...
After the al, there was no wine.
There was plain water.
Boiling water, with a slight pot sll, and not very palatable.
Yet ngshaoxia and Hecheng drank several bowls of water.
They ate and drank their fill.
And let out two belches.
They also had to leave.
They hadn't planned on staying overnight anyway, as they had lodgings in the county town.
And this house didn't seem like a place that could accommodate guests for the night.
However, Hecheng didn't understand.
Jiang Feng's father was such a beauty, how could he be living in a place like this? How could he possibly just be an idle helper at the county office?
These days, lavish lifestyles were in vogue in the imperial palace, and literati in Qingzhou would size up a person's appearance first.
With his looks, even if he submitted a blank exam paper, he would probably still be ranked in the imperial examinations.
How could he...
It felt abrupt to say anything in front of a beauty.
So it was the square-faced ngshaoxia who curiously asked, "Where is Uncle Jiang's ancestral ho? You must not be a local, right?"
When he asked this, the entire Jiang family fell silent for a mont.
The long-haired young man sitting on the bamboo chair, cradling an infant, calmly responded, "If you're asking about my ancestral ho, I suppose I should be from Jiangyin."
"The Jiang family of Jiangyin?" Hecheng asked eagerly, indeed he was from a distinguished lineage - one could tell at first glance that this beauty was from a prestigious family.
Jiang Changtian gently massaged the tiny hands of the infant Jiang Mianmian in his embrace. Her little hands were always clenched into fists, palms sweaty. Her father would help her open her palms and knead them one by one, so she could use her hands more dextrously.
"My father once served as Grand Preceptor to the Crown Prince, Director of the Imperial Academy, and Minister of Rites. My father's na is Jiang Bai. When I was born, he nad Changtian, wishing that I would live a life as vast and boundless as the sky, unfettered and romantic."
Beneath the night sky, in the small courtyard, sitting on the bamboo chair, the long-haired young man spoke slowly.
Hecheng and ngshaoxia were both stunned.
Hecheng wanted to say sothing but didn't know what.
ngshaoxia hadn't expected that Miss Jiang Yu was the granddaughter of Grand Preceptor Jiang.
Jiang Feng was also taken aback when he heard this, as his father had never ntioned it before.
But imdiately, a profound bitterness welled up in his chest.
Thinking of his father kowtowing and bowing to the county office runners.
He desperately wished he could grow up soon, grow up to beco his father's support.
So his father wouldn't have to recall those people.
Qinluoxia stood behind her husband, wringing her clothing tightly with both hands.
Jiang Yu fell silent too.
She felt her father was so pitiful.
If her parents didn't want her, she would cry herself to death just thinking about it. But her father's parents truly didn't want him.
"But what misunderstanding could there be?"
Hecheng recalled their visit to the Jiang manor earlier that day.
Although not lavishly grand, there were pavilions and towers, ancient paintings and vases, windows draped with gossar curtains made from Sichuan silk gauze.
Old Madam Jiang was resplendent in luxury.
His distant aunt, Lady Jiang, adorned in golden hairpins and jade bracelets.
Although Mister Jiang wasn't dressed opulently, he clearly had never been troubled by money - that spacious practice courtyard, bright study chamber.
Miss Jiang Wanxia in her semi-new silk dress, a warm white jade bangle on her raised arm, green gemstones studded on her shoes, fair skin, sweet smile, knowledgeable and cultured, showing no signs of ever having suffered hardship.
ngshaoxia also reviewed the scene in his mind.
Thinking again of Miss Jiang Wanxia, her appearance and bearing exquisitely refined, generous deanor, and endearing manner towards her maidservants.
Looking at the round-faced young lady before him in her coarse linen clothes, sitting there with reddened eyes like a little rabbit.
ngshaoxia felt like knocking on her silly little head.
Jiang Changtian finished kneading one of the little girl's hands and moved on to the other.
His voice grew even softer.
Because he didn't wish to dwell on those matters that would make him seem pitiful and fragile.
He didn't want to appear choked up or affected.
He spoke in the lightest tone possible,
hardly any friction in his vocal cords.
"From a young age, my mother abhorred , saying my eyes harbored evil and she felt repulsed just looking at . I studied diligently in secret, hoping to escape the family through the imperial examinations. But my mother inford the scholars, saying that I lacked filial piety and virtue, unfit to be human. Thus ending my path to the examinations."
As Jiang Mianmian had her hands massaged, listening to her father's speech, so different from usual.
Word by word, very slow.
Her father's body was slightly trembling.
She looked up at her father.
But saw him smiling down at her, head lowered.
"Mother wanted dead, but I didn't want to die, because I had my child."
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