Can't blame Meng Fangxun for not noticing. Last night, Xu Huaiqian was always veiled, and Chen Liejiu didn't let any else participate in lifting the veil.
He gave no chance for any to see the groom, so they still didn't know Xu Huaiqian's eyes had recovered.
"They're better." Xu Huaiqian nodded. "If they weren't, how could I get married?" He couldn't exactly fumble around to be with his husband...
Although not seeing was also stimulating—like last time, where sensation al nearly overwhelmed him—such playfulness was good occasionally, but who could stand it daily?
"Better, and you didn't even tell me." Meng Fangxun, picking up food, pursed his lips unhappily. "I worried for nothing for so long."
"Why were you worried about me?" Xu Huaiqian took the ginseng chicken soup Chen Liejiu had specially asked Wang Wanwan to prepare for him and drank it leisurely, not understanding.
He didn't know why the Chen family's food was so delicious?! Meng Fangxun, eating continuously, told Xu Huaiqian about the Commissir entrusting them with writing the epitaph.
Xu Huaiqian paused his chopsticks: "There's actually such a thing?" Holed up in the small mountain village for so long, prefectural matters felt very distant.
"Mm." Meng Fangxun didn't hide anything, explaining his analysis to Xu Huaiqian: "I thought it was uncertain whether the Commissir would stand up for you. Better to seize the immediate advantage."
There were many in the world with good handwriting. If Xu Huaiqian was blind, couldn't the Commissir just find some else?
Must he insist on Xu Huaiqian? And confront the Prefect for him? Unlikely.
Since this uncertain matter lacked guarantee, it was better to secure what was certain.
For example, doing the job well and gaining the favor of both the Commissir and Lord Jiang at once.
"You did the right thing." Xu Huaiqian nodded. Meng Fangxun's choice was correct. He was just an unknown minor figure; even with good calligraphy, he wasn't irreplaceable.
No need to take risks. After finishing his soup, he nodded: "I'll write it for you later when I have more energy."
Just transcribing, not writing an essay— a piece of cake for him.
And just married, in a good mood, his writing would reflect it. Xu Huaiqian felt the characters he wrote today would look festive.
" No rush." With the weight off his mind, Meng Fangxun could also enjoy the delicious food on the table.
They were eating happily, but Pei Wangshu found the food increasingly tasteless, the more he ate, the less he enjoyed it.
When is in a bad mood, even delicacies taste like chewing paper.
Seeing he had no appetite, Xu Huaiqian asked curiously: "What's wrong? Is the food not to your taste?"
Xu Huaiqian found it strange. At the academy, Pei Wangshu was the who loved his family's food the most, extremely uncomfortable if he didn't eat it for a day. Today, most dishes on the table were his favorites, so why had he lost his appetite?
"No." Pei Wangshu shook his head, scanning the table with a look of not knowing how to bring it up.
"Really, Pei Wangshu, there's a time when you don't know how to speak up?"
At the academy, Pei Wangshu had always clamored about coming to Xu Huaiqian's house to eat his fill someday. Hearing that he now had no appetite for the Chen family's food, the whole table looked at him curiously. Seeing his constipated expression, Zhang Bingwen, who felt restless if he didn't tease him for a day, was the first to speak.
"I feel..." Pei Wangshu pursed his lips. He knew he shouldn't spoil the mood now, but he couldn't help it. "...the gap between you all, who passed the Xiucai exam, and me is getting wider and wider."
Duan Youyan went without saying; he had a magistrate father-in-law. As long as he worked hard and continued his exams, his future would be bright and brilliant.
Here, Xu Huaiqian and Meng Fangxun had also gained the Commissir's favor, with the fourth-rank Hanlin Reader Lord Jiang behind them.
All this felt so distant to him, a merchant's son without a Xiucai rank.
Thinking about the growing distance between them in the future—from close friends to strangers—he couldn't suppress his distress.
He had had friends before that he drifted apart from, and it hadn't bothered him much. But this time was different. For the first time, he wanted to be friends with them for life and didn't want to separate.
But his not wanting to didn't mean others felt the same.
Pei Wangshu gave Zhang Bingwen an resentful look, especially towards this person who probably couldn't wait to kick him out of their group.
"What are you looking at me for?" Zhang Bingwen was speechless under Pei Wangshu's resentful gaze. "Did I make you not study hard?"
"I used stinky socks to fumigate you, and you still didn't get up! What's the use of regretting and blaming me now?!"
Zhang Bingwen hated people like Pei Wangshu the most—no burdens, studying if they felt like it, not studying if they didn't.
No worries about food or clothing, carefree for life. So what if he didn't pass the Xiucai exam? Why was he acting like a neglected husband here?
"...Sigh." Mentioning this made Pei Wangshu even more resentful. He didn't know what was wrong with him; he got sleepy as soon as he looked at books. "I'm just afraid the gap will keep widening, and in the future, I'll have to respectfully call you all 'Your Excellency' on the street."
Instead of being able to greet them warmly like now.
Hearing this, Xu Huaiqian, Meng Fangxun, and Duan Youyan all smiled simultaneously.
"Then it's not too late to work hard now." Meng Fangxun picked up a morsel of food for him. "The Xiucai exam isn't only held this year; you can take it next year too."
"And I, the last-place Xiucai, might have only passed because the Commissir liked my calligraphy— zero real value." Xu Huaiqian kindly shared some of his ginseng chicken soup with him to nourish his brain. "If you pass on your own, you might be much better than me."
The more Xu Huaiqian spoke, the more plausible it seemed. What a coincidence that right after he passed, the Commissir came looking for him to engrave characters.
Besides, since he passed, Pei Wangshu, who was on par with him, should have passed too. The only difference was that his handwriting was better than Pei Wangshu's.
Sure enough, having a skill made a difference.
"And you should feel fortunate," Duan Youyan added water to his empty teacup, pointedly addressing his fear. "Starting next year, you'll have four Xiucai friends to help you tutor."
Hearing this, Pei Wangshu's body shivered. He looked at Duan Youyan in disbelief: "You mean... you're all still willing to be friends with me next year?"
" Why wouldn't we?" Xu Huaiqian looked at him like he was an idiot. "Besides the academy exam mutual guarantee, don't we need for the provincial exam too?"
"But you could just find people in Class B." Pei Wangshu said without thinking.
" Not familiar. I'd be afraid they'd screw me over." The mutual guarantee wasn't easy; if anything happened during the exam, all five would be affected.
Xu Huaiqian couldn't be bothered to cultivate new friendships. He preferred friends like Pei Wangshu, who had stood by him firmly when others ostracized him.
"Okay." Pei Wangshu thought it made sense. You can know a person's face but not their heart. If Xu Huaiqian and the others found some randomly, what if that person betrayed them?
Every present was his Xiucai friend. If mutual guarantee went wrong, all four of them would be finished.
Thinking this, Pei Wangshu was happy: "It seems I'm still quite important!"
" Of course you are." Xu Huaiqian nodded. "So you have to work hard to pass the Xiucai exam quickly. Otherwise, in three years, if you're not a Juren, what will we do?"
Here, Pei Wangshu became uncertain again: "C-Can I pass?"
" Absolutely!" Meng Fangxun decided firmly. "With me teaching you, it will definitely work."
Having tutored three Xiucai pass in two months, Meng Fangxun's confidence soared. He refused to believe he couldn't get Pei Wangshu to pass too.
Pei Wangshu thought about the scene where they tied him to a chair, poked him with needles, fumigated him with stinky socks, and didn't give him food, having to go through it again, and his throat tightened.
" Eat more," Duan Youyan moved the dishes on the table closer to him. "This time, you not only have to keep up with the Xiucai progress but also our Juren progress. The task is heavy and the road is long."
Implied meaning: Hurry up and eat; stop being overly sensitive. After today, it's hard to say if you'll get to eat.
Don't be fooled by Xu Huaiqian's always smiling face; he was sly inside and sweet-talked people skillfully. Who knew if he'd even let Pei Wangshu eat later.
Pei Wangshu felt he made sense and didn't dare lose his appetite anymore, eating in big mouthfuls.
"Brother Liejiu, they are so interesting." Sheng Yunjin, on the side, seeing a completely different Duan Youyan from the at home, smiled until his eyes curved and spoke to Chen Liejiu.
Last time at the academy gate, Chen Liejiu had spoken to him, but he didn't dare respond, afraid of meeting a bad person—after all, what man was so bold?
These two days at the Chen house, after getting to know Chen Liejiu, he felt only admiration for him, no fear at all, and wanted to get closer to him.
"Mm." Chen Liejiu also liked seeing Xu Huaiqian interact with his friends without any inhibitions; it made him seem much more lively.
"Brother Liejiu, you are also very interesting." Seeing Chen Liejiu engage with him, Sheng Yunjin started steering the conversation towards him.
"How am I interesting?" Chen Liejiu didn't quite understand why he suddenly brought him up.
"You are different from all the men I've met." Sheng Yunjin said hstly. "N of us are as bold and unrestrained as you. It's like nothing in the world can defeat you."
Working as an escort, collecting debts, taking a live-in husband, making charcoal, building roads—Sheng Yunjin couldn't imagine a man doing any of these things.
But Chen Liejiu, a man, did them all and did them so well. He thought about it; if it were him, any of those things would have him drowned in others' spittle and scorn. But Chen Liejiu wasn't.
He completely ignored it without fear.
"What's the big deal," Chen Liejiu smiled. "I'm just doing what a normal person should do. If I were like other men, too afraid to go out because of others' strange looks, I might not even be in this world anymore."
From the moment Chen Liejiu, a man, dared to work with an escort agency, he had seen too many looks— scornful or disdainful, all malicious.
But if he hadn't g, when his family was starving, these malicious people didn't pity or sympathize with him either. It showed that people in this world were inherently evil.
Why should he restrict himself for these "evil people"? Clearly, just shaking off others' strange looks could let him live well. Why trap himself in place?
"My A-Jiu is right." Xu Huaiqian gave his husband a thumbs up. "The world never dictated what a man should be like, what a woman should be like, or what a man should be like. As long as you believe your own way is right, that's enough."
Xu Huaiqian really liked Chen Liejiu's free-spirited and fearless demeanor. Like himself—others might mock him for being a live-in husband, for being a grown man eating living off his husband, for being clingy with his husband.
But he wasn't afraid at all. He felt what he had with his husband was great: his husband provided for the family, he was responsible for being beautiful, and their marital life was harmonious.
"If only I could have been as open-minded as you back then." Duan Youyan sighed.
He had only recently learned that living under others' gaze was ultimately not advisable. Life was your own; opinions belonged to others.
"Actually, you are the normal ," Xu Huaiqian bit his chopstick. Duan Youyan completely fit the image of a live-in husband in this era. "I am the anomaly."
If he hadn't time-traveled, if he had grown up in this environment, he would also be troubled by the issues that plagued Duan Youyan.
But he had time-traveled, and he had met such a wonderful husband like his A-Jiu.
He now took back what he said about the author who supposedly wrote a novel based on him when he first arrived.
If there really was an author who wrote a book based on him, he hoped that he, his A-Jiu, and all their friends and family around them could have happy and fulfilling lives.
Life was already bitter enough; reading shouldn't be bitter too.
Duan Youyan smiled and didn't continue the topic, taking a sip of tea and moving on to business: " Coincidentally, I also have something to tell you."