“I’ve already sent someone to inquire at the Ministry of Personnel. That Ni Qinglan was indeed an examination candidate from Que County.”

Secretariat Drafter Pei Zhiyuan held a porcelain bowl, sprinkling fish food before the fish tank. “It’s just that he wasn’t on the winter examination list, so the Ministry of Personnel stopped paying attention to him and knew nothing of his disappearance after the winter examination.”

“However, didn’t the Yinye Bureau’s people catch a jailer who tried to silence her at the Bureau of Records in Guangning Prefecture?” Pei Zhiyuan set down the porcelain bowl, rubbed his hands, and turned back to look at that purple-robed Chancellor. “The murderer feared this woman would go to the Bureau of Remonstrance…”

If that woman named Ni Su went to the Bureau of Remonstrance to beat the remonstrance drum, this matter would formally be placed before His Majesty’s desk, requesting His Majesty to judge the case.

“The Bureau of Remonstrance has rules. Whether man or woman, anyone who beats the drum to bring charges must first receive punishment beatings to prove their sincerity. This one provision alone blocks countless common people.” Meng Yunxian lowered his eyes, casually examining a policy proposal. “The murderer saw that Miss Ni could endure even the authority-establishing beating at Guangning Prefecture’s government office. If she emerged unharmed from the Bureau of Records, she certainly wouldn’t fear receiving another beating at the Bureau of Remonstrance. Otherwise, the murderer absolutely wouldn’t have been so urgent to bribe the jailer Qian San’er to silence her.”

“That jailer Qian San’er—how did the Yinye Bureau interrogate him? Didn’t he spit out anything?”

“Before Han Qing could even use torture, he bit down on poison and killed himself.”

That Qian San’er hadn’t even entered the main gate of the Yinye Bureau before he was so frightened he bit down on the poison hidden in his teeth, dying on the spot.

“Right, if the murderer revealed their fox tail so easily, it would be truly pathetic.” Pei Zhiyuan wasn’t particularly surprised. “But that sister of Ni Qinglan’s—should we say she has good courage? Even after entering the Yinye Bureau, she still stuck to that story. Could it really be that her brother appeared to her in a dream?”

Hearing this, Meng Yunxian looked up. Meeting that bright light casting through the carved window, he suddenly said, “If there truly were such a thing as the wronged appearing in dreams, that would be good.”

“How do you mean?”

Pei Zhiyuan pulled a green jujube from his sleeve and took a bite.

“If that were so, I too would like to invite someone to enter my dreams.”

Meng Yunxian gathered the policy proposal on his lap. “To ask him to tell me—was he wronged or not?”

The jujube pit slid down Pei Zhiyuan’s throat, lodging there so he could neither swallow nor cough it up. His face flushed red as he coughed for quite a while, waving his hand as he said, “Cough… Minister Meng, speak cautiously!”

“Minxing, after all these years in the Eastern Bureau, your courage is still so small. There’s no one in this back hall but you and me. What is there to fear?” Meng Yunxian appreciated his awkward state with a smile and shake of his head.

“Even Chancellor Zhang, upon returning, was tested repeatedly by His Majesty. You, sir, should still be careful of troubles arising from careless words!” After this ordeal, the jujube pit was swallowed down. Pei Zhiyuan—that is, Pei Minxing—had fine sweat on his forehead. Helplessly, he bowed to Meng Yunxian.

“Take a look at this.”

Meng Yunxian handed him the policy proposal from his lap.

Pei Zhiyuan naturally took it and unfolded it. Meeting that bright daylight, he scanned down line by line. Surprise appeared on his face. “Minister Meng, this is excellent writing! It sharply criticizes current ills, has its own unique ingenious thoughts on new laws, and even the parallel prose is truly beautiful!”

“Written by Ni Qinglan.”

Meng Yunxian picked up his tea bowl. “There’s an examination candidate surnamed He still in the capital. After Ni Qinglan arrived in the capital, they interacted frequently. This was obtained from his hands.”

“It shouldn’t be like this.”

Pei Zhiyuan held that policy proposal, looking again and again. “If this was truly written by Ni Qinglan, then why was his name absent from the winter examination list? Such talent absolutely should not be like this.”

“You speak correctly.”

Meng Yunxian restrained his smile. Hot steam rose from his tea bowl, and his expression added a measure of cold sternness. “Such talent should not be like this.”

Pei Zhiyuan had entered office as a youth following Minister Meng. How could he not know the weight new policies held in Minister Meng’s heart? How could he not know how much Minister Meng cared about practical talents for the new policies?

Seeing he was no longer smiling amiably, Pei Zhiyuan generally understood that Minister Meng was determined to investigate this matter. He didn’t speak unnecessarily and pulled another green jujube from his sleeve to eat.

“Where did you get those jujubes?”

Suddenly, Pei Zhiyuan heard him ask this.

“Chancellor Zhang gave them this morning. He said the jujube tree in his courtyard bore many, and he couldn’t bear to let birds peck them to waste, so he had people knock them all down and distribute them for us to eat. They’re really quite sweet.”

Pei Zhiyuan spat out the jujube pit. “You didn’t get any? Well yes, Chancellor Zhang broke off relations with you long ago. Why would he still give you jujubes to eat?”

“Minister Meng, all the officials have assembled.”

A hall attendant outside knocked on the door.

Meng Yunxian ignored Pei Zhiyuan, heavily set down his tea bowl, and walked out with his hands behind his back.

Arriving at the main hall, Meng Yunxian took a glance and indeed saw many officials eating jujubes. Only before his desk was it clean and bare—nothing at all.

“Minister Meng.”

Upon seeing Meng Yunxian, the officials hurriedly rose and bowed.

“Mm.”

Meng Yunxian strode in. Not caring about their frantic jujube-pit-spitting appearance, he sat down in the chair beside Zhang Jing. He held back and held back, but still spoke up: “Why isn’t there a share for me?”

“Minister Meng has considerable attainment in matters of eating. I hear you even personally authored a cookbook. How could these roughly grown green jujubes from my courtyard enter your eyes? It just so happens that by the time it reached you, they were all distributed.”

Zhang Jing kept his eyes straight ahead.

In the Hall of Political Affairs, upon hearing these words, all the officials looked at each other, holding their breath in concentration, not daring to make a sound.

“Zhang Chongzhi.”

Meng Yunxian was so angry he laughed. “You exclude me just for wanting to eat a few of your jujubes?”

——

Ni Su had recuperated at the Grand Commandant’s residence for some days. She could barely manage to get out of bed now. During this time, Zhou Ting from the Yinye Bureau had come. Besides the news of jailer Qian San’er’s suicide, there was another extremely important matter.

Yinye Bureau Envoy Han Qing wanted to retrieve Ni Qinglan’s examination paper from the winter examination. However, the Examination Hall had just happened to lose several papers from candidates who weren’t on the list, among which was Ni Qinglan’s examination paper.

Although papers of unsuccessful candidates weren’t considered important, according to Qi law, all examination papers should be sealed and preserved, only to be destroyed after a year.

The Examination Hall punished several responsible persons, and the leads seemed to have been cut off there.

“Miss Ni, I truly didn’t think toward the worst at the time. Because those two days he was suffering from a cold. In the Examination Hall, his spirits weren’t very good either… I only thought he had failed due to illness and was unhappy in his heart, which is why he left without saying goodbye.” At the tea stall, the young man in black-ink scholarly robes looked full of regret. “If I hadn’t slept so deeply that night, perhaps he…”

He was that Yanzhou examination candidate He Zhongping who had sent the letter to the Ni family in Que County.

Since He Zhongping sat down, what he said was nothing more than these things. As a fellow winter examination candidate, he truly didn’t know more of the inside story. “However, previously, an Administrator Zhou from the Yinye Bureau took a policy proposal from me. It was written by Brother Ni. I had borrowed it to read but hadn’t returned it yet. Now it’s in the Yinye Bureau’s hands. I believe they will certainly give Brother Ni justice.”

Ni Su held her tea bowl. After a moment she said, “But justice can only be given with evidence.”

Hearing these words, He Zhongping also felt somewhat melancholy, momentarily not knowing what to say.

Ni Su didn’t stay long. Before finishing a bowl of tea, she took leave of He Zhongping.

Yuwen and several guards from the Grand Commandant’s residence waited beneath the large banyan tree across the street. Ni Su walked toward them with slow steps. A child being carried by someone walked several steps away, a pair of eyes still staring fixedly in her direction.

Ni Su lowered her eyes. Fuzzy luminous light flickered on the ground.

She stopped walking, and it also didn’t move.

The corners of Ni Su’s bloodless lips twitched slightly.

“Miss Ni, the mistress wants us to go directly to the Wild Goose Return Pavilion. Several ladies from her poetry society have all assembled. That Lady Sun is also there.”

Yuwen helped Ni Su onto the carriage and spoke to her.

“Good.”

Upon hearing “Lady Sun,” Ni Su’s expression shifted slightly.

Great Qi’s literary culture flourished. In this prosperous Yun Jing, it wasn’t at all rare for women to establish poetry societies. Bookshops often had transcriptions of poems composed by women in the poetry societies, collected into volumes and distributed, so Yun Jing had quite a few renowned talented women.

Among them was one—the wife of the current Chief Minister Meng Yunxian—Jiang Shao.

The Ruqing Poetry Society had originally been established by Jiang Shao and several close friends from her boudoir days at the Wild Goose Return Pavilion. But fourteen years ago, when Minister Meng was demoted for some matter, she also followed Minister Meng far away to Wen County. Her several old friends also scattered. Only one wife of a Secretariat Vice Director, Lady Zhao, still maintained the poetry society, inviting some younger ladies together.

Cai Chunxu was one of them, and that Lady Sun had only begun associating with them in the past two years.

“I heard the mistress say that Lady Sun’s monthly course came yesterday. Fortunately, your prescription worked. Otherwise, she would probably still be unable to leave home today due to abdominal pain.”

Arriving at the Wild Goose Return Pavilion, Yuwen carefully helped Ni Su while walking toward the waterside gallery, speaking as they went.

Ni Su was about to speak when she heard a bright woman’s voice call out: “A’Xi, younger sister!”

Looking up, Ni Su met the smiling eyes of Cai Chunxu, who was holding a brush at the table in the gallery. Today she wore an orange-red front-fastened jacket embroidered with fluttering butterfly flowers, her hair styled in a cloud chignon, with pearl hairpins and fresh flowers inserted diagonally.

“Quickly, all you elder and younger sisters, this is the younger sister of my benefactor’s family, Ni Su, childhood name A’Xi. Ordinarily she has also read quite extensively, so today I called her to come along.”

Cai Chunxu set down her brush and brought Ni Su before the ladies in cloud-like coiffures and silk garments, introducing her with a smile.

The woman wearing a dark green jacket, about forty-some years old, set down the fresh flowers in her hands and looked Ni Su up and down. She spoke kindly: “Her appearance is truly fine, but she’s so thin. Is she recovering from illness?”

Such gentle words, with several measures of appropriate concern. The remaining other official wives also looked at Ni Su again and again. Only one lady about twenty-some years old had a somewhat strange expression.

Ni Su was about to reply when someone spoke first: “Lady Cao doesn’t know—the wounds on her body were received precisely in your husband’s Guangning Prefecture.”

With these words, the gallery suddenly grew cold.

“Lady Sun, what do you mean by this?”

Lady Cao’s expression froze.

The one who spoke was precisely the Lady Sun that Yuwen had just mentioned. Now everyone was staring at her, and she too was somewhat unnatural. “I heard she spoke nonsense and received punishment in the Bureau of Records at Guangning Prefecture…”

“Sun Yun.” Cai Chunxu interrupted her. The smile usually on her face was gone. “I think you’ve been sick at home this year and it’s confused your head!”

“You needn’t remind me.”

Sun Yun murmured, lifted her eyes to glance at that clean, pale young woman standing beside Cai Chunxu, then turned her face away. “If you hadn’t brought her here, I certainly wouldn’t have said these things.”

A young lady sitting by the railing was completely confused. She inquired gently: “Lady Sun, what exactly is the reason? Why don’t you explain it clearly?”

“You don’t know.”

Lady Sun used her handkerchief to press her hair temples. “This young lady engages in the work of a medicine woman.”

What? A medicine woman?

Several official ladies looked at each other, then unanimously looked toward that young lady. Their expressions varied, but in their understanding as people from official families, a medicine woman was indeed not a pleasant term.

“Sun Yun.”

Cai Chunxu’s face grew even more somber. “Don’t forget—when you went so long without your monthly course, suffering abdominal pain daily and refusing to leave home, who examined your pulse at the teahouse and prescribed you a remedy? She’s the daughter of a family from the apricot grove tradition, immersed in it from childhood. What’s strange about understanding some pharmacology? It’s hard on you to have spoken thanks repeatedly that day, but today not acknowledging those words is one thing—why must you use words to humiliate her?”

The ladies in the gallery only knew that Sun Yun had often been ill this year and didn’t come out to associate with them, but they didn’t know she had this problem. Momentarily, various gazes surged toward her.

Having the matter she’d always hidden exposed so blatantly by Cai Chunxu, Sun Yun felt even more embarrassed. “If women do these things, what is it if not a medicine woman? Did she only treat me?”

She simply rose and removed all the jade bracelets and golden bangles from her hands in one go, stuffing them all into Ni Su’s hands. “Since I’ve been treated and used your prescription, I’ll just give you money!”

“Sun Yun!”

Cai Chunxu was about to erupt but was held by the wrist by the young woman who had been silent beside her.

“Yes.”

On this clear day with rippling waves, Ni Su met the various inscrutable gazes in this gallery. “I haven’t only treated you. Nor am I merely immersed in tradition with a rough understanding of pharmacology. Men study hard for ten years for a single achievement. I spent ten years in the apricot grove for a single aspiration. I am indeed different from all of you. What I’ve read most is not poetry and books, but medical books. There’s nothing shameful to admit about this.”

“I’m indebted to Sister Cai, which allowed me to leave the Yinye Bureau earlier. I examined you because Sister Cai mentioned your poor health. If we truly must discuss consultation fees, you can consider that Sister Cai has already paid on your behalf. These—I won’t accept.”

Ni Su lightly tossed them. Everyone saw those jade bracelets and golden bangles fall to the ground. Gold and jade collided with a crisp sound, and the jade bracelets shattered into several pieces.

“I shouldn’t further disturb everyone’s elegant mood. Ni Su will take her leave first.”

An extremely faint smile pulled at the corners of Ni Su’s lips as she bowed to the several ladies.

“Sister Cao, everyone, I’ll first see my A’Xi younger sister back.” Cai Chunxu shot Lady Sun a glare, nodded and bowed to the others, then quickly hurried after Ni Su.

The gallery was utterly quiet.

“How I look at that young lady, she doesn’t seem like a medicine woman at all…” A lady gazed at the young woman’s back in the corridor and suddenly spoke.

In these people’s impressions, medicine women were almost all old crones with one foot in the grave. Where would there be such a young woman who knew propriety and literature?

But just now they had heard it clearly—that young lady had admitted with her own mouth that she indeed examined people’s illnesses.

“A’Xi, younger sister, this matter is my fault. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have had you go there. You suffered her humiliation for nothing…” In the carriage back to the Grand Commandant’s residence, Cai Chunxu held Ni Su’s hand, her willow-leaf brows lightly furrowed.

Ni Su shook her head. “Sister Cai, you know I wanted to inquire about something from Lady Sun. Lady Sun doesn’t often go out, and it’s not convenient to visit her residence for an audience. I could only take today’s opportunity. You’ve helped me so much—I’m already very grateful. It’s just that this affair also made you unhappy.”

“Now I hope your prescription is less effective. It would be best if Sun Yun hurt so much she couldn’t even open her mouth!” Cai Chunxu rubbed her handkerchief and said indignantly.

Returning to the room at the Grand Commandant’s residence, Yuwen hurried to open the door. Who knew a rich, strong scent of incense would assault them, choking all three into coughing.

“A’Xi, younger sister, why did you light so much incense in the room before leaving?” Cai Chunxu coughed while waving her sleeves. “I don’t see you worshiping any Bodhisattva.”

“Ah?”

Ni Su’s eyelids reddened slightly from the smoke. “I did worship one.”

“Where?”

Cai Chunxu only dared to look from outside, not entering.

Ni Su didn’t know how to answer. She said vaguely, “Keeping it in my heart…”

If Yuwen hadn’t closed the windows before leaving, it actually wouldn’t have filled the entire room with smoke from the burning incense.

The room was temporarily uninhabitable. Yuwen placed a soft cushion on a stone stool beneath the tree shade for Ni Su to sit. Several maids and servants swept and talked at the corridor corner.

With Yuwen absent, Ni Su propped her chin on one hand: “Xu Ziling, the path through Lady Sun is blocked.”

To eliminate the chaos of examination cheating, every examination’s papers required names to be covered and papers to be transcribed before being sent to the chief examiner’s desk for review.

That Lady Sun’s husband, Jin Xiangshi, was one of the sealing officials responsible for covering names and transcribing papers in this winter examination.

“Preserving one’s aspirations does not differ between men and women.”

In the thick tree shade, Ni Su heard such a voice. She looked up through the flickering fragments of sunlight and saw the frost-white hem of his robe.

Ni Su gazed at him. “I know. From when I was very small, I knew that in this world, besides the petty-minded men my mother spoke of, there are also some women destined to never understand me.”

Just like Lady Sun—having used her prescription, she thoroughly categorized her in her heart as one of the six contemptible professions not to be approached too closely. Naturally, she also couldn’t tolerate Cai Chunxu bringing her to the Ruqing Poetry Society.

“But I think I must be better off than my brother.”

She said, “I’m a woman. The world cannot use the defense between men and women to constrain me, so they can only use the lower nine occupations to condemn me. But why should I plead guilty? Is it written in Great Qi law?”

“They think I should feel ashamed about this, should shrink back because of it. But I refuse. I want to carry both my brother’s and my own aspirations for living in this world, living openly and honorably.”

The fragments of light through the branches were somewhat dazzling. Ni Su couldn’t see his face very clearly: “Why don’t we go directly to find Jin Xiangshi?”

“What do you want to do?”

Leaves rustled. The young man with cold, clear brows and eyes in the tree shade lowered his eyelids, his gaze meeting hers.

“You pretend to be a ghost…”

Ni Su said halfway and felt her words weren’t quite right. He originally was a ghost. “Let’s go at night. You go scare him. All right?”