Pus.h.i.+ng open the red-painted door and lifting the bead curtains, Ning Que stepped into the dim Quiet Room. He had drunk out two big bowls of sober soup and took a hot bath to his heart's content, which, compounded by the torment from that big master on the bamboo bed on which somebody had died, had relieved most of his tipsy feeling that was about to spurt out. As a result, he felt much more clear-headed now.

Looking at that lady with her delicate figure hidden in ordinary cloth, and her wide and smooth forehead as well as her crow's feet, Ning Que would rather he never become sober, because he realized what he must face next. Although he felt that it was totally unreasonable for the lady to be so strict with him, he had to admit that there was care in the strictness. As a result, he had no other choice but to painfully accept it.

"Long time no see! I thought you began to cultivate yourself in the Academy, and knew the importance of seeking knowledge. But unexpectedly, I see little progress in your knowledge. Instead, you have made large strides in the art of drinking."

Mistress Jian looked at him with calmness, no hint of bitter hatred could be traced from her simple and amicable look. However, it was just that ordinariness of her tone that gave Ning Que a lot of stress. He hemmed and hawed but could not utter a word. He tried to disguise his embarra.s.sment by self-imposed composedness. However, all his efforts were destroyed by an unexpected hiccup, which smelt rather unpleasant.

Mistress Jian frowned slightly at the sourness that filled the room. She glared at him, and then smiled with self-mockery. She thought that her anger completely unreasonable. How could she make this lad a scapegoat of that guy? So she asked Ning Que as coolly as possible, "Tell me, what do you learn in the Academy these days?"

Taking over that cup of strong tea handed by Xiaocao, Ning Que drank some to recollect himself. He thanked her with great sincerity and then cleared his throat to describe his life in the Academy to her seriously.

"You sound as if you have been diligent. Since you know little about calligraphy and rite, you need to put in more effort in these two courses instead of giving them up. Mind you, when you graduate from the Academy, you have to live on those skills, no matter whether you will become an official or just a shepherd."

Upon hearing that Ning Que entered the old library everyday, Mistress Jian showed a relieved smile, making her crow's feet more obvious. She continued to ask, "Now that you enter the old library everyday, do you know the mystery of the Second floor?"

"I do." Ning Que answered politely.

After a short while of pondering, Mistress Jian said earnestly, "In your opinion, when can you go to the Second floor?"

Ning Que covered his mouth with sleeves, striving to hold back a hiccup or even the feeling of vomiting. He then answered, "Only those genius can enter such places. As for me, my physical condition is totally not qualified for cultivation, so I dare not have such daydreams at all."

"Can you grow to be a bit promising? How difficult it is to be accepted by such a good place? You must seize the opportunity, instead of spouting off those nonsenses... "

Mistress Jian shook her head with brows knitted and was slightly sorrowful. That year, she witnessed how that guy swaggered into the Second floor on a donkey. At present, she had faintly seen some trace of that guy in Ning Que and aspired to make up for her regret in the past, so she continued to persuade him, "The Academy is in itself a birthplace of miracles. Yet if you deny it, no others can help you."

Ning Que had no idea that the person who had adventured in Chang'an City on a little black donkey ended up with a great reputation but finally disappeared like a duckweed under rainstorms. As such he couldn't understand why Mistress Jian paid so much attention to a poor guy like him. He was clear there must be reasons for it, but decided not to bother about it. But still, he was sincerely grateful to this kind lady's ardent teachings.

For that was what he lacked in his life. What he had experienced at the backseat of bicycle in the previous life was another form of care which yet he wasn't fond of. In the current life, he also had enjoyed such love, which, however, was eventually devoured by b.l.o.o.d.y affairs. Because he was truly thankful or even moved, he was comparatively prudent and careful when answering her questions, which unavoidably would slow down his speed. This, however, made him careless in Mistress Jian's eyes which thus enraged her.

"We are neither intimate relatives nor friends. I won't have the mood to tell you these but for an impulse. so don't be emotional. All I want for you is to cherish the chance in the Academy. I won't do harm to you."

Then she continued in a rather serious tone, "Last time, I told you, those rich boys like Zhu Youxian can have fun here, but you can't. Those n.o.ble girls like Ms. Situ and the sisters from Jin Family can play here, but you are not qualified. They played with a poor boy like you just out of curiosity because you look funny and different. They don't mean ill with their interest but it is not real respect."

"If you want to be true friends with them, you need to foster an ability and charisma that can win their respect. If you can step into the Second floor of the Academy, I believe, all those in this world want to be friends with you."

Mistress Jian picked up the cup of Gold Orchid dew, took a sip to moisten her throat and then raised her head to continue in a calm tone, "You can come here to relax, but not too frequently, and don't drink too much wine. As a mammy in this field, of course I won't call it degrading to indulge in brothels, but I also won't boast of it as something elegant or beneficial. Thirty years ago, the great poet Mr. Caocun spent half of his life in brothels, but who dare to disrespect him? In fact, he even marries the daughter of the prime minister. That's not to say, his lingering in brothels has won him a great reputation. After all, it is because of his incomparable talent!"

"The Tang Empire values talent. So long as you have ability and you are a talent, no matter you are downstairs or upstairs, inside or outside, a lad from border town or a n.o.blemen in Chang'an, you won't be covered up."

After those instructions, Ning Que went downstairs, covering his forehead, to find the gathering also ended in the hall. He inquired from the steward to find out that it was Ms. Situ who had paid. And this made him felt lucky, because his two thousand silvers could be kept for a longer time.

As he was prepared to say goodbye to Dewdrop and other girls, the maidservant Xiaocao impolitely herded him to the horse carriage under the order of Mistress Jian, and then told the driver to send the drunk lad back to Lin 47th Street as soon as possible.

The horse carriage darted ahead joltily, and Ning Que was b.u.mped up and down on the verge of vomiting, but somehow he remained quite sober at the moment, constantly pondering over that serious problem, "I insist on entering the old library and going to the Second floor, at the sacrifice of my health and spirit, just because I like it, or more probably because I want to take revenge and strengthen myself. From now on there will be one other reason... to perform well in brothels?"

While his mind was in disarray in the horse carriage, another guest visited Dewdrop. As one of the most popular girls in the House of Red Sleeves, except for some regular guests like the censor Zhang Yiqi, she enjoyed a right to select her guest or even reject guests to a certain extent. However, for this guest visiting her at midnight, she had to disguise her weariness, braced herself, and poured tea water for him.

"Go and wash your face. As a pretty girl, you ought not to be as dirty as me."

This guest was a thin and tall old man, wearing a worn Taoist robe with traces of grease all over. Some rice could even be found inside the seams, not knowing when they had been left there. All of these made him dirty to the extreme. The face of this tall and thin Taoist was relatively clean, with several long beard under his lower jaw. His slanted eyes tilted upwards and the obscenity they shone with again made him extremely dirty.

Dewdrop smiled and followed the handmaiden to wash up and put on her makeup again.

She knew the importance of this n.o.ble guest, whom Mistress Jian had told her ahead of time. But she was not aware of his ident.i.ty and his job, and she never cared about outer appearances. The focus was, this Taoist had always been generous, what's more, he called himself Vitality-protecting G.o.d and didn't really have physical contact with her although he had been here for two or three times. For this reason, how could those brothel girls dislike him?

The filthy, tall and thin Taoist poured himself a cup of wine and sipped unhurriedly. In boredom, he caught the sight of a piece of paper rubbed into a lump beside the wine pot. That was the ordinary paper from an account book, from which words could be vaguely perceived. Out of the inclination fostered during decades of cultivation, he instinctly picked up that lump of paper and spread it carefully on the table.

On that ruffled paper wrote a line of ink words, with no clear distinctions in between, which, added by the mess and tilted frame, revealed something unpleasant.

On the paper it read, "Sangsang, I, your young master, am drunk today and won't come back to sleep, so you must remember to drink the stewed chicken soup left in the pot."

His messy brows tightly knitted at these words. But surprisingly, what was displayed between his knitted brows was not disgust but complete shock and delight.

The tall and thin Taoist carefully appreciated those words, which seemed to be blindly written by the claws of chicken, and then his eyes rested on the two words "chicken soup" at the last of the sentence. His skinny right hand dipped in the wine cup and began to imitate the style of writing strokes with strokes on the table.

The wine on the tip of his figures was transformed into characters on the rosewood table, which, in fact had little difference with the two characters that Ning Que had written on the memo. It seemed that a flow of Tao had penetrated the wine following the Taoist's figure and penetrated into the depth of that rosewood table, which then sprinkled immediately into numerous tiny whirls and disappeared.

Dewdrop who was making up outside seemed to sense something and stiffened as she watched the reflections of twinkling stars in the water of the basin. Not knowing why, she suddenly felt homesick, wanting to see that warm home which only existed in her dream. Thinking that she had never enjoyed a pot of chicken soup cooked by her mother, her eyes were filled with tears.