Chapter 128

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Chapter 128

The person who came to pick them up was a middle-aged man with extremely short hair driving a black car. Lin Qingyu could tell that this car was cleaner and more refined than most other cars on the road. Just as there were bad horses and good horses, there were also good cars and bad cars.

Lin Qingyu saw a circular sign erected at the very front of the car; a circle that was evenly divided into thirds. Did this have some profound meaning?

Jiang Xing has always gotten along with their family driver. Their driver didn’t need to come down and open the door for them. They were normal people, there was no need to put on any sort of show. Jiang Xing opened the door to the back seat and made a gesture of invitation. “Go on in. Didn’t you want to ride one of these?”

Lin Qingyu bent over to get in and then sat up. Jiang Xing then got in and greeted the driver, “Uncle Chen.”

The driver grinned. “It’s been a long time.” The driver saw Lin Qingyu from the rearview mirror and said in surprise, “A’Xing, is this your classmate?”

The driver and Jiang Xing spoke Cantonese, but Jiang Xing answered him in Mandarin. “No, he’s not.”

He wasn’t a classmate but the driver tacitly understood that he was a friend. The driver also switched to Mandarin. “Why is your friend wearing ancient clothes? Is he a celebrity?”

Jiang Xing smiled and said, “No, we just came back from the Hanfu Fair.”

“Hanfu? Oh, I know, it’s very popular among young people nowadays.”

“Yes.” Jiang Xing replied casually, “Uncle Chen, please turn down the temperature of the air conditioning. We walked around outside and it was so hot.”

The driver lowered the temperature by two degrees and complained, “At this rate, it won’t be cold until November.”

Lin Qingyu listened to the conversation between Jiang Xing and the man. In his estimation, the man should be someone like a groom but Jiang Xing had called him ‘uncle’ and he talked as if they were equals.

Jiang Xing did the same when he was in the Dayu. When Xiao Songzi brings him tea and water, he would occasionally get a “thank you” from the emperor and it made Xiao Songzi feel was if his life were about to end. He begged Jiang Xing to let him go, crying bitterly. Only then did Jiang Xing restrain himself.

The corners of Lin Qingyu’s lips quietly ticked up.

This Jiang Xing, who was gentle and courteous to others, had another kind of cuteness that couldn’t be seen in the Dayu.

With Jiang Xing by his side, Lin Qingyu was finally in the mood to appreciate this strange world. He looked out the window and saw all kinds of shops lining the road. He knew every word on the shops and didn’t know what it meant when they were connected together. There were also tall buildings rising from the ground. They went up so high, how were people about to go up?

As the sky gradually darkened, lights went on in every building, lighting up Lin Qingyu’s eyes.

This was Jiang Xing’s hometown, so bright, so colorful. There were air conditioners and mobile phones; there were generous girls working outside, cars that run faster than thousand-li horses and sweet milk tea and egg tarts.

Jiang Xing grew up in such a world.

It was so nice.

The driver drove the car directly into the community’s underground garage. Before getting out of the car, Jiang Xing said, “Thank you, Uncle Chen.”

“No need to be so polite. Your family pays me.” The driver smiled and said, “Call me anytime you need anything.”

After the driver left, Lin Qingyu asked, “Is the person who drove a servant of your family?”

Jiang Xing choked then said with lingering fear, “That was a close call.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a good thing you didn’t ask me this question in the car.” Jiang Xing toes curled in mortification just imagining that scene, “Or it would have definitely meant my social death.”

Lin Qingyu asked, “What does social death mean?”

“Human death is divided into two types. One is normal death and the other is social death...”

Lin Qingyu was extremely intelligent and he immediately understood with just this hint. He snorted coldly and said, “I’m not stupid. Of course, I wouldn’t have asked in front of the driver. However, your driver seems to speak differently from us.”

“Oh, that’s because he’s lived in a Cantonese-speaking area his whole life. Naturally, he’d have a bit of an accent when speaking in Mandarin.”

“Then why don’t you have such an accent?” Lin Qingyu then remembered, “Ah, that’s right. It’s because you only came back to Guangzhou when you entered high school. You told me that when you were in the Dayu.”

Jiang Xing made a “tsk” sound. “I used to tell you everything, huh? Am I that much of a chatterer in front of you? Conan says ‘my father taught me this in Hawaii‘ while you come here to Guangzhou and say ‘my husband taught me this in the Dayu’?”

“There are still many things you haven’t told me. For example, how do we go up this building soaring into the sky?”

“Thank you for finally acting like an ancient and allowing me my dignity as a person of modern times.” Jiang Xing led Lin Qingyu to a strange door, “We’ll take the elevator up.”

Lin Qingyu said, “Elevator?”

No matter how much Jiang Xing talked about it, he couldn’t cover everything. For example, the elevator, Jiang Xing never mentioned it to him.

Jiang Xing briefly introduced the principle behind the elevator, “The elevator uses a traction drive method and the core of the drive mechanism lies in...”

Lin Qingyu interrupted him, “In short, we can go up when we ride this box.”

Jiang Xing snapped his fingers. “That’s a good summary.”

Aside from the door in front of them, there was another one not far away. Lin Qingyu asked, “Is that other one also an elevator?”

“En, that’s a housekeeper’s elevator.”

“Housekeeper?”

Jiang Xing described to him a housekeeper’s duties. Lin Qingyu nodded. “I understand. A housekeeper is a servant.”

Lin Qingyu was a little thin, tiny fishes could swim in his collarbones. Coupled with his long hair that reached his waist, viewed from the back or side, he looked a little like a girl. Few men could look so delicate, but Lin Qingyu’s appearance wasn’t feminine. If he cut his hair short, no one would mistake his gender.

To distract himself, Jiang Xing handed him what he had in his hand and said with a smile, “You’re done with your bath? Come on, try this. I’ll get the hair dryer.”

“The hair dryer is for drying your hair? No, I’ll just wipe it dry.” Lin Qingyu looked at the bottle of black water and asked, “What is this?”

“It’s soda, a kind of water that can make people happy. It’s best for drinking after taking a bath in summer.”

“But isn’t it October?”

Jiang Xing shrugged. “October here is no different from midsummer.”

Lin Qingyu took the soda. He first lowered his head and sniffed it, then took a sip. His expression froze.

Jiang Xing asked with a smile, “Is it good?”

“It’s a bit sweet and it also has a stimulation that’s hard to describe. I don’t like it very much.” Lin Qingyu raised his head, “Jiang Xing, I want to drink milk tea.”

Jiang Xing said, “Don’t anymore. You’ve already had one today and you’ve eaten so many desserts. You won’t be able to sleep at night if you drink anymore.”

Lin Qingyu wasn’t very happy. Jiang Xing has always been responsive to his requests but now that he was in his own territory, he dared to refuse him. He asked Jiang Xing, “Is milk tea expensive? So you can’t afford too much?”

Jiang Xing couldn’t help but laugh. “Well, I suppose it is kinda expensive but it’s not that I can’t afford it. Don’t be angry, let’s drink it again tomorrow.” Without Jiang Xing knowing it, his tone had already turned coaxing, “That shop today was one that I just found randomly. To be honest, the taste was so-so. Tomorrow I’ll buy you milk tea that is a hundred times better.”

Lin Qingyu asked doubtfully, “Really? A hundred times?”

Jiang Xing assured him. “Really, a hundred times better.”

Lin Qingyu reluctantly accepted this plan, temporarily letting go of his obsession with milk tea. He pointed to the irregularly-shaped glowing cylindrical building very close to them outside the floor-to-ceiling windows and asked, “What’s that?”

Jiang Xing said, “That’s Canton Tower. Because it looks like a human waist, it’s also nicknamed ‘Slim Waist’.” “Slim Waist is a landmark building in Guangzhou and one of the must-see attractions for tourists.” Seeing it just outside their window, Jiang Xing had long grown numb to it. “If you like it, I’ll take you to see it tomorrow night. But it’s a holiday now, so there must be a lot of people going there.”

Lin Qingyu asked, “Who was the person who designed and built Slim Waist?”

Jiang Xing said, “We can look it up on the internet. Why do you ask?”

“I want to see him. It might prove rewarding.” Lin Qingyu pondered, “Dayu’s Minister of Public Works recently took leave to mourn the passing of his parent. We are in urgent need of someone to succeed him. Since this person was able to design Slim Waist, he must be a very talented person. If we can seek his advice...”

Jiang Xing almost spit out his mouthful of Coke. He suppressed a smile and said solemnly, “Don’t make your decision too rashly. Next time, I’ll take you to Beijing and Shanghai to have a look around. You might find a better candidate for the ‘Minister of Public Works’. Oh, would you like to read the financial news and select the Minister of the Revenue while you’re at it.”

Lin Qingyu asked, puzzled, “What are you laughing at?”

Jiang Xing had on a serious expression. “I’m not laughing.”

Lin Qingyu looked at Jiang Xing as if he was looking at a fool. “You’re obviously holding back your laughter.”

Jiang Xing: “...” He thought he had pretty good acting skills. How was Lin Qingyu about to see through him?

Lin Qingyu saw through Jiang Xing’s thoughts again. “We’ve been in a relationship for more than four years. I can tell what you’re thinking just by your expression.”

“More than four years?” Jiang Xing grasped the key point, “You mean we’ve been dating for more than four years?”

“Yes, we just had our fourth anniversary not too long ago.”

After such a long time, they could be regarded as old married couple. Four years, a lot could be done in four years.

Jiang Xing couldn’t help looking at Lin Qingyu’s lips. He asked, “Then Qingyu, have I... kissed you?”

Lin Qingyu said lightly, “What nonsense. You kiss me every day.”

Jiang Xing: “...”

With a wife this beautiful, it would be strange not to kiss him everyday.

“Then have we...?” Jiang Xing cleared his throat, and said as casually as he could manage “Have we had...”

Lin Qingyu looked up at him and said, “Does Laogong wish to ask if we’ve slept together?”

When he was in Dayu, if there were other people around, Lin Qingyu would always call Jiang Xing “the emperor”. If the two of them were alone, he would usually call Jiang Xing’s name directly. The number of times he’s called him Laogong can be counted on his fingers. But now he’s had an epiphany. When Jiang Xing called him “Baobei”, at first, he wasn’t used to it and even felt it was a little unnatural. Later, as Jiang Xing called him that more and more often, he seemed to form a misconception – Obviously, he was supposed to be Jiang Xing’s Baobei all along.

It could be deduced from this that if you wanted to turn a person into your husband, you should call him ‘Laogong’ every day.

A tingle went through Jiang Xing’s whole body at being called ‘Laogong’. He steadied his breathing, turned his eyes away and pretended to be calm as he said. “en”.

Lin Qingyu smiled, “What do you think?”

The heat on Jiang Xing’s body rose uncontrollably. He lowered his eyes and laughed lowly, “Don’t laugh at me like that.”

Lin Qingyu looked at him. “Why?”

Jiang Xing was quiet for a while. Then his hand holding the iced soda suddenly tightened. He raised his head and drank it all in one gulp.

The author has something to say:

Having written stories set in ancient times for so many years, I suddenly realized how fun writing modern Chinese can be! ! !

Me writing ancient Chinese: How should I gracefully describe the protagonist’s shock (joyful, indignant, sorrowful) mood... (So painful.. just 500 words per hour)

Me writing modern settling: F*ck it all! We’ll do it however I want!