Yun Ye didn’t linger in Chang’an. Upon leaving the imperial palace, he rode at full speed toward his fief.

Chen Shuda’s affair was not something he could meddle in, nor did he wish to add insult to injury. With Li Er’s King of Hell temperament, Chen Shuda’s hope of escaping unscathed was merely a pipe dream. The massive granting of noble titles at the dynasty’s founding had already made Great Tang’s titles less valuable than those of the former Sui. What he dreamed of day and night was to reclaim more titles and land. Since ascending the throne, he had only elevated the titles of six trusted key ministers, yet stripped away twenty-one. The entire forces of Crown Prince Li Jiancheng and Prince Qi Li Yuanji had all fallen from grace. From then on, the granting of Great Tang noble titles became extraordinarily cautious—without great merit, they would not be lightly bestowed.

This was none of Yun Ye’s concern. He only knew that when his own people suffered humiliation, he had to demand justice. There were no complex political relationships—it was only about grievances, not about factions. This was Yun Ye’s simple view. As for choosing sides, he would firmly hold onto Li Er’s leg and follow him—that couldn’t be wrong.

The horse galloped along the official road. Trees and flowers on both sides retreated uniformly. Wind howled in his ears. The horse beneath him seemed to know Yun Ye was anxious to return home—with a long whinny, it quickened its pace again. Behind him, Zhuang Santing and the others all shouted approval, spurring their horses to follow closely.

The old matriarch waited with the entire household at the estate entrance, her heart in turmoil, not knowing what crisis her grandson would face in the court hall. She couldn’t help—she could only pray repeatedly to Buddha, hoping her grandson would return safely.

When dust rose in the distance, her heart leapt to her throat. She prayed not to be disappointed this time.

It was her grandson returning. The old matriarch’s closed eyes suddenly flew open. Sure enough, her grandson’s horse swept across the land like a gust of wind. The crops in the fields seemed to welcome his return, rising and falling like waves. Xiao Ya lifted her skirt and ran toward her brother, her laughter crisp as silver bells.

“Grandmother, I’m back.” Yun Ye spoke as if he had just gone out for a stroll and returned home to greet his grandmother—relaxed and natural.

“It’s good you’re back. Hurry and wash up—you’re filthy as a mud monkey.” The old matriarch also acted as if nothing had happened.

Xiao Ya rode on the horse’s neck, Daya and Xiao Xi rode on the horse’s back. Seeing the young master happy, Zhuang Santing and the others quickly yielded their horses for the young ladies of the household to ride. They led the horses back home amidst laughter all the way.

Qian Tong wiped away tears, brushing the dust from the young master’s body again and again.

“Enough, enough! Brush any more and the clothes will tear.”

Li Gang sat in his chair reading. Scholar Yushan and Scholar Lishi were playing chess. Scholar Yuanzhang observed the game, from time to time criticizing Scholar Yushan for making another terrible move, without any of the spectator’s decorum of “a gentleman observing chess speaks not.”

Yun Ye entered with a smile. Before he could speak, Li Gang said: “Seems everything went as you predicted—dangerous but no real harm!”

“With the poem you old sir wrote, if this junior had gotten into trouble, wouldn’t that have made you lose face?”

Li Gang was about to nod with satisfaction when he asked urgently: “Who said that poem was written by me? It was clearly written by you. I merely copied it once. How did it get pinned on me?”

“His Majesty once asked about the origins of this poem, and said it absolutely couldn’t have been written by an unlearned fellow like me. This junior found that reasonable, so could only say it was your great work, old sir.”

“Heavens! I’ve been cautious all my life. Though I may not deserve to be called highly virtuous and respected, at least I was pure and unblemished. Never thought that in my old age, my lifetime reputation would be ruined in the hands of you scoundrel. I’ll beat you to death…”

Happy lives are all similar. After dodging the old scholar’s clutches, Yun Ye lay comfortably in his rocking chair and let out a long breath.

That night, the Yun residence opened a great feast. Several old scholars drank until tipsy. Li Gang actually boasted to his old friends about how his “Charcoal Seller” was this and that.

This sobered his three old friends considerably.

At this moment, in that low, damp earthen cell in the academy, Huangshu lay on the bed with closed eyes, idly moving his wrists. His head was empty, without any thoughts, like a dead man.

He actually had many things worth remembering, such as the woman in Xinfeng market who smiled so sweetly at him. This was the first time a woman didn’t care about his wretched appearance, even though she was just a fermented rice seller.

He didn’t know how he ended up sitting at the woman’s stall. He didn’t like drinking fermented rice—he only liked drinking wine. Yet that time he very much wanted to try it. He noticed the woman’s hands serving the fermented rice were very white, with a few shallow dimples at the finger joints. After hesitating a long time, he accepted the fermented rice with dried fruit from the woman’s hands. It was very sweet, just like the woman’s smiling face.

That afternoon, he did nothing but sit at the stall drinking fermented rice. He drank six bowls. The woman looked at him with concern. He waved his hand, only saying he liked fermented rice.

From that day on, he developed a habit—going to Xinfeng market to drink fermented rice.

A tomb robber shouldn’t stay in one place too long—that would lead to trouble. He resolved several times to leave, but before his eyes always appeared that woman’s smiling face.

The woman wasn’t very beautiful, couldn’t compare to the women he’d slept with in brothels, didn’t have their sweet fragrance either. She was just very clean, making him feel comfortable from the bottom of his heart. She should be a widow, otherwise her family wouldn’t let a woman go out to do business—she wasn’t a scantily-clad Hu girl after all.

Of course, if she wasn’t a widow, he, Huangshu, would make her one. Who said tomb robbers couldn’t kill? No fewer than ten lives had died by his hand. There were plenty of ways to make someone die without illness or disaster.

That terrifying marquis had shattered the most beautiful dream of his life. Whenever his mind recalled the past, no matter how wonderful the memory, it would always end with a basin of crimson blood. He always felt utterly exhausted, his arms no longer as strong as before. He attributed all this to that marquis extracting too much blood from him.

That chubby boy who was very curious about him didn’t come today. Perhaps it was because of the rain. Having spent years underground, he could tell from minute changes in the cell walls that it was raining heavily outside—very heavy rain.

Footsteps outside the door gradually receded—that was the Yun family guards going to the surface to rest. An iron spoon slid from his sleeve. With a bend of his wrist, he grasped it in his hand. He slowly moved the bed aside. A hole just large enough to barely squeeze through appeared in the wall. He skillfully crawled in, using that spoon sharpened to a keen edge to dig diligently. Fortunately, there weren’t many stones here.

The lamp in Yun Ye’s room was still lit. The several old scholars had drunk too much wine and weren’t suited to traveling at night, so he arranged for them to stay at the Yun residence. He himself returned to the academy to hold the fort. Just upon returning, he was grabbed by the studious student Li Tai to explain math problems.

“Ye, if there’s a room eight chi wide and six chi long that needs to be filled with earth, how many jin of earth are needed?”

“This problem can’t be solved.”

“Why can’t it be solved? Didn’t you say everything in this world can be measured?”

“Of course it can be measured. The problem you posed is itself missing conditions. Can you tell me how heavy a block of earth three chi long, three chi wide, and three chi high is? Only by knowing this condition can you solve your problem.”

“Doesn’t this mean that to solve this type of problem, one must first know the weights of many things at fixed dimensions?” Li Tai stared at Yun Ye with wide eyes.

“Qingque! I have to admit you really have a knack for learning. Your reputation for being intelligent from childhood is truly not undeserved. I dare not claim I can be your teacher, but I can lead you through the door. I believe you’ll be much stronger than me.” This was one of Yun Ye’s few honest statements. An eleven-year-old child deriving the concept of density from a seemingly simple earthwork problem—Yun Ye had to admire the power of the Li family genes.

“If I measure and calculate everything I can see, then when others solve such problems in the future, it will be much simpler, right?” After carefully looking at Yun Ye and confirming he wasn’t being sarcastic, Li Tai asked again.

“Just for this point alone, Qingque, you can leave your name in the annals of mathematical history.” Yun Ye said with certainty.

Li Tai nodded proudly.

“Ye, if I know these things, can I apply them to the cylinder calculations you talked about?”

“Of course. I only mentioned cylinder calculations roughly to give you a concept. It’s too early to study it now. Of course, you’re an exception. By the way, Qingque, when did you become interested in earthwork and cylinders?”

“Ever since I discovered yesterday that the ground in the tomb robber’s cell was an inch higher…”