Chapter 583: Losing the Vest
Chapter 583: Losing the Vest (Part )
"What's wrong? Is there a problem?" Xu Zhenguan stood under the street light, slightly tilted his head, and looked at him with a puzzled look.
Zhao Duan was silent.
I must admit that he was shocked just now, and almost thought that Zhenbao knew something. But now, looking at the beautiful urban woman with black hair under the night street lights, he pretended to be indifferent and asked:
"Why? Why did you specifically ask for this?"
Xu Zhenguan smiled slightly, raised his hand and gently brushed his hair, and said naturally:
"Because someone gave me a song of Water Melody for the Mid-Autumn Festival. Well, I want to use this tune to write a poem for the Mid-Autumn Festival, is that okay?"
So that's how it is... Zhao Duan first breathed a sigh of relief, thinking he understood the reason behind Zhenbao's request.
Immediately, I felt a sharp pain in my balls, and I wanted to slap myself twice:
Damn it, why are you pretending to be fine? Isn't this just digging a hole for yourself?
Fortunately, it is not impossible to remedy the situation. There are many poems with the tune of Shui Tiao Ge Tou in history, and it is not difficult to find one to fool people. Just when this thought arose, he heard the empress's subsequent additional request.
Water Melody Song, and it must be a Mid-Autumn Festival poem... This is a bit too targeted...
Zhao Duan has a toothache again.
Well, there must have been poets in history who used this tune during the Mid-Autumn Festival... right? Zhao Duan was a little unsure.
Logically it must exist, but he is not a student of this, so how would he know?
Moreover, if he did a random search, the most famous one would definitely be at the top. He was not sure how many words Zhenbao knew in this world, so the risk was too great...
After a moment of hesitation, he shook his head seriously and said:
"Unfortunately, as far as I can remember, there is no work that meets the requirements. Well, the tune you mentioned is not very popular. Yes, it is not very popular."
The unpopular poet Su Dongpo...
Xu Zhenguan watched him talk nonsense quietly, with a subtle look in his eyes, and cooperated by showing an expression of regret and disappointment.
So, women are born actors. For example, sometimes, for the sake of their partner's self-esteem, they will cooperate and call out a few times...
Yin Susu once said that beautiful women are the most deceptive.
At this moment, Xu Zhenguan's expression showed this point very well. If she hadn't been worried about going too far, the empress would have almost acted pitiful...
"That's it..."
Just when Zhao Duan had just breathed a sigh of relief, Xu Zhenguan raised his head again and cast an expectant look: "Do you have a farewell poem? I have a friend named Dong Da..."
"..." Zhao Duan exclaimed in his heart, wow, this mess is not going to work, right?
He naturally thought that it was the poem "Farewell to Dong Da" that he had copied that aroused the empress's interest.
So he frowned and shook his head:
"There are a lot of farewell poems. Miss Xu wants to see them. I can help you find a few, but there are none by Dong Da or anything like that."
The empress looked disappointed again, and then seemed to be a little bored after being rejected twice, and sighed:
"Forget it. Well, do you have any Confucian works here?"
She briefly described the content of Xinxue.
Zhao Duan was sweating profusely and shook his head seriously, indicating that this was beyond the scope of the topic and he did not understand it.
The empress tied up her hair again and said softly:
"What about Buddhist scriptures? I see there are temples here..."
Zhao Duan shook his head again. He had copied this before... Zhao had shamelessly quoted famous quotes from the Diamond Sutra and the Daoist Tao Te Ching. Once he checked, he was exposed.
The empress was a little unhappy after being rejected several times in a row. She frowned and said unhappily:
"You don't have this, you don't have that, what else do you have?"
I am here... Zhao Duan showed a simple smile:
"Well... if Miss Xu is interested in something else, then that's fine..."
The empress hugged her shoulders, looking at him with an angry look on her face, and said calmly:
"I want to see the history of the development of firearms here, but you said you couldn't see it?"
She had raised this question last time, but was ruthlessly rejected by Zhao Duan.
Seeing that Zhao Duan remained silent, Xu Zhenguan sneered and sighed:
"Forget it. I won't embarrass you. Last time I watched your 'drama', there was a dynasty. There should be records about the dynasty's legal reforms, right? How to rectify the administration? How to boost the economy? The gold and silver standard? Market trade..."
What she said were all the terms that Zhao Duan proposed when he opened a small class in Xiuwen Hall.
"..."
Zhao Duan felt that something was wrong. Although when he thought about it carefully, the things Zhenbao wanted were all very "reasonable". As an emperor, it was understandable that he cared about these things.
But...isn't this a bit too targeted?
Each and every one of them hit Zhao Duan directly in the throat, and each one of them hit the sore spot of his bad reputation as a plagiarist.
Seeing that he was silent, Xu Zhenguan glanced at him: "Why? You don't have this either?"
"That's possible." Zhao Duan felt that this was not a big problem, because history always repeats itself, and similar policies can be considered coincidences, and will never be as shocking as poetry.
"However, professional books need to be checked in the library, but it is closed at this time," Zhao Duan explained.
Of course, you can also use the Internet... Well, although this world in the painting is full of bugs, some functions of the Internet can be used, while others cannot. I don’t know if I can check it...
Seeing that the empress was showing signs of losing her temper, Zhao Duan felt that he could no longer remain passive.
He suddenly had an idea and pointed to a coffee shop not far away that was still open late at night and said:
"It's not convenient to talk while standing. Would you like to have a cup of coffee?"
Xu Zhenguan did not comment. Seeing him walk away quickly, he had to follow him with a complicated look in his eyes.
Order, scan code, pay...
All in one go.
When the two came out again, each of them had a paper cup in their hands.
Zhao Duan took out a thin tube, poked it open, took a sip, and his brows relaxed... Before the time travel, he would get off work late at night, and sometimes when he felt sleepy, he would order a cup of coffee, which brought back the taste he had not tasted for a long time.
Xu Zhenguan imitated his movements, bit the thin tube into his mouth, sucked it gently, then frowned, spit it out with disgust, and said coldly: "It's bitter."
It's actually kind of cute.
Zhao Duan smiled, regaining some of the initiative. He explained with a smile: "Only those who endure the most hardships can become the best."
Xu Zhenguan sneered: "How can suffering make one a superior person?"
Zhao Duan gave her silence.
The two of them, each holding a cup of coffee, walked along the street lined with bright billboards. Zhao Duan suddenly said:
"Why is Miss Xu so obsessed with poetry?"
He felt that Zhenbao was not quite right tonight and decided to test it out.
Xu Zhenguan spit out the straw and looked at the light pollution in the sky above the city. She could not see the stars or the moon. She said softly:
"My...fiancé, wrote a poem. It's very good."
"Oh? Would you like to hear the details?"
"When will the bright moon appear..." The empress recited the Mid-Autumn Festival poem and then asked, "What do you think?"
Zhao Duan was full of admiration:
"Although I am not very proficient in ancient poetry, I can tell that this poem is excellent. It's a pity that ancient poetry is declining nowadays, otherwise this one poem alone would be enough to make the world famous. I didn't expect that Miss Xu's fiancé is such a talented scholar. With such a deep foundation in ancient Chinese, he must be an excellent person, right?"
Xu Zhenguan looked at the "Chapter" bragging with a sidelong glance, feeling very surprised. He nodded and said meaningfully:
"He is indeed an excellent person, and very famous. His name is Zhao Duan, have you heard of him?"
Zhao Duan shook his head and said, "Not really."
Xu Zhen nodded, took another sip of coffee, and suddenly said:
"Have you heard of Su Shi? What about Gao Shi?" "Of course, these are well-known..." Zhao Duan nodded subconsciously, and suddenly stopped talking halfway. He also stopped abruptly and looked at Zhenbao in surprise and doubt.
The empress also stopped. The night wind ruffled her hair and the collar of her shirt, revealing her delicate collarbone. Half of her face seemed to be covered with a faint shadow in the light of the street lamp.
Xu Zhenguan turned back and looked at Zhao Duan with her bright dark eyes. She finally stopped pretending to be innocent and revealed a meaningful look on her face:
"I asked someone to look it up, Su Shi's Water Melody. They said it was a poem from the Song Dynasty, many years ago... What a coincidence... Don't you think so? Zhao... Qing...?"
Zhao Qing... ?
Her voice was soft.
To Zhao Duan's ears, it was like a thunderclap, instantly shattering his brain into countless turbulent and chaotic thoughts.
She...knew...
When did she know?
Who found this poem for her?
Zhao Duan stood there in a daze, feeling a numbness rushing from the soles of his feet to his scalp.
His scalp was tingling, but he still tried to stay calm and put on a blank look:
"Miss Xu, what did you say? I don't quite understand..."
The talent of playing dumb is activated.
Xu Zhenguan smiled. She really smiled. Her smile was somewhat gentle, but also had an inexplicable coldness to it:
"Mr. Zhao, do you want me to explain it more clearly? Those poems, firearms, government orders, Wang Yangming...
I just figured it out not long ago. No wonder the ‘chapter’ only appeared when you and I entered the human world at the same time. Last time, I stopped hiding it and revealed that I was not from this world, and you were not surprised at all…”
Zhao Duan's heart sank little by little, and he was finally sure that the empress was not deceiving him.
The two stood quietly facing each other, the street lights dragging their shadows long on the ground. In the distance, online ride-hailing cars were speeding on the road, and farther away, office buildings and bars were still brightly lit in the night.
There was silence for a long time.
Zhao Duan squeezed the coffee cup in his hand hard, then he let go and let half the cup of coffee fall to the ground.
Then, Zhang Hui calmly met the bright eyes of the Great Yu Empress, smiled slightly, opened his arms, and said:
"Since Your Majesty has already seen through it, there is no point in me pretending any longer."
"so……"
"I won't pretend anymore. I'm going to reveal my cards now."
"Your Majesty, welcome to my world."
……
……
Welcome to my world…
Xu Zhenguan listened to these words and looked at the urban youth standing opposite him with his arms open. A familiar expression and temperament emerged on that somewhat unfamiliar face.
She bit her red lips, and her slender fingers clenched the coffee cup, letting the warm liquid inside spill out and soak her white fingers.
In fact, even when she entered the world this time, she was not completely sure.
That's why she chatted with Zhang Hui for a long time and made many attempts to test him. It was through these targeted attempts that she gradually confirmed Zhang Hui's identity.
It was not until this moment that Zhao Duan admitted it himself, which finally put an end to her suspicions.
Zhang Hui is Zhao Duan.
Zhao Duan is Zhang Hui.
That’s not the point…
The key point is that Zhang Hui has existed in this world for a long time, and even has a home, an identity, and a past in this world... He is the "indigenous person" in this mysterious picture.
And a lot of completely unreasonable knowledge that Zhao Duan brought out about the past of the Great Yu Dynasty actually came from this broken world in the painting.
What exactly is going on?
Zhao Duan had entered the human world a long time ago? No... that didn't make sense.
He is the person in the painting? This is even more unbelievable.
At this moment, the empress got the answer, but was filled with greater doubts.
There was silence for a long time.
Finally, she opened her red lips and asked the biggest question in her heart: "Who... are you?"
Zhao Duan was silent.
It must be admitted that he was panicked for a moment when the empress revealed his identity, because time travel was his biggest secret, which he had never revealed to anyone.
However, the tension only lasted for a moment before he calmed down again.
Because, a long time ago, he had encountered the arrival of this day. From the moment he learned that the human world was actually the world he was familiar with, Zhao Duan knew that sooner or later, the empress would find clues of his plagiarism in this world.
Even if he didn't copy "Shui Tiao Ge Tou"...it wouldn't affect the final result.
But this day came a little earlier than expected.
Obviously, from the perspective of the empress, she did not care about the true source of the knowledge that helped the Dayu Dynasty. All she cared about was the origin of herself as the "imperial husband".
Zhao Duan faced the empress's sharp gaze, smiled bitterly, and spread his hands, saying:
"This is a long story..."
"Then let's make it short." Xu Zhenguan interrupted him and said calmly, "If we can't finish talking here, let's go out and talk."
Seeing Zhao Duan silent.
Xu Zhenguan stared at him with complicated eyes and said:
"I have always wondered why you have changed so much in the past two years. Since you let Zhuang Xiaocheng go, you have been rising to prominence. In less than two years, you have come to where you are today... You are truly amazing. But the more amazing you are, the more I don't understand."
She seemed to be talking to herself:
"I have investigated you. From your childhood to the year before last, there is almost nothing special about your life. This is the biggest anomaly. Even if according to your original statement, you were misunderstood as a playboy by the people in the capital, it was a deliberate disguise...
Okay, that makes sense, but how do you explain how a person who hadn't shown any extraordinary qualities in the past twenty years suddenly developed such a deep mind and outstanding talents?"
She continued:
"I was very confused for a while, until I found that the dragon soul was in you, I thought I found an explanation. But even this explanation doesn't make sense. Why did Emperor Taizu choose you as his inheritance... But now, I have figured it out a little bit."
Xu Zhenguan stared at him without blinking, and also dropped the crushed coffee cup, clenching his fingers with both hands:
"So, who exactly are you?"
Facing the empress's repeated questions, Zhao Duan answered calmly:
"I am Zhang Hui, and also Zhao Duan."
After a pause, he said with a look of reminiscence in his eyes:
"To be precise, in the bamboo forest in the southern suburbs of the capital, Ren Kun from the Kuangfu Society came from a distance and rescued Zhuang Xiaocheng. Before he knocked me out, I only had memories of Zhao Duan, but after I woke up that day, I had an extra memory in my mind."
Zhao Duan pointed to the top of his head and said calmly:
"In Zhang Hui's memory, he lives in this world."
-
ps: I won’t pretend anymore, I’m going to reveal my true colors… In order to prevent some readers from feeling uncomfortable with the setting of soul traveling, I’ll give you a little hint in advance that the protagonist is not a soul traveling… Of course, Yu State is definitely not Earth… The setting of this book is definitely different from Joy of Life…
(End of this chapter)