Author: Sigui Beihong

"Secure the sedan!" the boy shouted, and the sedan carrying Mo Yunxiao fell down. The sedan bars pressed down, forming a steep slope, allowing the people inside to get out.

Mo Yunxiao stepped out of the sedan and looked up. He saw towering houses everywhere, with a royal style. There were also pavilions, rockeries and flowing water, and countless exotic flowers and plants. The breeze blew, and the fragrance of the flowers refreshed the heart and mind, making it very comfortable.

.

The original Mo's residence was magnificent enough, but it pales in comparison to the even more gorgeous Prince Jian's residence. Even Mo Yunxiao, who was born a thousand years later, couldn't help but be amazed when he was in this beautiful courtyard.

"The flowers, grass, mountains and rocks look a bit like Suzhou gardens." Mo Yunxiao commented, and the boy following her laughed and said, "I guess Miss Linglong is also a well-informed person, and she actually understands the layout of this courtyard.

The beauty of it.”

Chinese garden art originated in the Ming Dynasty. Although it was immature in the Song Dynasty, it had already taken shape. Mo Yunxiao had studied calligraphy and Chinese painting since he was a child, and naturally had some experience in garden art, so he could tell at a glance that this was the style of Jiangnan.

If anyone else has never been to Jiangnan, they will definitely not understand.

Mo Yunxiao smiled slightly and said to the boy, "I just said it casually, I don't know if it's right or not."

"Yes, that's right." The boy bowed his waist with a flattering look on his face.

Mo Yunxiao didn't like him like this, so he walked forward. The boy also hurriedly followed. Mo Yunxiao couldn't get rid of him, and couldn't help but feel irritated. But then he thought about how fawning this boy was.

It must be an old man from the palace. He must know Huan'er's whereabouts.

She made up her mind and asked insinuatingly: "How many girls have entered the palace before me?"

The boy was a little embarrassed and hurriedly said: "Our king is good at making friends. Many ministers and nobles from the court have come to greet him. Naturally, they have made some contributions, about thirty of them. But as you know, just for a moment

In no time, all thirty girls were sent out."

"Besides them, are there no other maidservants?" Mo Yunxiao asked while pacing.

"This..." the boy replied hesitantly: "Yes, there is. The palace is different from ordinary people's homes. Someone has to take care of everything big and small. However, the young man doesn't care about buying people, or how many people have been admitted.

I don’t know how many people came out again.”

Mo Yunxiao nodded and did not ask any more questions. But she was thinking in her mind that the best outcome would be that Huan'er would be among the thirty girls sent out. But this possibility was very small.

She entered the palace as a singer in the Zeng Mansion. With her own way of saving people, the thirty girls must be similar. And Huan'er can't sing and dance, so naturally she can't be a singer. So she is probably as a singer.

Bought as an ordinary maid.

But this is okay. If it were an ordinary maid, Zhao might not pay attention to her deliberately. Then the possibility of her keeping her innocence would naturally increase. So no matter which possibility it is, there are pros and cons. Next, just wait and see.

Change and react appropriately.

Mo Yunxiao was in a trance, but the boy following her called in a low voice: "Miss Linglong, Miss Linglong."

She was suddenly startled and shouted "Ah!"

The boy chuckled, looked up at the sky again, and said, "It's getting late. I'll take you back to the attic."

Mo Yunxiao responded and said, "Brother, please lead the way."

"It's easy. You can come with me." The boy led Mo Yunxiao to his room.

This is a spacious and bright bedroom. Although it is a bedroom, it is a suite, consisting of a study, a living room and a bedroom. There is a screen separating the bedroom and the living room. The screen is carved with a cross-legged figure

Sitting there is a thin old man with a kind face. The old man has his eyes closed and his face is ferocious, which makes people shudder. Surrounded by cranes and colorful clouds. Although the picture is slightly weird, the carving technique is still very sophisticated.

The key point of Chinese art is artistic conception. But Mo Yunxiao stopped in front of the screen for a long time, but could not see what kind of artistic conception this picture wanted to express.

The boy chuckled and said, "Miss Linglong, what do you think?"

"Let me ask you, do you know who the person painted on this screen is?" Mo Yunxiao suddenly asked.

The boy was stunned for a moment and felt a little embarrassed. He couldn't help but smile bitterly and said: "This little boy doesn't know that no one in the past has ever asked about it."

"Oh." Mo Yunxiao didn't say much.

"Miss Linglong, you have been tired all the way. I will ask someone to boil bath water for you," the boy said.

"Ah?" Mo Yunxiao was a little surprised and embarrassed, and said quickly: "That's not necessary."

"I want it, every new girl who joins the house wants it. Miss Coral, you don't have to be polite, just wait a moment." After he finished speaking, he left without waiting for Mo Yunxiao to answer.

Mo Yunxiao wanted to stop him, but didn't know what to say. Just for a moment, she was stunned and she was the only one left in the room.

She looked around intently and found that the decoration of this room was also very exquisite. Looking at the bed, it was covered with soft silk sheets, and there was a gauze curtain hanging over the bed, which could block light and repel mosquitoes. The pillows were also

It is very soft, with cotton and buckwheat inside, and the outside is wrapped and sewn with silk cloth. If you put it up to your nose and smell it, it still has a faint fragrance.

It had been a long time since she had slept in such a bed. Ever since her home was confiscated, she had hardly slept soundly a day.

Sleeping on that kind of hard bunk bed, and being squeezed together with Yunxi, Yunxiang and the others, it was very difficult to turn over. When I closed my eyes, I could hear Yunxi snoring. I finally fell asleep, but I could always see it in my dreams.

When Mo Chenglin was covered in blood, he tortured her over and over again: "Have you avenged me?"

She often wakes up to find that she is covered in sweat and her heart is pounding.

But now, she can sleep on a soft bed, without having to squeeze in with anyone, without having to listen to other people's snores, and she can sleep until she wakes up naturally. What a comfortable life it is.

She sat on the edge of the bed, stroking the head of the bed with her hands, and couldn't help but think: "Now that you've come, let's take care of it. You might as well pretend to be real and enjoy it first, so that you don't leave this life in vain."

At this moment, several maids came in one after another, curtseying to Mo Yunxiao at the same time, and said, "The young one is here to serve Miss Linglong for a bath."

Mo Yunxiao didn't understand what "bathing" meant for a while. But looking at the trays they were holding that contained snow-white bath towels, bottles and jars of unknown nature, flower petals and soap locust, she should have understood that this meant ancient people.

toiletries.

Several other girls brought in wooden buckets filled with hot water, and then poured them into the large tubs for bathing one by one, before respectfully exiting.

Mo Yunxiao looked them over and saw no one there, so he asked their names and ages. It turned out that they were all teenage girls.

Although Huan'er was nowhere to be seen, it was a nice thing to see so many people waiting for her to take a bath, and Mo Yunxiao was no longer polite.

She first tested the water temperature with her hands. The water in the tub was hot but not harmful to her skin. Then she took off her clothes under the help of several girls.

A girl helped her take off her shoes and socks, and when she saw a pair of exquisite and beautiful "natural feet", she couldn't help but burst out laughing.

Mo Yunxiao knew what they were laughing at, so she said, "You must be wondering why King Jian likes such a talented woman, right?"

"Little girls don't dare." The girls stopped laughing and helped her get into the bathtub. Some of them sprinkled flower petals, some used soap locust to rub her back, and some opened the bottles and jars and took out the contents inside.

The liquid was slowly poured into the tub.

Mo Yunxiao was a little strange and asked: "What is here?"

"It's honey." The girl replied: "There is also water made from some medicinal materials, which is very effective in whitening the skin and leaving a fragrance."

"Oh." Mo Yunxiao also smiled and said, "The ancient dignitaries really knew how to enjoy themselves. It's just that the custom of foot binding is not good."

The girls looked at each other, and one of them boldly asked: "Hasn't Miss Linglong had her feet bound since she was a child?"

"Of course not." Mo Yunxiao said: "I have seen X-ray photos of the foot bones of women with bound feet. They had to break the toe bones alive and press them under the soles of the feet. Wow, it hurts to death just thinking about it. Such deformity

I don’t want the aesthetics of it.”

The girls were stunned at first, some were confused and others snickered. Although they didn't understand what an X-ray photo was, they felt that it was full of loopholes after listening to Mo Yunxiao's description.

"It seems that Miss Linglong has never had her feet bound, and there is such a big misunderstanding about it," said the girl who was rubbing her back.

"Misunderstanding?" Mo Yunxiao was a little curious and couldn't help asking: "What misunderstanding do I have?"

The girl explained: "The practice of foot binding started in modern times. Although it wraps up a woman's feet and makes them look like rice dumplings, it is not so cruel as breaking the toe bones."

"Oh? Really? But I saw..." Before Mo Yunxiao could say anything, another girl said: "Oh, if you meet a cruel woman, you can break her bones."

After she finished speaking, she also made a miserable expression.

The girl from before also nodded and said, "That's true. I heard from Zhang Xiucai in our village that women in the previous dynasty did not have their feet bound. They could ride horses and play Cuju. But now many women have to take this trip."

Maybe a few hundred years later, the women at that time would be so entangled that it wouldn’t be a problem to break their bones.”

As they talked like this, Mo Yunxiao finally understood. It turned out that although the foot binding in the Song Dynasty was painful, it was not as painful as the so-called "three-inch golden lotus" in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. She recalled it carefully,

Yunxi's foot massage was nothing more than removing the foot wrap and applying massage techniques to allow the blood to flow back and the meridians to relax. And if her foot bones were broken, she would have to ask a bone-setter anyway.

"Well, fortunately we are all children from poor families and we are not so picky." The girls chatted while helping Mo Yunxiao take a bath.

Mo Yunxiao suddenly added: "Even if you are not a child from a poor family, you may not be so particular."

"Oh? How can a girl say this?" a girl asked her.

"Do you know Mo Yunxiao from Minglou?" she suddenly asked.

The girls looked at each other, then burst into laughter. While laughing, they said, "Female Yama, you can ask around Tokyo. Who doesn't know?"

"Well, what do you think of her?" Mo Yunxiao asked again.

The girls grinned and replied: "Not very good. I heard that she is a Hedong lion, a hag."

"You..." Mo Yunxiao almost sat up from the bathtub. But she still suppressed the anger in her heart and asked, "How do you start talking about this?"

"That's what people say." A girl replied, then thought for a moment, and then said: "Some time ago, their Minglou house was ransacked. I don't know the crime. I only know that the whole family was dispersed. It seems... like a woman

The envoy even bought someone into the palace."

Mo Yunxiao's eyes suddenly lit up, and she hurriedly crawled over and asked, "What? Where is this female servant?"

The girl was startled, and several other girls hurriedly slapped her to signal her not to talk nonsense. She could only smile awkwardly and said, "Young lady, don't be offended if you talk without restraint."

"I'm not surprised. Tell me, where is she?" Mo Yunxiao asked urgently, as if she had grasped a life-saving straw.
To be continued...