“Jeffrey, come on a walk with me.” Chuyu beckoned to the youth clad in blue, tight warrior clothing. She didn’t wait for his reply before stepping onto the crooked pebble path.
The youth named Jeffrey Yue had a tall and handsome frame. His tight-fitting clothes also showed off his beautiful long legs, narrow waist, and broad shoulders. Although he didn’t have the prettiest face in the world, he had a soaring handsomeness.
Chuyu still remembered that when she just arrived in this world, the first time she left the room, Jeffrey materialized beside her as if a ghost. She almost had a heart attack, but later she found out that Jeffrey was her personal bodyguard and she calmed down, realizing that this was probably the legendary QingGong1 , appearing and disappearing at will.
Every time she left her room, Jeffrey would immediately appear beside her, no matter day or night. Similarly, no matter what time, whenever Chuyu returned to her room, Jeffrey would automatically disappear, not wasting a single second. Chuyu had attempted to suddenly burst out of the room early in the morning, but the moment she stepped out of the entrance, she would see the very recognizable broad shoulders narrow waist and long legs beside her. Chuyu had to admit that the protection Jeffrey gave her was 24/7 without any vacations.
Chuyu had been wondering to herself that by providing such close protection, where did Jeffrey usually rest? Did he sleep on her roof everyday? What will happen if it rained? It’s a shame that ever since Chuyu travelled through time, all the showers fell during midnight, when she was deep asleep; so of course she couldn’t climb up to get answers.
Ever since she decided to face life, Chuyu opened her arms to enjoy all that originally belonged to the Princess of Shady Mountains. The land that the Princess’ palace took up could be described as vast, as if land didn’t even cost money. In her previous life, every inch of land cost a fortune in the modern cities, extremely expensive. Some people work for their entire lives to save up for a single apartment, but right now, when Chuyu looked out, the pavilions, the gardens, the woods, the rockery, everything was her territory. Every time Chuyu thought about this she was elated.
And the clothing and food for the Princess was more luxurious than imaginable, too. Thirty to forty dishes was the most basic breakfast or midnight snack, while lunch or dinner consisted of at least a hundred dishes. And this was when Chuyu ate by herself. As for clothing, everyday was unique. All brand-new, and not any two days did she wear the same thing. Chuyu had asked Daisy about it before, and learned that all those exquisite garments, the Princess of Shady Mountains usually only put on once; after she wore them they were sent to a warehouse and collected dust. Chuyu felt sorry for them.
After getting used to life without modern technology, especially without computers, Chuyu lived an extremely comfortable life.
“Luxurious, so luxurious!” Chuyu exclaimed while enjoying the material comforts brought by her time travel resurrection. She embraced everything her new identity owned, except one — Men.
Although she stepped out of the room, Chuyu didn’t go anywhere far. She had forgotten to renounce her ban, so all the male concubines that came to see her were still prohibited from entering like they were a few days ago. Until today, Chuyu still didn’t see a single male concubine of the Princess of Shady Mountain’s besides Rong Zhi; although there were four others on the day she first woke up, their faces were blurry in Chuyu’s brain.
With good food, good drink, and good sleep, Chuyu devoted all her attention into tasting the natural and unpolluted foods of the ancient times. Excess nutrition speedily made up for the thinning a few days ago caused by her depression: in just a couple of days, Chuyu’s cheek returned to its gentle and moving luster. If she kept on eating like this, she suspected that her body shape would move towards expanding horizontally.
So Chuyu stopped. Not only was it to keep her figure, but also to exercise her body, and to meet some of the other people living in the Princess’ palace.
And a very important part of that was those male concubines.
It had been raining last night. Although one whole day had passed, cool moisture still persisted between the pebbles paving the path. A beautiful green covered the new leaves on the trees in the courtyard; such a fresh color could only exist in the spring seasons of Jiangnan2 .
After just two or three steps, Chuyu realized that if she, as the Princess, eagerly went to visit her own male concubines, that would probably be too weird. She paused her steps to summon Daisy, and told her that she was going to set up a Spring Banquet in the palace.
Daisy asked carefully: “Are we still going to let Sir Rong arrange it, like usual?” As far as she knows, many important things inside the Princess’ palace were assigned to Rong Zhi to manage.
Chuyu hesitated for just a second, then nodded her head, smiling, “Yes, let him arrange it.” Now that she was still unfamiliar with most of everything, assigning the matter to an experienced person would be the easiest. But at the same time Chuyu pondered in her heart, wondering, did the Princess of Shady Mountains give Rong Zhi too much authority and privileges? Not only can he ignore her bans and walk anywhere in the palace, he also administered many of the Princess of Shady Mountains’ businesses. There must something about him that was different from the crowd of male concubines.
But Chuyu wasn’t planning to take any action right now. Anything should be planned detailedly before carrying out, so she decided to continue considering for some time.
Right after Chuyu released her order, Rong Zhi went to execute it. He was quite efficient; after only half an hour, the banquet opened in the middle of a forest of apricot trees. Between a profuse array of flowers and trees, two rows consisting of short tables measuring one Chinese foot tall spread out; on top were food and wine. All the beautiful or handsome youths seated themselves one by one.
Chuyu quietly sat at the head of the table. As the Princess, she had no need to arrive so early, but Chuyu had been plotting her own scheme, so she let Daisy lead her here, and was one of the first ones to be seated. Sitting on the brocade cushion behind the long bench, she silently watched the entrance of the courtyard; she observed every single guest, and judged them with her own eyes.
During this time period, although chairs had already been introduced from the nomadic tribes, they weren’t popular yet. When people needed to do something, such as conversing, doing business, or eating, they knelt. And it was the type which the two legs were placed together and the heels touched the buttocks.
Therefore, when the Princess held a banquet, even if it’s the Princess herself, she still had to kneel.
Chuyu shifted her legs, stiff from kneeling, to lessen the numbness; at the same time cursing this time period which chairs hadn’t become popular yet. Although a soft cushion was placed under her legs, after being sat on by the weight of her body for a long time and blood circulation slowed down, this was still a very painful thing.
After only a short period of kneeling, Chuyu couldn’t bear it anymore. But when she turned her head to look at Rong Zhi, who had already finished dealing with all the trivial stuff and was now seated at the head of the right side of the table, his expression was peaceful and mild, not showing any sense of discomfort. She twitched her mouth: How come all these ancient people wouldn’t feel numb from the kneeling? Or was it that too much numbness made them used to the numbness?
Chuyu had only had a little bit of time to let her imagination fly, for people were starting to get seated, and she diverted her attention.