Nightfall

Translator: TransN  Editor: TransN

Ning Que should not have felt cold, because the scholar wearing the cotton padded robe did not release any hostility and danger from head to toe and from inside to outside. Instead, he was as clean as a pure lotus and trustable as a relative.

However, he still felt cold, because the scholar saw his umbrella on his back with just a glance, which was so big and black and it was the most important thing for Sangsang and him. Besides, he wanted to exchange something for it.

Sunlight couldn’t shine into the alley, so it was a little cold. Maybe that was one of the reasons he felt cold? Or it was his unexplained trust in the scholar made him fearful?

Ning Que was like an ice sculpture standing in the alley for a long time until he woke up. He looked back in disappointment, of course, he saw nothing. Then he thought it over, lowering his head, and he found that he had no idea what had happened. Therefore, he gave up thinking and shook his head, walking towards the crowd.

He didn’t know that the legendary Headmaster of the Academy had already left in a carriage; he didn’t know he had missed a historic moment; he didn’t know his refusing to exchange with the scholar was also a miss; he didn’t know that was his first real lesson. But, even if he knew, he still wouldn’t made the exchange. Using what he had to trade for what he didn’t have was not his style.

…

…

The first lesson at the Academy was a big lecture for a number of students. The students gathered on a bit cool stone ground, hopefully listening to some professor’s speech from the Academy and imaging their life in two or three years.

The lessons of the Academy also consisted of six subjects, just like in the academy entrance exams. Two hundred students were divided into six study rooms. Their class time was from morning to noon, which didn’t seem long, but they didn’t have time to take a break.

The seven people that were lucky enough to enroll in the magic skills course would learn related knowledge from the Academy in the afternoon. And, the other ordinary students could enjoy some free time, staying at the Academy to learn themselves or they could go back to Chang’an City to have fun. However, the professor advised students mildly and sincerely to review lessons in the old library at the Academy.

The Academy’s discipline was very loose. Students took the ringing from deep inside the Academy as the sign: the first ring was a warning; the second ring, they entered the classroom; the third ring, the class began; the fourth ring signaled the end of class. When the third bell rang, the students could learn in the study room. The Academy asked that the students listen to their teacher’s attentively during class. They could ask questions, but they couldn’t make noise. As for cleaning up, students didn’t need to pay attention to that, because the imperial court spent a lot of money on the Academy, so they employed many cleaners and chefs.

The next was to divide students into different classes. The Academy did it in the simplest and fairest way, by randomly drawing names. The students’ family background and their entrance scores were not considered. The children Xie Chengyun and Zhong Dajun were divided into Classroom One; Wang Ying from Linchuan, Classroom Four; Ning Que, Classroom Three.

After taking his own books and classics from the instructor’s room near the stone ground, Ning Que followed the people to find the wooden sign hung in Yanyu hall, and found Classroom Three. Looking at the clean windows, like pictures, and the white walls, like paper, thinking he would spend the next few years here. He also thought he had finally taken his first steps onto the Tang’s practicing road, his emotion was slightly in a trance. He took a deep breath to calm down and lifted his feet to stride over the high threshold.

“Ning Que! Here!”

Two surprising sounds rang out in the study room.

Ning Que looked up in astonishment. He saw Chu Youxian whose face looked a little pale excitedly waving to him from the spacious back seat of the study room, and in the front seat, Situ Yilan was seeing him excitedly as well. Today, the girl wore a suit of tight blue clothes with several embroidered plum blossoms on her chest, and peeking out from inside its slightly open collar was her white neck.

It was like a dream, and like a past life at the same time. In fact, it really was a past life. This was his most familiar memory. It seemed he could see this scene every year and every time there were more and more people shouting to him to come sit beside them.

Ning Que silently stood inside the door of the study room and closed his eyes forcibly to drive out the irritating memory from his head. Then he apologetically smiled at Situ Yilan, who was waiting with an expression of expectation and he walked towards her.

He hadn’t known that Miss Situ was the daughter of a Yunhui general, but he had known that she must be from a noble family from Chang’an City. Although, students were equal in the Academy, and he heard that his Majesty came to study at the Academy wearing normal clothes and sat beside the ordinary students from poor families. Who knew what kind of trouble would be produced if he had too much contact with the noble girl.

After putting down the heavy books and classics, he watched Chu Youxian’s pale and haggard face, and his blue lips, asking,”You came from the House of Red-Sleeves again, same as yesterday?”

“Stayed there for the whole night.” Chu Youxian sighed and said sadly without hiding, “Ning Que, this world has a problem. I couldn’t understand, so I stayed in House of Red-Sleeves for a whole night.”

Ning Que thought about the scholar that he had met before, then his body went a little stiff. He asked,” What’s the problem?”

“My unexpectedly entering the Academy was the biggest problem in the world.”

Chu Youxian said sadly and with extream annoyance, “You know that my father bought me a qualification to participate in the academy’s entrance exams with 2000 silvers. I only came here to find a good wife. I randomly answered yesterday, I didn’t even go to see the scores next to my name. However, my results are a B plus, in all four subjects.

At first, Ning Que was astonished and speechless, then he heartfeltly praised him,” You are hiding the real you well.”

“Bullshit.”

Chu Youxian’s deadpan expression was like that of a soulless corpse, and he said despondently, “My answer for a math question was that the Headmaster of the Academy was a drunk, and he had chewed half of a mountain’s peach blossoms. Even with answers like that, I got a B plus, which shows that the instructors of the Academy have gone mad.”

Ning Que thought it over for a moment before guessing, “Maybe your family spent some silver?”

Chu Youxian angrily said, “Who has ever heard of a student entering the Academy with just silver? And, my father only spent 2000 silvers, which will only be enough for me to stay in the House of Red-Sleeves for four months. It was nothing!”

…

…

In Chang’an, sitting on a chair in a silver workshop in the Eastern City, was an extremely fat old fogey, who was looking over their accounting book, and he sighed, in tears, “Two hundred thousand silvers… Son, I sold over half of our assets, and I expect that only you can do something. You can’t let me down. Who said the Academy didn’t accept money! That group of thieves just doesn’t accept small money!”

…

…

Chu Youxian didn’t know that his father had made a luxury bet that he normally never would in his business. He was still angry about thinking that the Instructors of the Academy had gone mad.

“I have never liked to learn, ride, or shoot since I was a child, so I couldn’t play with the noble young men and women in Chang’an. It is lucky that you are divided into Classroom Three, or I don’t know what I would have done for my next few years.”

Chu Youxian said sadly. Ning Que only noticed this when he had said that he didn’t like poems and books, and riding and shooting. He didn’t show any expression of shame, but rather his expression was so natural, it was even a little proud.

He smiled to console this only acquaintance and said, “As you are already here, you shouldn’t think about it too much.”

“You make sense.” Chu Youxian looked around at his classmates in the wide study room. His eyesight swept over the slim girls, and he gradually became happy,”I will have a good relationship with my classmates, so I can have a good marriage.”

Ning Que had no words or expression to respond with.

Chu Youxian was a typical Tang person who was open and clear, otherwise, he wouldn’t have invited Ning Que over to drink wine and play with the girls when they met in a brothel for the first time. After he adjusted his mood, he returned to normal immediately. His two fingers picked up a jade that was pointing at the girls sitting at the front, and said at a low voice, “That gentle girl is called Jin Wucai, little daughter of the Libationer of Tang. She is meek but she won’t be bullied at all because the Libationer is very serious and has a bad temper; You can’t annoy that high girl, because her surname is Gao, and she has an uncle working in the palace…”

“That fresh meat is called Chen Zixian, whose family opened a bookstore in the Western City and has some money. If one day we don’t have enough money go and drink wine, we can ask him to go with us. As for the short one near him, we ignore him. It is rumored that he came from Chen State, he only knows about eating, sleeping, reading, and shooting. Boring.”

Ning Que admired him greatly. He thought a person who didn’t want to enter the Academy, only used half of day to understand every person’s background and temper. What should this spirit be——maybe it was his spirit that caused him to all the time, eat, drink, and play, and considered finding friends as a hobby?

“Ah, you may know who this is. Yes, she is the famous daughter of the Yunhui general, Situ Yilan!”

Chu Youxian slightly slapped the table and quickly said, like a storyteller,”Brother Ning, just now you came over to me but not to her, I am so grateful. But, I must warn you that it’s probably going to annoy her. She rode a horse on Vermilion Bird Avenue when she was eight. She and some girls of the same age were called female soldiers. They frightened so many Chinese hamburger booths, Luzhu store (selling boiled pork giblets) and many men. If you annoy her, it will be difficult for you to walk in Chang’an City. It is just like when you entered into a Guozi store (Chinese hamburger), you have no good Guozi (ends)!”

Ning Que was astounded by his spray, like a fountain, and he snapped out of it after a while. He wasn’t afraid of a female soldier because he didn’t trouble them. Situ Yilan was just a little girl without bad intentions, in his eyes, so he wouldn’t be concerned by her. But, he acclaimed Chu Youxian’s ability, and said,”Next time, if you don’t have enough money to join the House of Red-Sleeves, you don’t need to force Chen Zixian, and you can just tell some stories to earn money.”

He thought he was being ridiculed when unexpectedly, Chu Youxian glanced at him and slightly laughed,”In that kind of brothel, earning some money just by saying some words was what you do.”

Ning Que was stiff and really wanted to kick his ass. But, he controlled his anger because the instructor who taught them the course of rites just walked in seriously.

The study room became quiet suddenly, and the young and jumping ravens and sparrows had flown away to some unknown places.

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