In the carriage, Qi Shaorong was sulking.
Mu Tingxuan looked at Qi Shaorong and said, "Young Master, what's up with you?"
Qi Shaorong snorted softly and said, "The woman said that I'm not good-looking enough, now I'm in a bad mood."
"Oh." Mu Tingxuan responded, and didn't say anything else.
Qi Shaorong looked at Mu Tingxuan, who only said "Oh" and then fell silent, and thought to himself: How did he end up accepting such a dense person as his subordinate? In this situation, shouldn't this guy be consoling him?
"You don't have anything to say to me?" Qi Shaorong asked.
Mu Tingxuan looked at Qi Shaorong and said, "Young Master, looks are nothing but skin and flesh, what's truly important is what's on the inside, so even if you're not as good-looking as Zhuang Hao, you don't need to feel too offended."
Qi Shaorong: "… " Fortunately, he had only let Mu Tingxuan be in charge of planning and logistics in the past. If he had let this guy be in charge of talking about business matters with other people, he's afraid that they would've gone out of business already. Yi Fan's taste was really… Too peculiar.
Mu Tingxuan saw the expression on Qi Shaorong's face and asked, "Young Master, are you okay?"
Qi Shaorong shook his head quickly and said, "I'm fine, I'm fine."
"Young Master, even if Young Master Zhuang Hao is much handsomer than you are, it's not a big deal." Mu Tingxuan said.
Qi Shaorong looked at Mu Tingxuan and thought: Why was he annoyed that Mu Tingxian was too quiet before? Mu Tingxuan, this guy who doesn't have anything good to say [1], it's pretty great when he's being quiet.
Qi Shaorong and the rest spent a month traveling, and after experiencing many difficulties, they finally reached Li Country.
Qi Shaorong held a fan and stepped out from the carriage.
"Young Master, we've arrived at Li Country." Yi Fan helped Qi Shaorong down.
"This wasn't easy!" Qi Shaorong sighed.
Yi Fan nodded and said, "Right!"
Their journey here didn't go very smoothly. Although the people who tried to stop them weren't too hard to deal with, it was annoying how there were so many of them. Some of them were hired by others, and some were originally the local tyrants from those areas.
Zhuang Hao walked over and squeezed in between Yi Fan and Qi Shaorong, saying, "Shaorong, let's find a place to stay first."
Qi Shaorong nodded and said, "Sure! Let's rent a room somewhere, I'm exhausted from our journey."
Qi Shaorong and the others found an inn and walked inside [2].
"Welcome, would you like to rent a room?" The innkeeper asked Qi Shaorong's group of five.
Qi Shaorong nodded and said, "Yes! Are there any rooms still available?"
The innkeeper looked at a list and said, "Not many, there are only two rooms left. Do you want them?"
Zhuang Hao nodded and said, "Yes, we do."
Chen Yuan leaned close to Zhuang Hao's ear and asked, "A-Hao, there are only two rooms, how is it going to be assigned!"
Zhuang Hao said without hesitation, "I'll stay in one room with Shaorong, you can squeeze into the other room with those two."
Chen Yuan's face darkened and he said, "How will that work, it'll be too crowded with all three of us together in one room!"
Zhuang Hao looked at Chen Yuan and said, "If you're afraid of it being too crowded, you can just sleep on the floor!"
Chen Yuan: "…" Zhuang Hao this jerk! They've been friends for many years, but this guy actually wants him to sleep on the floor.
Zhuang Hao took out a money card and handed it over, saying, "We'd like two rooms then."
The innkeeper received the money card and opened up two ordinary rooms for Zhuang Hao and the rest.
"Innkeeper, are there any rooms available?" Several people, dressed in white robes with spiritual grass embroidered on their sleeves, walked in.
"Yes, there are three principal rooms still available." The innkeeper hurriedly nodded and said.
Chen Yuan widened his eyes, full of agitation, and said a little indignantly, "Innkeeper, didn't you say that there are no rooms left?"
"There are no ordinary rooms left, but we still have some higher-level rooms available." The innkeeper said.
"Then you should've mentioned that!"
"If I told you, can you afford it?" The innkeeper said.
Chen Yuan: "…"
The young master of the Chen Family was actually looked down on by others like this. You should know, when he set out on this journey this time, his family was worried that he'd lose face and gave him five million gold coins for his travel expenses. What do you mean he can't afford to stay in a better room? This was really… Too snobbish of them.
The innkeeper waved his hand and said, "Alright, alright, you can go now, the two ordinary rooms are enough for you to stay in."
Chen Yuan wanted to say something but was stopped by Yi Fan, "Now that we're out here in this foreign place, we should act a little more inconspicuously. Even a fierce dragon is no match for a snake in its home territory!"
Chen Yuan heard Yi Fan's words and ground his teeth, he could only suppress the anger in his heart.
The group of youths in white robes began walking up the stairs, and the last one to leave turned around, sneering at Chen Yuan, and said in a low voice, "Poor thing, you don't even have any money yet you still dare to dream of getting a higher-level room."
Chen Yuan almost choked on his breath when he heard the words of the white-robed youth.
Mu Tingxuan looked at the backs of several white-robed youths as they left, his face sinking, and he didn't say anything.
Yi Fan held Mu Tingxuan's hand and said, "Are you alright?"
Muting Xuan glanced at Yi Fan and said, "I'm fine."
Yi Fan smiled at Mu Tingxuan and said, "If there's anything wrong, you can tell me!"
Mu Tingxuan nodded and said, "Okay."
Mu Tingxuan unwittingly dug his fingernails into Yi Fan's palm, leaving behind some bloody marks on Yi Fan's palm.
Chen Yuan looked at Mu Tingxuan, and felt that Mu Tingxuan's expression was a little bad. Chen Yuan rolled his eyes: That group of people in white, he's afraid that they might have some relationship with Mu Tingxuan, otherwise Mu Tingxuan wouldn't have had such an extreme reaction.
Yi Fan squeezed Mu Tingxuan's hand and said, "Let's go to our room first."
Mu Tingxuan nodded and said, "Okay."
Chen Yuan went out in high spirits and made some inquiries, and quickly found out the origins of the white-robed people.
Zhuang Hao saw Chen Yuan excitedly rushing into the room and said, "Do you need something?"
Chen Yuan looked at Zhuang Hao and said, "Nothing, I asked around a little about the background of those white-robed people."
Zhuang Hao nodded and said, "Really? Who are they then!"
"Those people are from the distinguished Mu Family of Li Country. The Mu Family is a very special clan, often giving rise to many talented wood mages. The most famous talent of the Mu Family in this generation is someone called Mu Huai, he's already a level seven wood mage. It's said that this Mu Huai person has two wood spiritual cores within his body."
Zhuang Hao said with some puzzlement, "How can there be two wood spiritual cores in one person's body?" Wood mages with a wood spirit core were usually very proficient in wood magic, and can be said to be geniuses.
Chen Yuan shook his head and said, "I don't know either, maybe this guy is just blessed by the heavens."
Zhuang Hao frowned and said, "I don't think this matter is that simple."
Chen Yuan smiled and said, "Although this Mu Huai person is powerful, he's still not as good as you, A-Hao. Let's not talk about him anymore, the reason why the Emperor sent Qi Shaorong here this time is to treat the illness of Feng Yuan, from the Business Alliance, but Feng Yuan invited a lot of other people too, not only Qi Shaorong."
"So we'll all have to compete against each other then?" Qi Shaorong pushed open the door and walked in.
When Chen Yuan saw Qi Shaorong, he immediately stiffened, "Young Master Qi, you're back!"
Qi Shaorong looked at Chen Yuan and said, "Yes! Continue talking, why'd you stop? Are you that afraid of me? Are you like Zhuang Qian, you think I'm too fierce?"
Chen Yuan awkwardly scratched his head and said, "Young Master Qi, you're not fierce, not at all."
Qi Shaorong waved his hand and said, "Your words are too insincere, it's better if you just don't say anything at all."
Chen Yuan: "…Young Master Qi, don't worry, although there are many people who're invited to treat Feng Yuan's illness, I don't think those good-for-nothings will be able solve the problem. In the end, it'll still be up to you to cure him."
Qi Shaorong waved his hands and said, "We can't say for sure that that'll be the case."
Mu Tingxuan walked in and said, "Young Master, let's go down to eat, I've already ordered some dishes."
Chen Yuan happily said, "Let's eat, it just so happens that I'm feeling hungry right now."
Mu Tingxuan and others went downstairs and sat down at a table to eat.
Some of the white-robed youths from the Mu Family had already finished eating and walked out from a private room.
"Those guys have left, who knows where they're going." Chen Yuan muttered.
Qi Shaorong glanced at Chen Yuan and said, "Why do you care so much about them leaving? Don't tell me you want to go with them?"
Chen Yuan quickly waved his hands and said, "No, I don't."
"Just focus on your food." Qi Shaorong said.
Mu Tingxuan looked towards the direction in which the few white-robed youths had left, with a complicated gaze.
The sound of the conversation at the neighboring table drifted over into the ears of Qi Shaorong and the others.
"The people from the Tianhu Mu Family sure are something [3]!" The Mu Family lived on the shore of Tianhu lake [3]. The water in Tianhu contained spiritual essence, which can help with the growth of plants and trees, and was very magical. The Tianhu lake was a symbol of the Mu Family, so when referring to the Mu Family, the words Tianhu would usually be added to their name.
"The Mu Family has already long passed their glory days, yet these people from the Mu Family only know how to put on airs, who knows for how much longer they can continue acting this arrogant."
"Brother, how could you say that!"
"Don't you know? The Xueyan spiritual flowers planted by the Mu Family [5], along with many other precious spiritual plants, have all wilted and died. Some people are saying that a problem seems to have occurred with the Mu Family's Tianhu lake, and that the spiritual water is polluted. The Mu Family had planted tens of thousands of mu of Xueyan spiritual flowers [6]! Now that the Xueyan spiritual flowers and their other spirit plants all completely died, the Mu Family has suffered a heavy loss!"
"No way, if that's really true, those people from the Mu Family don't seem to be worried about it at all! They're still eating and drinking away as usual."
"They're all just a group of second-generation young masters, they don't need to care about their family matters at all, so they probably don't know anything!"
"Even after suffering from a loss, rich people are still better off than ordinary people [7]. Even if the Mu Family's batch of spiritual plants have all died, considering the Mu Family's foundation and resources, they should still be able to provide for this group of second-generation young masters for a long time."
"You can't say this for sure either, ever since Mu Xingzhi rebelled from the Mu Family eight years ago, the Mu Family's prestige and power now really can't be compared to what it was like before. This time the Mu Family has suffered such a huge loss, I'm afraid that this first-rate family might have to be reduced to a second-rate family now."
"It was really unexpected! Mu Xingzhi actually betrayed the Mu Family."
"If it weren't for the fact that Mu Yueshan's actions were too cruel and dishonest, then that wouldn't have happened."
Mu Tingxuan's eyes suddenly widened. Qi Shaorong looked at Mu Tingxuan and said, "Tingxuan, are you okay?"
Mu Tingxuan shook his head and said, "I'm fine. Young Master, I'm full, I'm going up to rest now."
Yi Fan watched Mu Tingxuan get up, and he also stood up, saying, "Young Master, I'm also full, I go check up on Mu Tingxuan."
Qi Shaorong frowned and said, "They're all full now, they didn't even eat that much."
Footnotes:
Doesn't have anything good to say: "You can't get ivory from a dog's mouth" (what can you expect from a dog but barking)― An idiom, meaning something like a filthy mouth can't utter decent language or no good words are to be expected from a scoundrel.
Inn: So in Chinese it actually translates to restaurant, but in ancient China it's like a restaurant that also offers rooms for travelers to stay in, but their main focus is still on serving food and the rooms probably aren't as good as the ones in an actual hotel. I changed it to "inn" to make it less confusing (because for us, we probably think of a restaurant as just a place for food).
Tianhu: Literally translates to "Sky Lake", but I kept it as "Tianhu" because I think that sounds better. I'm going to refer to it as "Tianhu lake", also because I think that sounds better than just "Tianhu" on its own, even though I know if you translate it, it's basically saying "Sky Lake lake" lol.
Lived: Uhhh ok so this has been bothering me for a long time, in Chinese there aren't really a lot of grammar rules and like verb tenses and stuff, so when I translate stories from Chinese to English, I usually translate dialogue and thoughts in present tense and put everything else in simple past tense (or perfect past tense depending on the context), but I'm starting to think that maybe using simple past tense isn't the best? I don't know how to explain it, it just sounds weird sometimes, so I don't know if I should just change it all to present tense, or some of it to present tense and keep the others in past tense. For example, "The Mu Family lived on the shore of Tianhu lake. The water in Tianhu contained spiritual essence…" In this case, the "lived" in past tense sounds good to me, but for some reason the "contained" part in past tense sounds kind of weird, so I could change it to "The Mu Family lives on the shore of Tianhu lake. The water in Tianhu contains spiritual essence…" instead, or "The Mu Family lived on the shore of Tianhu lake. The water in Tianhu contains spiritual essence…", but then that one bugs me because the tenses are inconsistent QAQ. I'm probably just overthinking it, if you've read up to here, I'm so sorry for wasting your time with all that lol.
Xueyan spiritual flowers: Not the same "xueyan" as the one from previous chapters (the one used as a beauty product). In this case, the "xue" means "blood" and the "yan" means "flame/blaze".
Mu: A traditional unit of area, equivalent to 0.165 acre or one fifteenth of a hectare.
Even after suffering from a loss, rich people are still better off than ordinary people: "A lean camel that dies of starvation is still bigger than a horse" (idiom).