As the protagonist of the day, Mingzhu arrived in style for her party. She was still dressed as a general. Chi Lena and seen it fit to add a mask to the outfit. It was sothing that belonged to her as a child and it was a half mask which covered half of Mingzhu’s face.
There was a tad Dracula parrot sitting on her shoulders. A small entourage of her friends followed her. Ironically, the general should have been the one following the princesses and princes.
Mingzhu ca to a stop in the middle of the walk to the tents and she looked at the adults and other children. "Why aren’t you singing happy birthday to ? Mommy, don’t we sing for other babies on their birthdays?"
A host of confused faces turned to ’mommy. She blinked a few tis like a sheep in headlights and then she gestured for everyone to raise their voices and sing.
And so, Wu Tangning and Haena exchanged unappreciative glances as and competed in whose voice could belt out the words more lodiously and at the highest pitch. The rest of the guests felt that their very normal voices could not compete so they surrendered and left it to the professionals.
"They know that it not a stage, right?" Great great grandmother Jun whispered to her husband.
The old man shrugged. What could he say about the overall after all. What mattered was that his great great granddaughter was having fun, and she was. She was waving that wooden sword in the air and swaying from side to side without rhythm as the two singers seed to create a new version of the happy birthday song.
"She knows it is not her birthday, right?" Chen Na, Chi Zimo’s wife whispered a question in a very confused voice.
Her husband laughed, retrieving a lighter from his pocket which he started waving a small fla in the air from side to side. "She knows, many of us said it to her over and over, but much like my niece i i, her daughter seems to be of hard hearing. She filters information and only hears that which she wants to. Anyway, it is not as if we cannot afford to throw her another party like this later on in the year on the day of her real birthday."
"Her father owns a cake empire, we have that part covered at least." Chi Rui said.
"And we have Tangning for entertainnt." Rose added.
"We don’t have Tangning because we don’t own her." Chi Wei whispered to them. "She is not signed to Phoenix Ent and even if she was, we still wouldn’t own her. Will you people stop talking like that before we are accused of human trafficking or sothing."
Haena hit a high note, intending to outdo Tangning. Unfortunately for her, she was healing from a sore throat and the high note ended in cat like cough which made so children laugh and adults fold their lips to hide the smiles on their face. In the end Tangning won the battle and she cast Haena a smug look as she walked back to her seat.
It left Haena fuming and Tangning’s agent in a state of panic because she had been hopeful that this would be the start of a possible duet between the two singers. For Tangning, it would be a great move career wise to collaborate with a songstress like Haena.
"Okay...well.....let’s have so tea." Rize announced in an uncertain voice. "Err...soone was live streaming the wonderful collaboration between our two best singers and others are looking to get in on the competition. Stick around for more surprises."
i i’s upper lip traveled upwards and she frowned so hard that her nose twitched like that of a bunny sniffing the earth. What more surprises? The first surprise had been the planning of this tea party itself, it had been a simple idea.
i i had planned an ordinary play date for Mingzhu and her friends. This only lasted until the news reached madam Feng and Su Manchu’s ears. Word also reached her father so i i was sure it reached her mother as well. She was the only one with the ability to send over all the birds in the golden cages.
The decorations went from ordinary to extraordinary and things spiraled from there. The kitchen was turned into a tea house and pastry workshop and the backyard beca a fairy tale of sorts. One after another, relatives had arrived with their children and neighbors with kids had been invited.
Surprise number two was princess Rize turning into a host for a children’s tea party.
Surprise three was children from the royal family attending even though invitations had not been extended to them.
Surprise four was emperor Junjie showing up and gifting Mingzhu with his special wooden sword, a gift that had been given to him by his grandfather. i i had rejected the sword, Mingzhu had not. She had no idea how a gift like that would make tongues wag. Sothing like that should have been passed on to a child in the royal family, Junjie’s son. But he had no son, just two daughters. This did not explain why he had given the rose wood sword to Mingzhu.
"Sing happy birthday again." Mingzhu requested, jumping up and down.
i i sighed. What mattered was that Mingzhu was having fun.
Like the rest of the people of the people at the party, she looked at Tangning expectantly. Tangning’s agent pushed her out, sighing internally as this was a waste of her client’s talent. More alarmingly, it was not a paid gig!!
"The bouncing castle has been set up and the swimming pool is now open." Junjie shouted.
He saved Tangning from singing happy birthday again as the excited little ones took off running in the direction of Junjie’s voice.
"Tangning, please sing for us where the sun ets the moon." Chi Zimo shouted out loudly.
Tangning was about to sit down and eat a rose cake when the request was made. Her agent gestured for her to put down the cake and sing.
And so, the tea party turned into a kids party/private concert.
Compared to i i who was having fun, the empress was fuming. If anybody was supposed to inherit the rose wood sword, it should have been her daughters--any of them.
Why would her husband give it to the manner less, violent brat Mingzhu? Didn’t he know that her biological father was not even from their elite aristocratic society? Why did he have to be nice to her just because she was Jun ilin’s daughter?
Why had he gone for the tea party alone and not taken their daughters? Was he planning to beco Mingzhu’s father since ilin was divorced? To date, in their empire, emperors were allowed to have concubines in case the empress failed to have a male child.
It was a rare thing but sotis it happened and in her case, it was likely to happen as she had failed to birth a son. Was Junjie’s plan to bring in Jun ilin as his concubine?
Empress Hua threw down a porcelain cup, shattering it to pieces. She threw down another and another until an entire set was destroyed.
She heaved, huffed and growled. When she cald down, she asked the maids to get nice dresses for herself and her daughters. They had a tea party to attend.
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