Zhuolu

What’s so strange about this? It’s just a sign, you can know it if you ask the master or Zishu, and it doesn’t have to be told by Shen Lou himself. But saying this kind of spoiled the atmosphere, Lin Xin didn’t answer, but gave him a sly look, and opened his mouth to bite down hard.

“Hmm…”

Taking advantage of biting, Lin Xin grabbed Shen Lou’s pulse wrist to check. The pulse condition couldn’t tell the state of the soul, but it could tell whether his pain had eased. Unexpectedly, Shen Lou’s pulse condition was extremely unstable, and his muscles were tense.

“Does it hurt?” Lin Xin let go of his mouth and asked Shen Lou worriedly.

“It doesn’t hurt.” Shen Lou looked at him steadfastly, as if a vortex had formed in his eyes, wishing to swallow people into it.

“I mean, your soul.” Lin Xin stroked his forehead worriedly, the method of replenishing the soul with the soul was completely imagined by him, and he was afraid that it would make things worse for Shen Lou.

Shen Lou pulled his hand down and shook his head, “It’s better than before going to bed.”

It seemed to be useful, Lin Xin heaved a sigh of relief, and burst into joy, no matter how little the effect was, this direction was right. Stripping the soul was very exhausting, and when he suddenly relaxed, Lin Xin couldn’t stop yawning and a drop of tear overflowed from the corner of his reddish eye, hanging on his eyelashes.

“I’m going to sleep, I have to get up early tomorrow.” Lin Xin got into the bed as he said that, and looked at Shen Lou who was sitting upright with sleepy eyes, fearing that he still couldn’t let go of what he had just done and went to sleep on the soft couch.

Fortunately, Shen Lou didn’t have that intention, so he extinguished the candle with a snap of his fingers and got into bed.

As expected of the upright Shen Qingque, if he said he didn’t care, he really didn’t care. Lin Xin angrily pressed one leg onto Shen Lou’s, and fell asleep contentedly.

Shen Lou opened his eyes and watched him all night.

Early the next morning, he heard Zhu Xingli shouting in the yard, “Who smashed my bird’s head!”

Lin Xin yawned and walked out of the house, and said without opening his eyes, “It must be Zhong Zhong! He also said yesterday that he wanted to eat chicken brains.”

“When did I say I was going to eat chicken brains!” A black pot fell from the sky, almost smashing Junior Brother Jian Zhong to the ground.

“Stinky boy, if you dare to eat the Gu sculpture’s brain, you won’t have to be afraid of getting diarrhea if you eat it.” Zhu Xingli began to scold after picking up the quarrel, as if he had already decided that the little apprentice ate it.

With a bitter face, Jian Zhong looked at Shen Lou asking for help, “Shizi, you judge me, who would eat that stuff!” Since seeing Shen Lou’s toughness yesterday, Junior Brother Jian had unilaterally become friendly to Shen Shizi.

Shen Lou ignored him, and finished practicing the thousandth sword strike by himself, then he turned back and bowed to Zhu Xingli.

“Eh, what’s wrong with your neck?” Zhu Xingli noticed the teeth marks on Shen Lou’s neck with sharp eyes, a ring of bruises and purple, and the skin was torn.

“I bit it!” Lin Xin admitted it quickly, seeing his master’s face darken, as if he wanted to reprimand him, he immediately added, “It’s not my fault, he bit me first, you see.” Then he pulled off the clothes on the shoulders.

Shen Lou’s bite was relatively low, almost reaching his shoulders, and you could only see it when he pulled off his clothes. On the white shoulder, a red mark from biting was clearly visible, which seemed completely different from the one on Shen Lou’s neck.

Zhu Xingli’s face turned livid instantly, and everyone in the yard, including Zishu who came in to deliver the medicine, looked at Shen Lou with condemnation.

“We were playing with each other by biting each other.” Lin Xin looked at Shen Lou innocently as his face became darker.

Shen Lou didn’t intend to explain anything, he just walked to Lin Xin’s side and pulled his clothes back.

“Xin’er, come here!” Zhu Xingli looked cold and serious, as he called Lin Xin away.

The mansion in Yanqiu was not big, but there were all kinds of pavilions, towers and pools. The clear stream was led into by diabolo, and it was accumulated in a shallow pool. In the pool, there were three or two turtles. The inscription on the porch pillar by the pool said: “The pool is shallow but there are many kings.”

The master and apprentice walked to the waterside pavilion by the shallow pool, where there was no one around. Then Zhu Xingli couldn’t help laughing: “This Shen family boy is so funny.”

“Your apprentice has been taken advantage of by others, but I should thank you for being able to laugh.” Lin Xin picked up a little turtle and tossed it in his hand.

“You?” Zhu Xingli glanced at him sideways, it would be fine if his disciple didn’t take advantage of Shen Lou, he might have bullied him last night, and as the villain complained first.

Knowing that Master would not make decisions without consulting him, Lin Xin threw the tortoise into the water and looked at Master, “What happened?”

Zhu Xingli handed him a piece of letter paper, “A letter from Yongdu.”

Lin Xin twitched his brows and took it over to look at it. The vigorous and powerful characters were the handwriting of the current emperor.

The tone of the letter was very familiar, as if an old friend who hadn’t seen him for many years, first exchanged a few polite greetings before getting down to business. The emperor asked Zhu Xingli if he had adopted Jian Qiuluo’s son, and stated that this child was his prince who had been left behind among the people. Hearing that Jian Qiuluo had passed away, he had been looking for him for a long time.

In his previous life, Lin Xin had never seen this letter, but he thought it existed. It was just that even though he was too precocious, Zhu Xingli was used to discussing everything with him, so he showed it to him. After a moment of silence, he pretended to be surprised and said, “Junior brother, is he the prince?”

“Well,” Zhu Xingli grabbed a piece of grass and put it in his mouth, “The emperor is here to ask for someone. Do you think I should give him or not?”

Lin Xin pursed his lips but keep silent. To give or not to give?

In fact, Zhu Xingli had already made a decision. Had he not been letting Jian Zhong learn how to govern a country these years.

“A Luo said, if you don’t seek it, don’t force it. If you find it, you can’t keep it.” Zhu Xingli spat out the grass stem, took out a half-dry brush, licked it on the tip of his tongue, and wrote a very scribbled “on the back of the letter paper” word.

“He is neither a descendant nor a son. If you let him learn the way of governing the country, wouldn’t it just increase your troubles?” He wanted to ask his master countless times in his previous life, but unfortunately his master had passed away and there was nowhere to ask.

“Sooner or later, he needs to understand the truth. If he doesn’t learn it, will he be able to live well when he returns to the royal family?” Zhu Xingli randomly rolled up the letter paper, stuffed it into a crumpled envelope, and threw it to Lin Xin,  Go, give it to a moustached man at the Yuelai Inn in the town.”

Lin Xin took it and turned to leave.

“Wait!” Zhu Xingli suddenly remembered Lin Xin’s identity, and took the letter back, “Let me go, you pack your things, and we will go to the Southern Region tomorrow.”

Among the four regions, the Southern Region was the most affluent, such that when the horse travelled to the territory, one could clearly see the difference between the people of the Southern Regions and the people of the Central Plains.

Nanyu Yinian Palace was where the Zhu family resided.

Glass windows, crocodile skin curtains, white jade bricks and gold eaves. At that time, people said, the Bai Yujing[1] was in the sky, such was the Yinian Palace was on the ground.

The author has something to say:

Small theater:

“About the Zhu Family”

Patriarch: Who are we?

Family members: Zhu people!

Owner: What is our specialty?

Family members: Being rich!

Patriarch: What if there are poor relatives who come to play the autumn wind?

Family members: We don’t know them!

Patriarch: Did you hear that?

Master: …