Chapter Forty-Four: Princess Taiping Takes Notice

“Brother Pei, this handwriting...” Lu Ze stared in stunned disbelief, at a loss for words.

Pei Min, however, understood what he meant and laughed. “This is also small regular script. Can’t Brother Lu tell?”

Lu Ze swallowed and nodded with a kind of numb awe. “It is indeed very much in the style of small regular script, and there is even a trace of Wang Xizhi’s grace within it. But those edges, so sharply cut as though by knife and chisel, are truly beyond praise!”

Pei Min nodded in agreement. Song typeface had, after all, evolved from Tang regular script. Strictly speaking, Song typeface was regular script itself, only a refined version, sharpened by the long inheritance of history. A brush tip was soft and supple, strand by strand delicate to the utmost; it could be forceful or gentle, and the key lay entirely in the writer’s own skill. A sword, however, was different. Its edge was forged of pure steel, unyielding and hard to the extreme. In the turn of the wrist, no matter what one did, it could never achieve the same pliancy as a brush. If Pei Min were to use the method of brush writing to inscribe with a sword, then for all his swordsmanship and calligraphic foundation, the result would certainly not be poor, but neither could it be truly soul-stirring.

Yet the sword’s edge had its own strengths. It could carve out with the precision of a chisel the angular forms that brush calligraphy could never fully capture. Make use of its strengths and conceal its weaknesses. Song typeface, transformed from Tang regular script, was precisely the perfect choice for sword-script.

Feng Zhi looked at the writing and listened to the poem, his face equally filled with admiration. “To have entered the same examination cohort as Brother Pei is both the greatest fortune of our generation, and its greatest misfortune.”

The surrounding degree-holders all felt the same.

From Pei Min’s performance at today’s banquet and outing alone, they had nearly become mere background figures. Everyone could already foresee that once today’s events spread, Pei Min’s talent and deeds would sweep across all of Chang’an and be praised by all under heaven.

*****

Pleasure Hill.

Pleasure Hill was a high rise of land in the eastern part of Chang’an. Its area was extremely vast, and it lay only a short distance from the Great Ci’en Temple and Qujiang Pool. It was one of the most rare and treasured geomantic sites in the entire city of Chang’an.

As early as the reign of Wu Zetian, Princess Taiping had set her sights on this place. She had built pavilions and towers here, creating the largest private garden estate in Chang’an: the Princess Taiping Manor.

What Princess Taiping enjoyed most was standing high and looking out over Chang’an. Pleasure Hill already stood on elevated ground, and with a tall building as vantage point, one could climb the hill and gaze into the distance, surveying broad horizons on all sides. Within the imperial city, the view below was like a palm in one’s hand, allowing one to savor to the fullest the feeling that the great and majestic city lay entirely beneath one’s feet.

“So this means that in this imperial examination, apart from those who were already ours, only Pei Min is worth bringing over?” Princess Taiping stood in the tall building, looking down at the already concluded banquet outing for the degree-holders. Listening to the report brought by an assistant director from the Ministry of Rites, her eyes revealed a touch of interest, interest in Pei Min.

Assistant Director Xie Yi of the Ministry of Rites did not dare raise his head as he answered. With his head bowed low, he said, “Not entirely. This examination used the anonymous paper system, so most of the degree-holders advanced on true ability rather than reputation or influence. The overall standard of this group is far better than in previous years, and there are many outstanding figures worth noting. It is only that Pei Min is too dazzling. Beneath his brilliance, the others seem somewhat superfluous.”

Princess Taiping said softly, “I am only interested in the most exceptional talent... Come, draft an invitation for me. Have Pei Min come to my residence tomorrow for a talk.”

No sooner had the words left her mouth than a capable and efficient old steward immediately acknowledged the order and set things in motion.

“As for the others, tell Lu Cangyong later and let him handle it. Use them if they can be used; discard them if they cannot. Make sure our people pass the Ministry of Personnel’s review without incident.” Her words were plainly directed at Xie Yi.

Xie Yi bowed and accepted the command, then withdrew.

Leaving the tall building at a brisk pace, Xie Yi let out a breath, and the heavy stone in his heart somehow lifted. He himself did not know why, but every time he reported news to Princess Taiping, he felt a strange pressure, the same kind one felt in the emperor’s presence. Shaking his head, he walked on, passing by a broad-shouldered monk.

The monk paid him no mind at all and entered the tall building.

Looking at the monk’s retreating figure, a strange thought rose in Xie Yi’s mind. He knew that monk; his name was Hui Fan, a foreign monk from the Western Regions, with a group of fierce enforcers under his command. Rumor had it that he had an illicit affair with Princess Taiping, though whether this was true or not was impossible to say. But it was a fact that Hui Fan enjoyed great favor with Princess Taiping.

“Greetings, Your Highness, the Princess Royal...” Hui Fan bowed deeply before Princess Taiping, then secretly lifted his head to glance at that slender, alluring figure. Heat surged in his heart. Everyone outside said he and Princess Taiping had an affair, but the truth was known only to him: Princess Taiping had merely been using his temple to shelter underworld kingpins and hired bruisers of every stripe, keeping them in reserve for emergencies. There had never been any such relationship between them. Even though he was far from pure-minded and would gladly have wished it, he could only harbor those thoughts in his own heart. When he saw signs that Princess Taiping might turn around, he was so frightened that he shrank his head down into his neck, not daring to raise it at all.

Princess Taiping sat down at her leisure. “What have you come to see me about?”

Hui Fan said, “I have found him, Your Highness. This humble monk has found the youth who instigated Princess Yuzhen.”

“Oh?” Princess Taiping recalled the matter. Someone had once used her to teach Hui Fan a lesson, leaving a very deep impression on her. Yet after so many months, there had been no news at all of that mysterious young man, and she had gradually forgotten the affair. Now that Hui Fan mentioned it again, the memory came flooding back. “Tell me who it is.”

Hui Fan gritted his teeth. “His name is Pei Min. He is the top scholar of this year’s examination.”

Hearing the two words “Pei Min” once again, Princess Taiping’s lips actually curved slightly. Over the past few days, she had repeatedly heard this name. At first there had been his taking first place in the examinations, then the Ministry of Works and the Ministry of War trying to recruit him, then the Qujiang banquet, and now Hui Fan as well... To enter her ears again and again was proof enough that he was no ordinary man.

Talent is the foundation upon which great undertakings are built: Princess Taiping had long since learned that truth from her mother, Wu Zetian.

Princess Taiping said, “Put away your little schemes. Without my permission, you are not to touch Pei Min.”

Hui Fan was instantly dumbfounded. For personal reasons, he hated Pei Min to the bone and wished he could grind him to dust. Yet now Pei Min was no longer what he had been; he was the top scholar of the year, his momentum at its height, and Hui Fan did not dare act rashly. He had thought that since Princess Taiping was also investigating Pei Min, he had come specifically to lodge a complaint. Given his understanding of her, she ought to have acted at once. Why was it not as he had imagined?

Princess Taiping toyed with a teacup she had taken from the table and said to herself, “Do not try to guess my thoughts at will, and do not make decisions on your own. I can give you your present standing, and I can make you lose everything in an instant.”

Hui Fan went pale with terror and prostrated himself on the floor.

Princess Taiping did not even look at him. “Leave. I will not repeat the same words a second time.”

Hui Fan scrambled away on hands and knees.

Princess Taiping looked at the cup in her hand, sorting through the information she had gathered on Pei Min in her mind, and smiled lightly. “To go from obscurity to dazzling fame overnight... that was no accident, was it? Using reputation as protection, I really can’t move against you. Interesting...”