CROWN PRINCE'S CONCUBINE

“Look at the sun, it’s so beautiful, it’s orange!” Lan’er exclaimed, she pulled Fan’er’s hand and walked quickly to see the orange sun covered by clouds.

“Lan’er don’t pull me, what if I fall down?”

“Akh sister Fan’er won’t so easy to fall, let’s see up ahead, the sky is so pretty”

And the orange sun starts the afternoon which getting colder, look how fast time they had spent almost all day in the Jade Pavilion familiarizing themselves with the Queen, who had recently become very bored due to her busy schedule.

The sky was almost dark when BaiYing arrived at his pavilion, he and ChenMing who was in the pavilion not far beside him walked together, so BaiYing invited ChenMing to his living room to help the young man check on his wound.

“Does it still hurt?” BaiYing asked as he slowly removed the bandage that was wrapped around ChenMing’s palm, the young man stuttered, he didn’t expect the concubine to invite him to treat his wound, BaiYing’s eyes widened when all the bandages had been successfully removed,

“Look at this, this is great, you’re recovering quickly, Young Master Chen” the wound almost completely dried up.

ChenMing was about to withdraw his hand but BaiYing held it.

.....

“Wow, it turns out that young master Chen has the ability to heal so fast, this is all dry, it will just take a moment to peel and your skin will return to normal, this is great”

ChenMing stuttered, BaiYing’s face when he said it was so cheerful and looked at him with a big smile that all his eyes disappeared with him, he was taken aback, as if it was the first time someone had seen him in that way.

“Eh that..”

BaiYing let go of his grip, letting ChenMing see his palm.

“Young master Chen, it must be very difficult huh? Walking alone from a very far place, and nobody to accompany you, heh, I thought, in this world, Ying’er is the saddest because no family left, but, Ying ‘er was wrong, there are still many people whose lives are much more miserable, sorry, it doesn’t mean young master Chen’s life is like that, just, thinking, if Ying’er, was actually lucky enough to get to know the Crown Prince and all the very benevolent people in the palace, so, hehe, Ying’er won’t ask for much more.”

ChenMing was speechless, he raised his head to see BaiYing’s face still smiling warmly at him, the young man patted his hands.

“Well, young master just stay here a little longer, don’t worry about His Highness the Crown Prince, he actually has a very kind heart, just sometimes can’t show it, young master Chen don’t worry about that”

.....

“YingYing!” LuoXiang shouted as he entered the room, can’t wait to approach BaiYing who was sitting in front of his round table, that night the young man was still busy with his watercolor paintings scattered on the round table.

“Em, what is YingYing doing?”

BaiYing looked up, he tied all of his front hair together on top so as not to block his view while painting, just looking at the boy’s face LuoXiang was already very excited, he’s so cute.

“Ich this kid”

The Crown Prince caressed BaiYing’s cheek, seeing the young man who was enjoying his activities very leisurely.

“I am painting Your Majesty.”

The Crown Prince frowned looking at some papers scattered on the table with strangely shaped paintings, LuoXiang took one of them.

“Oh really? Paint what?” LuoXiang asked.

“Your Majesty guess it,” asked Bai Ying.

Paintings of the same shape, slightly round, with a slight shape on top resembling ears, then two round eyes, mouth, or beak, not clear, LuoXiang tilted his head.

“Erm, this is, maybe, um, a rabbit?” LuoXiang cautiously replied, not wanting to spoil BaiYing’s mood who had drawn so many similar shapes, and, frankly, still didn’t know what it is.

BaiYing stopped his hand movement, bad, LuoXiang thought, did he guess it wrong? The boy raised his head, then took the paper in the Crown Prince’s hand.

“Em, does it look like a rabbit, huh?” he pursed his lips, thinking hard,

“If not rabbits, then what?” LuoXiang asked carefully.

BaiYing looked at the Crown Prince, thrusting another painting paper back into the young man’s hand.

“Try this one, Your Majesty must be able to guess it right”

The Crown Prince thought hard, he had never thought so hard lately, but the question from the young man in front of him was very important, he couldn’t just answer randomly, he looked closely at the painted paper that was now in his hands, there are two, round, with a little part of the ears sticking out, big eyes, maybe the bottom part is the beak, it resembles an ostrich.

“Is this an ostrich?”

BaiYing lowered the brush in his hand, finally looking at the Crown Prince with furrowed brows in annoyance, snatched the paper from the Crown Prince’s hand.

“Your Majesty must be joking, these are clearly pictures of XiaoQe and XiaoMei, why doesn’t Your Majesty recognize them? Look, the head is round, round big eyes, slightly pointed ears and mouth, it’s so obvious.”

The Crown Prince thought again, who are XiaoQe and XiaoMei?

“Uh, who are they?”

The Crown Prince’s question made BaiYing even more annoyed.

“Your Majesty, that, the two alpacas that Your Majesty brought from DuAn, their names are XiaoQe and XiaoMei”

LuoXiang tried to remember, he indeed had not seen the two animals since BeiYau’s men brought him from DuAn, but, as he recalled they were not like this, LuoXiang He tried to hold back his laughter, but in the end, he couldn’t, he burst out laughing at the thought of BaiYing’s very cute painting.

“Hahahaha yeah that’s them”

BaiYing puffed out his mouth in annoyance, the Crown Prince was clearly laughing at him.

“Your Majesty”

And LuoXiang’s laughter was truly unstoppable, cute, and amused in one, how could he not laugh.

“Hahahaha they’re so cute YingYing, YingYing’s paintings are really similar”

BaiYing grumbled.

“What’s the resemblance, that you don’t recognize them, Your Majesty is making fun of me, huh? This person is so annoying”

“Hahahaha”

......

The next morning in the Peony field, BaiYing was seen standing in the middle of the field practicing with aYa who seemed to be teaching him how to properly hold the hilt of a sword.

“Wow, this is very heavy, do you really use a sword this heavy to beat the enemy?” BaiYing exclaimed as aYa lent her white sword for BaiYing to use.

AYa nodded, she fixed BaiYing’s grip on the hilt of the sword.

“Yes, what else? Hold the grip like this, two thumbs up, if you hold it with one hand, your thumb must be facing straight towards the handle, it’s flexible to moves”

BaiYing let AYa stand behind him to help him hold the sword, this is a bit ridiculous, the young man thought, he just asked how can he use his sword to fight, not that he wants to use it, how can he use it? it’s so heavy.

While in front of the pavilion, looking at the shady front porch where the table and chairs to rest after tired of practicing were located, ChenMing who had been sitting on his chair raised his teacup, since his hands were still sore he could have an excuse for not attending the morning sporting event, as BaiYing said to ease the boredom, the young man glanced left and right, before putting the cup back on the saucer and reaching out from under the folds of his waist, a dark black pill, which when no one was looking he dropped the pill into BaiYing’s teacup, which was right beside him, in an instant, the small round pill melted with water, it was pitch black, ChenMing’s eyes were wide open if it was black how could people not know if the tea had been mixed with something, but, slowly, deep black color in the water disappeared, without a trace, as nothing had happened in the tea water that turned back to its original color.

ChenMing was so focused on looking at the tea that he didn’t notice someone was standing in front of him.

“Ahem!”

Surprised, ChenMing almost jumped in surprise when he saw that person already in front of him, looking at him with his big round eyes.

“Eh C-concubine Fu”

FuLan glanced at ChenMing, then glanced at the opened teacup that the young man was staring at.

“What do you see? It’s something weird with the tea?” FuLan lifted the teacup and looked at it, put her nose close to smell it, it made ChenMing a bit nervous because that person might find strangeness in the tea they drink every day.

“Em, nothing strange, why did you look at it like that?” The curious FuLan was about to take a sip of the tea but ChenMing’s hand stopped him quickly.

“Eh s-concubine Fu, sorry but this is Concubine Hua’s, yours is over there”

The youth immediately grabbed the teacup and put it back in its place, Lan’er frowned.

“So what? Ying’er hasn’t drink it either, it’s the same, isn’t it, it’s weird” without much argument Lan’er headed to her seat, kept looking at ChenMing with a strange look, she felt that the young man was hiding something from her, don’t know what made that person look suspicious, but, it was probably just in her mind.

“Weird”

While in the middle of the field,

BaiYing had difficulty lifting the sword which was quite heavy, for him it was quite heavy, so following AYa’s instructions to lift it and rotate it in front of his body to just show the correct position, AYa backed away while BaiYing lifted the sword above his head and spinning forward,

Shett!

Whoosh.

The wind was blowing quite hard, but nothing happened, because BaiYing just carelessly pointed it at the trees in front of them.

“Wow, this is a good sword aYa” BaiYing’s eyes widened, of course, it’s a good sword, thought aYa, the weapon is made with first-class materials from Kili which is known as the best weapon producer so far, even the hilt is made of a mixture of sky stone and fused with primeval animal bones, high quality materials that were only given to the royal family if it weren’t for aYa so fond of BaiYing he wouldn’t have let just anyone hold her beloved sword.

“Ying’er, don’t stay there too long, come over here, big sister has brought food from the pavilion!” Lan’er exclaimed.

Hearing the word of food, BaiYing immediately returned AYa’s beloved sword to her.

“AYa, take this, we will practice another time.”

AYa still stuttered because suddenly the young man ended his training, she was about to turn around to follow BaiYing who was rushing towards the pavilion when she heard the sound of cracking at trees and branches not far in front of her.

“Kretek kretek krekkk” until several branches and tall trees suddenly fell as if they were cut in half in the middle.

Brukk,

AYa’s eyes are wide open, those trees, Ying’er just pointed his sword towards there, what, it’s just a coincidence that the trees are old and can fall by themselves, aYa glanced at the sword already in her hand, this is indeed very strange.

.....

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