“Though the noble lady from the capital is visiting her family this time, the most important matter is still accompanying the late old master here.” Mo Zi truly didn’t understand why they were playing this guessing game, but since Sanniang wanted her to explain, she went with the flow. “Though it’s already been two months since the old master’s burial, the Wei family still eats vegetarian meals, which shows they’re filial and compassionate people. If the young miss were to dress in colorful splendor, who knows—she might displease them. So it’s better to wear plain colors. Besides, the style is quite elegant.”
“Young miss, why didn’t you say so earlier? You let us servants wear out our lips for nothing.” Bai He pouted.
Qiu Sanniang laughed aloud, saying with delight that teasing the maids was fun.
Mo Zi observed this. It was precisely this fire-like cheerful temperament that made this eldest miss love and hate clearly, with first-rate skills in business and making friends. However, when it came to inner residence scheming, she was somewhat lacking.
“Mo Zi, you were gone quite a while. I almost had Xiao Yi go find you!” In the blink of an eye, all playfulness was put away as she asked about serious matters.
Mo Zi repeated what Tian Da had said.
“Cinian Hermitage?” After Mo Zi mentioned it, Qiu Sanniang didn’t pay much attention to it. “I imagine that lady loves to eat vegetarian meals and chant Buddhist scriptures, and has dealings with nuns. Still, it’s good to know. Bai He, go find that Heart Sutra woodblock print I bought from Su Yang—I’ll present it as a gift to show respect for my elders.”
Bai He didn’t move. “My dear young miss, at a first meeting, only elders give meeting gifts to juniors. When do juniors give gifts to elders?”
Qiu Sanniang thought about it and laughed. “Look at me—still acting like I’m outside.”
“Though we can’t give it today, there will always be opportunities to give it later.” Mo Zi felt it was an appropriate gift—neither extravagant nor able to precisely suit their preferences.
“That’s true.” Qiu Sanniang stood up. “Let’s go. Don’t wait—no one’s going to come notify us.”
“Young miss, I have one more matter to report.” Mo Zi gave a general account of what had happened at Yan Tower.
After hearing this, Qiu Sanniang furrowed her brows. “A group of bored masters, comparing you to singing girls for no reason—what for? Fortunately, you won. When I return, you must tell me that story again.”
Mo Zi agreed and, along with Bai He, Lu Ju, and Xiao Yi, followed Qiu Sanniang to the outer corridor.
The sunlight slanted westward, and the clouds at the horizon burned bright.
“Bai He and the other two are enough to attend me. You don’t need to come along.” Qiu Sanniang, as usual, left Mo Zi behind.
“Mo Zi, I left some pastries in the small kitchen. If you don’t want to cook, eat some pastries first to tide you over. When I return, we’ll eat together.” Bai He was the most kindhearted.
It was called a grand banquet, but the maids had no share in it. Generally, they would eat some dry pastries first, and after the banquet dispersed, they could go to the main kitchen to collect their meal. That Sanniang allowed them to make things to eat in the small kitchen showed she was quite a good mistress.
“Why make it sound so pitiful?” Qiu Sanniang’s beautiful eyes turned. “After the banquet begins, you can take turns coming back to eat.”
“My dear young miss, then you must let Sister Bai He come back first. This way, we can all eat ready-made food.” Lu Ju coaxed Qiu Sanniang.
“Mo Zi, since you’re staying home to guard it, you can cook.” Qiu Sanniang said this deliberately.
“Her? All talk, no action.” Bai He pointed her index finger at Mo Zi’s head. “She can eat but can’t cook.”
“This is called being blessed.” Mo Zi lightly pursed her lips. “Hurry now, don’t let someone else take the young miss’s front position.”
Amid laughter and joking, the three surrounded Qiu Sanniang and walked out of the courtyard.
Mo Zi closed and bolted the door, went to the kitchen to get a plate of pastries, then entered the corner room in the west wing.
This room had originally been used to store unused miscellaneous items, but now Mo Zi had obtained it from Qiu Sanniang to use as a woodworking room. A large board table was divided into two sides—one side for paper, one side for wood materials. Various tools were placed in the four corners—common items like saws, planes, files, and so on. However, her favorite tool to use was a palm-length blade. The realistic wings of Little Flower’s butterfly had been carved with this blade, as thin as paper.
When she’d first bought it from the blacksmith’s shop, she thought she’d accidentally picked up a divine weapon. But according to Xiao Yi’s appraisal, it was at most just a rather sharp little knife. Yet to claim that her left hand possessed miraculous craftsmanship—she wasn’t quite that confident.
One hand propping up her chin, the other holding a piece of cake, Mo Zi tilted her head and looked at the blueprints she’d drawn these past days. Except for the one at the bottom, the rest were all ornaments and toys.
She was an engineer, not a mechanic. She knew how to create watertight compartments, how to calculate draft, how to reduce water resistance—particularly the design of various parts of warships could be said to come to her effortlessly. But in this era, there were no engines, no electricity, no fuel, no steel—all the hardware equipment didn’t yet exist.
In this half year, her only improvement had probably been the graphite pencil. And it couldn’t even be called an invention, only an improvement. Because as early as the Western Han Dynasty, there had already been pencil-like implements. She had merely mixed graphite powder and lime powder together, solidified them into thin strips, embedded them in pre-made semicircular wooden tubes, then pressed two semicircular wooden tubes together to form a pencil shape. Though she was using the wisdom of the ancients, the pencil she’d improved was more delicate, durable, and much prettier in appearance.
Mo Zi belonged to the type of person who wouldn’t rack her brain over something unless she herself needed to use it. Because compared to the soft brush tip, graphite pencils were more convenient for drawing diagrams—that’s when she’d thought of the pencil.
After five or six pieces of cake went down, she pulled out the blueprint from the very bottom and looked at it over and over, revising it again and again. She was completely unaware that time was flying by—the moon was already hanging at its zenith.
She was just muttering to herself that she needed to find time to redo it when she suddenly heard the courtyard gate being pounded frantically.
Hastily stepping out of the room in one stride, she discovered that the courtyard was covered in a sheet of cold moonlight on the blue stone ground, eerily emanating chill.
Oh no—she’d forgotten to light the lamps.
If Qiu Sanniang returned after the banquet dispersed, there would be quite a lecture. Don’t think that just because Qiu Sanniang was good to her maids and treated them like sisters that she was soft—if you violated her taboos, she was still very much a thousand-gold young lady with quite a temper. For instance, when she woke from her afternoon nap, she wanted hot tea to drink, and at night she liked the courtyard to be brightly lit.
Mo Zi saw this very clearly.
“Mo Zi, open the door, quickly open the door.” It was Bai He.
Mo Zi hesitated about whether she should light the lamps, stopped in the middle of the courtyard, and asked, “Has the banquet dispersed?”
“Not yet.” There was a clear sense of tension in Bai He’s voice.
Hearing that Qiu Sanniang hadn’t returned yet, Mo Zi stopped worrying about the lamps and went forward to remove the bolt. As soon as she opened the door, she saw Bai He holding a bright yellow glazed lamp. As if she’d run urgently, the lamp swayed wildly, and Bai He’s breathing was rapid and uneven.
Thinking Bai He had rushed back to cook, Mo Zi smiled and said, “I ate all the pastries—I’m full. You don’t really need to come back to cook.”
“Mo…” Bai He placed one hand on her waist, lowered her head to regulate her still-rapid breathing, then suddenly raised her head, her eyes stretched wide open. “Mo Zi, this is terrible.”
Mo Zi’s heart skipped a beat. Her smile faded, though her expression remained unchanged. “What—don’t tell me our young miss has already been promised to someone by the mistress?”
“It’s not the young miss who has a problem—you have a problem.” This time Bai He changed to patting her chest. “The mistress has summoned you.”
The mistress summoned her? Mo Zi immediately thought of Ai Liu’s mean face.
“Why summon me?” Mo Zi didn’t hesitate. She stepped over the threshold and closed the door with both hands.
“The banquet was cleared away early. The mistress called for opera performers to sing, then said there were too many young maids, so she drove all of us who attend personally downstairs, keeping only the senior maids of the mistress and ladies. After about an hour, suddenly Ai Xing came down to call me up. The mistress instructed me to summon you, but didn’t say what it was about. I stole a glance at our young miss’s expression—it didn’t look good. Though the mistress was all smiles, my heart was very uneasy. Why would she summon you for no reason?” The struggle between Zhang Shi and Qiu Sanniang had already reached the point where even someone as kindhearted as Bai He saw danger everywhere.
“Then let’s go.” Though she was the one being summoned, Mo Zi had calmed down. “Perhaps the mistress sees that I attend the young miss well and wants to reward me.”
Bai He glared at her, then became speechless.