Teahouse.
Private room at the end of the second floor.
The room was simply furnished. Several ink-wash landscape paintings hung on the walls. The couch sat by the window, separated from the storyteller's platform by a wooden screen.
A long tea table occupied the center of the couch. An elegant tea mat covered its surface, with seven or eight exquisite tea utensils arranged atop it.
Guests could lean by the window and look down upon the long street, sipping tea as they listened to the storyteller weave his tales. It was truly refined.
And if that was not enough, the teahouse also had singing girls who played, plucked, brushed, and picked their strings with gentle grace. There was always one who could send a guest home satisfied.
There was also something worth noting: if the prop rod holding up the window lattice were knocked down and happened to strike some high-ranking gentleman, a Disaster of Bloodlight might well follow.
Xiang Yuan sat cross-legged behind the tea table. Beside him was Chan'er, locked in a struggle with a candied hawthorn skewer.
It was not that her cherry lips were small or that she ate with particular elegance, leaving her still unfinished even now. Rather, Uncle Xiang was kindhearted; seeing how much she loved candied hawthorns, he had specially bought her an entire candied hawthorn tree so she could eat her fill in one go.
Someone, feed the demoness candied hawthorns!
Behind the screen stood four storytellers. They all knew one another and were colleagues. Having been invited in together, they had assumed the guest wanted a group comic routine and were currently discussing how best to please this honored patron.
"I heard there's a famous saying in the teahouses: even a dog has to be reborn in the capital. It truly