TL Note: Apologies for the delay. Was held up with stuff and didn’t had time to publish this chapter till now.
Su Ce, who was residing at the academy, caught wind of the old man’s return and hastily arranged for a carriage to return home. He could barely contain his excitement.
His exchanges with old man Xuan Yuan had always helped broaden his horizons, regardless of the topic. The insights he gained from their few conversations was more valuable than what he had gained from studying for several years.
Although he knew he lacked the necessary talent to be considered as the old man’s prized student, Su Ce still sincerely treated him as a mentor and held him in high regard.
At the three-way intersection of the road back to his hometown, a carriage decorated with high-class brocade tapestry was approaching from the other fork. The exquisite ornaments on the carriage made jingling sounds as they swayed with the motion.
With their current trajectory, both carriages were bound to clash path.
The road leading to a rural village would never be wide enough to accommodate two carriages side-by-side. Su Ce slightly narrowed his eyebrows and was about to instruct his coachman to give way to the other party, but the other side unexpectedly made the first move and retreated slightly.
Surprised by the gesture, Su Ce shifted his sights to the other carriage. The edge of the curtain was slightly raised, revealing a young lady laid sloppily on a couch, completely immersed with a book in her hands.
He calmly withdrew his gaze and instructed the coachman to continue the journey. Since the other side had volunteered to let him go first, he would quietly accept their grace.
As someone who had always highly regarded people in pursuit of education and knowledge, that young lady had left a favourable impression on Su Ce, as he recalled the scene of her reading earnestly, on top of her kind gesture of conceding the path to him despite obviously being of higher status.
(To be so absorbed with the book even under such circumstances, that lady must be very knowledgeable and well-learned.)
“Second young lady, that carriage has left. Why did you concede the road to them?”
“Eh… what?” Jiang Wan laid lazily on one side, fully engrossed with her book to care about her attendant’s words. Without batting an eye, she responded without a thought.
But before her attendant could elaborate, Jiang Wan suddenly burst into laughter.
“Oh, my God … this is so hilarious!” She slapped her thigh and laughed heartily, apparently amused by the content of the book.
After wiping the tears off the corner of her eyes from laughing too hard, Jiang Wan reached for the jar beside her. Retrieving a piece of spicy strip snack with familiarized movements, she stuffed it into her mouth. Not once had her eyes left the book throughout the entire process.
Qinghe stopped talking and sighed, apparently gotten numb to the unbecoming behaviour of her young lady. Silently drawing down the curtain, she felt relieved that no one had seen this unsightly side of her young lady, otherwise she would have had troubles getting married.
When she was finished the book after some time, Jiang Wan started to stretch her body, obviously satisfied with whatever she had just read.
“Are we not there yet? Su Jin’s home is way too far.”
Jiang Wan pouted.
Today, her mother had once again forced her to attend an arranged meeting with some male scion of the Zhang family. And that was what she did. This was nothing new to her after all, and she had a way to deal with it. Her previous suitors had been frightened off by her usual farce of aggressive demeanour.
Jiang Wan had expected the same method to work on this male scion of the Zhang family, but her opponent this time was more than she could handle. He was totally unfazed by her hostile conduct and she had no other choice but to resort to beating him up for real and making a quick escape thereafter.
That was how Jiang Wan ended up on her current trip to visit Su Jin. It was definitely not because she had nowhere else to go to.
The two carriages ended up crossing paths again after arriving at the same destination, which was at the entrance of Su Jin’s manor.
Su Ce glanced towards the party who arrived after him and unconsciously halted his feet, unable to believe the coincidence.
A woman clad in green, presumably the attendant, disembarked first from the exquisite carriage before extending her hand towards the interior of the carriage.
The hems of a crimson red dress came into his view next. The owner was a charming and lively young lady with delicate facial features, and her legs were raised slightly as if she was preparing to hop out of her carriage.
But in that instant, she met gaze with Su Ce. She silently retracted her foot and accepted the supporting hand from her attendant, as she slowly disembarked from the carriage.
With her chin held high and her eyebrows arched with confidence, Jiang Wan lightly nodded towards Su Ce and gracefully walked towards the manor.
Su Ce was flabbergasted. He quickly lowered his gaze, taking a step back and bowed to the young lady.
……
“Please have a seat first. I shall inform our young lady of your arrival.”
Housekeeper Xiao received the visitor and led her to the front hall to have a seat. After instructing the servants to serve her some tea, he bowed slightly and left to look for Su Jin.
Su Ce had originally intended to head directly to the west yard to look for old man Xuan Yuan. But as he passed by the front hall, he recognized the familiar face was seated within. Maintaining his composure this time, Su Ce nodded slightly to give proper courtesy and went around front hall.
“What is your relation to Su Jin?”
Jiang Wan asked casually, noticing that he was heading towards the backyard by himself, thus likely to be a member of the Su family.
“This humble one is Su Ce, the second brother of Su Jin.” Su Ce made a fist-and-palm salute and answered respectfully.
“Second brother? You are the one who became a scholar? I have heard of your great feats…”
Jiang Wan looked at him in amazement.
Su Ce maintained his composure, bowing to her as he replied, “Such generous praise more than I deserve, especially when coming from a highly esteemed and well-learned lady like Miss, who seemed to genuinely appreciate poetry and literature.”
Su Ce bowed and left immediately after giving his humble response.
Jiang Wan: “???”
Did he just… complement her?
“What did he say just now? Appreciating poetry and literature? Me?”
Jiang Wan checked with her attendant, wanting to make sure that her ears had not played tricks on her.
Qinghe was confused as well. She has been serving by her young lady’s side for many years, but this was the first time someone had praised her young lady as ‘well-learned’. Surely, there must be some kind of… great misunderstanding.
“Such keen insight… No wonder he could become a scholar.”
Qinghe: “…”
She casted a sceptical gaze at her young lady for a split second, before lowering her eyes to stare blankly at the floor, opting to maintain her silence.
Su Jin arrived shortly after. Upon hearing that the visitor was Jiang Wan, she did not bother to change into more presentable attire, and rushed over immediately after setting aside her work.
To accomplish her newfound objective to relocate to the capital, she had been extremely busy recently, gathering various kinds of cotton seeds, researching and discussing with the System on how to improve agricultural tools and to increase efficiency and yield.
The Su Jin who had lived her life aimlessly was a thing of the past now. In order to achieve her goal of marrying the emperor’s son, she could not afford to laze around anymore!
At the thought of how she would provide the livelihood of that man in the future, Su Jin trembled with excitement and she instantly became energized. This was the perfect opportunity for a lady deeply ingrained with matriarchal ideologies like her to demonstrate her capabilities!
Reeling in her fantasies, Su Jin undone her rolled-up sleeves, patted the mud off her clothes and sat casually opposite Jiang Wan. She started the conversation with raised brows, “Which wind blew you here?”
“I just… wanted to pay a visit.”
Jiang Wan murmured bashfully with wavering gaze, completely discarding her farce front in front of Su Jin.
“Did you run away from home?”
With a hint of amusement in her eyes, Su Jin looked at the young lady across her, shrivelling like a timid mouse. Seeing Jiang Wan lowering her head uttering a word, Su Jin helplessly waved her hand and continued, “Alright, alright. I’ll have my servants prepare a guest room for you in the east yard. You can stay there for the time being. Don’t forget to send a messenger to inform your family. It will not be a laughing matter if they misunderstood that the second young lady of the county magistrate had gone missing.”
“Aye…”
Jiang Wan obediently nodded, feeling somewhat happy. She could not understand her own behaviour either. Whenever she saw Su Jin, she would lose her arrogant farce and cower timidly. Thinking logically, she should normally avoid and stay far away from Su Jin, but for unknown reason, she could not help but subconsciously feel attracted to her instead.
After receiving the permission from Su Jin, Jiang Wan celebrated within her heart, and her footsteps became much lighter as she joyfully followed the servant towards the east yard.
……
By the time Ming Jue’s entourage arrived at the capital, half a month had passed. The sound of horse hooves echoed through the city gates, and the guards at the gates knelt down to pay their respects.
Ming Jue rode atop a fine steed at the forefront of the entourage, surrounded by his guards, with a beautiful carriage following closely behind him.
The pedestrians scattered to both sides of the path to make way.
At this moment, within the private suite on the second floor of a first class restaurant, a man in a black brocade robe frowned slightly as he stared intensely at the scene by the window.
The grip on the wine cup within his hand tightened gradually.
His beloved younger brother had returned to the capital!
The man on the opposite saw that the eldest prince had remained silent and repeated his words, “What are Your Highness’ thoughts on the eldest daughter of the Luo family? She is the blood-related niece of Concubine Luo. If we bring Concubine Luo to our faction… with her influence in the palace, Your…”
Before the man could finish his words, he was interrupted by the eldest prince, Ming Yan, who had a clouded expression.
“We shall continue this discussion at a later date.”
With that, he took another glance at the entourage before standing up and departing from the suite.
TL Corner: I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Do let me know in the comments or discord if there are any errors or mistakes.
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