Two or three dozen pairs of eyes reluctantly turned away.
Everyone had different thoughts about Gongxi Chou.
Old ministers like Qi Shan were quite familiar with Gongxi Chou, but some officials had joined later or only entered government after Kang was founded. They had always been in the "heard of him, never seen him" camp, and harbored a trace of curiosity.
Mystery made a person more alluring.
The mysteries surrounding Gongxi Chou could not be counted on one hand.
He was strikingly handsome, and rumors based on little more than hearsay abounded among the common folk. They said their ruler had fallen in love with him at first sight, and that the position of King Consort/Queen Consort had remained vacant for years because it was being kept for him. In the words of the best-selling story writer Five Elements Lack Virtue, this was called a "white moonlight."
The "white moonlight" had gone abroad.
Their ruler had closed off her heart ever since, but because she loved the one, she loved what resembled him, too. She was especially fond of men and women whose temperaments and looks were similar to Gongxi Chou's, treating them as his substitutes. In the parlance of Five Elements Lack Virtue's stories, this was called "Wanwan resembles you, XX resembles Chou."
His appearance aside, his strength was among the very best.
It was said that during the Battle of Xiaocheng, before Kang was founded, their ruler and he had exchanged each other's hidden arrows, leaving both armies deeply shaken. The scene was so outrageous that even the authors of popular street stories could not have come up with it, yet it had actually happened, with tens of thousands of eyewitnesses!
This was further ironclad proof that Gongxi Chou was their ruler's "white moonlight." The betting houses were