Chapter 474 - 180: Rotten Romance
Chapter 474: Chapter 180: Rotten Romance
The day before Zhu Tongzhi’s birthday, the Prefecture academy had a day off, and all the students whose homes were in the Prefecture returned home.
Zhao Jing and De’an were at the academy gate. When they didn’t see the old woman with the ox-cart who was supposed to pick them up, they thought their family had forgotten to send someone.
Just as they were preparing to go back in Wang Jun’s carriage, they saw a one-armed man under a nearby locust tree, standing on the carriage shafts and waving at them.
"Young Masters! This old servant is over here."
This was the very man Chen Wanqing had bought back in Qingshui County to make incense.
The man was around forty and from a military background. Although he had lost an arm, his martial arts skills were still intact.
Making incense was difficult for him, but he was extremely vigilant.
Chen Wanqing entrusted him with great responsibility, putting him in charge of watching over the other workers back in their old home.
Nominally, he was watching over them, but in reality, he was supervising.
The main concern was that one of the servants might be bribed into adding something to the ground incense powder.
The man proved to be very capable, keeping everything neat and orderly.
Chen Wanqing came to trust him greatly and gradually began to address him as "Mr. Cao."
The two of them hurried over to the locust tree where Cao Xu was. As they stepped on a stool to get into the carriage, De’an asked, "Mr. Cao, when did you arrive? Is this the carriage my sister bought? How much silver did it cost? No wonder Jing and I couldn’t find you. We were only looking for an ox-cart—who knew our family had bought a horse-drawn carriage!"
Cao Xu laughed heartily. "I didn’t see you two young masters either. All the students coming out were wearing identical uniforms. It was dizzying."
When he finally spotted the two of them, he hadn’t dared to shout too loudly for fear of embarrassing his masters.
As they spoke, Cao Xu turned the horse around and headed into the city.
The roads were filled with carriages, packed together, and their speed was incredibly slow.
Seeing Zhao Jing frowning repeatedly, De’an teased him, "Regretting taking ten days off now? You should go back to taking five days off at a time. That way, when you leave the academy, the roads will be clear, and you can get home quickly."
In fact, Jing had become quite clever about it.
He was allowed five days off every ten-day period. At first, he would attend for five days and then take five days off. Later, finding the constant travel too troublesome, he changed his schedule. He would attend for ten days straight and then take a ten-day break, effectively combining two school-and-rest cycles to cut down on unnecessary time spent on the road.
Unfortunately, there were some things even a clever person couldn’t predict. For instance, whenever he left with the main crowd of students on a break day, the traffic was bad enough to make him question his own existence.
Every time, Jing would have that same vexed expression, and De’an never got tired of seeing it.
The carriage crawled along, and it was a long while before they finally got home.
As they entered the courtyard, a howling, cold wind carried down flurries of snow, rustling as they fell. Just as expected, it had started to snow.
"We’ve only had one snowfall since winter began, and it was a light one. It barely covered the ground before it stopped. I hope this one is heavier, otherwise the crops will lack water, and next year’s harvest will be smaller."
Mrs. Zhao was in high spirits because of the sudden snowfall. That, combined with her son’s return, led her to drink a cup of fruit wine at the dinner table.
The fruit wine had a low alcohol content and wasn’t intoxicating. Though it was called wine, it was actually more like fruit juice.
But Mrs. Zhao was so cheerful that she began to look a little tipsy, so she tidied up and went back to her room to rest.
Zhao Jing, Chen Wanqing, and De’an left Mrs. Zhao’s courtyard together. On the way, De’an asked, "Sister, you look so worried. What’s wrong?"
Zhao Jing took her hand. "I was just about to ask the same thing. Sister, what’s troubling you?"
Chen Wanqing touched her face. "Is it that obvious?"
"Very obvious."
A fierce wind howled past, blowing the hood from Chen Wanqing’s head and making her cloak rustle loudly.
Zhao Jing handed the lantern to De’an, freeing a hand to pull her hood back on. He asked again, "Sister, tell De’an and me what’s bothering you. Maybe we can find a solution."
"I’m afraid you two can’t help with this."
"Just tell us first, Sister. We won’t know if we can help until you do."
By then, they had reached the courtyard shared by the two boys. Chen Wanqing told them both to come inside, and the three of them went directly to the parlor.
「It all started three days ago.」
Three days ago, the escort agency she had hired earlier brought over all the servants Chen Wanqing had left behind in Qingshui County.
They were a large group, the nights were cold, and the roads were in poor condition. Their journey took much longer than expected, and they felt very apologetic to their employer.
"But it’s a good thing we traveled by land. If we had taken the waterways, I’m afraid none of us would have made it to the Prefecture."
Only after the dart master explained did Chen Wanqing understand.
In the eleventh month, river pirates had repeatedly been stopping and robbing ships passing through the Jitong River.