Chapter 374: Chapter 273 Just Like, That’s All Chapter 374: Chapter 273 Just Like, That’s All Zhao Rong had not expected Zhu Yourong to be so enthusiastic.
Even though he had known beforehand that she might be obsessive about characters, when he truly interacted with her, he was inevitably scorched by a certain fla nad enthusiasm emanating from the woman at his side.
Because he had to admit, even at this mont, in the matter of calligraphy, he could serve as Zhu Yourong’s ntor, but in so aspects, he fell short.
At this instant, inside the Lan Xuan study, facing Zhu Yourong’s eyes, which shone bright and clear like stars, Zhao Rong fell silent.
He suddenly put down his brush and didn’t offer an explanation for her recent question.
Seeing this, Zhu Yourong’s eyes dimd slightly, but her expression quickly brightened again; she pursed her red lips and glanced at Zhao Rong.
The next mont, the Confucian robed woman reached out, silently picked up an inkstone from nearby, poured so clear water into it, and with her head lowered, her white and slender hands began to gently grind the ink that was black as night for Zhao Rong.
Quiet and speechless.
Neither of them spoke again.
After a while.
Zhao Rong suddenly said, “Zhu Yourong, do you really think calligraphy can lead to the Dao?”
Zhu Yourong kept moving, as if absorbed in grinding ink, her Jade lips slightly parted.
“Do you want to hear the truth, or would you prefer lies?”
“The truth,” Zhao Rong answered without hesitation.
Zhu Yourong looked up at him, her mouth curving into a smile like a solitary orchid blossoming in an empty valley; she smiled for a mont and then softly said, “I… don’t know.”
Zhao Rong frowned.
Suddenly, Zhu Yourong extended a fair and round finger, lightly touching the knitted brows of Zhao Rong.
Zhao Rong was taken aback and his frown deepened as he leaned back, trying to evade.
“Stay still.”
Zhu Yourong’s face beca stern, her tone undeniable.
Zhao Rong’s expression stiffened, and he stopped moving.
His brow touched her forefinger.
Zhu Yourong’s fingertip gently massaged Zhao Rong’s forehead, slowly soothing the creases there.
The woman in the Confucian robe was all smiles.
And continued:
“Perhaps, it might lead to the Dao. There is a glimr of twilight light; or perhaps it might not, as it is a path without end.”
She gazed at Zhao Rong, her tone leisurely and unhurried, “But none of that matters… What about you, Ziyu, do you think it can lead to the Dao?”
Zhao Rong felt the continual coolness emanating from the tip of her finger on his forehead, the softness of the fingertip, delicate and finely textured, offering an indescribable sensation.
Under Zhu Yourong’s gentle kneading and slow twisting, his brow slowly relaxed.
But at that mont, Zhao Rong wasn’t concerned with these things; instead, he appeared sowhat hesitant and candidly said, “I… I’m rather pessimistic about it.”
Zhu Yourong’s face remained as usual.
She withdrew her slender finger, thought for a bit, “No problem, that’s normal.”
Zhao Rong stared into the woman’s eyes before him.
“Then why do you choose this path, abandoning the Confucian Classics and Confucianism? I heard them say… you were a first-rate Confucian scholar, and I don’t know how prestigious that title is, but they say you were almost like a standby gentleman. But after you chose this path…”
He stopped talking, not finishing his sentence.
Zhu Yourong listened attentively to the end, nodded gently, “They are right, indeed, I was a standby gentleman, and before I left, soone told that the masters in the Confucian Temple had prepared a Jade for , apparently it was a piece of new Jade from Kunlun.”
“Yes, it’s a pity indeed.”
She smiled.
Zhao Rong pursed his lips.
Daoist gentlen carry Purple Energy; Confucian gentlen wear Jade.
Jade, homophonous with ‘decision’.
A Confucian who is granted a Jade pendant is a gentleman; the affair concludes upon that gesture.
Zhao Rong opened his mouth, wanting to ask where that piece of Jade was, but in the end, he swallowed his words and remained silent.
Because the answer was quite clear.
The next second, he glanced at Zhu Yourong’s waist, which was still fixed with a plain white, ordinary-looking Jade, not a Jade Pendant lacking that small, thin gap.
Confucian disciples are all adorned with Jade; unless sothing improper warrants, their Jade never leaves them.
Apart from serving as a token within the strictly hierarchical Confucian community to distinguish statuses, it held more significance as a symbol of moral character, setting aside the lengthy discourses on the eleven virtues of Jade.
rely the fact that Confucian scholars wear Jade pendants that make a sound with their movent, only producing a pleasing, harmonious sound at the appropriate pace, thus also governing the scholar’s behavior to be proper and forthright.
Therefore, unless one was up to sothing shaful or improper, Jade would always accompany them.
Zhao Rong, currently just a Mochi student, had no particular concern for the style of beautiful Jade he wore, but once he beca a Confucian Scholar, there would be many more rules to follow, needing to wear the Jade Pendant publicly at all tis.
As for the gentlen, they would adorn themselves with even more noble and exquisite Jade artifacts, a symbol of their status. And just like the Daoist gentlen’s Purple Energy of the Daoist Scripture, every piece of a gentleman’s Jade signified a distinguished origin—a small token, yet a weighty tool of Confucianism ticulously crafted by the Central Continent Confucian Temple.
Engraved on each was a unique maxim from the Confucian Classics.
However, with the long history of Confucianism in the Xuanhuang Realm, most gentlen nowadays are granted ancient Jade relics that follow an orderly heritage, having been personally carried by Confucian scholars of old, passed down through the generations.
Brand new Jade artifacts, on the other hand, have beco exceedingly rare.
Nevertheless, a female Confucian scholar who appears once in ten thousand years surely deserves a new piece of Jade and a fresh maxim, a matter of no small significance.
Yet new and ancient Jade each have their advantages and disadvantages,
The ancient Jade, with a heritage spanning thousands of years and nurtured by Confucian scholars as their Lifebound Artifact—among them, no lack of those from the Seventh Realm.
With many Runes and restrictions added to it, and having developed a mysterious patina, these ancient Jades are truly weighty relics of inheritance. Those who are granted these Jades are the pillars of the Confucian school in the Xuanhuang Realm.
Although lacking the long lineage and ancestral blessings, new Jade, being freshly cast without blemish, signifies new possibilities and greater potential while also being free from the karmic entanglents left by generations of previous Jade owners.
Because beautiful Jade has a spirit, as one nurtures Jade, the Jade nurtures the person in turn. The influence of ancient Jade is profound; who knows what its forr owners have been through, the fortunes and disasters they’ve encountered, and thus more impressions are absorbed.
Most of what Zhao Rong knew about the many intricacies of a Confucian gentleman’s Jade were things he heard from Gui, especially after the Nuanyi Gathering where he learned that ‘purity’ and ‘non-action’ were the symbols of the Daoist gentleman’s Purple Energy.
According to Gui, there were rumors of a few gentlen’s Jades that manifested bizarre bloodstains, tainted with strange karma, either hugely consequential or of unknown origins. Their previous owners either died in strange circumstances or ingested the Jade to commit suicide… These had to be sealed within the Confucian Temple by the Confucians, never to be used again.
Zhao Rong, after hearing all this, took it rely as a diversion. It felt very distant from what currently preoccupied his thoughts—
how much longer until his breakthrough to the Fu Yao Realm, how exactly was Qing Jun’s Vast Realm physique, whether she feared the cold at night, and closer to his imdiate concerns, what he would have for dinner that evening, whether Teng Ying’s brother’s fields had run out of lons, or if Yushu had once again borrowed his howork to copy, hoping this ti it wouldn’t be an exact duplicate…
Then suddenly, amidst his unremarkable life, there she was—a woman in a Confucian robe who used to have easy access to those gentlemanly Jades, now standing silently in front of Zhao Rong.
And upon ntioning those relics, she seed to ponder for a mont before lightly responding, “Oh, the things you’re talking about, it was indeed a bit regrettable at the ti”, yet despite her words, her expression remained unchanged, her reaction indifferent, her face showing no sign of regret.
The woman before him, nad Zhu Yourong, styled Weirui, apparently didn’t think that creating a ‘flaw’ in a ‘perfect’ piece was sothing to boast about.
From what Zhao Rong could rember over two lifetis, coupled with his experiences along the way—
this kind of person, this kind of event, could an that their concealed desires were greater and greedier, or to put it more charitably, their sights were set higher, indifferent to small fleeting gains, aspiring for sothing greater and more abundant, which is why they could temporarily put aside the title of gentleman.
Or perhaps it was…
“A grand aspiration, or rather, a conviction in seeking the Great Dao?”
Zhao Rong suddenly asked.
So things, he wanted to clarify, just like back then in Zhongnan Country.
At the desk, quietly grinding ink, Zhu Yourong looked up at Zhao Rong upon hearing his question, then lowered her head again to continue her task.
The early sun streaming in through the west window brought with it floating dust, tinting half of her body and the hand that circled gracefully over the inkstone with its light.
The woman in the Confucian robe stood by the desk, her right toe delicately raised, her body leaning forwards slightly, pressing closely against the edge of the table. She held down the inkstone with her left hand to steady it and supportive her leaning body, while her right hand grasped the pitch-black ink stick, rotating and grinding it carefully within the thick ink.
Zhu Yourong remained silent in the dawn light, her hands steadily working. Just when Zhao Rong thought she might have forgotten his earlier question,
The woman in the Confucian robe, her lashes lifting slightly, said softly, “No.”
Zhao Rong’s expression showed a hint of surprise.
This ti, however, before he could ask again, Zhu Yourong’s practiced movents in grinding the ink suddenly quickened for so reason. It was unclear whether she rembered sothing or it was just an inexplicable change in her mood, but in an instant, the corners of her jade lips turned up, and her face blossod into a radiant smile that broke through like the first ray of dawn light that Zhao Rong would see when he woke from his dreams.
Under the morning glow, her features were incomparably bright and beautiful.
“No, those thoughts—noble, selfless, or grand—I’ve contemplated them too. Whether it’s to open a great path for the future or seek achievents, virtue, and a legacy; or that a woman is not weaker than a man and can establish her own grand tradition… These thoughts are very nice, truly wonderful, and they are the responses many people look forward to hearing with bright eyes…”
Zhu Yourong’s eyes narrowed slightly, and her voice was gentle.
“At first, when friends and… relatives persuaded , I answered them in this way. These noble thoughts served both as a reason to block their argunts and as an excuse for to let go of everything. During that ti, even I thought so, but…”
At this point, her ink grinding motion paused, and she laughed and shook her head before continuing to grind the ink that had stained her clothes, her hands, and even touched her lips and teeth.
“But after leaving them, making my journey to Wangque Continent, and arriving here where others say it’s the end of the world, life here really slows down. But I think even slower would be fine. In the countless days and nights, when I didn’t count, grinding ink and writing, continuously writing—my heart beca ever calr, and while writing, I belatedly realized that all those forr thoughts were just excuses to comfort them and even myself.”
The woman bit her lip, her expression slightly stunned as if reminiscing about sothing. The teeth on her jade lips appeared like broken pieces of beautiful jade dazzling under the sunlight.
Zhao Rong silently took in the scene before him.
After staring at the inkstone and becoming lost in thought, Zhu Yourong nodded, her eyes as earnest as Zhao Rong had ever seen.
“They were excuses I used to move myself and others. I’m not selfless; I don’t have any lofty ideals,” she admitted.
Zhu Yourong suddenly lifted her head to et Zhao Rong’s gaze, her smile beaming with joy.
“I simply really, really enjoy writing, that’s all. I like it, so I pursued it. What need is there for so many reasons?”
Zhu Yourong spoke with cheerfulness, her expression excited.
It was as if a traveler in a hurry, head down traveling deep into the night, unsure of the destination or what they sought, was always in a rush, coming and going quickly. It seed like all the answers lay in the far-off place they hurried to, but suddenly, a breeze arose. With the world becoming a little brighter, the head-down, hurried traveler suddenly looked up.
And saw the showering starlight.
Her weary eyes stung.
Her hasty footsteps halted.
Her heavy burden was set down.
She looked up, opening her mouth and standing on tiptoes, reaching up to grasp the stars that seed within arm’s reach.
…
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