Chapter 99 - Slippers
Yu Tang got out of the car and kicked Zhang Xiaoren aside, then opened the door to grab Song Xiao and carry him over his shoulder once more.
“Put me down, quick; the empress dowager will see us in a moment, wu…” Song Xiao flailed his legs, but when Yu Tang smacked his b.u.t.t, he promptly fell silent.
The women at home needed their beauty sleep, and hadn’t gotten up yet at this time. Only Emperor Hongyuan, who was diligent in both lifetimes, had gotten up early to practise his skills in the garden, and he ran right into his elder brother.
“Good morning, imperial brother!” Little Yu Lin was going downstairs, and immediately stood upright in greeting when he saw his brother.
Yu Tang raised his chin and continued up the stairs. Hanging over his shoulder, Song Xiao raised a hand to wave at Yu Lin.
“Saozi…” Yu Lin looked at the two of them in resignation and gave Song Xiao a sympathetic but helpless look. Shaking his head, he clasped his hands behind his back and walked downstairs. The little fellow’s gait was steady; just from looking at his back, one could see that he was still the emperor who cherished his country, taking the stairs step by step to the throne. But his legs were too short, and he tripped on the final step and was caught by the white-gloved Cao Gonggong.
“Be careful, Your Highness.” Cao Gonggong picked Yu Lin up with a smile.
“Put me down.” Yu Lin twisted his body. How embarra.s.sing would it be if saozi saw this?!
“The marble up front has just been polished, and it’s a little slippery.” Cao Gonggong carried him with a beaming smile and zero intentions of putting him down as he strode towards the garden. “In our last life, when Your Highness was small, laonu often carried you too.”
The two voices gradually drew further away. His head raised, Song Xiao was still looking at them when the door was shut before his eyes. His world flipped once again as he was tossed onto the wide, sea-blue bed. After that, a slender and strong body threw itself at him.
“Wu, what are you doing…” The breath was knocked out of Song Xiao as he was pressed down, and he tried to push Yu Tang away.
Yu Tang propped himself up. He loosened his tie and moved his neck, then undid his cuffs. “Eating breakfast.”
“You can’t eat breakfast in bed… wu…”
“Who says you can’t…”
By the time ‘breakfast’ was done, Mother Yu had already gotten out of bed. Since Yu Tang hadn’t slept the whole night, he held Song Xiao and took a nap. Song Xiao slept for a while, then woke up. He stared at the ceiling as his stomach growled.
The emperor was very satisfied after he had this breakfast, while Song Xiao got even hungrier. However, he felt limp and hurt all over, and didn’t feel like getting up to find something to eat, so he nestled in Yu Tang’s embrace and endured it.
After Yu Lin was done with his training, he took a shower and ate breakfast with his mother and sister. He glanced upstairs, then looked at Butler Cao, who was smiling lightly as he served the dishes.
“Butler…” After some thought, Yu Lin still spoke up.
“Yes.” A white napkin draped over his arm, Butler Cao bowed his head with a smile and asked what instructions the young master had.
“Bring some breakfast up to my older brother; have him eat something before going back to sleep.” It was clearly a very normal sentence, yet Yu Lin’s pair of jutting ears were slowly turning red.
Butler Cao exchanged understanding looks with him, then nodded. The two of them knew that the emperor was healthy and would be fine without a meal, but the empress needed to eat.
“Tangtang’s back?” Mother Yu raised her head in surprise. On the side, Yu Miao looked up, too.
“Oh, he came back in the morning and looked like he hadn’t slept all night.” Yu Lin lowered his head to eat a spoonful of rice, then paused before adding, “He came back with that good friend of his.”
“Is it Xiaoxiao?” Mother Yu instantly guessed who it was. Back when the Yu family met with a mishap, Song Xiao had come to visit a few times. He wasn’t like those young masters of other families who only spoke with empty politeness. She could see that Song Xiao was genuinely concerned for Yu Tang.
Hearing that the two of them hadn’t eaten before going to bed, Mother Yu hurriedly had Butler Cao bring them some food.
Yu Lin silently looked at his mother rushing about and shook his head slightly, before he lowered it with a mature air and continued eating.
Yu Miao stared at her little brother’s glowing ears and couldn’t help reaching out to tug at one. “What are you shaking your head at?” Her little brother was clearly so young, yet seemed like a little old man.
“…The fishb.a.l.l.s burned my tongue.” Yu Lin pointed at the bowl of soup filled with fishb.a.l.l.s in front of him.
When Mother Yu turned around, she saw Yu Miao and Yu Lin both shaking their heads and blowing ‘hah hah’ with a fishball in each of their mouths. She immediately raised her hands and smacked them both over their heads. “Where are your table manners, shaking your heads like that?!”
Cao Gonggong knocked on the door and entered. Placing the breakfast next to the bed, he pa.s.sed Song Xiao a warm towel.
Song Xiao propped himself up, put on his pajamas, and picked up a pastry to eat as he leaned back against a thick pillow. He really was hungry. He hadn’t eaten anything in the morning to begin with, and furthermore was forced to exercise so vigorously.
“Wu…” Registering his empty embrace, Yu Tang scooted over with a grumble to hug Song Xiao’s waist and carry on sleeping.
“Your Majesty, get up and eat something before you sleep ba.” Song Xiao rubbed the side of his face.
Yu Tang opened his eyes and gave Cao Gonggong a look. The butler tactfully and promptly took his leave, and considerately closed the door behind him.
“In the future, don’t call me Your Majesty anymore.” Yu Tang sat up and leaned against Song Xiao. Pulling over Song Xiao’s hand, which was holding a sandwich, he took a bite out of the same spot.
“Then what should I call you?” Song Xiao lowered his head and looked at the triangle sandwich, more than half of which had disappeared from that bite.
Yu Tang glanced at him, then burrowed into the blankets to continue sleeping. His meaning was very clear: Song Xiao had to figure it out himself.
Song Xiao blinked and finished off the remaining sandwich, then wiped his mouth with the towel. He wiped the emperor’s mouth as well in pa.s.sing, then leaned against the headboard and started playing with his phone.
The popular trend in the local entertainment circle recently was to film historical shows that were wildly fictional. The strange thing, however, was that even as people cursed it, they still watched it because there really wasn’t anything else to watch.
Scrolling through the entertainment news, it was basically all just ripping these shocking shows to shreds.
The entertainment industry was about sensationalism to begin with. It didn’t matter whether it was praise or curses; as long as the show was popular, it would earn money. No wonder some people would just do a sloppy job of it. In addition, some stations had begun to film reality shows, the ratings for which were also particularly good.
Business was business; since Song Xiao had decided to do it, he should do it well.
Yu Tang waited for a long while, but still didn’t receive Song Xiao’s reply. He was immediately unhappy, and reached out to rub the exposed part of his back.
“En…” The hollow of Song Xiao’s back promptly turned soft, and he turned to look at Yu Tang. This person still had his eyes closed, as if it wasn’t his hand that had reached out just now. Song Xiao couldn’t help laughing.
They acted sweet in bed for a long while, and only finally made their leisurely way downstairs close to lunch time. Song Xiao’s hair was a fluffy mess from being under the quilt, and stuck out in all directions. Yu Tang didn’t say anything about it either, and just looked on as Song Xiao went downstairs.
“Xiaoxiao ah, hurry up and come here.” Seeing Song Xiao, Mother Yu couldn’t help letting out a ‘pfft’ of laughter and promptly waved him over. When Song Xiao sat down, she took the small comb Butler Cao gave her and tidied up his messy hair.
Song Xiao blinked as it finally dawned on him what was going on. A little embarra.s.sed, he hastily thanked Mother Yu. He was feeling relaxed after fooling around with the emperor, and actually forgot his manners for a bit, which he really shouldn’t have.
Yu Tang looked at him from where he was sitting on the side, and silently drank his tea.
“Tangtang also didn’t tell me that he came back.” Mother Yu glared at her eldest son, then turned to smile at Song Xiao. “Were you with him yesterday, Xiaoxiao?”
The sentence made Song Xiao’s heart skip a beat, though his expression didn’t change. He slowly put down the teacup and looked at Mother Yu with curved eyes. “No. I’ve been in A City these days, and Tangtang hurriedly flew back this morning. I saw that he was especially tired, so I sent him back here. I also slept rather late last night…”
A lie couldn’t be told outright; it had to be a mix of truth and lies for it to be credible. In any case, most of this explanation was true.
When Mother Yu heard this, she promptly smiled. On the side, when Yu Tang heard Song Xiao say that word again, he was so happy that his toes, hidden in his woolen slippers, curled up.
Her eldest son shaking his leg made Mother Yu recall something, and she called for a maid to bring over a pair of woolen slippers.
The woolen slippers were something Mother Yu had ordered for the entire family, and the ones for winter were all fluffy. Yu Tang’s slippers were dark blue, Yu Lin’s were light green, Yu Miao’s were pink, her own were light yellow, and a pair of black ones… were left for Father Yu.
Song Xiao had heard Cao Gonggong mention it upstairs earlier, and when he heard Mother Yu call for a pair of woolen slippers to be brought over, he a.s.sumed that she was asking for the black ones, and he hastily stopped her. “Auntie, this is very good. You don’t have to…”
Before he could finish, the maid had already brought over a pair of light blue woolen slippers.
“Try and see if they fit; I ordered a pair for you.” Mother Yu beamed at him.
At this moment, not only Song Xiao, but even Yu Tang was a little astonished. These slippers were from a luxury brand and were custom made. She must have ordered them with the rest of the slippers back then, but why had Mother Yu bought this for Song Xiao?
“Hurry up, try them on. I saw that you could fit Yu Tang’s slippers, so your sizes are probably about the same.” Mother Yu pa.s.sed the slippers to him, urging him to put them on.
Song Xiao swallowed and slipped his feet into the fluffy, light blue slippers. As he sat side by side with Yu Tang, the two pairs in an identical design together looked very interesting.
“Looks nice!” Princess Yu Miao immediately praised, and she ran over pitter-patter in her own pink slippers.
Yu Lin sat in an armchair alone, his two feet dangling in the air and too short to reach the ground. As he watched this scene, his slippers came loose after a while and fell to the floor with a clatter.
Little Theater
‘Ancient Song·The Emperor’s Recital’
Grandfather: Immediately go fight a war, until the whole of China is at peace
Fish Fu: The Xiongnu are attacking the sides, distressed about internal trouble and outside aggression
Fish Tang: Resist foreign aggression and pacify the country, beginning a golden age for the country
Didi: Reborn as a new incarnation, still have to sort out the mess
Narrator (Didi): Ai, Empress Dowager, listen to a word of advice…
Baobao Notes
Uhhh about the little theater, I’m guessing that it’s based on a song which makes it funny, but I sure don’t know where it’s from… My bad.