aAfter a fast-bathing[1] for three days, Yu Xiang woke up unprecedentedly early on the day of the jiji ceremony. It was already the end of October and the pleasantly cool autumn breeze brought along a bit of coldness that all the servants had already changed into their cotton-lined jackets, making crunching sounds when they trampled back and forth on the fallen leaves.
Sitting in front of the mercury mirror to apply the lip rouge, Yu Xiang still felt dissatisfied after several colors were chosen that her lips became slightly swollen after she kept rubbing off several times with a handkerchief. She is coming of age once again but it’s unlike the eighteen-year-old of her previous lifetime where she hid on the top floor of the sanatorium with her elder brother drinking beer in the cold wind.
In this life, she has a family who loves her dearly, friends who stay with her day and night as well as a grand celebration. Gazing at herself in the mirror, she suddenly had a feeling of being in a different world.
“Young Miss, try this orange one again. It has some malt sugar in it which is very sweet.” Liu Lu picked up a box of lip rouge.
The stuff in ancient times is simply good which is completely uncontaminated that the facial cream and lip rouge made can even be eaten casually except for the blush rouge and foundation powder of course. Yu Xiang sighed faintly then dabbed a little with her small finger and smeared it carefully on her lips.
The sky was barely whitish like a fish’s belly as the sun had yet to rise up, so Tao Hong held a candlestick to light up for her. The young girl’s already delicate face was groomed as beautiful as a blooming peony and her full head of black hair cascaded like waterfall over her shoulders while the large round feline-like eyes of hers were unfocused, making her appear innocently clueless or maybe a little confused.
Liu Lu asked in a low voice, “Young Miss does not seem to be in high spirits today?”
“No, I just feel a bit perplexed to have grown up overnight.” There are always all kinds of worries that follow one after another after growing up. Yu Xiang thought so and pouted her lips to puff out a muddled breath.
Liu Lu smiled without saying a word as she picked up a double-edged fine-toothed comb to help comb her master’s hair. Treading on the morning dew, Yu Pin Yan strolled in followed closely by Feng Momo and several maidservants who were carrying small boxes that Tao Hong and Liu Lu hurriedly stepped forward to greet him.
“Elder Brother, are these the crown’s hairpin and pearl hairpin I’m going to wear today?” Yu Xiang craned her neck to look.
“Precisely. See if you like it.” Yu Pin Yan walked over and touched her cheek.
The few little maidservants opened the boxes in their hands and placed them on the dressing table in a row. Forged from top-quality jade and gold, the lotus-shaped crown’s hairpin looked extremely extravagant and luxurious under the candle lights.
Even Yu Xiang, who is experienced and knowledgeable, could not help but marvel.
“Like it?” Yu Pin Yan leaned over and asked with a smile.
“I could not like it more!” Yu Xiang held the small box up and kissed it twice.
Since there were so many people with mixed ideas around, Yu Pin Yan resisted the impulse to ask for a kiss and let those maidservants bring the boxes to Old Madam for her perusal. These things should be kept by the attendants but due to their high nobility status, the two attendants invited by Yu Xiang were purely here for fun and good-for-nothing that Yu Pin Yan and Old Madam eventually had to do it themselves.
When the group of people was far away, Yu Pin Yan took the comb in Liu Lu’s hand and combed his younger sister’s beautiful black hair one stroke at a time. As her hair is indeed too glossy, he put some sweet-scented osmanthus oil on his palm and bundled the hair into a simple fallen-horse-bun then picked a few beaded hair pins for adornment.
“Xiang’er has finally grown up. Elder Brother can hardly wait for this day.” He leaned down and pressed his cheek against his younger sister’s delicate cheek, gazing steadily at the bright and unparalleled beauty in the mirror while his slightly muted voice contained an undefinable ambiguity.
Yu Xiang felt her heart beating wildly with his scorching gaze that even a gush of shuddering sensation spread out from her ear that was pressed closely against his cheek. Yu Xiang smiled at the handsome young man in the mirror then pretended to be busy picking out the hair ornament in her trousseau. She dared not ponder the deeper meaning of his words, for she knew that it would bring earth-shaking changes to her life should she just take one step further by his enticement.
She feels that she is doing fine now and does not need this sort of change. Or perhaps more frankly, she is afraid of such changes.
Yu Pin Yan did not care to overdo. He helped her pick a lotus-shaped inlay and stick it between her eyebrows then kissed her sweet scented temple with great fondness before carrying her to the front courtyard.
Tao Hong and Liu Lu pushed the wheelchair and followed behind.
Lying on her elder brother’s shoulder, her breast inevitably rubbed against his strong and powerful arms. In the past, she did not feel anything but today, she felt particularly embarrassed that her cheeks stained red as the boundless rosy clouds of dawn without even the need to apply any blush rouge. She tried her best to ignore the aggressive sexuality scent emanating from her brother by meticulously counting the leaves on the ground, once, two, three…countless…
Wait a minute, aren’t there too many fallen leaves today? The servants even forgot to sweep the ground!
Yu Xiang raised her eyebrows and patted her elder brother’s shoulder as she said, “Wait, Elder Brother. Ask who is responsible for cleaning this path? Seeing the guests are about to arrive, our Marquis manor has not even cleaned up the path for them, how does this look like!”
Yu Pin Yan has never cared about such trivial matters but seeing how truly cute his younger sister’s little appearance as a housekeeper, he waved his sleeves at the two guards following behind him.
How would the servant dare to slight the personally questioning of the Marquis. However, since the reformation of Yu Miao Qi, those servants who originally had a clear division of labor undesirably became scattered, not only you shove it to me, I push it to you, they actually could not find anyone who was responsible after a long time that all turned uproariously for a moment.
“Don’t argue anymore. Where’s Yu Miao Qi, call her over. Didn’t she say she would help me make my jiji ceremony a success?” Yu Xiang’s brows furrowed tightly and somewhat regretted the decision she made that day all of a sudden.
This is the only coming-of-age ceremony she has ever had in her two lifetimes and if anyone screws it up, she will screw that person up too.
Yu Miao Qi had helped Mother Shen manage the household before taking over Marquis Yongle manor later. Although there were occasional minor mistakes, it was not difficult to handle with Lin Shi’s guidance and Yu Xiang’s previous established rules for reference.
However, the jiji ceremony is a complicated procedure which is loaded with trivial details and grand in scale which is also Lin Shi’s first time doing it. In addition, they have ruined almost all the rules set by Yu Xiang and offended some dignified stewards due to the support they rendered to their own cronies hence nothing happened during the ordinary days but once encountering such a celebration, chaos would surface.
One moment the kitchen was lacking a few crates of ingredients then a few hundred small cups were missing from the storeroom a moment later while the show-stage was not properly set up … all kinds of trouble came one after another. Yu Miao Qi was so busy that she became absent-minded and eventually didn’t even pay attention to the most basic cleaning. When she heard Yu Pin Yan’s summon, she wished she could conjure hundreds of doppelgangers and personally go sweep the ground herself.