CH 42

Chapter 42 - Date

An Hongche glanced at him in disgust and threw over a bright yellow handkerchief.

Su Yu awkwardly wiped his mouth, he was frightened by the His Majesty’s domineering “You are Zhen’s.” sentence. Shouldn’t the Emperor say “You are Zhen’s concubine” or “You are Zhen’s subject”, or something like that? Saying half of it sounded so awkward… it’s like a confession…

Startled by his own thoughts, Su Yu took a peek at An Hongche, who was quietly eating a crab leg. Su Yu shook his head and threw out that ridiculous idea.

It must be because today’s Emperor is too handsome, causing him to get delusions of grandeur.

At this time, the servants in charge of purchase carried the newly bought fish and shrimp into the courtyard, so the two stopped talking and lowered their heads to eat.

The fragrant spicy crab soup was best served drizzled over white rice. After His Majesty finished the crab, he then ate two bowls of rice with vegetables and soup,

“Would you like some more pike crabs?” Su Yu saw the Emperor’s unfulfilled desire expression and asked tentatively.

It was not easy to go out of the palace and crabs were cheap, so he had to eat till he was satisfied. In this way, His Majesty may not want to eat crabs for several days.

“No need.” An Hongche put down his chopsticks and looked at Su Yu.

“Do you still want to eat?”

“No, I just thought that the crabs were cheap…” Su Yu thought and suddenly blurbed out the truth.

“Don’t say that Master, these crabs are not cheap at all.” Said the fellow who was carrying the goods to the courtyard, hearing Su Yu’s words, he interjected.

“It’s two hundred copper coins a catty!”

“Why is it so expensive?” Su Yu frowned.

Pike crabs usually only cost 70 to 80 coppers a catty. Now was not the season for fat crabs, so logically it shouldn’t be so expensive.

“Recently, the price of fresh seafood has gone up.” Zhang Cheng, who had finished cooking, came over while wiping his hands. He wanted to take the opportunity to say a few words to his Shifu.

“Maybe it’s just a bad year, but recently fishermen are always catching empty nets.”

“No.” The man in charge of purchases had a pair of small eyes that were shining brightly, he moved closed mysteriously and said.

“I heard that it’s not because the nets were empty, but because they fished up a monster.”

“Nonsense!” Su Yu knocked the fellow’s head.

“Where did the monster come from?”

“It’s true.” The boy tried his best to widen his mung bean eyes.

“When I went to stock up this morning, I heard from them that the owner of the fish stall we always buy from had a disaster last night and a net full of fish was eaten by the monster.”

Su Yu didn’t take it seriously, he estimated that a fierce carnivorous fish appeared, which affected the fishermen near the capital.

“Has anyone seen that monster?” An Hongche, who had been silent this whole time, suddenly asked with a cold and dignified tone, which startled the fellow.

“Seen it.” The fellow seemed to think of something disgusting and curled his mouth.

“I heard that it also looked like a fish, but it had pig hair all over it, and that it would squeal like a pig…” As he spoke he rubbed his arms and shuddered.

“Is there such a thing?” Zhang Cheng’s lips curled, he didn’t believe it at all.

“Are you fooling around with the stock money and made it up?”

“If I stole even a penny, may the heavens lightning strike me down five times!” The fellow jumped up and swore that he merely bought seafood at the lowest prices.

Su Yu sighed, he wasn’t around every day and no one was in charge of Xianmantang, so everything was a mess.

“Zhang Cheng, if you don’t believe it, just go and have a look with the fellow tomorrow.”

“As Shifu said, I’ll go and see it tomorrow morning.” Zhang Cheng felt guilty and rubbed his head.

He was so busy cooking that he didn’t even know that such a big thing happened during the stocking.

An Hongche slightly narrowed his eyes and tapped on the stone table with two slender fingers. This fellow may be greedy for a few coins, but most of it should be true.

Qingyu, shaped like a silver carp with swine fur and sounds like a pig squealing. When it’s seen, it’s accompanied by a great drought in the land under the heavens.

This kind of thing actually appeared…

Leaving some new dishes for his two little disciples to learn by themselves, Su Yu planned to meet King Zhao at King Zhao’s Wangfu to discuss opening a new store with him.

He glanced at the Emperor beside him, he probably wouldn’t mind the fact that his concubine and younger brother were in a business partnership…right?

Think about it, if you were the Emperor and heard that your younger brother had business dealing with your beloved imperial concubine, her family property was bought by the Wangye, her restaurant was under the name of the Wangye, the Wangfu managed the interior decoration and even the shopkeeper and the chefs were all prepared by the Wangye… Su Yu swallowed his saliva, if he doesn’t mind, the Emperor is not the Emperor!

Su Yu suddenly realized that His Royal Highness was abnormally kind to him, willing to help him in any way.

If it was just because of Sauce, it doesn’t make any sense, although Sauce had a very high status in the palace, he’s not King Zhao’s cat, but the Emperor’s cat. King Zhao didn’t need to be so grateful to him.

“What are you in a daze for?” An Hongche took his jade fan and knocked Su Yu’s head.

Su Yu covered the place he was hit, looked up at the Emperor, and for the first time summoned up the courage to look closely at those beautiful eyes. In the depths of the bright obsidian eyes, there was an exotic amber color.

He always thought that these eyes would be always full of restlessness and impatience, but when he calmly looked at them, he discovered that this was not the case. His figure was clearly reflected in those beautiful pupils, peaceful and stable.

Gazing at such a pair of eyes Su Yu unexpectedly blurted out. “Chen would like to go to King Zhao’s Wangfu, and discuss the matter of opening a store with Wangye.”

He suddenly wanted to know, if there would be suspicion or even killing intent in those eyes that were so beautiful. Such a possibility made Su Yu clench his fists nervously… I must be crazy, ba…

“Hongyi is not at the Fu today.” An Hongche frowned.

“You can consult with Yuan Ce about opening the store.”

Huh? Su Yu blinked. The Emperor heard that his Wangye was colluding with his beloved Imperial Concubine, shouldn’t he say “How dare you”, or “You cheap sl*t”? What is this calmness? And who is Yuan Ce?

It took him a long time to remember that Yuan Ce was Mister Yuan, and by that time Su Yu had been dragged out of Xianmantang by the Emperor.

“You can’t do everything yourself even if you tire yourself to death.”

His Majesty the Emperor didn’t have the slightest amount of suspicion, and he even seemed to know everything… Something flashed in his mind, he wanted to grasp hold of it but he failed to catch it. Su Yu suppressed his inexplicable joy and chaotic thoughts in his heart and scratched his head.

“Then let me tell Mister Yuan.”

“Why are you so long-winded!” His Majesty captured Su Yu who was trying to turn back.

“Yuan Ce will serve at your command in the future, we will discuss it tomorrow. Now come with Zhen to a place.”

Just then, two men clad in black clothes leaped down from the wall and saluted An Hongche, then one of them came forward and whispered something in a low voice.

His Majesty frowned slightly, then he raised his hand to let the two leave.

“What was that?” Su Yu's eyes widened. He just saw the two shadows appear with a ‘whoosh’ and then with another ‘whoosh’ disappear again.

“Shadow Guard.” An Hongche said indifferently, glancing at the surprised Su Yu.

He won’t tell this stupid slave that these two shadow guards had been following Su Yu as early as two months ago, it was due to his own stupidity that he never found out.

Not long after, a shadow guard came in with a well-decorated carriage. Su Yu was stuffed into the carriage but he was still craning his neck to peer, unexpectedly there is really such a profession as a Shadow Guard.

“Your Majesty, why did you appear in the Su’s Residence at that time and fell asleep in my bed?” All of a sudden, Su Yu remembered His Majesty the Emperor, who had been initially misunderstood as a Shadow Guard, and he finally couldn’t help asking.

There was a moment of silence in the carriage, His Majesty looked out of the window with a deep gaze, and said after a long time. “You will know later.”

The carriage swayed through the city and went straight to the hunting grounds in the eastern suburbs.

The Eastern Suburb Hunting Grounds was a royal hunting ground, it covered an area of 1000 mu and was very vast. Now was not the season for hunting, so the prestigious children of nobility could also go horseback riding and shoot arrows here on weekdays.

“Does Your Majesty want to go horseriding?” Su Yu got off the carriage.

Seeing the open grassland and rolling hills he felt relaxed and refreshed.

An Hongche shook his head. “Taking you to a place.” Then he held out his hand to him.

After looking at his slender white hands, which had distinct joints and beautiful pink fingertips, Su Yu looked around and found that the two shadow guards disappeared instantly, and there was no one else around.

After swallowing his saliva, he reached out and held the beautiful hand. This kind of mystery gave him a bit of anticipation. They were having a date, right?

Jumping over a stream and bypassing a small forest, then taking seven to eight turns, they reached a very remote place. Then they climbed up a small hill that was only two zhang high. His Majesty suddenly stopped and slightly raised the corners of his lips.

“This is the place Hongyi and I used to come to when we were children, only the two of us know about it.”

In front of them was the sunny slope of the small hill, starting from the top of the slope and continuing to the distant woods, there was a large and luxuriant field of grass -- Dog Tail Grass!

The author has something to say:

Small Theater:

Fairy Tale Book: There must be a large rose garden behind the hillside.

Immortal Cultivation Book: There must be a rare treasure behind the hillside.

Palace Fighting Book: There must be an extremely ruthless and merciless assassin behind the hillside.

…

Little Fish: I always feel like the atmosphere is a bit abnormal.