In Castina's house, the candles were burning brightly.
The dinner tonight was as sumptuous as that of the previous day. However, Castina didn't have the same hearty appetite as she did yesterday. At present, she was moving about and sitting down with the utmost caution, like a pregnant woman. She was so full that she felt like vomiting. Facing the table full of meat, she naturally had no inclination to pick up the fork and take a bite.
She reached out, brushed her long wine-red hair behind her ear. Her charming face carried a look of relaxation and relief. Her willowy eyebrows were unfurrowed, and her beautiful eyes were filled with joy. She stretched out her hand, picked up the goblet filled with white wine on the table, and took a small sip, just to taste it on her lips and tongue.
The young master fool sitting opposite was, as usual, engrossed in his self-entertaining game of fighting with his left and right hands.
The old butler Delsson, on the other hand, looked rather gloomy. It seemed that he had experienced something that made him suddenly look a lot older.
And her father, Hall, beside her, was now wearing his best and most presentable clothes. The ancestral necklace was also around his neck. He looked relaxed and content, and for a moment, he actually seemed to have a bit of the bearing of a marquis.
...
The old and tattered silk robe on Hall was a witness to the difficult days of the father and daughter. When times were tough, it was pawned to pay off debts, and when things were a little better, it was redeemed. This silk robe was like Zhao Zilong in Changshan, going in and out of the pawnshop seven times.
As for the necklace, Hall had never pawned it. The main reason was not that he was reluctant to part with it, but because it was worthless and no one wanted it. It looked like gold, but in fact, it had an iron core wrapped in copper skin, with a pentagram shape on it.
The pentagram was the family crest of the Anson family. To be precise, the family's emblem was a red background with a white pentagram.
It was said that a long time ago, under the white pentagram flag, countless valiant warriors gathered and carried out numerous conquests in the south and north.
And now, this once glorious family with a large number of fierce generals and thousands of soldiers was left with only a father and daughter depending on each other.
Yesterday, it was Hall who was full of worry, and today, it was the old butler Delsson. Hall had a pleasant expression on his face and was beaming with joy. While pouring wine for Delsson, he said with a smile, "Old butler, why the long face? Hehe..."
"Come, let me toast you."
The old butler managed to force a smile, raised his glass to respond, but the look of worry still lingered. Hall was still curious and pressed on. Only then did the old butler Delsson tell about his encounter at the Sare Circus today.
After hearing the story, Hall took out his lighter, lit his pipe, frowned slightly, and fell into deep thought. Then he exhaled a puff of smoke, smiled, and comforted Delsson, "Old butler, don't worry. If this had happened yesterday, it would indeed have been a problem. But today, it's not a big deal. Today, the people of the Sare Circus have either left or scattered. Those who left have probably reached North by now, and those hooligans who scattered don't need to be worried about. Relax."
As he spoke, he raised his glass again as a gesture.
After Hall's several rounds of comfort, the old butler felt a little better. The two of them discussed the events of the day. The old butler reluctantly talked about the cruel and bloody performance he saw at the Sare Circus, and Hall said with a bitter smile that his childhood job was to clean up the bones on the stage.
The two old men chatted, sharing their respective experiences. Eventually, the topic came back to Castina. After some discussion, they finally set the wedding date. The marriage contract would be written at the wedding as part of the ceremony.
Soon after, the two old men continued to drink, until their tongues became numb and their cheeks flushed red.
...
Castina couldn't bring herself to eat any of the exquisite dishes on the table. She held a grape between her delicate fingers and rolled it around on the silk tablecloth, playing with it. Her fox-like eyes with slightly upturned corners stared at the meat on the table, and she couldn't help muttering in her heart.
"The seasonings in this world are pitifully scarce. There's only salt, rosemary, basil leaves, honey, sage, and nothing more."
"Alas, I really miss the takeout food packages from my previous life. Whether they were healthy or not is beside the point. At least they had rich flavors."
"Oh, right!"
"That Seris merchant, the transmigrator. Since he sells sanitary napkins, would he also sell something like Wang Shouren's thirteen-spice blend or Lao Gan Ma spicy sauce?"
"Wait, I heard today that his business includes a restaurant..."
"That means, as long as I go to Nide, I can eat Chinese food that I haven't tasted in two and a half years?"
The thought of this made Castina feel a pang of craving, even though she was extremely full at the moment. It had been two and a half years since she last had Chinese food. It was impossible not to crave it.
However, the thought that the restaurant was run by another transmigrator made Castina feel a bit uneasy.
"Tsk..."
"If the other person's system recognizes that I'm also a transmigrator, would that be a bad thing?"
"I just don't know what kind of person the other one is..."
"If he's like Xiao Yan, I could kowtow and recognize him as my big brother, and probably nothing would happen."
"But if he's like Tang San... then I might lose my life."
Castina was now in a real dilemma. She wanted to go to the only Chinese restaurant in the empire and have a good taste of the long-lost hometown flavor. But at the same time, she was afraid that the other transmigrator would discover her identity and cause trouble for her. Torn between craving and fear, she was at a loss.
The dinner ended with the two old men complaining to each other and Castina lost in her thoughts. After helping the extremely drunk Hall to his room and laying him down, Castina also returned to her room and went to bed early.
A few days passed without incident.
Castina, who had always been living a life seizing every minute, suddenly found herself with a lot of free time. To be honest, every day was rather boring.
So boring that Castina and her father Hall went fishing with the fishermen in the village to kill time.
The result of their fishing, as one could imagine, was that the father and daughter returned to the village with empty buckets every day.
As soon as they entered the village, they were teased by the gossipy village women, which made them feel rather embarrassed.
On the last day, unable to bear the embarrassment any longer, they bought a few big fish and pretended that they had caught them, showing off in front of the villagers.
Unfortunately, they ran into a fishmonger, and their ruse was exposed on the spot. The villagers made a lot of sarcastic remarks and teased them mercilessly.
The father and daughter couldn't take it any longer. They abandoned the fish and ran home as fast as they could, like turtles hiding in their shells.
It could be said that they were really suffering from idleness and looking for trouble.
...
A few days later, the knight's territory was filled with joy and decorated with lanterns and colored ribbons everywhere.
The farmers, who usually worked from dawn to dusk, had left their fields uncultivated today and didn't go to work.
The hunters, who usually entered the mountains before dawn, also slept in until noon today before getting dressed and going out.
The itinerant merchants, who usually left after collecting their goods, also stayed in the village for a change.
The men put on relatively presentable robes one by one. The women tried their best to make themselves look more presentable. The children were also full of joy and running around in the village.
It seemed as if today was a festival.
In fact, today was not a festival, but the wedding of the daughter of Marquis Hall in the knight's territory.
...
The old butler from out of town was really generous. He set up a banquet in the village.
Although the wedding hadn't started yet, the banquet had already begun. The bread was black bread, but people could eat as much as they wanted until they couldn't eat any more. The amount of meat was limited, but everyone got a share. The beer was not of high quality, but people could drink as much as they liked.
The jubilant villagers were 感叹 ing about the large amounts of real gold and silver being spent to marry Castina, a supposed husband-killer and a bringer of bad luck. They thought that the groom's family must have accumulated great fortune in eight lifetimes.
But at the same time, they didn't care. Anyway, after the wedding banquet, at most two or three days later, they could attend the funeral banquet of the groom.
Either way, it was free food and drink. So, who cared?
In Castina's room, a few relatively knowledgeable village women were busy helping Castina fix her hair and do her makeup.
For some reason, the clothes ordered a few days ago had not arrived, and the people sent to Meyer City to find a professional stylist had not returned for several days.
Something seemed to have happened in Meyer City, as if it had turned into a black hole.
At present, Castina's wedding dress was rented from the neighboring town, and the stylists were also relatively knowledgeable village women invited from the neighboring town. All of this was a reluctant and helpless choice.
...
Castina looked at herself in front of the dressing mirror and couldn't help but 吐槽 about the strange aesthetics of the empire.
With her natural face, she had long, wavy wine-red hair, eyes like a charming fox, delicate and alluring facial features, fair and rosy skin, and cherry lips that seemed to have a natural red tint, as if with a built-in lipstick effect. She was so beautiful that she couldn't get enough of looking at herself.
But the current style was really hard to describe.
Her long, wavy wine-red hair was all combed back and tied into an old-lady-like bun at the back, leaving her forehead completely bare.
Even so, the village women still said it wasn't refined enough and that she should shave off a circle of her hairline.
Castina fought hard to stop them, and only then did they give up.
Her face was covered with a thick layer of white powder of unknown material, looking deathly pale and sickly.
A very long and pointed hat was placed on her head, with a piece of light gauze hanging down and draped over her shoulders.
Castina looked at herself in the mirror, bald, deathly pale, with a stupid and comical hat, and was filled with helplessness.
As a person who was reincarnated from a man, to be honest, she didn't care too much about her own beauty and didn't deliberately dress herself up.
At most, she would look at the mirror and sigh a few times, "How could such a beautiful woman be me? It's such a waste. What a pity..."
But the current style was really too ugly. Anyone with a normal sense of beauty and ugliness would find it unacceptable.
At present.
The makeup and hairstyle were almost done. All that was left was to change into the wedding dress.
When the village women were just about to help Castina undress, Castina quickly dodged and said that she could change by herself and didn't need anyone's help.
She quickly got up and hurriedly drove the village women out of her boudoir.
She looked at her plump breasts that were so full that she couldn't see her feet, sighed softly, and then reached out to untie the sash of her dress.
...
The tight and old peasant dress slipped down from her fragrant shoulders, revealing her fair and smooth shoulders.
She reached out and removed the last restraint on her chest.
Castina looked at the two heavy and plump things on her chest in the mirror and couldn't help but shake her head slightly and click her tongue.
She didn't know why. When she was still Li Si, a man, she was eager for these things.
But after becoming Castina, having them on her own body, she only felt they were a burden and had no attraction at all.
She took off her skirt, and her flat, fair, and smooth lower abdomen was gradually revealed in the mirror. Thanks to her life of wandering and swindling, she had a faint outline of abdominal muscles, with some definition but not overly muscular.
A slender waist and wide hips, all the way down.
Sometimes, one really has to believe some rumors in the streets.
It was said that a woman like her, without a man, not only brought bad luck to her husband but also had a higher sensitivity in her body than ordinary people. It seemed to be true.
Her fair and delicate body was exposed to the air. The places that should be plump were plump, and the places that should be slender and graceful were slender and graceful. It could be said that it had a perfect balance.
Even after two and a half years of living as a woman, she still felt a sense of detachment from her own body.
When she felt itchy, she endured it and didn't relieve herself. She had never shown her body, whether male or female, to anyone. It could be said that she lived in great discomfort.
And just when her finger was about to touch the wedding dress, a sudden gong sound came from outside the window.
First, there was a gong sound, and then, a heart-rending scream suddenly came.
"Bandits! The bandits are coming! The bandits are coming!"
Immediately after, shouts of alarm, accompanied by all kinds of chaotic noises, came together!
...
Castina stared in astonishment at her finger that had just touched the wedding dress, and then looked at herself in the mirror, as if she had seen a monster.
The marriage contract hadn't been signed yet. At present, it was just the first time her finger had touched the wedding dress.
Could something go wrong so quickly?
How absurd!