Chapter 2 - Rebirth
Slender fingers paused at the line ‘Both emperor and empress were buried in the Zhao Mausoleum’. After a long while, Song Xiao sighed softly, closed the book and pressed the b.u.t.ton at the head of the bed.
With a loud ringing sound, a chubby nurse in a pink dress briskly walked in. “Are you ready to remove the needle?”
“Mn,” Song Xiao nodded, raising his hand which had been p.r.i.c.ked with the infusion tube. “I have to trouble you, jiejie.”
“Ai, why are you so polite for?” The delicate and fair youth, who used a clear and pleasant voice to call her jiejie, made her heart melt. The nurse smiled so hard her eyes couldn’t be seen.
In a quick and concise manner, she peeled off the tape, a hand pressing a cotton ball against the area while the other hand speedily took out the needle, then ordered the youth to press on the cotton ball himself.
Song Xiao pressed against the hand that just had the needle removed and nodded towards the nurse in grat.i.tude.
When his hand was no longer bleeding, he took the history book from the head of the bed to continue reading.
“This young master of the Song family is completely different from what the news had reported.” The chubby nurse had walked out with a smile on her face when she was pulled aside by another nurse. She jerked her chin towards the youth who was quietly reading in the room.
“Aiya, how could tabloids be believed? Last year, it was said that our hospital had transfused blood to a type-AB patient through infusing type-A blood through the left hand and type-B blood through the right hand,” the chubby nurse curled her lip and looked at the young man in the room, hands forming a heart shape.
“How could such an elegant young man get into a fight? He must have been bullied…”
When her colleague heard this, she couldn’t help shivering, rubbing the gooseb.u.mps on her arms. She went to another ward to take the patient’s temperature.
Waiting until the nurse left, Song Xiao rubbed his brow. He heard another word he couldn’t understand. What in the world was ‘tabloid’?
It had been several days since he woke up, and he was still bewildered about everything here. He had slit his throat, expecting to see the yellow springs when he opened his eyes. He had been prepared to go to Naihe Bridge to find Yu Jintang. But he didn’t expect that this ‘yellow spring road’ would be a white, four-walled room, with a white-robed man holding a soft rope with an iron sheet at the end, dangling it in front of his eyes.
“Is it okay to ask this brother, are you Bai Wuchang?” Song Xiao slowly sat up, greeting the man. He a.s.sumed that soft rope was the spirit rope.
k2018;Bai Wuchang’ was very surprised by his words. After a moment of shock, he stuck the iron piece from Gou Hun Suo against his chest, waited for a few seconds then took it away. He used two fingers to pull open his eyelids, then felt his head. “Does your head hurt?”
Now it’s Song Xiao’s turn to be taken aback. This man’s hand is warm. He can understand what the man said, even though there’s a strange accent. Moreover, these men had short hair while the women wore extremely queer clothes.
Could it be that he didn’t die, but instead came to a foreign land instead?
“This place is…” Song Xiao didn’t dare say more, afraid that these people would realise he spoke differently from them. Most foreigners were xenophobic.
“This is the Third People’s Hospital. You were in a coma for three days, do you feel any discomfort?” The man dressed in white questioned him gently.
Hospital? It seems that this white robed man was a physician.
“We heard that he woke up. We came to record his statement.” While the physician was speaking, two young men in blue short sleeves came in with a pen and paper. “Song Xiao, at that time, who was it that hit you?”
Song Xiao furrowed his brows slightly. What were these people talking about?
“The patient had just regained consciousness, couldn’t you guys come at a later date?” The physician was visibly upset, but it was obvious he was just chiding them, as he himself turned around and asked, “Before fainting, do you remember what had happened?”
Song Xiao shook his head. He used the Moye sword to slice his throat, so clearly he should be dead. The situation at hand was extremely unusual, so he couldn’t simply answer without careful consideration.
Much later, Song Xiao found out that these blue uniformed men were the police, which was the equivalent of bailiffs responsible for catching criminals within the government.
The physician and bailiffs rapidly interrogated him for a long period, only to discover an astonishing piece of information. Song Xiao had lost his memory. He couldn’t remember where his home was or who his parents were, much less remember who it was that had injured him. He could only remember that his own name was Song Xiao.
“You poor child!” Aunt Chen, who had been hired by the family to take care of him, held him and cried a river of tears.
Song Xiao had silently observed the surrounding people for a few days, entrusted Aunt Chen to buy some books for him to read and gradually came an unbelievable realisation. Great Yu had been extinct for nearly a thousand years, and now it was the twenty-first century!
Standing in front of the bathroom mirror, he stared blankly at the young man in the mirror. This was exactly what he had looked like at the age of sixteen or seventeen, except that his complexion was a little wan, far less than the high-spiritedness he had possessed as the champion of that year.
Now, he was also called Song Xiao, just turned sixteen this year. His mother died early, so he only has a single father.
“What is the family’s business?” Song Xiao guessed that he didn’t drink the Mengpo soup when he reincarnated, but for some reason he couldn’t recall his past sixteen years, so it was likely that Yu Jintang had reincarnated as well. Now, what he was more concerned over was his own origin.
If he was a n.o.ble, then he could partic.i.p.ate in the imperial examination, and when he becomes a senior official, he could search for the person he wished to see.
“Your father started an entertainment agency,” Aunt Chen took out the things she had just bought, giving him a peeled apple.
“What do entertainment agencies do?” Song Xiao frowned. It seemed that he was a businessman. Although a businessman’s status wasn’t that good, at least he could read books.
“Ah, they hire a group of good-looking youths to sing, dance and perform to earn money.” Aunt Chen said with a smile.
She had worked as a housekeeper in the Song family for many years and watched Song Xiao grow up. Before, this child had never liked speaking, and was always dull. Mr. Song said that this child had some form of autism, and his intelligence was not high, asking her to pay more attention.
This time, Song Xiao had been beaten in the head by someone and lost his memory, but he had become a lot more quick-witted and talkative. Maybe it was a good thing.
Song Xiao’s heart thumped. These days, from what Aunt Chen said, he a.s.sumed that the family was very well-off. Originally, he had thought that his family was at least the level of a squire, yet he completely did not expect that it was actually a theatrical troupe! Actors had very low rank within the society, if his father was also from an actor’s family, then it’s impossible for him to partic.i.p.ate in the imperial examination!
Song Xiao sighed sadly and opened up the book that had just been bought by Aunt Chen. The words in these books were very odd, with very few strokes, like wild scribbles. Fortunately, most of them could be understood.
“Song Xiao!” A clear voice came through from outside the door. Song Xiao turned his head and saw a youth about his age, sticking out a colorful head. Seeing that there was no one around, he proceeded to rush inside and shut the door, taking off the sungla.s.ses on his face.
“This distinguished sir is…” Song Xiao had read thousands of books since his childhood. He had a highly retentive memory, and within these few days he had already learned the dialect of the people of modern times, but the use of words were slightly unsuitable.
“It’s me, David! You don’t even remember me?” The colorful youth circled around him in shock, then sighed. “You really lost your memory? This sort of melodramatic plot, when your father told me, I couldn’t believe it!”
The youth named David circled around him again in sympathy, and began to unceasingly babble about himself. His name was Li Weiwei, his stage name was David, a contracted actor for Song Xiao’s family’s entertainment company. He started acting at the age of eight, a bona fide child star.
Because Song Xiao had an antisocial temperament and had no friends, Song Xiao’s father had asked the only child in the company to frequently accompany him at home. After a long time, David became Song Xiao’s only friend. Of course, this was what Li Weiwei himself said, so the authenticity remains to be discussed.
Song Xiao quietly watched this young man talk with enthusiasm. Even though he was dressed like a beggar and had strange, colorful hair, this person had a pair of clear, big eyes. After mixing within the official circle for so many years, he still had the ability to understand a person. Song Xiao could sense this youth’s friendliness. Even if he was a little long-winded, Song Xiao could also ask some questions without his notice.
“Today you’re going to be discharged from the hospital, yet your father is too busy joining the new movie’s premiere, telling me to pick you up in his place,” Li Weiwei rolled his eyes. “For an old woman, he doesn’t even care for his own son. If he wasn’t my boss, I would have scolded him in front of the press.”
“Like I said, even if we disregard the fact that he didn’t come visit in these few days, he didn’t even bother coming to have a look during your discharge.” Aunt Chen complained while she packed.
Song Xiao wrinkled his brow. Listening to this, it seemed that this life’s father was a man who indulged in the beauty of a woman. He had read about movies in a book, it was a play performed by actors.
That was to say, his father had raised an actress as a mistress, and to support his mistress’ movie, he disregarded his heavily injured son.
“Sons do not speak badly of their father. Should father not come, he must have his reasons.” Song Xiao finished changing his clothes in the washroom and stepped out. Seeing that the two of them had continued criticising his father, he let out a sentence to stop them.
Song Zicheng, who had unhurriedly arrived after the end of the premiere, just happened to hear that sentence. He immediately stopped at the door, stunned.
The author has something to say:
Small theatre:
Fish Tang: Empress, are you living well now?
Song Xiao: Not well, my father is an actor from a theatrical troupe QAQ
David: Hey, that’s an entertainment company!
Fish Tang: Don’t worry, zhen won’t turn his back against you for your origins!
David: You fish seller, turn your back against what!
Song Xiao: Thank Your Majesty for your grace!
David: _(:з」∠)_
Ahem, don’t trust the small theatre, little gong is not a fish seller 23333