Shen Zhuxi noticed that her appetite had grown considerably lately — she was eating far more than usual, and she could feel a little more flesh when she ran her hands along her waist.

She pondered this, knowing it wasn’t the season for fattening up before winter. So why was she hungry after sleeping, hungry after a stroll in the breeze, hungry even after a short walk?

The one thing that consoled her was that she wasn’t the only one eating more. Compared to the Li brothers, her increased appetite was nothing worth mentioning. Ever since Li Kun had devoured twelve steamed buns in a single sitting — each one larger than a fist — Li Wu had banned him from drinking sour plum soup. Li Kun was so furious he was nearly stamping the ground in tears, but Li Wu remained unmoved.

In truth, Shen Zhuxi desperately wanted to give her portion of sour plum soup to Li Kun — she was completely sick of it. But Li Wu watched her drink it every day without fail, and if she didn’t finish the two bowls allotted to her daily, he would bark in her ear without rest, not giving her a moment’s peace.

Half a month passed, and it wasn’t just her — every member of the Li household had grown noticeably rounder.

Li Wu insisted it was all muscle, built up from training with sandbags.

Shen Zhuxi didn’t dare argue. Whenever it came up, she would change the subject. She could only hope that he would never encounter the refined gentlemen of the capital in his lifetime, and never learn that those noble young lords didn’t practice their calligraphy with sandbags strapped to their arms.

The later he learned the truth, the longer she could delay her reckoning.

But the later he learned, the more miserable her end would be when it came.

Shen Zhuxi was caught between a rock and a hard place, damned either way. Every time she saw Li Wu sitting in the main hall strapping sandbags onto himself, all she could manage was a polite, uneasy smile — fearful, yet not outright rude.

That morning, Shen Zhuxi pushed aside the bamboo curtain and walked out, only to find Li Wu sitting at the table again, practicing his characters by tracing them in water. A five-catty sandbag sat heavily across the forearm of his writing hand. She walked around behind him to watch, and found that each stroke on the table was being laid down with steady, unwavering control.

“Well?” Li Wu didn’t even turn his head, yet somehow knew she was standing behind him. Just from his bright, jubilant tone, Shen Zhuxi could already picture the self-satisfied look on his face. “Not bad compared to someone who’s been practicing for years, right?”

Li Wu was always brimming with confidence. Shen Zhuxi couldn’t quite decide whether that was a flaw or a virtue.

She looked at the back of his head with a sympathetic eye and said, “You are the fastest-improving person I have ever seen.”

After all, she had never met another fool who practiced calligraphy with sandbags strapped to their arm.

“But of course.” Li Wu set down his brush and turned to look at her with a bright, exuberant air. “Do you know who you’re looking at?”

Shen Zhuxi returned a polite smile, then turned and went about her own business, leaving Li Wu to continue practicing his characters at the table with undiminished enthusiasm.

By the time she had finished washing up and returned, Li Wu called out to her without lifting his head. “Come here. Teach me how to write a character.”

“Which one?” Shen Zhuxi walked over.

“The character for joy,” he said.

Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help but think of their upcoming marriage. She held the brush and froze.

“You don’t know it?” Li Wu looked at her with suspicion.

“…I know it.”

Shen Zhuxi dipped the soft brush lightly in water and slowly traced the character for joy onto the tabletop.

She stared at the character taking shape stroke by stroke, and every thought of her marriage to Li Wu made her heart clench with unease. When it was done, she handed the brush back to him and fled the main hall on the excuse of having breakfast.

In the kitchen, Shen Zhuxi found a few steamed buns resting in a rattan winnowing basket. They were still warm from the steamer. She took one, split it in half, and carried only one half as she walked out. She stood at the kitchen doorway sighing softly, slowly finishing half a bun.

The words had already been spoken. Was there any room for her to go back on them now?

Besides, Li Wu was easy to reason with and had tolerated her time and again. But the people outside — they would probably not be so accommodating as Li Wu.

She turned the matter over and over in her mind, and every time she reached the same conclusion: the only path forward was to go through with the marriage. Feeling utterly lost, she drifted back to the main hall, and the urge to run away flickered in and out of her thoughts, tangled up with her dread of the approaching wedding day.

The main hall was cold and quiet. All that remained on the table was half a bowl of clear water and a soft brush resting across the rim.

“Still not tidying up.”

Shen Zhuxi muttered under her breath, walking to the table and reaching for the porcelain bowl and the brush — but her gaze was drawn to the thousands of identical characters covering the smooth surface of the table.

Dense clusters of joy characters blanketed the polished wood. The ones written earlier had half dried, while those written later still shimmered with water. Thousands upon thousands of crooked, wobbly characters stared back at her, each ugly in its own distinct way.

As she looked and looked, Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help but laugh.

What was the point of the sandbags? They were still ugly.

But those graceless characters — beneath even a child’s first attempts, devoid of any aesthetic quality — had somehow swept away the unease inside her.

She knew him. She knew his arrogant, overweening side. She knew his coarse and hot-tempered side. She knew his stubborn, never-say-die side. She knew his loyal, honourable side. Just like these lopsided, clumsy joy characters before her, Li Wu’s image stood before her mind clear and sharp.

It seemed… there was nothing to be afraid of after all.

This was just a temporary arrangement in any case. If Li Wu ever dared to mistreat her, once she reunited with the Crown Prince, she would make sure the Crown Prince smashed that insufferable head of his to pieces.

Shen Zhuxi’s fears came and went as quickly as the tide. When she saw the basin in the backyard filled to the brim with her freshly washed new clothes, the last trace of hesitation in her heart vanished entirely.

She hummed a little tune, grabbed a wet garment from the basin, shook it out, and flung it toward the clothesline with all her might.

Such happiness was brief.

“Ouch!”

The water-soaked sleeve came smacking across Shen Zhuxi’s face with a loud slap. Her happiness evaporated in an instant.

“Li Wu——!” Shen Zhuxi shrieked.

That scoundrel had left without wringing out the clothes first!

……

“Achoo!” Li Wu sneezed.

Beside him, Li Kun, panting heavily from their run, turned to glance at him. “Big brother… are you sick…”

Li Wu said, “Isn’t it because you two run so slowly that the sweat on my body turns cold? One gust of wind and of course I’m going to sneeze.”

“Second brother and I… didn’t sneeze. Only you did…” Li Kun grumbled.

“Stop your chattering and pick up the pace!” Li Wu sent a kick toward Li Kun’s backside. Li Kun yelped and took off at full speed, his thirty-catty sandbag bobbing up and down as he ran.

Li Wu slowed his pace and looked back at Li Que, who was gasping for air some distance behind.

“Are you going to speed up yourself, or do you need me to help you speed up?”

“No… no need for big brother to trouble himself…” Li Que managed a smile that looked worse than crying, and lurched forward at a faster pace.

After one full lap around the Lan River, all three of them were drenched in sweat. The moment they reached the finish, Li Que fell flat on his back, motionless, his chest heaving rapidly up and down.

Li Kun squatted at the riverbank, scooping up water with both hands and gulping it down loudly.

Li Wu stood at the river’s edge, facing the breeze. He stripped off his outer robe and trousers, unbuckled the sandbags from his body, and plunged headfirst into the river.

The current surged, waves breaking and spraying white foam. Li Wu’s lean, powerful frame moved freely through the water. The rushing river crashed relentlessly against his broad shoulders, and amid the churning froth, a green swimming phoenix dipped and resurfaced like a creature vanishing into the deep.

Li Wu washed and swam at once, and only after the time it took to burn two sticks of incense did he emerge, looking thoroughly refreshed. He was soaked through — even the top of his head dripped with water.

Droplets rolled down his dark lashes and fell. Li Wu blinked and casually swept his wet black hair back behind his head, then dropped onto a large moss-covered boulder at the riverbank. He settled onto the sunwarmed moss and let the river breeze wash over him with easy unconcern.

The glorious morning sun draped itself across him like a battle robe soaked in the glow of blood. Li Wu sat without a word, his posture languid and loose, yet the gaze that came from his eyes was sharp as a blade. He stared at the place where the river met the sky at the far end of the horizon, looking for all the world like a man surveying the enemy who had already fallen before him — an unspoken authority that needed no announcement.

“Big brother, when will we be able to leave Yutou County?” Li Que lay on the ground, staring up at the sky, but his question was directed at Li Wu, who stood a dozen paces away.

“Now is not the right time,” Li Wu said without turning.

“When will the right time be?”

“When an emperor dies.” Li Wu picked up a pebble from the ground and skipped it across the river’s surface. “As long as neither the True Dragon Emperor nor the Primordial Dragon Emperor has died, the realm won’t fall into chaos.”

The stone skipped across the water, sending out a dozen rippling rings before sinking into the rolling current of the Lan River.

Li Que said, “The late emperor squandered the people’s labour and indulged in extravagance beyond all measure — he lost the hearts of the people long ago. I’ve heard the Primordial Dragon Emperor has already issued a call to arms, but very few regional officials have responded. The True Dragon Emperor, on the other hand — the one who holds the capital — was originally an illiterate peasant. After receiving enlightenment from a white serpent that could speak in a human tongue, he suddenly understood a hundred different texts. After his rebellion succeeded, more and more people flocked to him, and as luck would have it, where the uprising began was close to the capital region — that’s how he was able to strike straight to the heart of the Great Yan dynasty before it could react. His fortune has been extraordinary, and he has been touched by strange omens. The world says he is the true Son of Heaven.”

“Son of Heaven — all just tricks to fool the gullible.” Li Wu’s expression turned scornful. “If I were to lead an uprising, I could manufacture my own signs and portents — born knowing all things, heaven sending its omens.”

“Even without such deceptions, big brother is already truly extraordinary,” Li Que said with a smile.

The morning sun had fully risen. Its golden brilliance spread across the earth, leaving not a shadow of gloom behind.

Li Wu jumped down from the boulder and picked up his clothes to put them on.

Li Que got up from the ground too, and gave a kick to Li Kun, who had already begun snoring against a rock. “Big brother’s wedding day is approaching. Is there anything your brothers can do to help?”

“Go and deliver the invitations for me.” Li Wu was strapping the sandbags back onto his body, and in no time at all looked a size larger.

“That is naturally something I should handle. Who does big brother want to invite to the wedding banquet? Have you decided?”

“Invite everyone who can come.” Li Wu wrung the last drops of water from the ends of his hair. “I’ve already spoken with Fan Sanniang — I asked her to bring several extra people to help prepare the wedding feast.”

“Inviting so many people?”

Li Wu, still wringing out his wet hair, said offhandedly, “A woman only gets married once in her life. Spending a little more is nothing.”

Li Que smiled. “Well said. Big brother, after you rise to prominence in the future, you’ll likely be like those wealthy landlords — taking a new bride every night. But it’s different for Sister-in-law Shen. In her lifetime, she’ll only wear the red bridal veil once.”

“Enough.” Li Wu’s brow furrowed. “One Shen Zhuxi jabbering away is already enough to give me headaches. Are you trying to bring me several more?”

“Perhaps big brother will one day rescue a princess of the imperial family,” Li Que said wistfully, “and from there fulfil a long-cherished dream. It’s such a pity that Princess of Yue died so young. They say among all the late emperor’s dozen or so princesses, she was the most beautiful.”

Li Wu fixed him with a cold stare.

“What kind of long-cherished dream involves marrying a princess? Last time you talked nonsense and made Shen Zhuxi think I was going to sell her off to a brothel — I haven’t settled that score with you yet. Are you so numb to trouble that you don’t feel it anymore?”

“Your brother will never say such things again.” Li Que made a show of pinching his lips shut with two fingers, but his mouth was itching so badly he couldn’t help adding one more word: “Your brother simply hadn’t realized how deeply devoted big brother is to Sister-in-law Shen.”

A sharp glare shot over from Li Wu. Li Que immediately pressed his lips together and shook his head repeatedly, signalling that he was truly done.

“Come with me somewhere in a moment,” Li Wu said.

Li Que exhaled with relief and quickly asked, “Where are we going?”

“The Jinyin Pavilion, to borrow a wedding garment.”