CH 45

Lu Shi Qing soon regretted it, all because of his cursed hand! Not to mention that this was not something Xu Shan would do, he must have forgotten the fear of living in the shadow of others.

But helplessly, his body turned faster than his mind, and the person fell into his arms, so he couldn’t push it back into the river. Seeing that Yuan Ci Xian had stabilized, he immediately let go of her, took a step back and said, “Xu is rude.”

Yuan Ci Xian was shocked, waved her hand and said “thank you”, then also took a step back. For some reason, she felt a little guilty because of this unexpected intimacy, and looked back. At a glance, she saw the woman behind her standing at the stern of the boat, her eyes went passed her, and fell on the person opposite.

She could clearly see Xǔ Ru Qing’s eye sockets turned red all of a sudden, and she seemed to heard the word “Xu”.

She suddenly felt a strange sense of embarrassment, nodded to the two people, and hurried away.

Lu Shi Qing tried his best to keep his neck turned forward, and restrained himself from looking at her, then followed Xǔ Ru Qing into the Wupeng boat.

Yuan Ci Xian still had business to discuss with him, so she didn’t leave immediately, only retreated to the shore to wait for the two of them. From a distance, she saw the boatman waiting at the bow propped up a long pole and steered the boat to sail slowly towards the middle of the river.

But the situation inside the Wupeng boat was not what she imagined. After Xǔ Ru Qing asked Lu Shi Qing to sit down inside, she sighed: “Zishu, is it you?”

Lu Shi Qing didn’t seem to plan to hide it from her, so he reached out and took off his mask, and resumed his original voice, apologetically saying: “Madam, apologize for letting you made a trip for nothing.”

“It’s not for nothing, I haven’t heard his voice for three years, you mimic him very well.” Xǔ Ru Qing poured him a bowl of wine and said with a wry smile, “Only you will acknowledge me as ‘Madam’, but don’t let him hear it, or he will be upset again.”

Lu Shi Qing swallowed with difficulty, frowning.

Xǔ Ru Qing said to herself: “One day three years ago, I received a letter from him, saying that he was going to travel around the world. The shortest period was five to ten years, and the longest period was to never return. When I couldn’t find him, I came to Chang’an to ask you, it turned out that the explanation you gave me was exactly the same as what he said.”

Then she did not return home.

He said he wanted to travel around the world, so she searched around the world to find him.

“Three months ago, when I heard my grandfather talking about a chess record, I knew it wouldn’t be him, but I’m afraid of missing one in a million chance. The person who brought me here told me to wait for more than two months, until you returned to the capital from a business trip, and then that young lady just now sent me the news. I immediately guessed that it’s probably you.” She laughed a little at this point, “Zishu, I’m not as weak as he thought, so why you bother help him lie to me. Tell me, how did he die? Before he left…was he in pain?”

Lu Shi Qing suddenly felt his tongue was astringent, and he kept silence for a while before saying: “Teacher was assassinated on the way to the capital. When I rushed over, he only had one breath left, so he used all his last power to write a letter for you, and asked me to send it to Jiangzhou for him. I buried him nearby in Luoyang.”

Xǔ Ru Qing was silent for a long time after hearing this, and then she said with a smile: “In this world, what he cared the most is really me.” Then she continued, “Luoyang is good, the peonies blooms beautifully in there. I want to go and see.”

After she finished speaking, she raised her head and drank a bowl of hot wine. After putting down the bowl, she asked, “Who did it?” This time her tone was much colder.

Lu Shi Qing frowned slightly: “Madam, I will handle these matters, you should leave them alone, Teacher doesn’t want you to get involved.”

She nodded, didn’t insist anymore, and smiled while sighing: “You say, how good it is if he follow me and become a couple of carefree mandarin ducks, but he insisted on taking care the common people of the world.”

Lu Shi Qing pursed his lips: “There is never a shortage of people in this world who ‘comes out when there is a way, and hide when there is no way’, and there are only a few people like Teacher who “comes out when there is no way”. What Teacher didn’t have time to do, I will do it for him.”

Xǔ Ru Qing glanced at him: “It’s hard for you.”

He shook his head: “Teacher’s ideal is also my ideal, there is nothing hard about it.”

“Last spring, there was a famine in Jiangzhou. You were ordered to inspect it, but do you know what the people there said about you behind your back?”

Lu Shi Qing thought for a while, and asked with great interest, “Are they calling me the emperor’s running dog?”

“You actually know.” She glanced at him, “Why, you don’t care at all?”

“Why should I care?” He smiled, “I used ‘running dog’ way to do what I should do. The more the world misunderstands me, the more the emperor trusts me.”

Xǔ Ru Qing responded in a low voice, pointed her chin towards the already far away river bank: “You also don’t care of how Young Lady Yuan thinks of you?”

Lu Shi Qing choked.

This question seemed like a smack in the back of the head for him.

Of course he didn’t care at first, so at the beginning no matter what she said to test his political stance, he always looked like “Oh, okay, I will tell His Majesty”. As a result, this time he went south, in order to create a glorious and righteous image, the airs were no longer in place, and the score was also gone.

Seeing that he was at a loss for words, Xǔ Ru Qing laughed.

Lu Shi Qing glanced at her: “How do you know who she is? Did she introduce herself to you?”

Xǔ Ru Qing shook her head, “She didn’t say. I guessed based on your reaction. After all, the romantic story of Lancang County Princess pursuing Assistant Minister Lu has spread everywhere in the streets and the alleys.”

Lu Shi Qing was stunned for a moment: “This matter has spread to Jiangzhou?”

“It’s not, I heard about it after I came to Chang’an.” Seeing that he was relieved, Xǔ Ru Qing smiled and said, “However, I see that gossip from people on the street is still inaccurate. Where is it Lancang County Princess pursuing you? It’s clear that you’re the one who’s yearning for her.”

Lu Shi Qing choked again.

Xǔ Ru Qing continued to say heartlessly: “I’m not attacking you, I just see that her attitude towards your teacher is unusual, so I’m jealous.”

Exactly!

Lu Shi Qing finally found an ally who could also see this matter, and said with an ugly face, “Don’t mention it.”

Xǔ Ru Qing was also a little angry: “You say, you borrow your teacher’s name, but how can you still provoke a peach blossom for him? I don’t care why you have to borrow this name, I didn’t know it before, but now that I know, you must cut off this peach blossom.”

Lu Shi Qing thought in his heart that it’s a good idea, and asked: “Does Madam has an idea?”

Xǔ Ru Qing brushed the loose hair in front of her forehead, and confidently said: “Yes.”

“Madam, please teach.”

Yuan Ci Xian, who sat at the shore with one hand supported her chin while gazing far away towards the middle of the river, suddenly saw that the small Wupeng boat shook violently, back and forth, left and right, shaking as if it was going to fall apart.

She stared in shock at the ripples in the center of the river, and after a while, she glanced at Shi Cui who was also very surprised.

Shi Cui reached out her hand to cover her eyes, as if affirming what she was thinking: “Young lady, this Mr. Xu is too impetuous, you should stop watching…”

The impetuous “Xu shan” was sitting the cabin with dark face, looking helplessly at Xǔ Ru Qing who shook the boat with her feet on the opposite side, he couldn’t bear to look at her and said: “Madam, it’s enough…”

Xǔ Ru Qing panted, “No…! Let me tell you, women know women best. After this, she won’t have other thought!”

Lu Shi Qing gritted his teeth: “If one day she finds out my identity, and recalls this scene, you say how she will think of me? You are not helping me, you’re digging a hole for me to jump.”

She said confidently, “I didn’t mean to help you in the first place. I just won’t allow her to covet your teacher. If you don’t let me to finish this scene, I’ll tell her the truth and shake your affairs clean!”

She said while kicking her feet harder, then continued: “I didn’t ask you to shake with me, I’m already your ‘teacher’s madam’.”

Lu Shi Qing looked helplessly at the sky, sighed, felt the sway of the boat then wondered: “But didn’t you shake it too much, how could it be… How could it be so violent.”

Xǔ Ru Qing let out a “poof” laughing: “Zishu, you haven’t pop you cherry yet, have you?”

“…”

Lu Shi Qing said patiently: “Please pay attention to your wording as a madam.”

Xǔ Ru Qing was shaking from laughter: “Your teacher is gone, so naturally I should give you some advice. Remember, this is your teacher’s shaking intensity. But the student should surpass the teacher, otherwise Young Lady Yuan will despise you.”

“…”

Lu Shi Qing couldn’t listen anymore, the corners of his mouth twitched slightly, and he said perfunctorily, “This student abide by Madam’s teaching.”

But Xǔ Ru Qing was not finished, and continued to instruct: “Oh, by the way, you should memorize the duration, you should surpass the duration.”

He gritted his teeth and said, “Hurry up, it’s cold today, she doesn’t wear much clothes.”

Xǔ Ru Qing glanced at him: “Don’t use your teacher’s name to care for her.”

“Understood.”

Xǔ Ru Qing finally stopped, then asked the confused boatman to drive the boat back. She then pretended to have a weak leg while bending down to get off the boat, and walked towards the shore. When she arrived in front of Yuan Ci Xian, she said with a smile: “I heard that County Princess still have important matters to discuss with A Shan, so I’ll go back first.”

Yuan Ci Xian was not surprised that she knew her identity, thinking that it was Xu Shan who told her. But after all she still felt a little embarrassed about the scene just now, so she didn’t say much, just nodded to her.

Xǔ Ru Qing bowed her head slightly and left, but after walking a few steps she seemed to remember something, turned around, and whispered in her ear: “I also heard a lot about you and Assistant Minister Lu in Chang’an City. Let me teach you, our women’s mouths are not meant to coax men’s ears. Rather than rack one’s brain to come up with one hundred love words, it’s better to just kiss him. If you don’t believe me, try it next time. It will get twice the result with half the effort, and you can easily catch him.”

Xǔ Ru Qing felt that she had done a good deed for Lu Shi Qing. After finished speaking, she left while “deeply hide her merit and fame”, leaving Yuan Ci Xian to stay.

When Lu Shi Qing got off the boat, he saw the scene of the two whispering, but he didn’t know what Xǔ Ru Qing said. He was really itchy with curiosity, but he couldn’t ask as Xu Shan, so he had to hold his breath and walked up to Yuan Ci Xian, and just when he was about to speak, he saw that her face was slightly flushed, as if blown by the cold wind.

He originally wanted to ask her, apart from bringing Xu Sanniang to see him today, what else did she have to discuss with him. But after seeing this, he stopped. He really wanted to say: It’s too cold on the shore, if you have anything to say, let’s talk on the boat.

But he promised Xǔ Ru Qing that he would not care about her as his teacher.

Seeing that he hesitated to speak, Yuan Ci Xian asked, “What do you want to say, Sir? Just say directly.” After saying that, she happened to be blown by the cold wind and sneezed.

Lu Shi Qing couldn’t hold back anymore, and said: “It’s cold outside, County Princess should follow me to the boat to talk.”

After he finished speaking, he really wanted to slap himself.

He didn’t want this kind of thing to happen either.