The Empress’s Gigolo

The empress woke up from her transcendental state and pondered deeply for two days before returning to her normal self.

“Let’s go out of the palace for a walk.”

Ren Baqian had just reached the palace when he heard the empress say, “We aren’t having lunch in the palace.”

“The empress is in a good mood today.” Ren Baqian smiled.

“Not really. I’m just feeling a bit bored!” the empress said.

“Your Majesty should go out more often. Traveling 10,000 miles is better than reading 10,000 books!” Ren Baqian added. The ancient emperors in China faced many restrictions when traveling. Preparations had to be made two months in advance while secrecy was needed due to fear of assassination and other dangers.

However, traveling wasn’t a problem for the empress because she didn’t face restrictions in traveling. Furthermore, she herself was a top-ranked expert.

It was just that most of the time, the empress preferred to hang around in the palace.

In modern parlance, she was a homebody who seldom talked about going out, so Ren Baqian was more than happy to accompany her.

Ren Baqian went back to Pingle Park to change into ordinary clothes and discovered that the empress was still wearing the same red dress as before.

“Your Majesty, you will be easily recognized this way. Do you wish to be easily recognized?” Ren Baqian asked.

“Why is that so? There shouldn’t be a large number of people who can recognize me,” the empress retorted.

“Not to mention your looks, just your disposition is beyond comparison to ordinary people—even those that have never met you before can feel it. Furthermore, many people in the city have seen you before and will certainly find it hard to forget you once they have taken a look. In addition, I will be by your side… They can also infer who you are when they see the two of us walking together,” Ren Baqian explained with a smile.

The empress frowned and agreed with the fact that it was easy for people to recognize her with Ren Baqian beside her. She looked up and said, “This is all your fault!”

Ren Baqian spread out his arms and shrugged his shoulders.

“I don’t want to change my clothes!” The empress was defiant. In his eyes, her tantrum made her look rather cute.

“Your Majesty…” Ren Baqian pondered and remembered a phrase from the ancients that was very relevant to this situation.

The phrase went, “When you are running around naked, do you cover the top or bottom parts?”

The answer was, “Cover the face.”

“In that case, cover your face!” Ren Baqian’s arms were still spread out.

The empress expected Ren Baqian to come up with a good suggestion, but unexpectedly he produced such an unconstructive idea.

“I’m serious!” the empress said seriously.

“I’m also serious!” Ren Baqian asked, “Is there a better solution?”

The empress thought about it and couldn’t come up with a better idea…

.

A moment later the empress wore a red dress with white underclothes and used a red scarf to cover her face.

Ren Baqian wore a green robe and had a black mask on his face.

The two of them then swaggered out of the palace.

The imperial guards following them felt like laughing but didn’t dare to show it.

“This is silly!” The empress couldn’t help but say, “I must be a dolt to listen to your stupid ideas!”

“Custom-make two sets of clothes later. For one set, write the word ‘female’ on the front and the word ‘big’ on the back. For the other set, write the word ‘male’ on the front and the word ‘robber’ on the back. The words combined will be ‘male and female thieves.’”

Ptui! The empress spat.

The two of them strolled through Beihong District and attracted a lot of attention.

The way they were dressed, it was hard not to attract attention.

As the empress and Ren Baqian walked past a restaurant, the empress looked at the signboard and said, “I remember coming here for a meal when I was young and the taste was good!”

“Do you want to give it a try? We haven’t eaten lunch yet!” Ren Baqian stopped to look up and saw the words “Shanhuai Restaurant” written on the signboard.

This restaurant looked like a place that the descendants of the court officials preferred to frequent.

He wondered whether the empress would cause a furor with her entrance.

The empress was of the same mind and nodded before saying, “Good idea.”

As soon as the empress nodded, Ren Baqian became excited. As he pulled the empress along to the second floor, he was eagerly waiting to see who the unlucky fellow they encountered would be.

“Guests!” A fat waiter with a face that looked more like a thug than a waiter attempted to block them.

“Why can’t we go to the second story?” Ren Baqian asked, thinking that show time was imminent.

The thuggish looking waiter kept on waving his hands and said earnestly, “Of course you can, but there are many people there and it’s noisy. If you want to go up, it isn’t a problem.”

In Lan City, those that could afford woven clothing weren’t ordinary people. People who could work as waiters were certainly smart and discerning.

“No problem—we prefer crowded places as they are livelier!” Ren Baqian said.

Ren Baqian led the empress straight up to the second story, saw many people, and recognized quite a few of them.

There was Hong Xian, the daughter of Hong Wu. In addition to Liu Ruoyao, the two cousins of Du Changkong were also present.

Ren Baqian even saw two students from his academy, Du Laoliu and Xu Peng. Both were the children of court officials, but in terms of talent, they were right at the bottom in comparison.

The empress and Ren Baqian did attract some attention, or rather they drew some suspicion. Why were the two wearing masks when it was such a hot day? However, the crowd sensed that these two were Man Wheel experts and focused their attention on others instead.

Ren Baqian led the empress to a corner seat and discovered that the group at the table of Du Laoliu were debating some matters.

“How can it be! We are envious as out of so many people, a few of you were selected to enter the Black Bamboo Academy. It can be seen that you are different from us! You guys are scholars, and I also want to study badly!” A 16 or 17 year old teenager named Tu Yu spoke in a strange tone.

Laughter erupted before he finished speaking.

Everyone knew that those who were selected were the useless ones.

“Stop talking nonsense in that weird voice!” Xu Peng pounded on the table in anger.

“Why are you so worked up? I just said it casually. However, you have been there for a year. Don’t tell me you haven’t learned anything at all! Why don’t you tell us something eye-opening?”

“If you want to learn, go to school yourself and listen. However, with your brain, you will need to use your fingers to do basic addition and subtraction. You will not understand even if you attend class.” Du Laoliu couldn’t help sneering.

“That’s why I asked you to tell us about it.” Tu Yu didn’t take it seriously and laughed at them instead.

“What’s there to talk to you about? Do you know chemistry? Do you know physics? Do you know what a lever is? How about an internal combustion engine? You don’t even know what I’m talking about, so what’s the point of talking to you? Have you heard of ‘preaching to deaf ears?’” Du Laoliu sneered.

“What use are those things that you mentioned if nobody understands?” Tu Yu was blasted by Du Laoliu and became rather upset.