During the morning audience, the various ministers were still busy arguing about the matters in Yi Zhou.

Luo Wei stood beside Emperor Xing Wu, watching the noisy court dispassionately. The common people all thought that this was some elevated place that they couldn’t hope to reach, but in truth, it was no different than a marketplace. Luo Wei glanced at Emperor Xing Wu’s features, frozen over with ice, and he wondered who would consider being the head of a country a cushy job?

Emperor Xing Wu said “We shall reconvene”, and ended this combative morning audience.

As always, Luo Wei followed Emperor Xing Wu back to the Hall of Eternal Light, but just before they made it inside, the two of them ran into the fifth prince, Long Xiang.

“Your humble son kneels in front of the imperial father, long live your imperial majesty.” Long Xiang got on his knees and paid his respects to Emperor Xing Wu.

“You may rise,” Emperor Xing Wu responded, coldly.

Long Xiang got up, his eyes meeting with Luo Wei’s from behind the emperor, both smiling at one another. Long Xiang was the same age as Luo Wei. Even though the fifth prince was Consort Liu’s son, but he’d been childhood playmates with Luo Wei. This prince had been in line to control the military, and had just come back to the capital after a visit to Nan Zhao with Grand Prince Xin, Long Yi(1).

“Your humble servant greets your imperial highness,” Luo Wei made a salute to Long Xiang.

“Xiao Wei,” Long Xiang stared at Luo Wei up and down, grinning, “I heard that you’d changed completely after being sick, but I didn’t think it would be this much.”

Luo Wei smiled back, “I just got thinner, I’m still Luo Wei on the inside.”

Luo Wei and Long Xiang had always been friendly with one another. In the past life, after Long Xuan ascended the throne, his only brother from the same mother had been sent to Yun Guan to become Commander in Chief. Long Xiang had become, after the death of Luo Qi, another great asset to Yun Guan, and was gifted the title of Grand Prince Yu. It was because of this development that Grand Prince Yu, Long Xiang, was not able to protect Luo Wei’s family from being torn apart. All he could do at the time was send missive after missive to Emperor Ping Chang, asking him to send Luo Wei to Yun Guan as a bond-servant. But all of these missives were just a drop in the ocean to Long Xuan, and Long Xiang had never been able to make it back to the capital to properly plead for Luo Wei. If there was a single person in the imperial family that Luo Wei did not have some hatred for, it would be Long Xiang.

“The two of you may go chat amongst yourselves,” Emperor Xing Wu knew that the two of them were friends. If he were within earshot, the two of them wouldn’t dare say anything too close to one another. So the emperor did them a favor and allowed Luo Wei to take a break instead. With Grand Prince Xin, who’d just arrived at the Hall of Eternal Light, Emperor Xing Wu left the two of them so that the adults could chat about the goings-on in the Kingdom of Nan Zhao.

Luo Wei had wanted to talk to Long Xiang alone, considering the fact that from his point of view, he hadn’t seen Long Xiang for years and years. But Luo Wei didn’t expect Long Xiang to drag him all the way to Long Xuan’s Hall of Literary Transcendence(2).

“Big brother,” Long Xiang called out for Long Xuan as soon as he entered, “Look who I brought over!”

Long Xuan was writing at his desk with his head down, but he lifted his eyes to see Luo Wei standing with his brother, and wasn’t able to look away.

“Your humble servant greets your imperial highness,” Luo Wei quickly paid his respects to Long Xuan.

“Eh?” Long Xiang thought it was funny, “Xiao Wei, I didn’t know you could be so formal with my big brother!”

Luo Wei replied, “It was because your humble servant was not conscientious in the past.”

Long Xuan turned his gaze to Long Xiang, “When did you get back?”

Long Xiang answered, “Just now. I went to pay respects to our imperial father, and came here straight after.”

Long Xuan chided him, “Where are your manners? Why aren’t you going to pay respects to our consort mother?”

“I wanted to go with you,” Long Xiang answered casually. The fifth prince’s eyes fell on something on Long Xuan’s desk, a little knick-knack of some sort, “Big brother, what’s this?” He pointed at the little model ship.

Luo Wei startled at the sight of that wooden model ship. It was something he’d made last year for Long Xuan’s birthday, he didn’t expect that Long Xuan actually kept it, and even put it out on display.

Long Xuan was staring at Luo Wei again.

FOOTNOTES:

1. Grand Prince Xin – The character for Xin is “trust”. Grand Prince is a title, not to be mistaken with the princes who are sons of the emperor. The title of Grand Prince is often gifted to the brothers / cousins of the emperor. In Chinese, the title is similar to “king”, but this translation will use Grand Prince as to not confuse with the titles of “king” which will be used later on.

2. Hall of Literary Transcendence – The original Chinese for this hall name is “qing wen”. “Qing” literally translates to leaning, bending, or inclining. “Wen” means words, script, language. However, there are other word groups that use “qing”, as in “qing guo”, which means to overcome a country via one’s beauty / ability, etc, or “qing shi” which means the best in the world. This translation will use The Hall of Literary Transcendence in order to give a little nod to the original context of the individual characters.

TRANSLATOR’S NOTES:

Hope you guys didn’t forget Long Xiang!! He’s a good kid. Just a reminder of some of the characters (maybe I should set up a character page). Long Xiang will later be named Grand Prince of Yu, which is a title, which is different from Long Yu, who is the crown prince at the moment. It’s kind of confusing in English but again, in Chinese, the characters are pretty different and easier to tell apart 😉