"Hotpot sliced meat coming through!"
Zheng Wu, whose true identity was Lou Mingbi, an instructor at Diligent Academy, was tall and thin enough that his robes hung loosely around him. The mask on his face was quite festive—a plump little colt, its hooves treading auspicious clouds as though it were about to charge into every future that lay just right.
"Festivity" was a smoky red, drifting through the hem of his robe. Wherever it floated, it stained whoever it touched. In the Yin-Yang School's cultivation, only a year's worth of virtuous deeds could bear the blessings of the old year and the joy of the new spring.
Before entering Diligent Academy, Lou Mingbi had been a private-school teacher in a small state. He built himself a hut in some remote, impoverished countryside, helped the villagers with farmwork every day in exchange for permission to teach those farm children spattered head to toe with mud.
He believed that studying could change one's fate.
The later part of the story was not so easy to tell. That small state was gone, and not one of the students he had taught remained alive. Zuo Qiu Wu had picked him out from a heap of corpses, and he had gone to Diligent Academy to become an instructor.
"May you all achieve success the moment you mount your horses, race onward without stopping, ride upon the Azure Cloud, and leap over mighty passes—"
Lou Mingbi carried two large platters of neatly sliced lamb in his hands, words spilling from his mouth like a string of pearls while his steps remained swift and steady. The marbling of the lamb slices was distinct, fat and lean interwoven, like potted flowers blooming in his palms.
Feng Shen followed close behind and turned in after him, carrying a basin