Immortal-Inviting Tower, second floor.
Su Yun was inexplicably low-spirited today. Though he had long prepared the flower pins, he still had no satisfactory opening poem.
He lacked neither money nor wealth, yet he had no truly presentable Academy talents.
Those Confucian scholars with genuine learning usually possessed a measure of backbone, unwilling to bend their waists for five pecks of rice.
A thousand worries tangled in his heart, foremost among them Xie Guan's polite refusal.
His feelings toward Young Master Guan were complicated.
He admired his talent, yet Xie Guan's attitude today clearly showed that he had no intention of forming a deep friendship with him, nor did he wish to have any entanglements with the Su Family.
Even Li Shuwan, the woman he admired, was the same.
Su Yun had been fawned over by everyone since childhood, but most of that adulation had arisen from the Su Family's power and standing.
However!
Among the Nine Great Surnames, there were also quite a few lineages that avoided Su Yun as though he were a plague.
Rarely, Su Yun took a deep draught of fine wine to ease the sorrow and frustration in his heart.
Xie Xuan and Chen Jiuyan stood behind Su Yun.
Chen Jiuyan wore a fitted black martial outfit for men and a hanging-footed turban upon her head. Though she was a woman, she possessed a roguish charm all her own.
"Su Yun, why are you putting on that girlish look again?"
Hearing that, Su Yun could only feel helpless toward this princess. When she was young, she would often carry a little axe into his grandfather's courtyard to chop down trees.
No one in Su Manor dared stop her.
His grandfather did not care either.
Back then, dressed in a red padded jacket and carrying tree branches