Вдовствующая императрица Сяосюань

Глава 46

Yu Xuan, standing to the side, scoffed, "Creating? He's wasting ink."

Ru Feng glared at him: "Is it any of your business? You're just jealous of my writing talent!"

Yun Tianze unfolded his folding fan and slowly waved it, not joining their struggle. Among the four, he was always very quiet, occasionally interjecting with a word or two, but they were always insightful, or his interjection meant the end of the topic.

Ru Feng stared enviously at Yun Tianze's folding fan. The handle and ribs were made of ivory. Ivory is known to be fine-grained, tough, easy to carve, and dyeable, making it a very precious material for fan making. Yun Tianze's wealth was no secret, and he had even been robbed because of it before. But what Ru Feng envied at this moment wasn't the ivory material itself, as there were other wealthy people who could afford that. What Ru Feng envied was the painting on Yun Tianze's folding fan.

That was Yu Xuan's work. Since participating in the "painting competition", Yu Xuan's works have become famous in Xiangzhou City. Many people came to ask for his paintings, but Yu Xuan lacked nothing and was lazy, so no one succeeded. Thus, there was the saying that "Yu Xuan's paintings are hard to come by even with platinum."

Seeing this as a business opportunity, Ru Feng kept pestering Yu Xuan to paint her portrait. Yu Xuan was initially delighted and quite pleased with himself, ready to showcase his skills. However, upon overhearing that Ru Feng intended to sell the portrait, his expression immediately changed, and he refused to paint it under any circumstances. At that moment, Yun Tianze was lying on Ru Feng's bed, leisurely fanning himself with a folding fan. In a fit of anger, Yu Xuan took Yun Tianze's fan and painted a picture of Ru Feng gazing at birds under a tree. The man in the painting bore a striking resemblance to Ru Feng, signifying "desire unfulfilled."

This infuriated Ru Feng, but Yun Tianze quite liked it. Even though it was late autumn, he kept taking it out and shaking it, claiming that Ru Feng was well drawn.

Thinking of this, Ru Feng huffed, "Tianze, stop shaking it, lest you attract thieves. Look at you, this fan is really valuable!" Ru Feng looked at the fan again; the handle was inlaid with carved tortoiseshell, amber with cloud and lotus patterns, and a carved kui dragon inlaid with tortoiseshell. A jade pendant hung below. Tsk tsk, the value of this fan was enough for an ordinary family to live on for a year or two. Ru Feng really wished he could snatch it away.

"Hehe, how about I give it to you?" Yun Tianze suggested for the fifty-first time.

"Don't give it to him! He might just sell it." Yu Xuan stopped him.

"No! I'll earn money by writing novels myself." Ru Feng shook his head with great pride.

Yu Jue, standing to the side, was quite helpless. Why did Ru Feng and Yu Xuan always steer the conversation to something else every time he asked a question? Ming Dan had just asked what Ru Feng had been busy with lately, but he didn't expect them to immediately start talking about fans.

When Ru Feng returned to the dormitory, his eyes lit up, and he excitedly sneaked out of the academy. When he came back, he was holding a fan and waving it in front of Yu Xuan.

This is a straw fan, made of straw woven into a flat strip, about the size of a washbasin. The handle is made of bamboo strips held together on both sides. The straw is golden and lustrous, light and easy to use. A small circle of five-colored silk is attached to the center. One side is embroidered with a picture of an arrogant scholar, and the other side is embroidered with the words "Heaven has endowed me with talents, which must be put to use; though a thousand pieces of gold are spent, they will return again" in white thread. The characters are elegant and unrestrained, and you can tell at a glance that they are written by Ru Feng.

"How about it? Isn't this fan beautiful?" Ru Feng proudly showed off in front of Yu Xuan and Yun Tianze.

Yu Xuan scoffed: "Your fan only costs a few coins, what's the big deal about showing it off?"

Ru Feng laughed happily, "I'm poor, so of course I have to use a fan that matches my means. Although this fan is made of wheat straw, look at how exquisite it is. Most importantly, the design and the calligraphy were embroidered for me by Wu Yan, the most famous and beautiful dancer in the country. See, doesn't that show its value?"

"You went to see Wu Yan again? Didn't you say you weren't going?" Yun Tianze suddenly asked with a stern face.

As Ru Feng fanned himself, he replied, "I went secretly, didn't I? Wu Yan definitely wouldn't be free at night, but she would be during the day, so I went to look for her. Sigh, I only know a few women in Xiangzhou City. I originally wanted to find my junior sister, but she can handle acupuncture needles, but not embroidery needles. Back in the mountains, I was the one who sewed up her lacerations, and her skills are even worse than mine!"

"No matter what, you should avoid that place in the future," Yun Tianze emphasized. Yu Jue happened to come out and overheard this, nodding in agreement.

Ru Feng curled his lip, thinking back to how they were the ones who dragged him into this mess in the first place, and now they've already forgotten about it.

"Did you hear that?" Yu Jue affectionately pinched Ru Feng's nose.

Ru Feng pushed his hand away, wrinkled her nose, and said, "I know, I know, stop pinching. It'll flatten your nose, and it'll be a shame to flatten such a straight nose."

Everyone laughed.

From then on, Yun Tianze waving his opulent fan and Ru Feng waving her straw fan became a unique sight on campus.

As the academy was about to close for the holidays, Hanshan's medicine shop and bookstore were already thriving.

Shiweitian Medicinal Cuisine Restaurant targets middle-class customers. Its most famous signature dish is Beggar's Chicken, made with a special technique that adds diced chicken, lean pork, shrimp, diced cooked ham, diced shiitake mushrooms, etc. It is fragrant, flavorful, and nutritious, making it popular with many people. At least the students of Fengxian Academy like to buy one to take home and eat during their holidays.

Because Ru Feng distributed coupons at the academy, offering a 10% discount, many students were willing to go to "Shi Wei Tian Medicinal Cuisine Restaurant" for a meal during the holidays. Although the prices were a bit high, most of the people there were wealthy and didn't care about such a small amount of money.

Now, with the introduction of hot pot set meals in winter, business is booming, and a branch has already opened.

Boya Bookstore is located not far from Fengxian Academy and Luolin Academy, next to Shiweitian Medicinal Cuisine Restaurant, the two shops being only one street apart. Boya Bookstore has two floors, decorated in an elegant style. The first floor sells books of all kinds, as well as writing brushes, ink, paper and inkstones. Of course, you can also rent books by the day if you pay a certain deposit. The second floor has reading rooms, divided into men's and women's rooms, with the women's room being smaller.

The young ladies of the Zi Luo Kingdom are all quite knowledgeable and well-educated, so some of them come out to buy books, but few actually read them. In fact, the main reason Han Shan set up a women's reading room was to make it convenient for Ru Feng, herself, and Zui Yue to meet, where they often discussed issues.

The most distinctive feature of Boya is that the pens there are very novel.

There are quill pens, which, after processing, can be sharpened to a point. They must be dipped in ink before writing. The quill pen's shaft absorbs ink, providing a continuous ink supply through capillary action. Ru Feng likes this because her handwriting is small, so her pen is made of crow feathers. Yu Xuan even teases her, saying it will bring her bad luck.

There was a pencil made by washing mineral graphite with water to turn it into graphite powder, then mixing it with sulfur, rosin, etc., and then attaching this mixture to a strip, and then attaching two wooden strips together and gluing them together. This made a simple pencil. Although it was not as good as the modern pencil, it was still quite to my liking.

These two pens were quickly popular with students after their release because they made taking notes in class very convenient.

Another major feature is the abundance of novels there, such as "Journey to the West," which is incredibly popular. Of course, it's a serialized novel, as Ru Feng hasn't finished writing it yet. There are also many popular novels, with romance novels being a favorite among young girls. Ru Feng has many classic plot points in her mind; she simply tells Han Shan the general idea, and Han Shan then finds someone to flesh out the story, resulting in a novel.

Therefore, according to the profit sharing, Ru Feng received two-thirds of the profits, becoming a small-time tycoon. Because of this, Ru Feng was extremely proud and smug in front of Yu Xuan.

"Hehe, now our family is rich too, Yuxuan, how about I treat you to beggar's chicken at 'Shiweitian'? I'll pay for the beggar's chicken, and you can pay for the other dishes." Rufeng said happily as he counted the money in his bank.

"Hmph, it's rare for our stingy miser to be willing to pluck feathers today, so I'll have to call the two of them along." Yu Xuan didn't mind, put down his paintbrush, examined it for a moment, and then answered.

Ru Feng waved her hand and said generously, "Go ahead, go ahead. I was going to invite Brother Jue and Tianze anyway." In fact, she also wanted to invite Mu Wenchen, but she was afraid that the three of them would feel uncomfortable, so she gave up the idea.

One day, while having dinner at Mu Wenchen's house, the weather had already turned cold. Ru Feng looked at the food in front of her and sighed, "I'm going back home for the winter soon. Alas, I won't be able to see you for a long time. What am I going to do? I'll miss you." As she spoke, she turned to look at Mu Tong and said, "I'll miss you too—I'll miss your cooking."

Mu Tong's lips twitched, and Mu Wenchen's expression froze. He frowned and said, "You want to go home? Can't you not go home?"

Ru Feng shook his head: "No, I haven't seen my family for eight months, and we're going to celebrate the New Year together." What Ru Feng didn't say was that his family had been writing to him since last month asking when he would be back. Thinking of their excited and expectant faces, Ru Feng was also eager to go home.

"Oh," Mu Wenchen responded, then fell silent and picked up his chopsticks to eat again.

Ru Feng was very disappointed. She had originally wanted to ask him if he was going home for the New Year, hoping to take the opportunity to learn more about him. In the past few months, Ru Feng had not had much of a chance to learn about Mu Wenchen's family background. One reason was that Mu Wenchen was usually not very talkative, and it was Ru Feng who did most of the talking. The other reason was that Ru Feng did not want to ask, and no one else knew either. They only knew that Mu Wenchen's family should be very powerful.

Sigh, there are only ten days left before I go home, and I still don't know where his home is or who else lives there. What a failure! Ru Feng thought to herself, and she ate absentmindedly, losing her usual "ruthlessness," which made Mu Tong look at her sideways.

When it was time to leave, Ru Feng was reluctant to part and kept lingering, ignoring Mu Tong's repeated hints.

“…Headmaster…” Ru Feng called out rather awkwardly. Seeing Mu Wenchen looking at her intently, her heart started racing. “Wenchen, I…I…” She couldn’t bring herself to say it.

Neither Mu Wenchen nor Mu Tong had ever seen Ru Feng like this before, so the two of them looked at Ru Feng with great curiosity.

Ru Feng's eyes darted around, and he said, "Mu Tong is going out first."