Living leisurely in Tang Dynasty

Chapter 121:

Li Yuanying is someone who can create drama out of nothing. Now that there’s something to work on, he made a big fuss. He quickly went home and inform mother about his future princess.

Lady Liu is well-aware that her son’s marriage will be the Emperor’s decision. Hearing that her son went out for a trip and have gotten a future wife, she was surprised but then decided to probe the matter further. Yuanying told her all about how Li Er arranged his upcoming marriage to sister Shu. “It’s sister Shu, I’ve told you about her many times.”

Of course mother knows the girl, she is someone personally raised by minister Wei and is studying in the Imperial College. She is indeed an extraordinary girl, otherwise Li Yuanying might not like her so much.

Within a minute, mother and son shared the same joy. “Then I shall need to carefully prepare the meeting gift.” (Lady Liu)

Although Li Yuanying went on ranting about preparing a betrothal gift. In fact, there were regulations in place for betrothal gift by a prince and what etiquette to follow. His Majesty will arrange for someone to take care of it and there isn’t anything that the boy needed to worry about.  All he needed to do was be present on the day.

Lady Liu wanted to prepare a meeting gift for Wei Shu.

“Sister Shu writes well. If you choose good ink and inkstone for her, she will definitely like it.”

“Why would someone gift ink as a meeting gift?” Lady Liu told Yuanying to mind his own business and not meddle in her gift to her future daughter in law.

Li Yuanying silently uttered “Get a daughter in law and forgets the son”. He then instructed his men to withdraw money  and to pay everyone a 1 month bonus and 2 new suits to celebrate him getting a future wife. Since the prince is wealthy and generous, his men were all happy and boasted about their master’s good deeds.

In the blink of an eye, everyone knew that Li Yuanying was going to bring home a princess. Yuanying didn’t stop there, he then handed out red envelopes to all his nephews and grandnephews, saying that he should share his luck to them too. Get married and have children as soon as possible to expand the Li family tree.

Even Li Chengqian got one.

“Although you already have Xiang’er, you still should have more children. More means more blessings. More means more fun!”

“Young uncle is right. Young uncle should hurry up too.” He smiled and teased: “Young Uncle, do you know where children come from?”

Growing up in the palace and able to persuade His Majesty to work less, Yuanying would not be troubled by such a question. Although he didn’t know the whole process but he and Sister Shu were still young so this isn’t a problem to think about now. When he grows up, he will naturally know how!

Yuanying hummed: “How could I not know? I understand!” After saying that, he wanted to take Chengqian’s pulse to see if he had overindulged in “action”. Although he should have more children, over-indulgence is not good, as it harms the body.

Li Yuanying said in a serious manner that he would give Chengqian some prescriptions to replenish his energy, causing Chengqian to flee in despair.

If people were to find out that the dignified crown prince had to take nourishing medicines at such a young age, where should he hide his face?

Will Li Yuanying let someone outrun him? Even though Li Chengqian ran away, he asked someone to pick out deer tail, tiger tail, bull tail and the likes and sent them all to East Palace. All is left to make things super obvious is to beat a gong loudly to announce that he is helping his eldest nephew strengthen his virility!

Li Chengqian  hates himself for uttering an additional sentence teasingly. Now everyone looks at him with inquiry and pity.

The key is that no one would dare come forward to offer him condolences. At least that way he can refute the rumour.  What can he do? Li Chengqian could only spend more time with the crown princess, hoping to be blessed with another child to put rumors to rest.

Li Yuanying made too much noise and His Majesty heard all about it. Hearing that Li Yuanying had caused rumors about the Crown Prince’s fertility, the Emperor was speechless and immediately gave him a scolding. I know you are happy about having a future princess, but you don’t have to cause so much havoc right?

Li Yuanying was not one to be scolded obediently.

“It’s Chengqian’s fault. He said that I didn’t know where children come from, so I had to prove to him my knowledge.”  

Li Er was lazy to entertain him. Pack up and go back to the Imperial College as soon as the Lantern Festival is over. Stop causing trouble.

On the day of the Lantern Festival, Chang’an City was bustling with activity. It’s a rare occasion where the night curfew is lifted and everyone can walk around freely. The streets were crowded. The music team at FengThai also made their debut today.

Cheng Xin updated that the stage had been set but they didn’t have enough time to practice new music so they will be using the music program from the year before, outsiders has not heard of it, so it should still be attractive. We take this chance to announce that there will be performances every month at the restaurant this year.

Yuanying was satisfied with the arrangement. Since there were no new songs, he would not be joining. After the festival he would have to return to school and so he cherished the little time he had and invited Wei Shu out to play at night and happily ran to pick her up in the evening.

Everyone in the Wei family had mixed feelings about Li Yuanying. In the past, they thought that he was going to kidnap Wei Shu so everyone was extremely vigilant; now that Wei Shu has really been abducted by him, they don’t know whether they should kick him out. This guy is so thick-skinned. No one have doubts about him climbing over the the wall to enter the house if they were to kick him out!

Mrs. Pei had always liked Li Yuanying.  Since the two got engaged, Mrs. Pei had inquired lots about  Prince Teng and was always worried. In the past, she only had to worry about Wei Zheng, but now she also has to worry about Li Yuanying too.

Li Yuanying did not feel the complex emotions of others.

He originally wanted to bring Wei Shu out alone to have fun but Sizi and the others were eager to play too. Naturally, he couldn’t leave them so when he arrived at Wei’s house, he had a bunch of children with him along with friends; all ready to see lanterns and the moon.

He greeted Mrs. Pei and quickly explained the situation to Wei Shu. Although Wei Shu didn’t like fun as much as Yuanying, there was no reason to leave everyone else behind so she had no objection to everyone celebrating the Lantern Festival together.

As they were all good friends, Gao Yang and the others teased Wei Shu with a few words and then everyone started thinking about how best to play!

Li Yuanying had no plan, he led the group from street to street, from the East Market to the West Market. They walked everywhere and didn’t stop all night. They even stopped by FengThai restaurant to have a look and only left after seeing more and more people gathering.

“I leave this matter to Chengxin, the one playing the pipa just now. It’s an instrument I listen to since young and not many plays it well. Chengxin plays it very well and I first heard her playing at Chengqian’s place. He’s such a great nephew that he assigned her to me when I asked!”

Before Wei Shu could speak, Gao Yang laughed.

“If brother is so great, why are you messing with him?” Although a normal lady would refrain from hearing such rumour but Gao Yang is not normal. She plays together with the boys and had heard all about the biggest scandal in the palace.

“I’m just showing my concern for my nephew.”

Wei Shu asked what they were talking about.

Li Yuanying being shameless quickly whispered to her all that had happen in the palace.

Wei Shu’s ears became red but she held onto a neutral expression. Hearing all about the nonsensical things that uncle and nephew had done she could only reply: “You guys really do share a close relationship.” If it weren’t for the tight kinship, they would have beaten Yuanying to death!

“Of course!”

After a night of playing, Yuanying sent Little round ball home and then the girls to the palace gate. Then, he and Wei Shu walked towards the Wei Family home.

On their way home, Li Yuanying never shut up. He went on and on about his future plans. This year he might not be able to pass the imperial examination but that’s alright. Li Zhi will be moving to Taiyuan after getting married, so let’s visit him for a fun time. Once he has passed his exams then let’s visit WenCheng in Tibet!

Once they come back from Tibetan Empire, he would be 14 or 15. He will then have to move to his fief and brother will have no reason to keep him anymore. By then, no one can stop them from doing whatever their hearts desires, let’s build a huge academy and a big boat, let’s go out to sea to play!

But Yuanying wasn’t just doing this for playtime. Since the incident of Wei Zheng falling sick, he found that his system is useful as it is good at treating illnesses. Let’s collect more points so that we have points in case someone dear falls sick.

Since scanning documents and buildings have become “questionable”, he will scan more dinosaur fossils. Anyway, there will be specialist in this field in the future. Why not spend money to train a team to look for fossils?  I might make more money by selling more dinosaur models!

So if he were to go out travelling in the future, he will ask his team of “fossil experts” to investigate if there are any fossils around. If there is, he will scan them. This way, you won’t miss out on playing or earning points, the best of both worlds!

Li Yuanying’s little abacus was rattling in his mind when they reached Wei Shu’s home. Yuanying didn’t like to come and go quietly, so he openly delivered big and small gifts to the Wei Family.

This guy doesn’t regard himself as an outsider. After entering, he happily placed the ornaments into Wei Zheng’s house. He placed a vase shaped like a graceful lady in Wei Shu’s corner in the study and put flowers onto it.  After finishing his work, he said goodbye to Mrs. Pei and happily returned to the palace.

Wei Shu sat in front of the flowers and then looked at the lantern that Li Yuanying personally hung for her. She laughed softly.

At night, Wei Zheng cursed at Li Yuanying to Mrs. Pei. Not only is this guy bring his granddaughter out to play, he bought half the street back. He felt that it wouldn’t be long before he, the number one admonisher of the Empire, would become the target of impeachment!

At this moment, Wei Zheng finally realized the evil heart of His Majesty. Wei Zheng carries himself to be honest and upright in all aspects. As a result, His Majesty chose such a grandson-in-law for him. Sooner or later, his reputation will be completely ruined!

When it comes to extravagance, who can compare with Li Yuanying? Someone said that when he was at the Imperial College, he had a bunch of big boxes. He wears his clothes only once and then throws them away! In order to have good food, he even found a restaurant to feed the Imperial College hundreds of dishes. Different dishes were served for a hundred days and then his favorite food was picked and served every day.

Not to mention his amazing ability to make trouble. He creates a big fuss no matter what he does. Forget about anything else, let’s just focus on this arranged marriage. His Majesty has not even finished the basic procedures but he has already announced it to the whole world and then dragged the Crown Prince into this mess!

The Crown prince had secretly asked Wei Zheng to control this prospective grandson-in-law, and to persuade His Majesty to stop him from causing trouble every day.

Wei Zheng felt that he would soon be sick again!

Although Mrs. Pei heard everything, she didn’t fully agree with Wei Zheng. Although she is also worried about whether Li Yuanying will cause huge disasters but isn’t he doing well now?

“What’s wrong with my grandson-in-law buying you something? Who dares to say anything? Don’t they also have in-laws? If their family is not filial, they can’t see other people practice this virtue?”

Wei Zheng remained silent.

Mrs. Pei continued with praises: “I think this child is blessed. Your illness was so severe and the doctors were helpless and could not revive you. This child came not long after and you got well and was able to walk right away the next day!”

Wei Zheng snorted: “I was so angry that I woke up.”

He has many children and several grandchildren but Wei Shu is his favourite. She can do whatever she wants and he only hopes that she grows up happily. At that time, Li Yuanying wanted to kidnap her on his sickbed. How can he not be angry?

“You can hear him and be angry with you but you can’t hear us crying? The child is lucky enough to wake you up!”

Come on. In Mrs. Pei’s eyes, that brat is faultless and a good child!

Wei Zheng shut up for the night.

Notes from the author:

Little Prince: Of course I am the best! (Proud pose)

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