Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
After traveling for countless days, they finally reached the Sealed Grounds of Changhan. In order to ensure the comfort of Empress Dowager, the group travelled very slowly, but Meng Fuyao wasn’t in a hurry either; Empress Dowager had been imprisoned within the palace for most of her life, and now, she finally had the chance to tour around Dahan with her son. Who had the heart to deny her this chance, looking at how happy and contented she was? Moreover, time was aplenty, and there was no need to rush anyway.
When Meng Fuyao raised her head and saw the four words “King of Dahan Manor” in black against a gold tablet, then looked around at the manor itself that seemed to stretch on for an eternity, she couldn’t help but blurt out, “Those who do not know the extent of my contribution might think that I am trying to usurp the throne, building a scaled-down version of the imperial palace.”
Under the glaring sun, Zhan Beiye looked at her and smiled, his smile even brighter than the sun. “If you want the imperial palace, I’ll give it to you,” he said.
Meng Fuyao pretended not to have heard him and remained silent. She had just crossed the threshold when the inner doors suddenly swung open and Ji Yu and Yao Xun, along with a group of guards, poured out. Ji Yu dutifully led the guards and knelt down in greeting, while Yao Xun rushed forward and launched himself at the ground in front of Meng Fuyao. He grabbed her robes and bawled, “Heavens, my master, you’ve finally returned, I’ve recently earned a huge sum of money, yet I had nobody to praise me, how torturous…”
Meng Fuyao kicked him aside, unceremoniously and scolded, “Dirty money!” Turning to Ji Yu, she personally supported him up and smiled. “General Ji, I have yet to thank you for killing that rabbit,” she said.
Ji Yu’s mouth curved upwards slightly as he responded, “That is due to Your Highness’ effective method of rearing rabbits.”
Meng Fuyao laughed loudly and patted his shoulder forcefully. “I didn’t expect for you to be this good at cracking jokes,” she remarked. She turned around and bowed, smiling at Zhangsun Wuji and Zhan Beiye as she cupped her hands in front of her and said, “I can finally host you two in my own home.”
When Zhan Beiye heard her words, his eyes lit up happily, and he glanced slightly at Zhangsun Wuji. Zhangsun Wuji was smiling, his expression unchanged as he let Zhan Beiye enter before him.
As for Meng Fuyao, who had been smiling throughout the journey without speaking a word, she had already revealed her tail a long time ago…
That evening as they were having dinner, Emperor Zhan’s expression was extremely dark. Empress Dowager glanced at him anxiously, unsure why he was acting as such. However, Zhan Beiye realized that he had ignored his mother and quickly softened his expression.
Meng Fuyao snorted inwardly, thinking that Zhangsun Wuji was too much and could only offer wine in return as the owner of the manor, fully intending to get the two drunk so as to make things easier to handle. Much to her chagrin, she soon realized that the two had insane alcohol tolerance and despite her hand getting tired from constantly pouring wine, the two men remained unchanged. In the end, they bypassed her pouring and simply drank straight from the jar.
Meng Fuyao sat by the side watching them, afraid that they might start fighting once they’d gotten drunk. Hence, she stayed and watched the two of them drinking…
Standing guard as she lifted her eyelids with her fingers and watched them drink…
Standing guard as she peeled her eyelids open and watched them drink…
Finally, Meng Fuyao stood up, outraged, and stormed out of the room. ‘I’m not going to accompany you two anymore, you can drink until you die!’
She had every intention to go back and sleep, and after asking Ji Yu where the sleeping quarters were, she headed in. However, the damned manor was too big, and after half a period of walking around, she soon realized that she’d gotten lost in her own manor.
All of the rooms looked similar, and she couldn’t identify which one was her own, and thinking that since the entire manor belonged to her, it didn’t matter which room she slept in.
Hence, she randomly selected a meticulously prepared room and undressed, ready to sleep.
The day’s journey had been tiring, and she was finally able to relax and sleep peacefully in her own manor, so she fell asleep very quickly.
At that moment…
In the middle of the night…
Under the cold moonlight…
The streets were long, dark, and silent.
A single shadow traipsed down the street, stumbling around, dripping blood and sweat on the ground as the figure fell, crawled back up, and fell again. The figure finally made its way, leaning against trees and walls, towards the King of Han Manor.
The person was heavily intoxicated as they walked into the manor, swaying as they inched their way towards precisely the room Meng Fuyao had chosen.
Ya Lanzhu sat atop the roof of the King of Dahan Manor, drinking sorrowfully.
She had gotten into an argument with Zhan Beiye the other day and in a fit of anger, refused to follow him and had gone ahead to Dahan to have fun. In the midst of her journey, she’d heard that His Majesty was accompanying his mother on a tour of the region, along with the King of Han. Since she’d not seen Meng Fuyao for quite some time and missed her, and also couldn’t bear to be away from Zhan Beiye, she followed them. However, upon reaching Dahan, her ego flared up again, and she refused to appear in front of Zhan Beiye just like that. Hence, she had snuck into the kitchen to steal some wine, found a little area, and began to drink. Obviously, the guards were able to see her, but Ji Yu and Yao Xun had already stated long ago that the doors to the King of Han Manor would always be open for Princess Ya; thus, they let her do as she wished.
Ya Lanzhu leaned against the wall, several jars of wine piled around her. Her alcohol tolerance was average, yet she intentionally stole the wine known as “Drunken Dusk.” She’d heard that this wine was the strongest and three mere bowls could knock a person out cold for a whole evening. However, let alone three bowls, she had already drunk three jars, and yet she only felt slightly tipsy. She sullenly picked up a jar and sniffed it, swaying. In the end, she let out a burp and sighed. “My alcohol tolerance… ah… it must be getting better…”
However, what she didn’t know was that after Yao Xun had received the news, he immediately ordered for all the wine outside to be switched to a much gentler “White Jasmine.” Who was anyone kidding? One Zhan Beiye plus one Zhangsun Wuji plus one Meng Fuyao; this manor was under his care, and every grass and tree was worth several thousand pieces of gold, what if the three crazy alcoholics got drunk and started breaking things? What if they broke little friend Lord Yuan Bao? Even if they couldn’t break Lord Yuan Bao, it wasn’t good to break the flowers and trees either.
The shrewd Yao Xun had long ago dabbled in the business of counterfeit wine and hence, what Princess Ya had stolen was “White Jasmine” stored within “Drunken Dusk” jars.
However, too much White Jasmine would still cause one to get drunk, and Ya Lanzhu was already gone as she cupped her burning face and thought, ‘Zhan Beiye really is heartless, I just wanted to help him dry his clothes since they were wet. Speaking of which, since when did a princess like myself bother about this kind of servant work? Moreover, instead of being grateful, he’d reacted nastily… If Meng Fuyao was the one doing it, would he still react this way? If it were Meng Fuyao instead… No… If it were really Meng Fuyao, he wouldn’t get mad at all, he might even be nervous, wouldn’t he?’
Ya Lanzhu thought for a moment and started to get jealous. Slapping herself slightly, she grabbed a jar of wine and began drinking again. She drank ferociously as if she wanted to wash all of her previous thoughts into her stomach. Finally, she wiped her mouth and murmured, “Ya Lanzhu, Ya Lanzhu, can you have some dignity, you’ve already stolen other people’s wine, now you want to eat their vinegar too?”
She squinted at the moon and thought that the moon was actually rather pretty, much better than Zhan Beiye’s constantly dark face. She couldn’t help but blurt out drunkenly, “What a bright moon, the beauty’s face is truly stunning, I lay comfortably, but my heart is troubled…” Suddenly she felt that this poem was too good for the bastard and thought of another poem that she had remembered when she was drinking with Meng Fuyao that was much better than this one, and hence, she began reciting:
“Last night, heavy snow pressed against the huge trees, I drink alone, get drunk on the road, losing all my clothes along the way I regret, why do I keep drinking vinegar? I look around at everyone around me, and suddenly I realize, everyone is the same, they’re all difficult!”
Beneath her, a group of guards was patrolling by and quickly moved way…
Just then, Lord Yuan Bao was just passing by beneath her—it was originally sleeping in Meng Fuyao’s room, waiting obediently for her, yet after a long time she did not return, and it had felt the need to relieve itself after drinking too much wine—Zhangsun Wuji did not let it drink normally, but since Zhangsun Wuji himself had drunk a little too much, Lord Yuan Bao had snuck into every empty jar and lapped up the remnants. There was more than enough leftover for it to drink, especially from Zhan Beiye’s jars due to the latter’s sloppy drinking ways. After three vats, Lord Yuan Bao was filled, and it soon felt the urge to pee.
It had tried relieving itself in a flowerpot, but the flowerpot was dirty, so it decided that it might as well explore the manor as it looked for a suitable place. The guards had naturally received orders earlier to not do anything if they saw a fat white ball roll by, and not mistaken it for a rat.
Lord Yuan Bao had just relieved itself somewhere when it suddenly heard a voice above it go “Good poem” and immediately headed up. It stretched its claws and lay down beside Ya Lanzhu, preparing to sleep. Ya Lanzhu looked at the little white and brown furball beside her and laughed happily. “Yuan Bao, you’re the best, you know how to accompany me,” she chortled.
Lord Yuan Bao’s mouth twitched as it looked at the half-finished jar of wine. ‘I just enjoy sleeping with the fragrance of alcohol,’ it thought.
The human and the guinea pig lay down together. Ya Lanzhu stared at the moon, absentmindedly and sighed. “How far… How far indeed…” She murmured.
Lord Yuan Bao glanced at her, its heart thinking, ‘Just go to sleep, just go to sleep…’
After that, it crawled into a wine jar. Suddenly, it sniffed the air and pricked its ears. Ya Lanzhu had also noticed a strange noise and crawled up to take a look.
She noticed a figure, stumbling towards them in the distance. The person looked to be seriously injured and had difficulty walking. Under the moonlight, she could faintly see that his body was completely covered in blood.
The direction he was heading towards was precisely the King of Dahan Manor. However, he was still two alleyways away, and even further in the distance, a group of men clad in grey came chasing after him. They seemed to be intent on stopping this man from reaching the manor. Eventually, one of them released an arrow straight through the back of the man.
What the hell… In broad daylight… Right in front of the righteous Princess Ya… who dared to commit murder so blatantly?
