Wang Xiuyu quickly agreed to Rong Tang's suggestion. After hearing this, Ke Hongxue thought for a moment, smiled, and clasped his hands to Rong Tang, saying frankly and sincerely: "Hanying thanks the prince on behalf of all scholars in the world."
He was talking about "scholars all over the world" and never mentioned gender.
He is the most idle tutor in the Imperial College, but he is also the teacher who gives lectures at Linyuan Academy every month.
Rong Tang understood what he meant and did not say much. He just let him negotiate with the dean of the academy.
When Princess Duanyi heard about their plan, she looked at the newcomers of this era with her simple and deep eyes for a long time, and gave away two land deeds, as well as the ancient books collected in the Princess's house, and also donated several boxes of pens, ink, paper and inkstone to Linyuan Academy.
It is hard to say exactly what kind of behavior this should be characterized as, but Rong Tang only felt that, at least from the beginning to the end, he was not the only one fantasizing, doing something that perhaps was not recognized by the times while facing the incomprehensible gaze of the world.
He has many like-minded people around him, many companions who are willing to advance and retreat with him and dream a big dream.
Rong Tang was extremely grateful for the choice he made in this life.
In such a busy life, summer came to an end. In early autumn, Sheng Chengming sent two baskets of green persimmons from his fiefdom. They were soaked in clean water and the handles were plugged with straw. When the fruit stems fell off completely, the persimmons were sweet, crisp and refreshing.
Rong Tang sat in a rocking chair in the yard, eating persimmons while watching the drifting clouds in the sky. He closed his eyes and rocked slowly, feeling the wind of all seasons blowing across his face.
As he swayed, the light in front of him dimmed. Rong Tang was a little confused and wanted to open his eyes, but a kiss like a dragonfly touching the water landed on his forehead. Su Huaijing looked at him with a smile and said gently: "Tangtang, are you waiting for me to kiss you awake?"
Rong Tang was stunned for half a second, his cheeks heated up uncontrollably, and his mind subconsciously recalled the fairy tale he had read before.
Su Huaijing smiled seductively and took out a bag of freshly baked spicy rabbit heads from behind him: "Want some snacks?"
The embarrassment of being mistaken for a sleeping beauty disappeared in an instant in front of the delicious food. Rong Tang's eyes lit up and he sat up suddenly: "Eat!"
Su Huaijing was startled by him. After coming to his senses, he smiled helplessly: "Slow down, no one is competing with you for it."
The person who wants to rob is not here. Yuanyuan has almost been raised into a small wealthy man by Ke Hongxue, so she would not compete with Rong Tang for this bag of rabbit heads.
Su Huaijing pulled Rong Tang towards the restaurant. Another season had passed and most of the years had passed.
-
On the day of the Ghost Festival, several people gathered at Tang Jing's house to burn paper for the deceased and have a reunion dinner.
Yuanyuan was a little confused, not knowing why his uncles and brothers had to pull him along when they kowtowed. Su Huaijing looked down at him for a long time and did not tell him the truth. Instead, he said half-truthfully, "The grace of raising a child is greater than heaven. Your brother Mumu has raised you for a year. He is your father."
Mu Jingxu was startled, and immediately frowned and gently scolded: "Nonsense."
Su Huaijing shrugged indifferently and turned around to see if the food was ready in the kitchen.
Rong Tang stood in the fireworks-filled courtyard for a while, then followed. Seeing Su Huaijing's slightly red eyes, he smiled softly and said, "I should have come later, you little crybaby."
Su Huaijing glanced at him unhappily: "No."
"Okay." Rong Tang coaxed in a low voice and stayed with him quietly for a long time until the villain completely calmed down.
Su Huaijing explained: "I don't want to recognize him."
"I know." Rong Tang nodded, "Brother also needs Yuanyuan."
He did not say that Mu Jingxu needed family more than Su Huaijing. Both of them had scattered family ties, and neither of them was more pitiful and fragile than the other.
It’s just that young children and teenagers always have different perceptions when facing the same thing at the same time.
Su Huaijing might have been ignorant at the time. He was too young to know the whole picture. However, Mu Jingxu was always smart and quick-witted. As betrayals and separations kept appearing before his eyes, the blow he suffered was, to some extent, much deeper than Su Huaijing.
but…
Rong Tang whispered, "Brother needs you too."
Su Huaijing lowered his head and did not say anything for a long time.
Rong Tang sighed silently in his heart, and waited until after dinner to return to his room, waiting for his little fool as usual, while Su Huaijing and the others were discussing matters in the study.
The system was slower than usual this time. Before Rong Tang could tell it to stop running back and forth, the ball of light had already reached his neck and shrank back without saying a word, like an autistic child who had suffered a huge blow and returned home in grievance.
Rong Tang was slightly stunned, but soon came up with a guess.
The full moon outside the window fell into the window frame, and the light balls cried out by the system were glowing faintly in the room.
Rong Tang raised his hand, took the system down and held it in his palm, slowly stroking its fur.
It was not until a long time had passed that the system spoke: "Tangtang..."
"Yes, I am."
"Sorry." said the system.
Rong Tang asked it with a smile: "Did you fail to find the exit, or did you fail to find the main brain after you went out?"
The system was silent for a long time, and then replied in a muffled voice: "It's empty outside..."
It was an endless darkness. There was no channel that could connect to the main brain space as it had imagined, nor was there any trace of any other system.
There is a flaw in the way of heaven, so it can break through the sky, but after getting out, it can't find anything. They are an independent world.
Rong Tang closed his eyes and whispered, "I guessed it."
The system was stunned and looked up at him blankly.
System: "The protagonist's eyeball?"
Rong Tang nodded: "It's funny, in the past six months, no matter whether Sheng Chengli was promoted or demoted, rewarded or punished, my pain never got any worse or better."
The system was stunned for a long time after hearing these words. After it reacted, it was in disbelief that Rong Tang's palm floated up and stopped in mid-air. The hairs all over his body were trembling with excitement: "You mean, you are untied from Sheng Chengli?!"
Rong Tang looked at its excited and expectant expression and was reluctant to give a negative answer. Instead, he smiled softly and said ambiguously: "Maybe, who knows?"
The system was not so easy to fool, and asked: "What do you mean by maybe?"
Rong Tang: "Let me give you an analogy. If you have a bottle in front of you, it is filled with water - or energy. They will not disappear or grow out of thin air, and you need to use this water to complete a project. The project is divided into many parts, and there is a container in front of each part. You need to pour water into it to make the corresponding part work properly."
System: "What does this have to do with Sheng Chengli?"
"If the main brain does not exist, then the way of heaven is not the way of heaven?" Rong Tang said softly.
The system was confused for a long time.
Rong Tang: "If the so-called mission was to deceive us from the beginning, then can we understand that these are all fake, and someone needs to spend a lot of energy to build a functioning and logically self-consistent world to deceive our eyes? And this kind of 'energy' is what I call water in the bottle."
"They are divided into many parts. Some are used to mobilize luck to the protagonist, some are used to maintain the existence of the system, and some are used as rewards for evolution... When the energy is insufficient, there will inevitably be sacrifices. One of the uses will be abandoned, and energy will be diverted to focus on other potentially more important things, so that the surface will still appear stable."
The system was silent for a long time. Rong Tang waited for a while and heard it say in frustration: "Tang Tang, I don't understand..."
Rong Tang laughed and smoothed its fur again: "It's okay, I'm here."
He said: "You don't need to understand so much. You just need to know that if the assumption is true, the day Sheng Chengli's eyeballs were dug out, the main brain paid a huge price to restore him - or replace his body, so it was unable to maintain the communication between you and me."
It may not be that he was unable to maintain it, but that he realized that if the two of them were together, they might soon be able to uncover the truth behind the scenes, so in an evasive choice, he squeezed the system out of Rongtang's consciousness space as soon as possible.
The system was still confused. After it came out of Rong Tang's head, it seemed to have become much dumber. A whole ball of light spread out in the palm of the host's hand, asking the question it cared about the most and was also the first question: "Since you have already untied Sheng Chengli, why don't you just kill him?"
A dark color flashed across the young man's eyes, and Rong Tang replied: "It's just my guess, maybe it's not untied."
"Besides..." He paused and asked the system softly, "What if my inference is wrong? What if Sheng Chengli is really the Son of Heaven, and the whole world depends on him?"
Even if there is only a one in ten thousand chance, he cannot take the risk.
The system was silent for a while, and then replied in a muffled voice, not sure whether it was confused or angry: "Maybe they are taking advantage of your mentality to gamble."
Rong Tang did not comment: "Then they made the right bet."
The system was sulking: "You really are the Holy Father! In a derogatory sense!"
Rong Tang smiled gently and repeated the original words they had argued about many years ago: "If it's not the Holy Father, who will save the world for you?"
The system froze for a moment, and after a long while, a muffled voice replied, "Not for me."
It's obvious that Tangtang herself is worried.
It stayed with Rong Tang for a very long time. Before the ball of light went out, Rong Tang whispered, "Don't fly around anymore. Stay by my side."
The system did not agree directly, but said: "I am not an adult yet."
Rong Tang was startled, and his calm and relaxed demeanor instantly disappeared. He was quiet for a second and replied, "Don't come to my room at night."
"Heh." The system said disdainfully, "Do you only sleep at night?"
Rong Tang fell into a long silence, and finally became angry and said: "Get lost."
System; "Tui! Who wants to see it?"
Just before he disappeared, Tongzi said, "I'll go see the world for you. I can fly very fast."
This was Rong Tang’s original dream, but it has not been realized yet.
He paused for a moment, nodded in agreement, and then dark clouds covered the moon and the light disappeared.
Rong Tang went out to the study and saw Mu Jingxu coming out. There were several books scattered on the floor, as if there had been a quarrel.
Another half month passed, at the beginning of August, an imperial decree came from the palace, ordering the Fifth Prince to reside in the Dali Temple permanently and assist the Dali Temple Minister in learning matters related to criminal litigation.
After hearing this, Rong Tang was stunned for a long time.
He looked up at the sky. Once autumn came in Beijing, winter would soon follow. There was already a chilly breeze in the air, as if a heavy snow would fall at any time.
Whether in the original novel or in his previous life, Sheng Chengli had never walked this path.
Rather than saying that he went to the Dali Temple to study criminal procedure, it would be more accurate to say that he went there specifically for a certain person.
Rong Tang felt a sense of panic for no reason.
(End of this chapter)