"You should offer a handful of incense as well."
Martial Graduate Dan stepped aside and gestured for Wei Tu to come forward.
"Yes, Master."
Wei Tu nodded. He took a handful of incense, lit it from the candles, bowed, then knelt on the ground and kowtowed three times.
Only after completing this did Wei Tu place the incense in the censer.
Seeing how properly Wei Tu conducted himself, Martial Graduate Dan felt even more satisfied.
After the apprenticeship ceremony, it was already late. To avoid impropriety, Wei Tu took his leave of Martial Graduate Dan and departed the inner courtyard.
Along the way.
He ran into several maids.
These maids had clearly already learned that Wei Tu had become Martial Graduate Dan's disciple. When they saw him, they put away the haughty manner they had once shown toward hired hands and became humble instead, stepping aside and curtsying to him.
One plump, shapely maid even called Wei Tu "Young Master," her voice so sweet it seemed as though water could be squeezed from it.
Wei Tu was somewhat dazed. Only after leaving the second courtyard did he come back to himself.
"Young Master?"
"I've become a young master?"
Wei Tu returned to the West Room in a fog. He savored that one phrase—"Young Master"—again and again, a smile surfacing on his face from time to time. He no longer had the composure he had shown during the apprenticeship ceremony.
If anyone had seen him, they might have thought Wei Tu had gone mad, grinning foolishly to himself without end.
In Year 15 of Qing'an, he had been sold into the Li Family. Though the masters had appreciated him, he had still been no more than a stableman who held horses and ran errands.
And now.
It was Year 23 of Qing'an.
Not only had he redeemed his indenture contract, he had also become Martial Graduate Dan's disciple. His social standing had risen by a great stride.
Under such circumstances.
No matter how steady Wei Tu's temperament was, it was difficult for him to remain as calm as usual, neither proud nor pleased.
"I can't slack off! The servants at the Dan Residence respect me only because I'm Martial Graduate Dan's disciple. This status is like rootless duckweed, unstable and unanchored..."
Half a quarter-hour later, Wei Tu climbed down from the kang bed, drew a bucket of cool well water, and washed his face. The calmness of old returned to his expression.
"I should write Xinghua a letter and tell her this good news..."
"Tomorrow, I'll ask Martial Graduate Dan to lend me paper and brush, then write Xinghua a letter."
Wei Tu thought to himself.
The West Room where he stayed was a dormitory for hired hands. Other than beds, tables, clothes, and bedding, there was nothing else inside.
Much less the paper, ink, brushes, and inkstones used only by wealthy households and scholars.
However.
Just then—
A faint patter of footsteps came from outside the West Room.
After cultivating the Health Cultivation Technique for so long, Wei Tu had not only grown stronger; his hearing and eyesight had improved as well. He could tell that these were not a man's footsteps.
Then.
A knock sounded at the door.
"Young Master Wei, have you rested yet?" Madam Shan knocked on the door and asked.
"Third Madam?"
Wei Tu was surprised.
In wealthy households, not only did male outsiders and servants need to avoid suspicion, but the women of the household had to do the same.
It was already deep into the night. For Madam Shan to come to the hired hands' quarters, with a lone man and a lone woman together, was inevitably somewhat improper.
But before Wei Tu could think further, Madam Shan's next words dispelled his concerns.
"The West Room is too crude. At Master's instruction, I've come to take you to a side room in the second courtyard."
Madam Shan said.
Hearing this.
Wei Tu relaxed inwardly and let out a breath.
He then dressed and climbed out of bed. After straightening his appearance, he opened the door.
When the door opened, Wei Tu discovered that Madam Shan was not alone. Deng An, who had just returned from the threshing ground, was there as well.
Deng An perhaps feared Madam Shan. He stood beneath the eaves, more than ten paces away from her, watching the scene from afar and not daring to return to his room to rest.
"Come with me." Seeing Wei Tu emerge, Madam Shan said with a smile.
Shortly after.
The two entered the second courtyard one after the other.
As they entered the second courtyard, Madam Shan handed Wei Tu a key and said, "This is the key to the second courtyard's gate. Keep it safe, and don't lose it."
Wei Tu nodded. After hanging the key from his waist, he quickly widened the distance between himself and Madam Shan, keeping five paces away from her.
To prevent thieves from slipping into empty houses and illicit affairs in the inner quarters, wealthy households would often lock the gates of each courtyard at night, forbidding those inside from moving about.
Before long.
Madam Shan led Wei Tu to a side room in the second courtyard and had the maids arrange his bedding and clean the room.
"Young Master Wei, it's late. I'll be going now." Madam Shan stood outside the door, pressed her lips together, and gave Wei Tu a slightly restrained curtsy before disappearing beneath the corridor.
"This..."
Wei Tu was startled by this sight at first. Then, after pondering it for a while, he gradually understood.
In the Shan Family, since Madam Shan had always managed the household affairs, he had regarded her as a mistress of the house, with a status similar to Madam Li's.
But only today did he remember that Madam Shan was merely Martial Graduate Dan's third concubine. With no children under her knees, she was only a somewhat favored concubine.
Her actual status was not high.
Yet after becoming Martial Graduate Dan's disciple, Wei Tu's standing in the Shan Family had in fact become equal to Madam Shan's, even surpassing hers by a notch.
Though Martial Graduate Dan had never stated these differences in status outright, the servants and concubines of the Shan Family understood them with perfect clarity.
"This is duckweed with floating roots, clouds drifting with the wind."
Wei Tu silently warned himself.
Earlier, when he had been in the West Room, he had realized this truth, but not deeply. After all, his status had just risen, and he had still been immersed in immense joy.
Only now, seeing this former "mistress of the house" humble herself before him, did he realize that however muddleheaded he might be, it was time to wake up.
If his martial training progressed more slowly than Martial Graduate Dan expected, or if he failed this year's martial examination, then although his status as a disciple would not necessarily be revoked, his position in the Shan Family would be difficult to predict.
After the maids had finished making the bed, Wei Tu began looking over his new room.
A wooden bed stood against the eastern wall, draped with a printed summer-cloth canopy. Before the bed, against the western side, was a half-table bearing two long-necked porcelain vases.
Looking farther west, he saw a lacquered wooden desk behind a curtain, with a stack of old books and a brush-washing stand upon it.
Wei Tu lifted the cloth curtain and stepped closer. Several brushes of varying sizes stood in the brush rack—wolf-hair and goat-hair brushes alike.
Paper, ink, brushes, and inkstones—nothing was missing.
As for the old books, Wei Tu flipped through them and found that they were military texts rarely seen in bookshops. There was Ji Jiao on training troops, as well as Duke Tai's Book and Yin Fu Jing on formations and strategy.
"Master truly considered everything..."
Seeing these things, Wei Tu felt heartfelt gratitude toward Martial Graduate Dan for accepting him as a disciple.
If, after redeeming himself, his chances of passing the martial examination had been thirty percent.
Then now, with Martial Graduate Dan's all-round instruction, Wei Tu was confident he could raise them to more than fifty percent—perhaps even sixty or seventy percent.
Very soon.
Wei Tu composed himself, ground some ink, and began writing a letter.
In the letter, he told Xinghua the good news that Martial Graduate Dan had accepted him as a disciple. He also told Xinghua not to wait for him to return home for the New Year, as he needed to make the most of his time and patch up all his weaknesses before the examination in February.
Only then would he have the confidence to take the martial examination.
Many thanks to Rising Power for the 100 Qidian Coins reward.
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