Translator: TYZ Editor: Book_Hoarder
After putting everything into the car, Ren Baqian and the empress walked towards a plaza not far away. From a distance, they could already hear music playing at the plaza. There were also many people gathering there.
As Ren Baqian and the empress walked closer to the plaza, they could see several people dancing there. Their dance moves were cheerful and light-hearted. Among the dancers, there were more young people than old people. All of them were doing the plaza dance merrily with beads of sweat sprinkling all over the floor.
In addition, there were also a few girls with a really good figures. They were already wearing shorts when it was barely the beginning of June.
Ren Baqian merely took a glance at them, and he could already sense an aura of death coming from beside him. Immediately, he turned his head around and saw the empress staring at him coldly. Both of them stared at each other for a while before the empress turned to her side and continued eating her popcorn.
“What are they doing?” the empress asked casually. She had seen such a scene a few times before, but she did not know what they were doing.
“Plaza dancing.”
“Plaza martial arts? Fanciful but impractical movements,” the empress said nonchalantly.
[“Dancing” and “martial arts” have the same pronunciation in Chinese – “wu”.]
A series of question marks emerged in Ren Baqian’s mind. When he looked at the movements of those plaza dancers again, they did seem like they were doing practicing martial arts in the plaza. A look of realization dawned upon his face as he tried to hold in his laughter.
“When the citizens are free, they would train exercise and train their bodies. Most people seldom exercise. As time passes, their bodies will turn unhealthy,” Ren Baqian explained without pointing out the empress’s misunderstanding.
This scene would only appear in modern societies. In ancient times or in that world, commoners needed to work hard for their livelihoods every day. They did not have the luxury of time to dance or exercise.
At the same time, modern societies used various types of machinery, leading to a decrease manual labor. In modern societies, many people were either sitting down or lying down the whole day every day. And as such, they began to come up with various ways to train their bodies.
After listening to Ren Baqian’s explanation, the empress slightly understood what he meant. She envied the increase in quality of life in modern societies. This phenomenon would only appear once a civilization reached a certain level of development.
The term “civilization” was taught to her by Ren Baqian.
After walking past this group of plaza dancers, they saw another group of plaza dancers not far away. This time around, the group of plaza dancers was mainly made up of elderly people. Their movements were much slower as well.
“The vast land is my love. The rolling green hills are flourishing at the foot of the mountain. What kind of rhythm is the most rocking…” The catchy tune kept on drilling itself into the Ren Baqian’s and the empress’s minds. Ren Baqian quickly brought the empress away from the group of elderly plaza dancers.
[The song is called “The Hottest Ethnic Trend”, a very popular song by a band called Phoenix Legend in China.]
As they walked further into the plaza, they could see people taking a stroll and children skating on rollerblades. Not far away, there were a few youngsters skateboarding. When they saw a red-dressed beauty looking at them, they immediately began to do various stunts. Every movement required a great deal of attention. Suddenly, one of them slipped and fell to ground, causing all his friends to burst out into laughter.
Walking on this lively and bustling plaza, Ren Baqian and the empress also saw a fifty-year-old woman teaching a few youngster wushu. Their movements were slow and soothing, warming the heart of anyone that was watching them.
After watching them for a while, Ren Baqian and the empress heard them talking about entering a competition.
“What do you think?” Ren Baqian wanted to hear the empress’s opinions on wushu.
The empress shook and remained speechless. She felt that their movements were too powerless and there was no need for her to comment anything.
This kind of ordinary boxing technique was insignificant to aboriginals.
Aboriginals lived in the Sixty Thousand Mountains and they had to fight with wild beasts every day. In the past, the strongholds would even come into conflict with each other over territories. Therefore, they had already come up with a set of martial arts that were suitable for them.
Ren Baqian and the empress strolled around the plaza. Suddenly, a thirty-year-old man stopped the pair.
“Hey, do you want to take part in the making of a movie? I have a movie that is in need of two characters now. I also need a lead female character. I feel that both of you are very suitable for the roles in my movie. Especially this lady, she is extremely suitable to be the lead female character. If both of you are willing to take part in my movie, I promise that both of you will definitely make it big in the show business.”
Initially, Ren Baqian still thought he was a fraud. He had seen a lot of such incidents happening online before. However, he changed his mind after taking a closer look at the man. The man was roughly thirty years old, his hair was slightly long and messy, he wore a peaked cap and held a handbag, and he looked very sincere too. He looked as though he had finally found someone that he had been searching for a long time.
“I will give you 99 out of 100 marks for your acting, the one mark is deducted for your haughtiness.” Ren Baqian chuckled.
“My name is Du Rufeng, this is my business card. I’m really a director. I have prepared this move with utmost care for many years. Now we are about to start making the movie, but we still lack one lead female character.” The man quickly passed his business card to the empress.
However, the empress did not care about him. She turned around and gave Ren Baqian a can-I-punch-him-into-oblivion look,
“We are not interested,” Ren Baqian waved his hand and replied. Then, he left together with the empress.
That man did seem like a legitimate director. He was indeed very imaginative.
It was an interesting idea to let the empress be a lead female character in a movie.
“You should really consider it. Given your appearance, it would be a waste if you’re not acting in a movie. You can just stand there and say nothing, and everyone’s gazes will be drawn to you will put their gazes on you.” Unwilling to give up, Du Rufeng got very close to the empress.
Ren Baqian quickly held on to the empress’s wrist. Otherwise, Du Rufeng would be knocked flying into the air.
“Thump.” Du Rufeng was still knocked flying into the air.
No one at the scene saw how the empress punched Du Rufeng. Her punch was simply too fast.
“Can you at least put in some effort in your acting? Nowadays, no matter what you do, you have to put in effort. How can you make money if you don’t put in effort? She hasn’t even touched you and you are already in the air. Don’t you think you’re exaggerating?” Ren Baqian had a look of contempt and shock on his face.
The empress had been attracting a lot of attention with her appearance. The people surrounding them now were looking at her all this time. Now that something like this happened, everyone around them bustled with noise and excitement.
Upon hearing Ren Baqian’s words, many people burst out laughing.
That’s true. Only a boxing champion can punch you that hard. You got so close to her and then threw yourself backward, do you take all of us for fools?
“Let’s go,” Ren Baqian said to the empress. Both of them left just like that.
After they had left for quite some time, Du Rufeng was still lying on the ground motionless. Someone checked on him and realized that he had fainted.
However, no one thought that he was punched by the extremely gorgeous red-dressed girl. After all, there were so many people at the scene and there was definitely more than one person peeking at the empress.
Ren Baqian and the empress walked around the plaza once. After receiving countless envious looks, Ren Baqian brought the empress back home.
“Do you like it here? Do you think I should buy this house or move to a new house?” Ren Baqian asked casually as he opened the door to his house. He was considering whether to continue staying here or to move to a new place.
He felt that buying a house on Hainan Island was a rather good idea. The air there was fresh and the climate there was favorable throughout the year. There were also many girls wearing bikinis there. Whenever he was in a bad mood, he could look at them to feel better.
“This was a rather good place,” the empress replied casually as she did not know what Ren Baqian was thinking. After all, this was the first place she stayed in upon arriving on Earth. She was already quite familiar with this house. Furthermore, she did not have high requirements of the house she was staying in. This small house was just to her liking. It was much more better than the cold and empty palace hall she woke up to every morning.
“I will buy this house then,” Ren Baqian nodded his head and replied. Since the landlord rented out this house all year round, he should be willing to sell it.
Ren Baqian had also decided to buy a house on Hainan Island.
After putting down the things they bought, Ren Baqian took out a set of Chinese checkers that he just bought to play with the empress. To Ren Baqian, this board game was second only to Five in a Row.
[Five in a Row is an abstract strategy board game.]
The empress played it once and… flipped the table.
“Boring.” The empress had a disdainful look on her face. She picked up the remote control and switched on the television.
Looking at the checkers that had been reduced to powder on the table, Ren Baqian smiled bitterly.
Initially, he wanted to win a few rounds against the empress and then throw a few rounds to encourage her. Reality proved that he had thought too much.
“Do you want to play Five in a Row?” Ren Baqian suggested.
Without even batting an eye, the empress threw the remote control at him and said, “I want to watch a movie.”
…
“I never told her that I love her, because I know the untasted fruit is always the sweetest.”
“Love is like a contest, I can’t say if she’s the winner. But I know very well that I’ve been a loser from the start.”
“I thought the words ‘I love you’ really mattered. I thought they meant a lifetime commitment. But looking back, nothing matters because everything changes.”
“If ever I ask you the same question again, please don’t tell me the truth. Although it may not be the truth, please tell me you love me.”
After switching off all the lights in the house, the glow from the television flickered on the empress’s face.
While listening to the lines of Ashes of Time, the empress hugged a bolster tightly with a pensive look on her face. Then, she turned around and looked at Ren Baqian. Following which, she shifted her gaze to the television again and watched the movie in great spirits while placing a slice of chocolate into her mouth.
[Ashes of Time is a 1994 Hong Kong film written and directed by Wong Jiawei and inspired by characters from Jin Yong’s novel The Legend of the Condor Heroes.)
The more Ren Baqian listened to the lines, the more regret he felt for choosing this movie.
In the past, he felt that this movie was quite classy. Now that he watched it again, he wondered why the lines sounded so ridiculous.
“Mankind never appreciates what they have at the moment. Only when they lose it, do they then realize how much they miss it. That’s why there aren’t many happy people but so many miserable people. Actually, all we have to do is to appreciate and hold on to what we have at the present,” Ren Baqian said profoundly while sipping on a bowl of chicken soup. He was trying to distract the empress.
Ren Baqian had made up his mind to hate Wang Jiawei from today onwards.
[Wang Jiawei is the director of Ashes of Time.]
You aren’t an overzealous, infatuated young girl, why are you such a fan of Wang Jiawei’s lines? You might as well watch Calabash Brothers…
(Calabash Brothers is a Chinese animated TV series produced by Shanghai Animation Film Studio.)
