"Hey, she's thirty-six and you're twenty-two. She's fourteen years older than you?"
Long E Ying's expression turned awkward.
"Is that not okay?" Liang Qu asked.
"Of course it is! A good thing! You kid sure knows how to eat—mm... pick!" Lan Jicai flipped through the Geng Tie, gave a thumbs-up, and rattled off words like cannon fire. "Not to mention someone like me who studies fate—even ordinary folk who know nothing of it understand: six years is a major clash, three years a minor clash; differences of four or seven make an auspicious match.
She's fourteen years older than you, two sevens apart—double the good fortune! If the woman is one year older, gold flies in; two years older, gold grows. Yours is another seven times two years older, so gold will grow seven times over. Kid, you're going to live in a house of gold and make a fortune! Good, good!"
A high-ranking Imperial Astronomical Bureau official had personally calculated his birth characters, and his words never stopped.
Long E Ying understood a little of it and listened intently.
The Nine Branch Beast Lamp held up its candles, their flames roaring brightly.
Liang Qu leaned back in his chair and looked around.
He had often heard the name of the Imperial Astronomical Bureau. It was a vast department, mysterious and mystical, one that did no "practical work" and usually had little presence—setting calendars, talking big. Yet whenever a major event arose, whether sacrifices to Heaven and Earth or armies setting out to war, it could never be bypassed.
Pingyang Prefecture's River Conservancy Office had also often received "directives" from the Imperial Astronomical Bureau. Several purges of Ghost Mother Sect branch lines had all been completed under its "guidance."
Still, this was his first visit to the Imperial Astronomical Bureau.