Chapter 63: True Bodhisattva

The bustle in Baiyi Lane was different from the bustle in Hongyi Lane. The shops in Hongyi Lane were called brothels, teahouses, inns, and kilns. Here, the shops were called Qingge private classes.

Baiyi Lane had clean and neat blue brick paving the road. Plum, orchid, bamboo, chrysanthemum, and other patterns were even carved on the blue bricks.

There was no soliciting for customers here, nor were there flirtatious women standing on the second floor leaning on railings to attract customers. Only the sounds of zithers and harps floated out from the buildings and courtyards, and the women's singing voices were melodious and pleasant, stirring the heartstrings.

Only heard the sound, not saw the person, like a woman embracing a pipa, concealing her appearance.

Chen Ji opened his eyes. Golden, shiny melon seeds fell heavily into his palm.

He hadn't intended to wait for the gold melon seed to fall into his hand before opening his eyes just now. It was just that he had been flipped to the ground by the giant halberd warrior again and had almost not come back to his senses...

At this moment, the area in front of the embroidered building became lively again, attracting everyone's attention: it was the carriage of Tongzhi of Luocheng, Chen Fu's family, that had arrived.

A spacious carriage stopped in front of the door. Chen Wenzong, Chen Wenxiao, and Lin Chaojing got out together, chatting and laughing, and came to the table in front.

Chen Wenzong asked with a smile: "Brother Chaojing, is it you or me? We only need one poem to enter four people. Either of us can make a move."

His speech was confident, as if he could easily achieve it.

Lin Chaojing said modestly with a smile: "Naturally, it's you, Brother Wenzong. It's been half a month since I left Donglin Academy. I haven't appreciated your poetry for a long time and miss it dearly. Do you have any new poems recently?"

Chen Wenzong smiled and replied: "I have some."

These three scholars had an elegant demeanor, like the weather today. It was getting cool, and the three of them had already put on plain fur coats.

Fur coats were also divided into three, six, and nine grades. Among them, the white fox underarm fur on the three of them was the most precious.

Beside them, Liu Quxing pouted and said in a low voice: "It hasn't even reached winter yet, and they're already wearing fur coats. Aren't they afraid of being hot? How about holding a hand warmer!"

The next moment, they saw a coachman behind Chen Wenzong help him take off the fur coat on his shoulder. He then picked up the brush on the table and quickly wrote down four poems.

After writing, he smiled and looked at the two welcoming girls outside the embroidered building: "We are three people traveling together, and we won't take advantage of Liu Hangshou. So, one poem per person in exchange for a private seat on the second floor."

The welcoming girl laughed: "How come you wrote one more?"

"This is for Liu Hangshou separately."

The surrounding spectators all praised him, acclaiming Chen Wenzong as a romantic talent.

Chen Wenxiao smiled and said: "Elder brother is so talented! You will definitely pass the rural examination as Jie Yuan this time!"

Chen Wenzong's face seemed a bit unhappy: "You also need to make an effort. Forget it, I won't dampen your spirits today."

They saw the welcoming girl take the four poems upstairs, but after a while, she returned to the door and smiled, saying: "My lady said that Young Master Wenzong's thoughts are clever. The four poems just wrote about spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Three young masters, please go upstairs!"

Baili Junzhu looked at Chen Wenzong, then looked at Chen Ji: "Your father is too partial."

Chen Ji smiled: "No harm, I'm living quite well now."

The Shizi sighed: "Your legitimate second brother, Chen Wenxiao, wasn't much better than me when he was at Donglin Academy. I even saw him at the wine shop at the foot of the mountain. Now he's pretending to be proper."

Everyone just looked at Chen Wenzong's face and gave him some respect.

Baili frowned: "Brother, you're not allowed to speak ill behind people's backs!"

"I'm talking about Chen Wenxiao..."

Nobody, this is not what a gentleman does! If you are dissatisfied with him, you should wait and scold him face to face!

The Shizi raised both hands: "Alright, alright, I won't say anything."

Just then, the welcoming girl said: "Gentlemen, there are only a few private seats left on the second floor. If you have poetic works, please bring them quickly."

These words made the Shizi anxious.

While others weren't paying attention, the Shizi lowered his body and leaned towards Chen Ji: "Quick, quick, quick, what other poems do you have?"

Chen Ji thought for a moment: "Besides the previous sentence, I still need two more sentences. One gold melon seed might not be enough."

Baili took out another gold melon seed and put it into his hand, complaining quietly: "It's like making wishes to Buddha. You still need to donate incense money."

The Shizi laughed: "Sister, when you donate incense money to Buddha, Buddha may not care about you. But when you donate incense money to Chen Ji, he will immediately care about you. Just treat him as Buddha."

Chen Ji thought for a moment. While gathering the gold melon seeds into his sleeve, he selected two more sentences of poetry and quietly taught them to the Shizi.

Baili's eyes on the side were flashing brightly: "Why are they all only half a sentence? It would be great if he could write the whole poem. It's such a pity now... Hey, why is he asleep again!"

Chen Ji did not answer her. He had already returned to fighting on the green mountain.

The Shizi and Baili came in front of the embroidered building. Someone recognized them: "It's the Shizi and Baili Junzhu of Jing Wang Fu!"

Someone also whispered: "Is he the idiot Shizi that the scholars of Donglin Academy mentioned...?"

"Shh! You don't want to live!"

"It's okay, the Shizi is good-natured and won't mind."

The principles of this world were very strange. The more evil people were, the less others dared to bully them. But if you were precisely a good person, then anyone dared to step on you.

They saw the Shizi come to the table and, with a bold stroke of the brush, spiritedly wrote down two sentences of poetry. When he got to the third sentence, he lowered his voice and asked: "Baili, what's the third sentence?"

"Thousands of mountains, birds' flight is cut off..."

Only after Baili reminded him did the Shizi write down the third sentence.

The Shizi put down his pen, raised his head to look at the two welcoming girls: "I wrote well, but I am different from others."

The welcoming girl had also heard his identity from the bystanders and asked with a smile: "May I ask, Shizi, how are you different?"

The Shizi said proudly: "Others need to write a whole poem to enter the door, but I write better than them. Half a sentence is enough! Take it, let Liu Hangshou look!"

The welcoming girl was stunned for a moment, took the Xuan paper, and ran upstairs.

"I heard a scholar who returned from Donglin Academy say that this Shizi is scolded by teachers every day. Every day he either catches wild chickens and rabbits on the mountain or slips down the mountain to the city to drink. Look at their group of people, which one is like a literati? One by one wielding knives and swords, country bumpkins."

"Liu Hangshou should consider his Shizi identity and let him go up, right?"

"You don't know this. Earlier in Jinling Qinhuai River, the legitimate grandson of the Hu family couldn't produce poetry and still wanted to board the ship. He made a big fuss. Guess what happened?"

"What happened?"

A young master of the Xu family beat that legitimate grandson of the Hu family and threw him into the Qinhuai River! So, if the Shizi wants to put on airs, he's really putting them on in the wrong place. This Liu Hangshou is protected by the Xu family, the first assistant of the cabinet. The Xu family doesn't need to give face to a vassal king..."

At this time, the crowd was still discussing. The Shizi was deaf to these voices, only waiting for the welcoming girl to come down. He asked curiously: "Girl, what did Liu Hangshou say?"

The welcoming girl said with a charming smile: "My lady said, Shizi did not speak big words. Your half a sentence is worth ten sentences of others! Please go upstairs!"

The surrounding crowd was surprised: "The idiot Shizi can also write poetry?"

The Shizi's eyes narrowed slightly. He turned his head and swept towards the crowd, wanting to find who had spoken.

They saw his handsome appearance, wearing the Shizi's black gauze hat on his head and a silver silk dark patterned python robe on his body. As soon as he retracted his smile, he had dignity about him, making him appear a bit unlike the previous dissolute son.

The person who spoke was not stupid. He was just taking advantage of the chaos of the crowd.

Seeing the Shizi's faint anger, how would he dare to truly provoke this dignified person? He immediately shrunk into the crowd.

Someone in the crowd shouted: "Put the poem the Shizi just wrote out, let us see if Liu Hangshou is showing favoritism!"

The Shizi was silent for a moment, then laughed heartily and潇洒, actually no longer taking these attacking words to heart: "Say whatever you want. Anyway, I can go to the second floor, and you can't. Piss you off! Go drink!"

The Shizi waved his hand grandly, quite like a hero from the rivers and lakes.

He no longer minded these people, and turned excitedly to Liang Gou'er, beckoning: "Quick, quick, quick, carry Chen Ji upstairs with us to drink!"

Everyone's gazes turned towards Chen Ji and the others. How was someone still carrying a sleeping person?

"Why are so many people carrying him?"

"Perhaps he has a disability and can't walk."

"So pitiful."

Liang Gou'er and Liang Mao'er carried the bamboo chair forward. Liu Quxing laughed: "This time, Chen Ji is going to be famous in Luocheng."

Yu Dengke couldn't bear it in his heart: "It's better to put him in the medical hall to avoid being called disabled."

Liang Gou'er said bluntly: "We are Jianghu children. How can we drink without one person? How boring would he be alone in the medical hall? Naturally, we want to drink together! Drink until morning, then we'll carry him up the drum tower to watch the sunrise. That's called happiness!"

Chen Ji had already died once and woken up, but listening to the surrounding discussions, he truly had no courage to open his eyes.

He closed his eyes and said through gritted teeth: "Don't chat, hurry up and walk!"

Liang Gou'er and Liu Quxing laughed heartily: "Oh, you were awake!" After entering the embroidered building, it was quiet and elegant inside. In the great hall, there was even a square fish pond with three or five brocaded carp.

The crowd was about to go upstairs when a pretty maid walked down from the stairs. The Shizi suddenly raised his hand, signaling Liang Gou'er and Liang Mao'er to stop in front of the maid.

The Shizi patted Chen Ji: "Chen Ji, look at this girl, she's very good-looking."

The maid covered her mouth and smiled shallowly.

Chen Ji refused to open his eyes, dead or alive, he wouldn't do this embarrassing thing. But the Shizi was so mean that he didn't leave.

After an unknown amount of time stiffening, as if sitting on pins and needles, Chen Ji quickly opened his eyes and quickly closed them, his teeth almost bitten off: "I saw her. Quickly go upstairs."

The Shizi laughed heartily: "What are you afraid of just looking? Don't be shy!"

Chen Ji: ......

You didn't treat me as disabled, but you also didn't treat me as a person...

"Usually I see you!" The Shizi walked beside the bamboo chair and teased: quite calm, how are you so reserved today?

Chen Ji turned his head to look at him: "Have you also been carried over?"

"Hahahaha."

The sound of the crowd's laughter rushed to the top of the building, as if circling on the beams, lingering and not dispersing.

Chen Ji only felt extremely embarrassed, but after being embarrassed for a moment, he couldn't help but laugh himself. He cursed: "Wait until I'm healed, I'll kill all of you..."

Just dozens of Zhang away on the street, Jin Zhu and a secret agent dressed as a rich merchant were quietly paying attention to the embroidered building.

Jin Zhu was saying in a low voice: "This embroidered building needs to be focused on. Now Luocheng is in a time of many events. Today is not a good day. His choice to open for business today is suspicious."

"And that Liu Hangshou, who stayed well in Jinling, suddenly ran to Luocheng for what?"

"Sir, it is already a convention for our dynasty to invite the Hangshou from Jinling Qinhuai River to open Clear Chant private classes everywhere, after all, they are famous. Everyone knows the ones from Qinhuai River are the best."

Jin Zhu shook his head: "It's different, it's different. All the new faces appearing in Luocheng during this period, we have to watch closely."

"And this Shizi and Junzhu, Donglin Academy has been on holiday for a month. Even if they came back by carriage, it would take half a month. Where did they go and what did they do for the other half a month? Check it out."

"In the territory of Luocheng, provoking Jing Wang Fu will not: ..."

Jin Zhu narrowed his eyes slightly and sneered: "If there were no Jing Wang Fu backing, would the Liu family dare to collude with the enemy? Even if he rebels, he needs to find a new master for himself."

"If there were no Jing Wang, it would be difficult for the Liu family not to sit on that chair. Would he even be worthy! Wouldn't the Xu family, Chen family, Qi family, Hu family, and Yang family swallow him alive?"

Jin Zhu was very clear about one truth: even if the Liu family rebelled successfully, they couldn't sit on that chair. So the other side must choose a person to sit on it.

Then who would the other side choose? Fu Jun Wang, Qi Jun Wang, and An Jun Wang were all still young and simply didn't have the ability to respond to everything. Only Jing Wang had the qualification to become the backbone of the Liu family.

While chatting, Jin Zhu's eyes widened as he watched Chen Ji being carried by Liang Gou'er and Liang Mao'er into the embroidered building, with Baili Junzhu still helping to lift the handrail...

He subconsciously rubbed his eyes: "Did I eat something dirty and hallucinate? Look quickly, is the person Liang Mao'er and Liang Gou'er are carrying Chen Ji?"

The trusted secret agent said dryly: "It is him."

Jin Zhu was even more shocked: "This boy's status in Jing Wang Fu is so high! I must visit him tomorrow and tell him to keep a close eye on the Shizi and Junzhu. Think of a way to dig out evidence of Wang Fu colluding with Jing Chao!"

Upon reaching the second floor of the embroidered building, they saw that the arrangement here was strange: all the private seats were blocked by layers of gauze curtains hanging from the ceiling, as if isolated from the world.

The Shizi said in surprise: "What does this mean? Everyone is sitting behind these gauze curtains. How can we still see Liu Hangshou?"

The maid at the side explained: "This is tonight's game. Autumn is high and refreshing. My lady said to take autumn as the theme. Everyone needs to compose three poems related to autumn."

"There are three layers of gauze curtains blocking the outside of the private seats. Write one, then remove one layer. Write three, then you can see my lady."

The Shizi looked around and saw that a maid had just removed the three layers of gauze curtains from Chen Wenzong's side. The other side had actually already written the three poems.

Looking at another private seat, someone had just handed out a piece of Xuan paper from behind the gauze curtain. Soon, a maid came to remove the outside gauze curtain of the private seat, revealing Liu Xianming sitting upright inside.

The Shizi subconsciously looked towards Chen Ji, but Chen Ji had actually entered dreamland again.

He urged: "Baili, quick, donate incense money!"

Baili Junzhu took out three gold melon seeds from her small pouch and put them into Chen Ji's hand, but this time, Chen Ji, lying on the bamboo chair, did not wake up.

The Shizi whispered: "Bad, giving money is not working. He's a true Buddha!"