His Highness Prince Yu personally went over to the Academy’s small dining hall to ask the kitchen staff how to prepare various dishes. Given his status, no one was about to stop him — though the kitchen staff were thrown into a panic, their faces pale with apprehension.

Xiahou Zuo was delighted. For someone like him, being able to say two or three harsh words to his father was his last remaining pride and dignity, the very outer limit of his severity toward those he loved.

In truth, his facade in front of his father was not particularly convincing.

Status brought many privileges. Things others would desperately petition for and never obtain, a Prince could accomplish with a single word.

For instance: Xiahou Zuo said he wanted to watch his father cook, but Prince Yu felt that with Xiahou Zuo’s current injuries, the smoke and oil fumes of a kitchen would irritate him — so the Prince asked whether cooking implements might be moved out to Yan Qingzhi’s small courtyard instead.

He said the word, and who was going to say no?

So the kitchen staff were all suddenly set in motion, carrying pots and bowls and ladles, oil and salt and sauce and vinegar, the whole lot of it ferried over to Yan Qingzhi’s small courtyard, with a clay cooking stove assembled in the shortest possible time and the great iron wok scrubbed until it gleamed.

Yan Qingzhi and Li Diudiu returned carrying their repaired wooden bucket to find the courtyard in all this commotion, and both stood there blinking in momentary bewilderment.

“My vegetables!”

Yan Qingzhi’s face fell as he rushed back into the courtyard, then exhaled with relief — though people were everywhere, they had apparently all taken care to avoid his vegetable seedlings. Otherwise with such chaos, they would have been trampled to nothing long ago.

Yan Qingzhi let out a long breath and looked toward Xiahou Zuo. Xiahou Zuo smiled back at him and said three words.

“You’re welcome.”

Yan Qingzhi smiled — he understood now that Xiahou Zuo had been guarding them for him.

Xiahou Zuo’s expression said clearly: you should be figuring out how to thank me. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes communicated it plainly enough. Yan Qingzhi replied with a look that said: if you hadn’t shown up none of this would have happened. Xiahou Zuo’s wicked hand then reached toward the tender young seedlings nearby.

“Stop right there!”

Yan Qingzhi looked at the seedling: “The seedling survives, you survive — the seedling perishes, you perish.”

Xiahou Zuo’s hand still extended — but only to pick up a small clod of earth from the ground, which he then tossed at Yan Qingzhi with an exaggeratedly delicate gesture and a highly affected, simpering tone: “How awful.”

Yan Qingzhi shuddered.

Li Diudiu, watching this from the side, was struck dumb. He muttered to himself: “He only slept in Teacher’s bed for one night — how did he end up like this?”

Every pair of eyes in the courtyard turned toward Li Diudiu on account of those words. Xiahou Zuo and Yan Qingzhi both moved toward him simultaneously. Li Diudiu turned and bolted, becoming in that instant something like the earthbound sword immortals of legend, moving as though skimming across the ground.

Prince Yu was in Yan Qingzhi’s small courtyard learning to cook, with Director Gao hovering nearby to keep him company and offer constant praise — more exhausting than coaxing a child.

Li Diudiu disliked scenes like this, and having slipped away from the courtyard, made his way to the wooded area, where he found Gao Xining sitting as usual on the low wall, her two long legs dangling, one cheek noticeably puffed out with something in her mouth.

“What are you eating?”

Li Diudiu came over to ask.

Gao Xining opened her mouth to show him: “Hard candy. Very sweet.”

She reached into the adorably charming little sachet hanging at her waist and took out two pieces, passing them to Li Diudiu. Li Diudiu unwrapped the paper and looked — they appeared rather dark in color — but when he popped one in his mouth, a deep, rich cane-sugar sweetness flooded out.

“Sweet, isn’t it?”

Gao Xining had a smug little air about her: “I made them myself.”

Li Diudiu said, “Impressive.”

“I learned it from a book.”

Gao Xining asked, “Do you want to learn?”

She glanced over toward Yan Qingzhi’s courtyard: “The adults should be busy for quite a while — shall I teach you how to make hard candy?”

Li Diudiu said, “We should probably catch up on our studies first.”

Gao Xining hopped down from the low wall and pulled at his arm: “No — I want to teach you how to make candy. Once you know, you can use it to win over girls. Trust me, every girl likes candy.”

Li Diudiu: “…”

Without waiting for any further protest, Gao Xining dragged Li Diudiu back to her home, dug out all her candy-making ingredients, and began explaining as she prepared everything: “First you have to boil it down. After that you let it cool somewhere out of the heat — at first it’ll be very soft, so you need a small mold to put it in while it hardens. Brush a thin layer of oil inside the mold first so it won’t stick.”

Li Diudiu looked genuinely impressed. “You figured all this out on your own?”

“Of course.”

Gao Xining arched an eyebrow: “Compliment me.”

Li Diudiu said, “You’ve really gone to extraordinary lengths for the sake of food.”

Gao Xining: “Hmph!”

Li Diudiu snickered. “Wait for me a moment.”

He turned and ran out — it wasn’t clear what he was up to — while Gao Xining crouched in the cool shade watching the candy in the molds and waiting for it to harden. Before long Li Diudiu came running back, carrying several half-dried stalks of bamboo.

“Just ran back to grab these.”

Li Diudiu sat down and used a small knife to split the bamboo open, then cut it into thin slivers like toothpicks. He had only his left hand for convenience, so the work was slow. Gao Xining didn’t know what he was doing, but she picked up a small knife herself and began mimicking him.

They whittled dozens of the little sticks. Li Diudiu had Gao Xining take them away to wash clean, then inserted these small bamboo sticks into the cooling candy in the molds.

Li Diudiu smiled: “This way it’s easier to eat while holding it.”

Gao Xining couldn’t entirely explain why, but because of this small thing she found herself with a measure of admiration for Li Diudiu.

While they waited for the candy to harden, the two of them practiced martial arts in the courtyard. Li Diudiu taught patiently; Gao Xining studied diligently. Though her physical execution wasn’t very good, she could speak about the techniques with great clarity.

This was a strange thing — the moves Li Diudiu taught her, she could practice them twice and then clearly articulate their power, their application, and even their weaknesses. She gave Li Diudiu no small amount of food for thought; and yet when she actually performed them, her movements were awkward and odd.

After a good while, the two ran to check the candy and found it had set firm. Gao Xining picked one up by the little bamboo stick and held it up to the light — it was the same candy as before, so why did adding a small bamboo stick suddenly make it so charming?

The two set to work cutting oiled paper into small square pieces and wrapping each candy one by one.

Gao Xining noticed Li Diudiu crouching there looking thoughtful. She bumped his shoulder with hers and asked, “What are you thinking about?”

Li Diudiu said, “Could we sell these for money?”

Gao Xining froze. “These are things I made for you — are you going to sell them?”

Li Diudiu said, “We can make more.”

The workings of a girl’s heart are so full of unexpected shifts and transformations — Li Diudiu said he wanted to sell those candies, and she felt uncomfortable, unhappy, feeling that these were something the two of them had made together, a gift Li Diudiu was giving to her, and how could he sell them?

Yet when he said they could make new ones to sell, she felt that was fine.

“It’s so hot — they won’t keep. What do we do?”

Gao Xining asked.

Li Diudiu thought for a moment. “Wrap them tightly in oiled paper and seal them, then find a bucket and a basin — put the candy in the basin, float the basin in the bucket of water, and keep it all somewhere cool. That should work.”

The two got to work. By noon they had boiled another small pot of candy, poured it into molds, inserted the small bamboo sticks, then set it all in water to cool — the hardening came much faster this way.

They were still busily at work when Xiahou Zuo strolled over to call the two of them to eat. His father had cooked with his own hands, and though Xiahou Zuo was now seventeen or eighteen, he still couldn’t help feeling a faint glow of pride.

“What are you two making?”

Xiahou Zuo asked with curiosity.

Li Diudiu answered, “Candy.”

Xiahou Zuo found the shape of these candies rather peculiar. He pinched one between his fingers, raised it up to the sunlight to look at, and found it somewhat interesting.

“We’re planning to take them out to sell — see if we can make some money.”

Little Gao Xining beamed with expectation and pride.

Xiahou Zuo said, “How much are you planning to charge per piece? Have you calculated your costs?”

“Costs…”

Li Diudiu and Gao Xining exchanged a glance — they’d completely forgotten about that. Gao Xining didn’t even know how much the raw materials had cost, since her grandfather had had people buy them for her to play with, and since he hadn’t minded about the money, she naturally hadn’t given it a thought either.

Xiahou Zuo said, “If you’re free this afternoon, I’ll walk out with you to have a look around — we can ask about these things. The summer field holiday lasts over a month, and there’s nothing else to do. Think of it as going out for fun.”

He looked carefully at the candy and said, “Don’t you think the variety is too limited? There’s only this one kind. Look at the candy peddlers on the street — when they open their boxes, all kinds of candy are inside, colorful and beautiful, in all different shapes. Your product doesn’t have that advantage.”

He thought for a moment: “But you could sell it like this.”

He set one candy aside: “Say this one piece sells for ten copper coins — then…”

He picked up two candy balls and placed a bamboo stick between them: “This is the double portion, sold for eighteen copper coins, or sixteen. People will feel they’re only missing one stick but saving several copper coins — they’ll think they’ve gotten a bargain, because the stick itself is worthless.”

Li Diudiu said, “Good idea, but the shape looks a bit odd to me?”

Xiahou Zuo paused, looked down at what he’d arranged, and his expression went through something very interesting.

Fortunately Gao Xining didn’t understand.

Gao Xining was thinking about a different problem: “This candy needs a name. What should we call it?”

Xiahou Zuo had completely failed to notice that he was genuinely becoming childish while seriously discussing this with the two of them — it hadn’t even occurred to him. Instead he was fully absorbed.

He answered, “How about Bamboo Candy?”

Li Diudiu said, “Not a bad name.”

Gao Xining pointed at the two-ball version: “And this one is Double Bamboo Candy?”

Li Diudiu said, “The sound of it isn’t right.”

Xiahou Zuo said, “Then just call it Stick Candy. Or Two-Stick Candy. Or look at the shape — it looks like a big hammer. Big Hammer Candy, Hammer Candy, we go out and sell Hammer Candy…”

Gao Xining said, “Lollipop!”

Li Diudiu: “Childish!”

Xiahou Zuo said, “That’s a name for some girl thing — sounds terribly soft.”

Gao Xining gave a snort: “I say what it’s called, so that’s what it’s called. It’s my candy and I get to decide!”

Xiahou Zuo said seriously, “It really does sound a bit soft and sweet, ‘lollipop’… so childish a name. Big Hammer Candy is better — Iron Big Hammer Candy!”

Li Diudiu said, “You’re technically right, but let’s just go with what she says.”

Xiahou Zuo laughed and said, “You two are the bosses.”

He got up and said, “Let’s go eat first. The way you two are looking at it, you’d think selling this candy would make you rolling in gold and you’d be rich in no time — I’m not trying to discourage you, but if this lollipop of yours actually sells well, I lose. And if I lose, you can name one condition — anything within my ability, I’ll agree to.”

Gao Xining’s lips curved into a little fox’s smile: “You said it — no going back.”

Xiahou Zuo said, “Going back? The word ‘going back’ does not exist in my fate — lollipop, ha ha ha ha ha… lollipop a hammer… ha ha ha ha ha.”

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