Red Mansion: Picking up a Lin Daiyu

Chapter 392: The ladies recognize the door, the marquis recognizes the person

Anjing Marquis Mansion,

On both sides of the plaque in front of the door, a pair of red lanterns are hung high on the flying eaves and brackets, and colorful ribbons are arranged into the shape of flying clouds, decorating the area in front of the gate with a festive atmosphere.

Ni Er, who has been guarding this house all the time, feels refreshed today.

After he went to Yue Ling, he and Jia Yun took charge of the affairs of the mansion. As a result, Yue Ling went south and never came back, which led to him staying alone in the mansion and becoming an idler.

He also envied Jia Yun for being able to stay with the master all the time and grow into the master's right-hand man, but he also knew in his heart that it was inconvenient for the master to take him out because he had a wife and daughter.

Today, Ni Er learned that the master had returned to Beijing after an absence of eight years. He was very excited. Even now, standing outside the door, he clenched his fists unconsciously and broke into a sweat.

After eight years of ups and downs, he has no merit but only hard work. I wonder what the master will think when he sees him again, and whether the master has changed.

"Brother Ni, come and give me a hand."

Jia Yun stuck his head out of the carriage and waved to Ni Er who was waiting at the door.

"Hey, why didn't I notice the flag on my brother's car?"

Ni Er suddenly came to his senses, beat his chest and stamped his feet, shook his head in anger, hurried forward, grasped the reins of the carriage, and led the carriage towards the mansion.

"The master went to the palace, and Miss Lin was stopped by Lady Wang of the Jia family on the way. She went to Rongguo Mansion and asked me to escort the carriage loaded with luggage back first."

The carriage drove into the courtyard. Not only was there a cargo carriage, but there were also two horse-drawn carriages carrying passengers following behind.

After the carriage stopped, Jia Yun excitedly jumped off and gave Ni Er a bear hug.

"Brother Ni, thank you for taking care of my mother all these years."

Ni Er also patted Jia Yun on the back and consoled him, "Hey, brother, your mother is my mother. Besides, this mansion is peaceful and the master is well-known outside, so no one dares to cause trouble here. I am so idle that I am sick. I envy you for being able to travel around with the marquis."

"If I were ten years younger, I would never let you be the master's horse driver."

Jia Yun was also amused and laughed. He held Ni Er's shoulder and said, "Okay, Ni Er brother, I'll leave this to you. We can sit together and drink some other day. I'll go see mother first. Is she in her room?"

"I'm here, I'm here, don't worry brother, leave this to me."

"Oh, by the way, Brother Ni, Miss Lin has told us to take these luggage to the courtyard and distribute them to the rooms when they return."

"okay."

Watching Jia Yun go away, Ni Er shook his head and sighed inwardly, "This brother Yun has been traveling around for a long time. He has lost his weak air and has become stronger."

After pinching his shoulders again, Ni Er sighed again: "I have to practice a little bit, too. I hope I can't be unable to help the master in the future and can only guard the gate at home."

Lamenting the fleeting youth and the passing of time, while Ni Er was silent, there was movement in the carriage.

The servants in the mansion were just about to take all the luggage off the carriage, but the curtain of the carriage was opened first, and more than a dozen maids walked out.

Each of them has a typical appearance of a Jiangnan woman, with willow-shaped eyebrows, sharp cheeks, and a bun on their head. They don't look very old.

Ni Er was even more stunned because none of them looked familiar to him.

"Didn't Brother Yun say that there were only luggage? How come there were twelve living people?"

Ni Er nodded secretly and saw that the girls were also looking around with confusion on their faces.

The two groups of people were in a stalemate for a while before a bolder maid took a few steps forward and asked crisply, "Excuse me, is this the Anjing Marquis's Mansion?"

Ni Er nodded, "Exactly."

Lingguan held his chest and breathed a sigh of relief, "That's good. May I ask where is Butler Yun?"

"He's in a hurry to go back and see his mother."

Lingguan blinked and nodded slightly, "Oh, this housekeeper? My name is Lingguan, these are my sisters, we are a troupe bought by the Marquis, and Miss Lin asked us to go back home before she goes to the Jia Mansion."

"Oh, that's what happened."

Ni Er wiped his forehead and wiped away the beads of sweat.

He thought that even Jia Yun hadn't said it explicitly, and that it was in response to the rumors spread by the masters in the capital that he had deliberately hidden these twelve little maids in his mansion for his enjoyment.

If this was really what he thought, then the master had gone to Jiangnan, but there were too many changes caused by the corruption of money. Ni Er didn't dare to think about it too much, and felt a sense of fear in his heart.

"Okay, okay, okay, come with me. Fortunately, Brother Yun sent a letter asking for a few more rooms in the mansion. I just found a craftsman to build a row of houses in the yard. There will be five houses in total, which will definitely be enough for you to live in."

"I didn't expect that the master's trip would add so many people to the mansion. If there is no place to accommodate them, it would be a big joke for me as a housekeeper."

The girls looked at each other and chose not to tell Ni Er the truth because there were more girls coming back later.

After sending the small troupe into the inner room, Ni Er instructed his maid, Ni Ni, who was the rough servant in the inner room, and said, "These are the maids that the master has brought back. You should treat them well and arrange for them to live well."

Ni Ni blinked, looking at the girls of the same height and good looks, and suddenly felt dazzled...

……

More than two hours later, a longer convoy stopped outside the Anjing Marquis Mansion.

Ni Er, who had been tipped off by the doorman and rushed out to greet them, was dumbfounded when he saw so many carriages queuing up through the main gate to enter the mansion.

The second time, there was only one van carrying luggage, and the rest were passengers.

Seeing this scene, Ni Er's throat moved, not knowing what to say, but when he saw Lin Daiyu being helped down from the carriage, he quickly stepped forward to salute.

"Miss Lin, you are finally back."

Lin Daiyu raised her eyebrows and saw that it was Ni Er who came to greet her. She smiled and replied, "Thank you for your concern, housekeeper Ni. It has been three or four years since the spring banquet that year. I guess you have grown into a beautiful young lady, right?"

Ni Er scratched his head and replied awkwardly, "She stays in her room all day by herself, and still acts like a child."

Lin Daiyu nodded, turned around and looked at Xueyan, "That's not bad."

Stepping into my own house, the sense of security I felt was truly incomparable to anywhere else, not even in the Lin Mansion.

When she was in Yangzhou, she was a young lady in the mansion, but here she was more like the mistress of the mansion. Everything had to be approved by her. Of course, there was a difference in the feeling.

Lin Daiyu raised her chin slightly, looked at the blue sky and white clouds in the distance, and felt extremely happy.

"Oh, I'm really back. Every blade of grass and every tree is still the same as before. They are taken care of very carefully."

Looking at Butler Ni again, Lin Daiyu nodded affirmatively.

"As expected of someone that Brother Yue found, he really does the job properly."

But Ni Er's eyes were not on Lin Daiyu. Instead, he was looking in astonishment at the girls who were walking down from the carriage one after another.

"One, two, three... eleven, thirteen, fifteen, eighteen?"

Ni Er counted on his fingers, thinking to himself, "This... I can't even count them with my hands. Yun Ge'er didn't say that the mansion expansion needs to accommodate 30 more girls. How can they accommodate them?" "This... so many girls, is the rumor about the master false? It can't be true? The master's body is really different from ordinary people."

"Butler Ni? Butler Ni?"

Qin Keqing repeated it several times before waking Ni Er from his shock.

"Hey, Miss Qin, I'm here."

Qin Keqing hugged her shoulders and raised her eyebrows, saying, "Butler Ni, you are too careless. Sister Lin called you, didn't you hear it?"

Ni Er smiled bitterly and said, "Well, I haven't seen so many people in the room for a long time. I am a little distracted."

Lin Daiyu also covered her mouth and laughed, and looked back. Indeed, there were too many people in the room.

"It's okay, you'll get used to it."

Ni Er struggled fiercely in his heart for a while before he sincerely lowered his head and admitted his mistake with a sad face: "Miss Lin, I am wrong. This mansion can't accommodate so many girls now. There is only one independent courtyard, a back room and five small houses in the courtyard..."

Lin Daiyu smiled and said, "It's okay. Brother Yue won't be back today, so we can just squeeze in. Tomorrow morning we will move into the palace granted by the emperor, which will be much more spacious."

At the right moment, Shi Xiangyun chased after Lin Daiyu, held her arm tightly, and said, "Sister Lin, I want to sleep with you."

"Okay, okay, sleep with me."

Looking again, so many exquisite-looking girls dazzled Ni Er, a moneylender who used to work hard among the neighbors, and he became a little face-blind.

Ni Er twitched his lips and said with a wry smile: "Master, our mansion is not prosperous, but...but isn't this a bit too extreme..."

"Wait, Miss Lin just mentioned the mansion bestowed by the Emperor?"

……

Imperial Palace, Shangshufang,

Yue Ling was led by the eunuch all the way to the place where the princes studied.

Emperor Longyou has three sons, all of whom are said to be born to the empress, and the age difference is not that big. The eldest prince is only sixteen years old this year, and the youngest is only thirteen years old.

The princes raised in the deep palace are taboo to outsiders.

As verified by history, if there are multiple princes, there is bound to be a fight for the throne. Unless the previous emperor clears all obstacles for the next prince to ascend the throne, there will be struggles.

But fighting isn't a bad thing.

After all, the princes are almost all pampered in the deep palace. Under the same learning conditions, the prince who is able to integrate his own resources and win in the battle for the throne proves that he is the more capable one.

Whether he can be a good emperor or not is not the point for now, but he is capable and will not become a lamb to be manipulated by others.

Imperial power is inseparable from manipulating people's hearts and minds and exerting one's influence.

According to Yue Ling's observation, Emperor Longyou had not yet made up his mind whether to make the eldest legitimate son the crown prince and focus on training him, or to go back to his old path of seizing the throne.

It is cruel in terms of family relationships, but it may not be a bad thing for the country.

Emperor Longyou asked Yue Ling to get along with several princes first. Yue Ling could understand the purpose of this, which was to allow him to observe beforehand.

After all, once you become an emperor, no one can evaluate you, only history books of later generations can comment on you.

“Wealth comes from the art of fortune-telling, not from toil; profit comes from position, not from hard work.”

The sound of reading aloud came from the gap in the window lattice. Yue Ling listened with his ear tilted, slightly surprised.

"The book they are teaching is The Treatise on Salt and Iron instead of the Four Books and Five Classics? This is much more rare. Could it be Emperor Longyou's intention?"

"Salt and Iron Discussions" is a famous book about reform, recording the collision of ideas among ancient sages.

After Emperor Wu of Han's aggressive military expansion, Huo Guang presided over reforms and led debates between Confucian scholars and Legalist officials, and then compiled their words and deeds into a book.

What is recorded is the promotion of pragmatism, centralization and state-owned economy, which is exactly in line with today's Dachang.

In that era, the value of this book lies in the fact that it did not just talk about ideals and ethics.

"Ah, cut."

Yue Ling suddenly sneezed, interrupting the sound of reading in the room.

"It's weird. Who is talking about me behind my back? Why do I sneeze once and then twice? And it doesn't stop?"

After a moment, the door opened from the inner room, and a man of medium height, with a slightly thin face but bright eyes and a mature demeanor walked out.

"Oh? Is it Marquis Anjing?"

The eunuch was about to introduce him, but he didn't expect the gentleman to call out Yue Ling's name first.

Yue Ling was also slightly surprised.

When he was in the capital, he often mingled with the military and didn't know many scholars. Moreover, not long after the war with the northern barbarians, he went to the south of the Yangtze River. After eight years, few people should have recognized him.

After bowing, Yue Ling said politely, "I apologize for the offense just now, sir."

The visitor waved his hand and saluted respectfully, "Marquis An Jing, you are too kind."

The man in front of him was very polite and not just an ordinary scholar. Yue Ling still had a slight favorable impression of him. "Have you ever met me, sir?"

The visitor held up his long beard and couldn't help but smile, "Of course, everyone knows the name of Marquis Anjing. Not only the common people, but even the three princes in the room often ask me about the Marquis."

"As for having met the Marquis, I have indeed met him, but the Marquis probably doesn't have much impression of him."

Yue Ling blinked and became even more curious, "Oh? Sir, do you remember where you saw me?"

The visitor smiled and said, "Prince Kang's Mansion."

"Prince Kang's Mansion?"

Yue Ling looked him up and down again, and was even more surprised. "You are from Prince Kang's Mansion, and you are here to teach the three princes?"

The visitor couldn't hold back his expression, and couldn't help laughing as he said, "In the old days, each served his own master, and I had no way to help him. But when I saw that King Kang was colluding with foreign countries, I abandoned him. I didn't report him because of the relationship between the king and his subject."

He then raised his hands to the side of his face and continued, "Your Majesty is a wise and enlightened monarch. All talented people can be accepted into the court without any grudges. That is why I have the opportunity to teach the three princes."

"Marquis Anjing, please don't stand outside. Since you can come here, you must not just come to watch. Please come in."

Yue Ling paused and asked, "I haven't asked for your name yet, sir?"

"My surname is Tang, my given name is Xiao, my courtesy name is Zijun, and I am an aide to the rebellious Prince Kang's palace..."

(End of this chapter)