Disclaimer: This is edited MTL. Do forgive any grammar mistakes as they are my own and not the author’s. I may add some of my own words for clarity sake, but I will try not to change the meaning of the whole sentence. When the author uses 成语 / Cheng Yu, which is something like idiom-like phrases, I may just translate them in simple English if they are not very meaningful. Otherwise, I will add a translation note. An example would be ‘不三不四’, I would most likely translate it as ‘dubious’ depending on the context.

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The maid timidly nodded her head and saw the Crown Princess standing not far from them, the corners of his lips were slightly raised, this sent a chill into her heart.

She feels that the Crown Princess was purposely acting like this……

The distance between them was quite short, so Yan Ke would naturally be able to hear the words that Meng You was bellowing, based on his reaction, the Lord……probably really couldn’t ‘stand’.

If not, why else would he have such a TNT reaction every time when ‘consummation of the marriage’ was mentioned.

[T/N: Author used TNT in English, meaning explosive.]

Meng You had just been provoked by Yan Ke, only to be summoned to enter the palace when he had just stepped out of the house.

As he was walking in the palace, surrounded by the palace layers of walls, Meng You was pondering over the reason that his royal father would summon him into the palace.

Even though they were allied to Chu Kingdom with marriage, but everyone knew that Chu Kingdom was harbouring evil designs on their country. Even the bordering Ming Kingdom, which was originally their vassal country, became restless and began stirring up trouble at their borders since the alliance marriage.

Meng You bowed and gave his greetings: “Imperial Father.”

[T/N: The author used a generic word for greeting with the implications that he is following a certain etiquette, so it is not clear how Meng You greeted him. Even if they are a family, there is different etiquette that everyone must follow when greeting people of a higher status than them. As his father is the king and he is a crown prince, he must still greet him formally. In different dynasties, the etiquette will differ, I assumed that he bowed since that is one of the more common etiquette for a prince to a king. If a commoner/civilian greeted the King, he would probably need to kowtow to him. This is part of the culture of the people in the past, so the different forms of greetings between different people may come up quite frequently.]

The emperor helped Meng You to get up: “Do you know why this Emperor has asked you to come here?”

[T/N: Zhen means I/me but only the emperor can use this word so I translated it as this Emperor.]

Meng You: “I’ve guessed a few reasons.”

Emperor: “The Ming Country has rebelled.”

Meng You laughed: “This would have happened sooner or later; these group of clowns have been waiting for the opportunity to jump from our ship. They were probably also being egged on by Chu Country.”

“But it doesn’t matter, even if Chu Country has so many idle soldiers to lend to Ming Country, these borrowed soldiers are probably young and inexperienced, there’s nothing for us to be scared of.”

The emperor sighed: “I understand what you’re saying, but it is precisely because of Chu Country’s backing, that it is difficult to handle the situation. You’ve just married Chu Country’s Crown Prince, if you go against Chu Country, what would the other countries think?”

Meng You shook his head: “Why does Imperial Father consider Chu Country in this situation? We are only defending our country, attacking the rebelling vassal country, Ming Country. Chu Country is our ally, so they naturally won’t move against us.”

Meng You smiled with his eyes shining brightly.

He already said it before, even if Chu Country lent soldiers to Ming Country, this can only be a hidden transaction, since this was a hidden transaction, how would they be able to know it! All they knew was, Ming Country was rebelling, they were simply suppressing the rebellion and not going against Chu Country.

The emperor listened to Meng You’s words and laughed, he got down his throne and patted Meng You’s shoulder: “You’ve really grown up!”

“Even though going onto the battlefield so soon after your marriage is inauspicious, but only you can do it.”

The corner of Meng You’s lips curled into a smirk.

“Dare I ask Imperial Father, what else could be more morale-boosting for the troops than the Crown Prince going onto the battlefield so soon after marriage?”

The emperor also smiled, for a long time, he could already see Meng You’s talent in this aspect, he was well-versed in both literary and military arts, and he was also brave and strategic.

He was a great choice as a Crown Prince!

So early on, he had already established the position of Crown Prince as Meng You’s, on one hand, he wanted to use this position to motivate Meng You to work harder.

On the other hand, he could also let Meng You’s brothers know that, even if they killed each other to get this position, it will be useless. This country, after his death, will only be given to Meng You.

Emperor: “Summon Yan Ke, let’s have a meal together as a family.”

Meng You: “……He’s sick.”

Emperor: “How did he get sick again?”

Meng You: “His heart is loftier than the heavens, but his body is more brittle than paper.”

His body is so weak, yet all day he is still thinking about consummating the marriage? Isn’t he scared of dying beneath him?

Emperor slapped Meng You’s head with his palm: “Watch your words! He is still a Crown Prince after all, the Chu Kingdom is not dead yet!”

Meng You shrugged his shoulders: “I know, didn’t I serve him well with good food and drinks? He’s sick today, I need to go back and watch him. If there is nothing else that Imperial Father needs, I will head back first.”

“Set off to the battlefield in three days.”

Meng You nodded his head.

If it’s three days, that sickly person should be able to recover within that period.

Meng You returned to the manor and ordered some people to pack his things, while he secretly went to Yan Ke’s courtyard to find him.

[T/N: A courtyard looks similar to this, the left is like the inside while the right is like the outside. A manor could contain a few courtyards.]

Just as he was about to enter the courtyard, he almost bumped into the person coming out.

When their eyes met, the two of them stared blankly at each other.

Meng You thought in his head, in the morning, he had left angrily, yet he was now sneakily entering his courtyard, would Yan Ke misunderstand him?

 “……”

Yan Ke blinked his eyes, looked at the man who appeared in his courtyard, after looking over him from top to bottom for a while, he grinned: “Who are you looking for?”

Meng You: “………”

Oh right, when he took care of Yan Ke, Yan Ke had always been unconscious, it seems like the both had yet to formally get to know each other.

Meng You instantly sighed in relief, just as he prepared to speak, he suddenly thought, even though Yan Ke had yet to see him, he had heard his voice before.

Hence, after waving his hand to indicate that he went the wrong way, he hurriedly left.

Yan Ke looked at his back and clicked his tongue twice.

Yan Ke: “If this person existed in modern times, he could get the centre position, yet unexpectedly, he’s a mute.”

[T/N: In the original text, they used c-position, where the c is in English. It is referred to as a core/centre position or a position that is regarded as the best/most important. In this context, he means that he looks outstanding.]

Such a pity.

However, Yan Ke didn’t muse about this for long and went around everywhere to look for the Lord Crown Prince to create a chance meeting.

Every once in a while, a maid would come up to him and ask if he needed them to lead him to where he wants to go but they would always be tactfully rejected by him. Divorcing, in this time period, seems to be a shameful matter, so it would be better if there wasn’t people around when he mentioned it.

As he walked around, not only did he not find the prince, he had also successfully got himself into the Crown Prince Manor’s maze-like back garden.

Yan Ke lamented: “Bro, why would you build a maze inside your house?”

Seeing that it was getting late, Yan Ke started to get anxious, only heaven knew how many rounds he had walked as trees taller than him surrounded him and every road looked the same.

Yan Ke yelled: “Excuse me, which family’s Crown Princess has gone missing…please come to the Crown Prince Manor’s back garden to collect him.”

[T/N: He’s imitating those ‘lost kid’ announcements.]

The only answer he received was the sound of the summer breeze rustling the tree leaves.

Having been one-sidedly talking to himself and walking, Yan Ke got tired from walking too much and sat down to rest for a while.

“This is the first time I saw a back garden like a maze! Damn it, the further I walk, the more lost I feel!”

Yan Ke nodded his head, he feels the exact same way!

Yan Ke: “I agree! Isn’t he scared that one day he might not be able to find his way out?”

“Exactly!”

“The one below, catch this Lord!”

Yan Ke heard this and lifted his head. His eyes met with the person sitting on top of the tree.

The question of ‘who are you’ had yet to be asked when that person atop the tree prepared to jump down.

“Catch! If you don’t catch, this young Lord will get someone to throw you into a manure pit!” The young man on the tree jumped.

Yan Ke shifted to the side and saw the young man who had jumped down gradually change from a smiling face to one of fear and crashed into the ground.

Yan Ke controlled his laughter: “Young bro, you are still young, the more you fall, the taller you will grow. GeGe can’t do it, my bones are old, I probably can’t handle it if you crash into me, please——don’t be upset.”

[T/N: Yan Ke refers to himself as GeGe, in this context, it’s a casual way to call himself this elder bro /an older person of the same generation.]

“What audacity!” The young man held his knee as he stood up, angrily staring at Yan Ke, then he reached out to grab Yan Ke’s collar and dragged him to find the way out of the maze. As he was searching, he kept harping on: “This Young Lord must find the Capital’s smelliest pit to throw you into! No matter who pleads for you, it will be useless!!! Useless!”

Yan Ke: “………”

Bro, can you first find the way out before you say all this.

 “This Young Lord will definitely find a day to cut off every tree in the Crown Prince Manor!”

Yan Ke: “………”

“This Young Lord also wants to change the Crown Prince Manor’s servants! How dare they stop this Young Lord from entering!”

Yan Ke: “………”

“This Young Lord also wants to fight with Meng You! I must ruthlessly step on him with my feet, then let him personally throw Tang Qi that wretch into a pit!”

Yan Ke: “………?”

Cutting trees, changing servants, fighting, this little kid shouldn’t be an ordinary person, right?

“What are you looking at?! This Young Lord might just dig out your eyes!” This volatile person saw Yan Ke’s eyes resting on him for a long time and exploded.

Yan Ke: “Dare I ask this brother; which position are you in your family?”

[T/N: Position like 1^st = Eldest Child, Last = Youngest Child]

“What does this have to do with you?”

Yan Ke: “………”

He’s definitely younger than Meng You, if he calls Meng You ‘older brother’, then he should call him sister-in-law, right?

The volatile person dragged Yan Ke around to search for the way back, barging around and swearing at everything, while complaining about Meng You, he also ended up dragging himself in as well.

Yan Ke: “You can’t scold Meng You as a beast.”

The young man glared at Yan Ke: “This Young Lord wants to scold! So I will scold! You can go and complain to Meng You if you dare to!”

Yan Ke sweatdropped: “Aren’t——Aren’t the both of you brothers? If he’s a beast, then you——”

Young man: “I am also a beast! I am more beastly than a beast! I will let you see the might of a beast!”

Yan Ke: “………”

Why were these words so weird to hear?

 “Why don’t——the both of us split up to search? Who knows how long we’ll take if we searched like this? If I find the exit, I will bring you out, if you find the exit, you’ll bring me out, okay?”

Yan Ke looked at the sky getting darker, and didn’t want to dawdle, the temperature difference between day and night was huge, even though the temperature was like summer in the day, but once the night hits, it would become like early autumn, chilly and humid.

He doesn’t want to spend a long time here.

The young man looked at him hesitantly, and slowly loosened his grip: “If you find the exit and don’t tell this Young Lord, this Young Lord will torture you to death.”

Yan Ke nodded his head.

The two of them split up to different roads, logically speaking, the Crown Prince Manor back garden shouldn’t be so large that they can’t find the exit, but the both of them simply couldn’t find their way back.

Yan Ke took out a piece of cloth from his sleeves and tied it on to a tree. He did the same thing for the next few trees, every time he walked back to a tree with a cloth on it, he would switch to a different road to walk.

Using the process of elimination, he eliminated the roads that would not lead to the exit.

When Yan Ke finally walked out of the back garden, he sighed in relief.

Seeing a servant not far from this area, Yan Ke stopped him and pointed to the back garden behind him: “There is a prince inside who got lost, find someone to bring him out.”

“Is it the Seventh Prince?” The servant tone was normal, as if he was accustomed to it.

Yan Ke: “A roughly fourteen- or fifteen-year-old child.”

“Then it is the Seventh Prince. Crown Princess, why don’t you return to your room first, the night is quite humid.”

Yan Ke: “Alright.”

After Meng Han was brought out by the servants, his face was dark. While Meng You was not in the residence, he took the opportunity to get the Crown Prince Manor’s steward to call out all the manor’s servants for him to look at.

The steward looked at Meng Han, this little devil can only be controlled by the Crown Prince and so he secretly sent someone to find the Crown Prince.

Meng Han looked at the familiar faces in the Crown Prince Manor, why couldn’t he find the person who caused him to crash into the ground, impatiently he banged the table: “Hurry up and hand over that person! If you don’t, before Meng You returns, this Young Lord will throw the whole lot of you into a pit.”

Sweat started appearing on the steward’s head, he had spoken to the servant who brought Meng Han out and knew that it was the Crown Princess who got the little devil out, thinking about it, the seventh prince should be looking for the Crown Princess.

Steward: “Seventh Prince, who are you looking for? If you give us a description, we can help you find the person, what do you think?”

Meng Han nodded his head: “A male, extremely thin, he’s a new face in the Crown Prince Manor that this Young Lord had never seen before.”

Everyone: It’s undoubtedly the Crown Princess……

Steward: “Seventh Prince, the reason you are looking for him is to……”

Meng Han was expressionless: “Throw him into a manure pit.”

Everyone: ………

Everyone: !!!

　　———

Author has something to say:

Meng Han: This Young Lord wants to throw him into the Capital’s smelliest pit!!!!! No matter who pleads for him, it will be useless!

Meng You: Okay.

Meng Han: …………Whoever…Whoever pleads…it will…it will…Big brother! Please leave some face for me! (TAT)

Meng You: Please go ahead and throw.

Meng Han kneeling: I’m wrong……