Despite it still being autumn, the mornings began giving off a frosty glow. Verglas clung onto the blades of grass, and nearly all the leaves had been blown away by the wind. Within the red pavilion, Hui Chao was preparing for his classes.
One by one, students began trickling into the room. They dutifully sat themselves at their assigned seats and prepared to take notes. With one last clear of his throat, Hui Chao made his way to the front of the room. He greeted his students and began by telling them to write down the lyrics to Thoughts on a Silent Night from memory. The students were all obedient and began immediately. Su Hai was one of the students.
"Su Hai." Hui Chao called. "Explain to me what the first line of the poem means."
Su Hai immediately stood up, determined to answer correctly.
"Teacher Hui, the first line of the poem is chuáng qián míng yuè guāng (床前明月光). Li Bai states that the moonlight is at the front of his bed. Upon further analyzation, Su Hai believes it explains that the poet is awake and unable to sleep, as most people would be sleeping at night. Therefore, Su Hai believes that there is something troubling Li Bai."
Hui Chao stroked his beard. "Very well, you may sit down."
Su Hai sat down, internally congratulating himself for answering correctly.
Hui Chao continued calling on his students until he had gotten past the last line of the poem. He took his own copy of the poem and began unfurling it in order to show his students how the calligraphy should have been done.
However, he was quickly startled by 'his own' writing. Hui Chao constantly boasted about his own calligraphy to his students, so when he had seen the writing on the scroll, he was appalled. But he was a little too late when it came to covering up the writing on the scroll. Most of the students had already seen the calligraphy.
Hui Chao began rummaging through his other scrolls, frantically scanning each of them. All of them were replaced with someone else's atrocious writing. A vein began to pop on his forehead and neck, he knew immediately who the culprit was.
"Jin WangShu!" He hissed through gritted teeth.
Su Hai meanwhile was also surprised at what was on the scrolls. He had not realized that he had been unknowingly helping Jin WangShu pull off a prank on his teacher. Su Hai was horrified, but was very unsure of what to do. So he stayed completely silent, while covering up his trembling hands with his sleeves.
Hui Chao glared at his class, humiliation shown on his face.
"Your lessons today are over!"
Without saying another word, Hui Chao pivoted and stalked out of the pavilion. He immediately headed toward the courtyard in attempts to find the emperor. He was in luck, as the emperor had happened to come out at the same time.
Hui Chao immediately bowed down in respect to the emperor.
"Your humble servant would like to speak to his imperial majesty regarding his new disciple."
Li FeiHong looked at Hui Chao in indifference.
"Rise and speak."
Hui Chao stood up and began to speak. "Your humble servant begs his majesty to assign another teacher for Jin WangShu."
The emperor raised a brow. "Why?"
Hui Chao took a deep breath and continued. "Jin WangShu has tarnished your humble servants reputation as a teacher this morning. He had replaced all of your humble servant's scrolls with scrolls filled with his less than impressive calligraphy. Your humble servant is certain that this was done in order to spite his teacher."
Having heard this, the emperor was not angry at all. In fact, he found it quite amusing. But seeing Hui Chao's livid expression, he covered his laugh with a cough.
"What Jin WangShu had done has now been deemed as harmless by me. You will continue to teach him unless you are told otherwise by me."
Hui Chao's eyebrow twitched in anger, but accepted what the emperor said.
"Your humble servant understands. He will take his leave now."
The emperor stared at Hui Chao's retreating figure but couldn't help a smile from creeping up onto his face.
~~~~
It was the next morning during the court hearing when the subject of the Tibetans was brought up. The emperor's face immediately turned gloomy.
"Your imperial majesty, your humble servant wishes to speak." One of the higher court officials said.
"Huang Yang, I allow you to speak."
"Our men have already tried negotiating with the Tibetans. However, they remain stubborn and wish to invade China. This lowly servant believes that a war is inevitable between the two lands, and should therefore prepare the troops for war."
Li FeiHong nodded thoughtfully.
"I will take Huang Yang's advice. Court is dismissed for today."
The court officials all bowed one last time before they filed out the door.
~~~~
Jin WangShu arrived at the training grounds on time at the first kè. From far away, he spotted Su Chen and made his way over.
"Brother Su! What are you doing?"
Su Chen's gaze snapped over to Jin WangShu.
"What am I doing? I'm training of course! Now get out of my way before I accidentally shoot you with my arrow." Su Chen replied.
"Brother Su, didn't you say that you were skilled? If you were truly skilled, you would not accidentally shoot me with your arrow."
Su Chen gritted his teeth in annoyance, but otherwise said nothing.
"Brother Su, come on... don't be like that." Jin WangShu drawled out. "Practice with me and show your brother Jin how to defend himself in sword combat."
Su Chen relented.
"Then draw your sword, I shall see where you're at."
Jin WangShu unsheathed his sword, not expecting the heavy weight of it and nearly dropped it onto the ground. Seeing this, Su Chen scoffed.
"Give me a minute to get used to this sword. I borrowed it from brother Xie when I bumped into him earlier."
"Why don't you have your own sword? It's irresponsible of Xie Bai to lend you his sword. A man should not be willing to part with it as it is his lifelong companion." Su Chen said.
"Oh."
Jin WangShu paid Su Chen no mind and continued to swing the borrowed sword around. At last. he felt that he had practiced enough and told Su Chen. The latter was already aching for a good match, so upon hearing that his companion was ready, he was very excited.
"Here I come."
Su Chen thrust his sword skillfully toward Jin WangShu, who swiftly side-stepped the offence. During the next few minutes, Jin WangShu was constantly on defence avoiding the sword and blocking with his own. Even Su Chen was surprised at the skills WangShu possessed.
Once the two had entered the second half of the match, Jin WangShu began making offensive moves. He moved swiftly while he swung his sword. Su Chen hated to admit, but even he found it hard to keep up. He had practiced his swordplay for years, and struggling to hold his ground against a rookie was a blow to his ego. A sheen of sweat was present on both their foreheads, and their breaths came in pants from their physical exertion. Su Chen couldn't help but notice the smile on Jin WangShu's face, the latter seemed to find the match fun.
Having seen this, Su Chen became greatly irritated and began making much more powerful swings. Thankfully his annoyance worked in his favour, and he was able to disarm Jin WangShu at last. By the end of the match, both parties were exhausted, although one of the men were still smiling.
"Thank you for practicing with me, brother Su." Jin WangShu cupped his hands in respect after sheathing the sword.
Mu LongWei, the general who was overseeing the training had already arrived by the time they had finished the match. Several other soldiers were captured by the performance and hurried to congratulate Su Chen while they secretly admired Jin WangShu's skill. Not many had ever dared to go up against Su Chen, as he was known for excelling in all forms of martial arts. It was quite hard to believe that WangShu was a new soldier.
Training was brutal for all the soldiers, even for Jin WangShu, it was no exception. They ran many laps around the training ground and did many sword swings. By the end of it, their arms were all sore and their legs were close to giving out.
"Brother Jin... how are you still standing?" One of the fellow soldiers asked WangShu.
"Brother Yang, I'm very physically capable. Of course I'd still be standing."
But despite his words, he had already begun to fall over like the other soldiers.
Yang GuiRen laughed and helped Jin WangShu back up onto his feet.
"Your skills are very impressive! I'm sure you will surpass Su Chen in martial arts very soon."
"Care to repeat that?" A voice came from behind them.
Yang GuiRen shuddered and turned around, only to be met with the sight of Su Chen himself. Irritation flashed in the older male's eyes.
"Brother Su! Care to join me for some wine later? We can quickly wash up and visit a wine shop before sundown! We have plenty of time, and I'll even buy you a jar." Jin WangShu offered.
Even Su Chen was unable to refuse the offer of alcohol. He loved wine, so could not turn down a free drink. He nodded stiffly in reply.
"I'll hold you up to that offer." Su Chen said.
Yang GuiRen thanked Jin WangShu repeatedly in his head for getting him out of the situation and scurried out of the training grounds.
Chang'an was busy with life as usual. Many people walked and chatted about with their companions while appraising different goods. The owner of the wine shop Jin WangShu and Su Chen went to was a friendly man. He immediately welcomed his guests and recommended the most popular wine.
"Young masters, please try our newly imported grape wine from Central Asia. We have received many compliments regarding this wine."
Jin WangShu took out his money pouch. "I'll buy two jars of those!" He generously handed his money over.
"This humble shop owner thanks young master for his generosity." The owner of the store grabbed two jars and handed them to Jin WangShu, who eagerly accepted.
He thrust one of the jars into Su Chen's hands and went to find a seat.
"Brother Su, let's have a drinking contest! Whoever gets drunk first has to be the winner's servant for a week."
Su Chen grinned. "You're on. Don't go easy on me."
The two men drank the wine quickly. Hurrying to have the most empty wine jars on their side of the table. They had already bought many jars by now, and even the shop owner was very impressed at their drinking durability.
They had reached the fifth jar, when both their faces were beginning to get red. And by sundown, both were terribly drunk. Neither of them had won the drinking game.
"Brother—brother Su!" Jin WangShu hiccuped. "If General Mu sees us when we return to the palace, we would get punished for sure. We would— would also lose face for looking this— drunk..." His speech was slurred and he held onto Su Chen's shoulder for support.
"Let's— let's just— stay at my house for tonight..." Su Chen replied.
Jin WangShu drunkenly nodded.
And so the two drunk men headed toward Su Chen's house. The house was extremely quiet when they entered. It was a simple place with only the bare necessities much unlike the palace. Su Chen was a man who did not find comfort in possessing unnecessary items, therefore his house was often seen as bare.
"Brother Su, where— where do I— I sleep?"
"I don't care..." Su Chen replied while stripping out of his outer robes.
Jin WangShu did the same and followed Su Chen to the bed. Su Chen fell onto the bed not expecting WangShu to follow. So when WangShu plopped on top of Su Chen, the latter yelped in pain.
But neither man bothered to move as they were far too tired, so they both fell fast asleep very soon.
~~~~
Bonus Scene 1: (Available only in Chinese)
金望舒： 李哥哥。。。我今天真的很想你啊。。。
李飛鴻： 真的嗎？我一點兒都沒有想過你。
金望舒： 哎呦。你為啥對我那麼差？我這次原諒你，不會有下一次！其實。。。
李飛鴻： 。。。
金望舒： 李哥哥。我其實沒有想你，但我很想你的雞雞！
李飛鴻： 閉嘴。走開！
~~~~
For anyone interested, here is the poem that was used in this chapter. It is a famous poem by Li Bai called Thoughts on a Silent Night:
Original:
床前明月光
疑是地上霜
舉頭望明月
低頭思故鄉
Translation:
Moonlight falls at the foot of my bed,
Seeming like frost on the frozen ground.
I look up and see the bright moon,
And look down, reminded of my hometown.
~~~~
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