The Story of Yanxi Palace, Chapter 9: The Dispute

   The Story of Yanxi Palace《延禧攻略》Yanxi Gonglue

   The Story of Yanxi Palace, Chapter 9: The Dispute

   Fang Gugu ushers a group of young court maids into the court maid's house.

   “After you have been tested on the broom and embroidery, you are official court ladies.” Fang Gugu swept her stern gaze over the crowd and said, “From now on, live here under my control.”

   They saw that the windows were clear, the tables and chairs were all there and there was a picture of the Goddess of Mercy hanging on the wall, with her kind eyes, holding a vase and a few green willow leaves in the middle.

   Especially when there were two plates on the table, one with pea and bean cakes and the other with kidney bean cakes, the work of the imperial chef was not comparable to that of a small folk shop, each one was small and cute, transparent Linglong and when you looked closer, there were small birds carved on them, with distinct plumes, comparable to a work of art.

   Her family had sent her to the palace so that her family would have fewer mouths to feed, as she was hungry more often than not. She asked, “Gugu, is this a midnight snack for us?”

   “It's for you.” Fang Gugu said and just as Jixiang's face showed a hint of joy, she was heard to add, “But only to look at, not to eat.”

   Jixiang was stunned at the words and said, “Why?”

   “You have come to the palace to serve, not to be ladies.” Fang Gugu gave a cold lecture, “You must be clean and neat and especially not smell dirty, otherwise if Noble Lady saw you, it would be a great disrespect and you would be in trouble and I would not be well, so you must not touch the fish.”

   The implication is that you are not even allowed to have a full meal and you can't even think about a midnight snack.

   “It's getting late, you guys go to bed.” Fang Gugu looks around the group, her eyes resting for a moment on Jixiang's face in particular and says with narrowed eyes, “I'll come over in the morning, if the plate is short ...”

   Jixiang bowed her head sheepishly.

   The rest of the group stood as low and wooden as she did, until Fang Gu left, when the logs came to life and scrambled for the beds in the house.

   “I'll sleep here!”

   “No, I had my eye on this shop first!”

   “What you see is what you get?”

   Jixiang is a man of action. While others are still arguing over a window seat, she has already jumped onto the bed and grabbed the best seat in the house, then smiled back and said: “Come on!

   “Hey!” Linglong thought she was shouting at her and thought to herself that this fellow villager was quite kind and was about to walk over to her, when she kept shaking her hand and shouting, “Yingluo, Yingluo come over here, I've got a good seat for you!

   Linglong's foot stopped in the air, embarrassed, only to feel that everyone in the room was looking at her and her face turned red with shame.

   Wei Yingluo saw the scene in her eyes and felt a little helpless. She climbed onto the bed with her bundle and Jixiang took it from her, smiling at her affectionately and saying: “Yingluo, thank you so much for today.”

   “What a big deal, you've been thanking me all day.” Wei Yingluo looked around and said, “By the way, in this house, are all the new palace maids living here?”

   “Yeah, what's wrong?” Jixiang looked at her suspiciously.

   “Nothing.” Wei Yingluo said with a faint smile, “I was just thinking that it would be nice if one or two of the palace sisters who had entered the palace before us were there, so we could learn more about the rules of the palace from her, lest we act later and accidentally break the taboo.”

   “You're right.” Jixiang trusted her words wholeheartedly as she sighed softly and said with her eyes once again looking at the two plates of dim sum on the table, “If I wasn't afraid of breaking the taboo, I could have eaten it all by myself ...”

   A snort of laughter rang out, a unique and mean laugh and they looked over to see Jinxiu standing beside them, laughing at Wei Yingluo, “You really believe everything she said, don't you? I don't think it's a question about rules, it's just someone trying to suck up to Gugu!

   Wei Yingluo would have been fine if she had sneered back but Jinxiu couldn't even get a slightly hostile look in return for a sneer.

   “It's getting late.” Wei Yingluo even begrudged her a look and turned to Jixiang and said, “Let's tidy up the shop and get an early night.”

   “Mmm!” Jixiang, like an obedient little sister, immediately joined her in tidying up the bunk and made a point of drawing their pillows close together so that the two could sleep next to each other and if they couldn't sleep, they could nibble on each other's ears and whisper at night.

   Jinxiu felt that she had become a clown talking to herself. She dared not turn around for fear of seeing faces laughing at her.

   “What are you doing?” Jixiang pushed her with displeasure and pushed her away from Wei Yingluo saying, “You're annoying hey, Sister Yingluo is already tired today, can you let her rest early?”

   “You don't have to speak for her so much.” Jinxiu laughed coldly and said, “Do you think she really helped you? I'm telling you, she's trying to make a name for herself in front of Manager Wu, you're just a stepping stone for her, we're all stepping stones for her!”

   “You are talking nonsense!” Jixiang, being impatient, immediately jumped off the bed and rolled her sleeves upwards, looking like she was going to fight Jinxiu.

   “Did I say something wrong?” Jinxiu was not willing to fight with this foolish person, this kind of foolish person, there is no lightness in his hands, she could not bear it, she hurriedly directed the topic to Wei Yingluo and said, “If you don't believe me, ask her if she made a big show today, was it for herself?”

   Wei Yingluo glanced at her indifferently, this person's small mind, where could she not see it?

   If she answered no, Jinxiu would say that she was being sophomoric but if she answered yes, she would immediately fall for it, so she simply continued to ignore her, spread out the folded bedding and burrowed herself into it, saying in a somewhat tired voice from under the blanket: “Jixiang, come here.

   “Here it comes...” Like a small pet summoned by its master, Jixiang quickly left Jinxiu behind, taking off her shoes and socks and burrowing into the bedding.

   “Fine, you don't dare to speak up do you?” Jinxiu saw herself being ignored again and finally lost her mind, she quickly rushed to the table, where besides two plates of dim sum, there was also a fat teapot with an ink and bamboo pattern, she lifted the teapot and returned to Yingluo's window, pouring a full pot of tea over the mattress being used by Wei Yingluo.

   “Ah!” Jixiang jumped out from the futon and yelled at Jinxiu saying, “Jinxiu, what are you doing!”

   “Telling her to step on us to get to the top, that's the downfall.” Jinxiu laughed smugly and at the end of it, she even turned back to the crowd and asked, “What do you think, should I do this?”

   Laughter rose up and the court maids said, as you and I said, “Yes, that's the way to do it!”

   “Calling her out on the limelight!”

   “No, it makes us all look like crap!”

   “You'll have to remember that in future, don't be so eager to get ahead!”

   Wei Yingluo slowly crawled out of the bedding and felt the bedding on her body with her hands, only to find that it was heavy and heavy, already wet from the outside to the inside, the night was cold and dewy, covering such a wet bedding, only to fear that it would cause illness.

   Jixiang was sleeping next to Wei Yingluo and her quilt was also splashed with water but only a small corner was wet and the rest of the quilt could still be slept on. She said: “Sister Yingluo, come and sleep here, we'll both share the same quilt.”

   Wei Yingluo cupped her bedding and looked at it for a moment, then suddenly looked up and smiled at her and said, “Wait a moment.”

   After she finished, she threw down the wet bedding in her hands, stepped out of bed on her embroidered shoes, reached out and pushed the door and went out of the house, a move that made the laughter in the room stop and the people looked at each other, all seeing the nervousness and weakness in each other's faces.

   Linglong, who had not spoken up for Wei Yingluo earlier, could not help but complain at this moment and she said to Jinxiu with a sad frown: “Hey, why did you bother to provoke her, I think she must have gone to Gugu to complain now.”

   Jinxiu was also a little uneasy but she was still a little clever and with a twinkle in her eye, she spoke loudly to the court ladies in the room: “Hasn't she made enough of a stink today? We have so many mouths here, we're afraid of her!

   The palace maids' eyes lit up and they thought, “That's the reason.

   If only the people in the room would say that Wei Yingluo had wet the bedding herself and then deliberately framed Jinxiu for the crime, wouldn't that be enough?

   There are so many of them, Wei Yingluo is only one and she is not a relative, why should Fang Gu believe her and not them?

   “Jinxiu, you're so bad!” Jixiang was so angry that she jumped and said, “I hate you!”

   “Am I bad, or was your sister Yingluo born to be disliked?” Jinxiu hid her lips in a smile and asked those around her, “What do you think!

   “Wei Yingluo of course!”

   “I've seen her for a long time.”

   “An ambitious, bad thing that knows how to pull a stomp on us ...”

   Jixiang tried her best to refute Wei Yingluo but two fists were no match for four hands, let alone so many mouths. Jixiang's mouth was so dumb that she was no match for these people's snide remarks.

   “What's wrong with us, you tell me!” Jinxiu reached up to her chest and pushed her onto the wet bedding on the bed. Jixiang was furious and was about to fight her when suddenly a bucket of water was thrown from behind Jinxiu with a crash.

   “Ah!” Jinxiu screamed and instantly became a fallen chicken.

   She turned back to Wei Yingluo, who was carrying a bucket of water behind her and said angrily, “What are you doing?”

   Wei Yingluo smiled faintly and carried the remaining half of the bucket of water, pouring it all the way, soaking everyone's bedding in the water. But the house was filled with screams and the palace maids jumped out of their beds one by one, cursing: “Yingluo, you're crazy!”

   “This is too much!”

   “Yeah, we just said a couple of words about you and you're doing this to us?”

   “Go! Let's go and find Gugu!” Jinxiu raised her hand to wipe the water from her face, she was soaked to the skin, water droplets were falling down her sideburns and the corners of her coat, she gave Wei Yingluo a sinister stare, then lifted her feet towards the door and said, “I'll see if Gugu can still tolerate you after what you've done!”

   Seeing that the situation had reached such a stage, Jixiang was a bit anxious and said: “No, no, don't go, Yingluo is just impulsive, she didn't mean it! Yingluo, say something!

   Wei Yingluo's hand slackened and the already empty barrel fell from her hand and rolled bones to Jinxiu's feet.

   “Let them go.” Wei Yingluo said with a wry smile, “It will only be them, not me, who are unlucky anyway.”

  

   The Story of Yanxi Palace《延禧攻略》CHAPTERS