Don’t Be a Kept Man

anyway.
He rose up and patted his sleeves, preparing to go home when someone suddenly called out behind him, 

“Ah! Is that Brother Chen?”

Chen Miao Ping paused in his footsteps when he heard the call.
He turned his head around in suspicion and found that the person who called him was dressed in brocade, red from the top to the bottom.
With a rounded face and tiny slithers for eyes.
In this wealthy looking man’s embrace was a lady with a beautiful face and the aura of a literary arts learner.
One glance and Chen Miao Ping could tell she was not an average tiered entertainment lady.

 

From his memories, this rounded face with dots for eyes was the Wu An Hou’s eldest son, Liu Zhen Hu, who was also this examination’s second ranking examinee4.
And it so happened that this man and the original host of this body were on bad terms, and Liu Zhen Hu always wanted to find ways to undermine him.
Who could have known that Chen Miao Ping would see him here today?

Chen Miao Ping looked like he just remembered who he was and then casually raised his hands in a loose clasp, 

“Oh, it was Brother Liu.
Pardon my manners, pardon my manners.”

Liu Zhen Hu however did not return the courtesy bow and walked towards him with the lady still in his arms.
He was limping as he did, evidence of an injury he attained from falling off a horse when he went to play outside the capital a few days ago. 

He laughed out loud, 

 

“Brother Chen, you sure have been met with double the fortune! First, you married into that Xie family to become Chang Guo Gong’s son-in-law, and then you obtained the rank of Flower Seeker.
It makes this Placard Eye5 really embarrassed by his incompetence.”

These words were spoken with many insinuations.
First to talk about him marrying into another family, and then on how he hit the jackpot in becoming the Flower Seeker.
It was no less than very blatantly telling everyone that Chen Miao Ping got to where he was through connections.
And to top it all off, Liu Zhen Hu even used his own ranking to press down on Chen Miao Ping’s ranking.

Not a quite friendly exchange here.

Liu Zhen Hu’s voice was quite loud and so quite a few people nearby could hear him.
And at this moment, the eyes on Chen Miao Ping were slowly turning into something a bit more aggressive.
The cheating scandal had just been pacified a mere few days ago, and there were no doubt a few scholars here today.
These words and their implication most definitely pushed Chen Miao Ping to the edge of the cliff, and no matter how he answered, it would be considered wrong.

Seeing that Chen Miao Ping was not saying anything, Liu Zhen Hu looked him up and down and put on a surprised face, 

“Huh? Did His Majesty appoint you to a ranked position? City Warden Inspector? Patrolling the streets? Puh ha ha ha ha ha! That’s brilliant! Brilliant!”

Qian Tong and the rest of the group was just recovering from the news that Chen Miao Ping was the son-in-law of Chang Guo Gong, and then suddenly hearing the ridicule in Liu Zhen Hu’s voice when he said “patrolling the streets” made them feel like they had been stabbed. 

They never had to hold in their temper as they were all recruited as soldiers, so they immediately slammed the tables and stood behind Chen Miao Ping, all angrily looking at Liu Zhen Hu.

Qian Tong excitedly whispered, 

“Da-ren, would you like xiao-ren and the rest to beat all these talkers and no-doers up to vent out your anger?”

Chen Miao Ping said, 

“Sure.
Do it.
Knock out his entire set of teeth down for me.”

“Hoh……”

Qian Tong laughed in embarrassment and scratched his head.
Too embarrassed to say anything else.

Chen Miao Ping laughed coldly, 

“I already knew you wouldn’t dare to.
Move aside.”

Then he looked at Liu Zhen Hu, smiling quite pleasantly, 

“Blessed by His Majesty’s trust in me, I was privately appointed to this position.
To protect the peace on the streets is this official’s fortune and luck.
My eyes were a bit blinded, and I didn’t even recognize Brother Liu at first glance, but a bright red brocade robe is definitely befitting of your elegant style.
One glance at you, and one could even think it was this year’s Primus, Jiang Hong Yuan.”

Implying two things in his words: the first, this position was bestowed personally by the Emperor, which means one cannot mock or ridicule the appointment; the second, Liu Zhen Hu, although merely the Placard eye, was being more eye-catching and attention-seeking than the Primus.
If someone saw him on the streets, they would think he was instead the one who ranked first.

Liu Zhen Hu could hear the meaning beneath his words, and a fake smile tugged at his mouth.
His brain was flying through all the possibilities he could use to make Chen Miao Ping look worse than he did now.

Chen Miao Ping however was not willing to converse with this idiot.
He knew that the more he dwelled here, the more unfavorable it would become for him.
All the eyes of those scholars that were here to fool around could rip him up into pieces and more if he continued to stay.
He quickly found an excuse to leave, 

“Oh, what a bad timing.
I suddenly remembered that something needs my attention at home.
We should get together next time to meet up and talk more.
Farewell.”

In a bit, he’s going to fucking get Qian Tong and the others to wait outside the entrance and cover Liu Zhen Hu with a sandbag and beat him until shit comes out of him!

“Ack, why are you leaving? It’s such a pity that you will miss the poetry and singing competition later on with the top two ladies of Chun Xiao House, Ying Feng and Xue Yi.”

Liu Zhen Hu let go of the girl in his embrace and went up to block Chen Miao Ping’s path.
He gave a long “Oh~” as if he just realized something, 

“Are you afraid of getting caught in here by that second son of the Xie family? Afraid that he will divorce and forsake you out of anger?”

All around him rose a mocking laughter.
Those poor scholars who had fallen out of the rankings patted their sleeves and one said coldly, 

“Afraid! Of course he is afraid.
Otherwise his position would not be safe!”

Chen Miao Ping was without a doubt the center of attention at this moment, but he was not flustered at all.
He shook his head and smiled, 

“Brother Liu, that is indeed correct and also incorrect.
I am wedded to the second son of Xie, only because my heart likes him and respects him.
So of course I would not find someone and stab him in the eye, stab him in the heart.
Since today is the first day of my job as the newly appointed official, I am only here to treat my fellow brothers for a meal and have some wine.
If it was not for Brother Liu calling out to me, I believe I would already be back home by now.”

Liu Zhen Hu snorted with ridicule, 

 

“A mouth that can only speak words that sound good.
Perhaps you came here to look at beauties, on the sly.
Even if you can’t taste their delicacy, looking is still good right?”

To exchange blows in a word battle with Chen Miao Ping, that is akin to holding a lantern to go to the toilet6, to dig your own grave.

“If Brother Liu ever has a day where you truly fall in love with someone, then in this world, except for the one you love, no matter how beautiful her skin may be, she can only be a passing cloud.”

 

 

Notes:

*1 Entertainment district: I struggled to translate it directly as red light district or like brothel house or prostitutes, as it’s not just that.
They can and mostly are associated with selling their bodies in sexual activity, but sometimes they are selling their bodies for time.
It’s kind of like… a life companion or life coach? Or escorts that only sell their time to a male, and don’t have sex, just for their companionship.

 

As referenced in Chun Xiao House where these kinds of activities are their livelihood, these girls are mainly known to converse with their clients, through playing the quqin, talking and discussing literary arts and stuff, with some physical closeness, dancing, or just drinking and eating, etc with a more “higher quality”, rather than strictly having the exchange of sex and money. 

*2 Yun-Niang: -Niang is a suffix for older females versus ‘-er’, which you may recall if used as a suffix is for younger children/youth/people

 

*3 Gong-zi: A way to address a man with high-ish ranking/someone that looks wealthy, or even a boy/younger man who comes into a shop, as to say dear customer, that kind of thing.

 

*4 As you may have read and gotten confused, I made a mistake at the end of chapter 42 where the maid of Xie Su Zhi (the consort/elder sister) actually says Liu Zhen Hu is the second ranking examinee, not the top ranking.
Apologies about that but for clarification and to be on the same page after this: Chen Miao Ping is third, Liu Zhen Hu is second and Jiang Hong Yuan is first!

 

*5 Placard Eye: examinee that ranked as second place after the imperial examinations

*6 This is a play on words with the tone of “death” and “poop”.
To go into the outhouse with a lantern is as if you’re going there to look at poop (implying otherwise why would you do that?) And to find “poop”/ “屎” is to find “death” “死” – they have almost the same inflection in tone (I was terrible at linguistics, so I can’t really explain this well, but at the basic level the phrase is using how similar they sound to say like you’re going to find your own death/dig your own grave)