Chapter 105.2
She said in a soft voice, "Then mother will make you a new one."
To tell the truth, she hadn"t made clothes for Gu Jinyu for a long time.
The main reason was that the clothes she made couldn’t keep up with the trend of the capital. Gu Jinyu thought it was too old-fashioned and didn’t like to wear them.
Gu Jinyu affectionately took Yao shi"s arm and said, "As long as it is made by Mom, Jinyu will wear it every day!"
Gu Jinyu stayed in Yao shi"s courtyard for dinner. Marquis Gu also came over.
He only recovered today after he was badly beaten last time. He didn"t have the guts to say that he was beaten up by a little girl and had to slander Huang Zhong for drunk driving, which caused the carriage to have an accident.
After dinner, Gu Jinyu asked a servant girl to carry a big chest over.
Yao shi asked, "What is this?"
Gu Jinyu said gently, "The gifts I chose for my sister. I don’t know what my sister likes, so I prepared these instead."
Yao shi told the servant girl to put away the food, open the box, and put the contents on the table one by one, including jewelry, antique calligraphy and painting, and embroidery works.... One could see that each and every one of them was very out of the ordinary.
But the most eye-catching thing was the guqin.
When Yao shi opened the case and saw the five-string guqin that exuded a quaint atmosphere inside, she gasped momentarily, "Jinyu, this is..."
Gu Jinyu nodded with a smile, saying, "That’s right, it’s the Yue Ying f.u.xi guqin."
This was no ordinary guqin. It was a gift from His Majesty and was the only one throughout the entire State of Zhao.
The real f.u.xi guqin antique was lost in the former dynasty. This one was made by Yue Ying, the number one guqin player of the State of Chen. It was the most successful imitation of f.u.xi guqin so far, so it was also called Yue Ying f.u.xi guqin.
Gu Jinyu once played this guqin in Imperial Concubine Shu’s palace, and was heard by His Majesty, who praised her for her superb guqin skills, second only to the future Third Prince"s Consort then.
The future Third Prince"s Consort was known to be the most talented woman in the State of Zhao. She had studied the guqin for seventeen years and was older than Gu Jinyu.
His Majesty felt that Gu Jinyu"s talent was rare, and gave Gu Jinyu the Yue Ying f.u.xi guqin.
Yao shi thought it was inappropriate and said, "How can you give away such a valuable thing?"
Gu Jinyu smiled sweetly and replied, "It doesn"t matter. His Majesty said that since he had given it to me, it’s mine, and I can do whatever I want with it."
Yao shi still shook her head, "I mean, it"s too precious."
Marquis Gu couldn"t agree more, saying, "That’s right, not to mention that girl... Cough, your sister doesn"t know how to play guqin." Wouldn’t she just give it to her for nothing? What a waste of precious stuff!
Gu Jinyu held the guqin in her arms, and hung down her eyes in grievance. She said, "But this is the best thing Jinyu can come up with. Jinyu likes sister and wants to make it up to her. Jinyu can"t even wait to give her life to sister. What is a mere guqin?"
Yao shi tucked the hair of her temples behind her ear and sighed, "Silly girl."
Ultimately, Yao shi didn"t let her give away the guqin, but left everything else. She planned to take them to JiaoJiao another day. If JiaoJiao liked them, she could keep them, otherwise, she would bring them back.
Gu Jinyu took the guqin back to her courtyard.
Marquis Gu caught up with her and solemnly said, "Don"t do such a stupid thing in the future!"
"What?" Gu Jinyu looked at his father with a puzzled face.
Marquis Gu looked at the guqin in her arms and asked, "What if your mother really accepted it just now? Aren"t you afraid?"
Gu Jinyu opened her eyes wide and said with an innocent look, "But I really wanted to give it to my sister! Unfortunately, Mom doesn"t like that."
Marquis Gu breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Fortunately, your mother didn"t agree. Your sister grew up in the countryside and doesn’t know about music. She only knew about house ch.o.r.es. It’s better to just ask her to cut wood, what does she know about playing the guqin? Really! It"s just a waste to give her such a precious thing."
Gu Jinyu said sincerely, "I can teach my sister if she wants to!"
Marquis Gu snorted coldly, "Then she can just appreciate the sentiments! All right, keep the Yue Ying f.u.xi guqin. Don"t take it out and just give it away again!"
Gu Jinyu lowered her eyes. No one could make a better imitation of f.u.xi guqin than the one in her hands. In truth, she really didn"t want to give it away deep down.
……
The private school was on a holiday, but the Tianxiang Academy had cla.s.ses. Gu Jiao was cooking dinner in the kitchen. Calculating that Xiao Liulang and Gu Xiaoshun were about to arrive at the entrance of the village, she began to cook the last dish.
“JiaoJiao, JiaoJiao! My abacus is gone!"
Little Jing Kong rushed into the kitchen, at a loss of what to do.
Gu Jiao put water in the pot and covered it. She said, "Don"t worry, I"ll help you find it."
Little Jing Kong brought back many things from the temple, and Gu Jiao put them in two large chests for him.
Although he was a child, Gu Jiao still respected his privacy and didn’t touch his things at ordinary times.
His chests were in a mess, filled with lots of different things.
"Which chest is it in?" Gu Jiao asked.
"This! No, it seems to be that!" Little Jing Kong, though a very planned child, was still somewhat unsatisfactory in organizing things.
Gu Jiao rummaged through the left chest first, and soon found a glittering abacus.
Pure gold!
Gu Jiao asked blankly, "Is... Is it this?"
"En!" Little Jing Kong nodded as if he was pounding garlic.
Gu Jiao asked, "Who gave it to you?"
"My master!" Little Jing Kong took the abacus and fiddled with it. Recently, one of their lessons was calculation using abacus, and he wanted to review!
Your master is so rich? He actually gave you a golden abacus?
Gu Jiao finally couldn"t resist asking, "Do you know that it"s made of gold?"
Little Jing Kong nodded his head, "I know! Master has a lot of abacus, and I specially chose this one!"
"Why?"
"It looks awesome!"
Gu Jiao：“…”
Gu Jiao put everything that was on the ground back into the chest one by one. Suddenly, she heard the sound of a string when she moved the big thing wrapped in a cloth.
Gu Jiao unfolded the cloth and found it was a guqin.
Its appearance was very shabby and didn’t even have a case, but the timbre was good, and the sound it produced just now was actually pleasant to hear.
Gu Jiao struck the string again twice.
The timbre was really good.
Little Jing Kong looked over at Gu Jiao and wondered, "Hm? Can JiaoJiao play the guqin?"
Gu Jiao didn"t answer his question, but asked him, "How about you?"
Little Jing Kong thought carefully and said, "A little! But I don"t like it!"
Gu Jiao asked, curious, "How come you have a guqin if you don"t like it?"
Little Jing Kong sighed like an adult, saying, "Oh, it"s from my master! Everything here is sent by that old man!"
Gu Jiao found a blackened spot in the upper right corner of the guqin.
Little Jing Kong explained, "Once, there was no firewood, Master threw the guqin into the fire to make the fire strong, but it didn"t burn after a long time, so he pulled it out again."
Gu Jiao was dumbfounded. Even if it was a broken guqin, no one would use it as firewood, yes? What kind of master did you get for yourself?
Little Jing Kong said, "JiaoJiao, if you like it, I can give it to you!"
Gu Jiao stroked the guqin with her fingers, and inadvertently caught a glimpse of two words engraved on the bottom of the guqin— f.u.xi.
******
Low-key local tyrant Jing Kong: o(*￣︶￣*)o