yet and he was already picking a fight with Cai He. Normally, Kuai Ran should start to respectfully distance himself from Liu Mang as people like Liu Mang was disagreeable to a noble’s interest. Even the Kuai Family engages in business. However, Liu Mang had stepped forward bravely for him, gave him women and was also close to his uncle. So, Kuai Ran was also unable to say anything.
However, Liu Mang could not be blamed. Liu Mang was quite angry after all his previous mishaps and the Cai Family was one of the reasons why he needed to go to Jingzhou in the first place. It would be even stranger if Liu Mang had a good impression of Cai Mao.
On the other hand, Jia Xu frowned because Liu Mang was too childish. Cai He may be annoying but even then, Liu Mang needed the Cai Family’s help. Offending Cai He for two merchants was simply idiotic.
Cai He simply wondered who Wang Shu was. He had been in Jingzhou for so long and yet he had never heard of this name. Fatty Liang and Wu De was also wondering who Wang Shu was as they paid attention to Sky 14.
“Lord Kuai Ran. Your Brother Wang have already spoken. There is no need for you to hide behind him anymore!” The Huang brothers spoke up while everyone was still thinking.
The Huang Family and the Cai Family were both military families. They don’t get well with each other because they both wanted more power. That was why the Huang brothers were initially happy that Cai He was offended. However, they were happy to ally themselves with Cai He just to take down Kuai Ran and Liu Mang.
“Kuai Ran!” Cai He repeated the name as he recalled the identity of this person. He remembered that Kuai Ran was the only heir to the Kuai Family. Kuai Yue was strict and constantly calls him unfilial but Kuai Yue still loved him a lot.
“Brother Cai. I trust you have been well.” Kuai Ran smiled bitterly as he ended up as collateral damage. Liu Mang may have money but he did not have the reputation. If it was not because Liu Mang had bought him Yan Ran, he would have cut all ties with Liu Mang long ago.
When Cai He realized that Kuai Ran was in Sky 14, he assumed that it was Kuai Ran’s intentions to have him in this predicament. Otherwise, a mere Lumen Academy student would not say such things to him. Even though the Lumen Academy is detached from the matters in Jingzhou, they were still living in Jingzhou. Cai He would still be able to make life difficult for a student in the Lumen Academy.
“Brother Kuai, you seem well.” Cai He greeted back. Their age was about the same and they were from different families. So they simply greeted each other like that. Cai He had also simply reacted by greeting Kuai Ran instead of paying any attention to Liu Mang. It was evident that Cai He believed Liu Mang to be Kuai Ran’s attendant and the one he was having a conflict with was Kuai Ran.
“I hope Brother Cai can give me some face. Brother Wang here is my good friend and also my uncle, Kuai Liang Kuai Zirou’s friend!” Kuai Ran knew that Cai He held grudges and would take revenge. He was not afraid for himself but for Liu Mang. However, Kuai Ran actually did not need to worry. Liu Mang was actually provoking Cai He to cause an incident. That way, the Cai Family would not be able to say anything back if he were to raise this issue to Liu Biao.
Kuai Ran’s words gave Liu Mang two identities. The first one was being Kuai Ran’s good friend. This is not sufficient as people would give Cai He more face than Kuai Ran. The second one was being Kuai Liang’s friend. This was a big problem as everyone knew who Kuai Liang was. Kuai Liang had even worked as a judge that punishes criminals in Jingzhou.
As Jingzhou was so large, there were usually a lot of cases for many different offences. A lot of those cases from before Kuai Liang took the post also seemed to have people related to nobles, for example, a noble’s attendant accidentally killing someone. In other words, they were scapegoats.
However things changed when Kuai Liang took over. He had three policies. The first is for first time offenders. As long as the crime isn’t murder or arson, the criminal would simply be fined.
The second policy is for second time offenders. This is also not much of an issue. The criminal would simply be fined twice the normal price. Nobles may grit their teeth in displeasure but they could still pay the fine and walk off.
The third policy is for repeat offenders. If they were to commit crimes the third time, they would be executed. Any pleas for leniency would be useless as you would be executed before you could even kneel.
The Kuai Family was no longer in charge of the military but they still had a comparable amount of private soldiers and those caught had nowhere to escape. Even nobles were afraid because they had bad track records. They also did not dare to go against the Kuai Family because the Kuai Family was too powerful.
In the end, several hundred families of nobles all went to Liu Biao and pleaded for Liu Biao to promote Kuai Liang for his talent and loyalty. As a result, Kuai Liang was no longer the judge in Jingzhou and the nobles were able to sin in peace.
Despite that, Kuai Liang’s name was stil known to all many years later. If they were to mess with Wang Shu and then Wang Shu went and complain to Kuai Liang, they would all be dead.
“Zirou’s friend.” Cai He repeated in fear. He was one of the nobles that almost got executed. Had there not been someone before him that served as an example, he would be dead as well. He was also one of the few that were too afraid of offending Kuai Liang. That was why he now lost interest in Liu Mang.
“That’s right. We even intend to pay him a visit later in the evening.” Kuai Ran continued to make others believe him.
“Brother Cai. You are a noble. There is no reason to bother with these two merchants. These nobles may have spent their money unreasonably but don’t you think it shows that Jingzhou is prosperous?” Kuai Ran added. While he initially did not care about the lives of these two merchants, he had no choice but to speak up for them since Liu Mang had already spoken.
“Hmph! These two lowly merchants!” Cai He was still angry.
“Since Brother Cai have already said so, continuing to bother them would be unbefitting of your status. You two! Quickly thank Brother Cai for his magnanimity!
Fatty Liang and Wu De were not fools. They begged for forgiveness immediately. Fatty Liang also handed over Luo Xiang as a gift to placate Cai He.
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“Read ten thousand books and travel ten thousand miles” means to “learn and do all you can.” Yet it somehow makes less sense in context when translated meaningfully so I gave you the less meaningful one.
Before anything else, I’d really like to know how they can all converse to each other despite all of them being in separate private boxes that also supposedly hides their identities (since Liu Mang had to bribe someone to find the Huang). If it is so useless, why have private rooms at all?
