After twelve days of reading and learning to paint every day, chopping firewood each morning, and training his coordination each evening...
Lin Ke felt different.
He had long since chopped all the firewood in his own courtyard, so from the third day onward, he brought wood home from the Tongfu Grand Restaurant and delivered it back once he had chopped most of it in the morning.
His painting skills had made great strides, and he was working hard to incorporate the local style into his dancing.
Everything was moving in the right direction!
At dusk, Lin Ke stood outside the painting studio, his brush tip pointed downward as he sketched the pillars outside the "Song-Listening Entertainment House" down the street.
When he lowered his head and raised it again, a head appeared above his easel, looking down at his painting.
The head that suddenly appeared before him startled him into a full-body shudder.
Although Lin Ke rose, the brush resting against the painting did not move at all, so his trembling did not leave a single flawed stroke!
Lin Ke had already trained to the point where someone's arrival could not disturb his brush hand in the slightest!
Once Lin Ke saw the newcomer clearly, he smiled, lifted his brush from the paper, set it down, and stood to salute him with clasped hands. "May I ask who you are, sir?"
After Lin Ke stood, the man hurriedly squeezed over, presenting his profile as he looked at Lin Ke's painting.
The newcomer wore an exquisite pure-white robe. He perfunctorily brought his hands out from behind his back, holding a White Jade Folding Fan with a red agate pendant dangling beneath it, then casually raised his clasped hands while standing sideways.
Then he went back to looking at Lin Ke's painting.
Lin Ke's painting depicted the view from "Butcher Zhang's Meat Shop" next door to the "Song-Listening Entertainment House" down the street.
There was not a trace of color in the painting!
It was all black lines!
Yes!
Lin Ke was drawing the outlines of the street scene!
The painting was nearly finished, and he was adding lines to the pillars of the "Song-Listening Entertainment House."
The man raised a hand to pinch his chin, then smoothed the hair at the side of his head.
He turned to look at Lin Ke and smacked his lips, muttering as though to himself, "Has Lin'er changed her tastes? Is she into pretty young boys now?"
Now that Lin Ke could see the newcomer's face clearly, how could he fail to understand what the man meant?
One glance told him that the man had gotten entirely the wrong idea!
To Lin Ke, this man truly deserved to be called a suave young master from a great clan!
Lin Ke smiled and clasped his hands. "Sir, I'm merely Master's disciple. It isn't what you think."
Understanding dawned on the man's face. "I get it. A teacher-student romance, right?"
Lin Ke's head began to ache. Wang Lin alone was already more than he could handle, and now another formidable character seemed to have appeared, one whose thoughts jumped around even more wildly than hers!
He did not rush to explain. Just as he was about to call for Wang Lin, the Painting Studio door opened.
Wang Lin appeared in the doorway. The moment she saw the newcomer, a lewd grin spread across her face. "What brings you here? Come in, come in! I've made a few new pieces. Want to appreciate them?"
The handsome man's eyes immediately gleamed green. "Then what are we waiting for? Hurry!"
And then Lin Ke was left alone outside the Painting Studio, standing bewildered in the wind.
Lin Ke drew a deep breath and checked the sky. It was time to head to the Tongfu Grand Restaurant. He picked up his brush, which remained as steady as Mount Tai; only when the wind occasionally stirred its tip could any movement be seen.
The man had interrupted him earlier. He finished the final incomplete stroke, put down his brush, and prepared to leave.
Since the second day, Wang Lin had refused to let him enter the Painting Studio. He suspected she had overheard him calling her a pervert to the restaurant's manager on the first day.
More than ten days had passed, and she was still keeping Lin Ke outside.
Every day, she put the easel, paper, and brushes outside in advance, told Lin Ke what to do, and then disappeared, unless a customer came or something like today happened...
Lin Ke had just lifted his foot when he stopped short, because a clattering, crashing racket came from inside the Painting Studio.
Then he saw a white figure fly backward out of it.
And then?
And then he saw the man plastered against the wall, where he remained for quite some time.
Lin Ke stood rooted to the spot, staring blankly at the white-clad figure stuck to the wall.
"Why aren't you hurrying off to do your chores? Waiting for me to feed you?"
The words came in Wang Lin's soft, sweet voice, and Lin Ke immediately shivered.
He turned his head to look at the white-clad figure plastered to the wall and silently prayed for him for three seconds!
Then he took to his heels, racing to the entrance of the Tongfu Grand Restaurant in a flash, where he stopped and looked back.
At that moment, the manager also jogged over, panting, and looked in the direction Lin Ke was watching.
Then they both saw Wang Lin go inside and shut the door.
A second later, the sound of the door closing reached them.
Bang...
It even echoed?
The two exchanged a glance and jogged back into the restaurant together.
"What happened?"
"I don't know either!"
One asked and the other answered, as though they had said everything, yet also as though they had said nothing at all.
They went their separate ways. Lin Ke deftly found a rag and began wiping around the window, occasionally glancing toward the Painting Studio...
As he wiped, Lin Ke sank into thought.
Over these twelve days...
Every day, he traveled between the same three places: Li Chungang's tofu shop, the Immortal Realm Painting Studio, and the Tongfu Grand Restaurant. Every day, he studied and did odd jobs...
At Li Chungang's place, Lin Ke had already reached the second row of books.
The second row contained books on law, and he had read more than half of them. Starting on the fourth day, he had arrived two hours early each day to read, then begun grinding beans for tofu at the usual time of nine.
Of course, he also had to get up two hours earlier, because he needed to use the early morning to train his coordination.
On the day he began the second row, the old man had left him a question and told him to find the answer there.
He had asked: could Great Wei reinstate mutilating punishments?
Mutilating punishments?
What were mutilating punishments?
For example, if someone committed a capital offense that was not particularly serious, yet did not truly deserve death, they could instead be punished by facial tattooing, beating with a rod, or the severing of fingers, arms, or feet, or even castration... and so on, injuring parts of the body in place of execution.
Mutilating punishments could greatly reduce the number of death-row prisoners in Great Wei, sparing those sentenced to death for offenses that did not warrant it, such as harboring unspoken criticism, taking a sack of grain, or stealing a single copper coin.
Lin Ke had wanted to answer right away.
But Li Chungang waved a hand and said, "Answer me after you've read at least this row, or all the remaining books."
Lin Ke fell silent then and could only nod, though his thoughts remained tangled.
Why?
Because Lin Ke's soul ultimately came from another world. He believed that whether viewed in terms of democracy, public opinion, or people's livelihoods, human life was deeply important.
Yet on his very first day, Lin Ke had come across the laws of the Great Qin Dynasty, which included an edict called [All Qin People Must Obey Edict].
What did it mean? The Sage Emperor Qin had established this edict with Legalist thought at its core, and its implementation was exemplified by the burning of books.
At the time, the Sage Emperor Qin ordered Li Si to burn books. All who refused were subjected to mutilating punishments, but anyone who survived the harshest punishment would be made a king!
Later, someone really did survive the punishment and become a king.
But afterward, another six million punished convicts built the Sage Emperor Qin's Mausoleum.
When Lin Ke read this, he felt somewhat puzzled.
Later, during the Great Han Dynasty, the Han Literary Sage Emperor first reformed mutilating punishments.
He made mutilating punishments less agonizing, though relatively speaking they were still somewhat gentler than those of Qin. Lin Ke frowned when he read the subsequent account, which recorded it this way:
"To redeem her father, a young maiden accompanied him to Han Xianjing, wishing to offer herself as a bondservant. Taking pity on the people's plight, the Han Sage Emperor issued an edict: 'The gracious sovereign is father and mother to the people'..."
The gist was that a young girl went to Han Xianjing to redeem her father's punishment, willing to become a slave if only he could be spared mutilation, because someone who underwent it would be no different from a paralyzed person.
The girl's actions moved the Han Sage Emperor of that time, who then abolished mutilating punishments!
But because mutilating punishments had been abolished, the girl's father was sentenced to death!
When Lin Ke reached that passage, he put down the book and remained speechless for a long time, lost in thought.
Now, whenever he had a spare moment, he pondered these questions.
At the same time, his thoughts were not limited to that one question. More often, he pondered history and reality.
History offered so many mistakes to learn from, so why did later generations still tread the same path?
First, because humans found it difficult to learn from the lessons of history; second, because they were not masters of their own fate.
Some mistakes were plain for everyone to see, but no one had a better solution. They could only use the old methods, and so they could only keep walking the same road.
Before you continue