The food at Fan Wang's house was far worse than at Liu Cheng's: just a bowl of stewed vegetables and a bowl of congee, though there were shreds of meat.
Even the egg Liu Acheng wanted had to be boiled on the spot.
After breakfast, Liu Acheng had his already rather dazed Attendant Secretariat Supervisor lead the way back to Black Robe Alley, where he requested an audience with Wang Biaozhi, who had transferred from Court Commandant to Minister of Personnel.
Sure enough, Wang Biaozhi was waiting at home.
By rights, Wang Biaozhi belonged to the same age group as Xie Shang and Xie Yi, but his bearing had absolutely nothing in common with theirs... perhaps he had been wild in his youth, too, but now he really was a stern version of Wang Xizhi.
A son or nephew led him inside. The two met at the entrance to the reception hall, where Liu Cheng bowed from below the steps and Wang Biaozhi returned the courtesy from above. Then they went in together. Wang Biaozhi took the principal seat, Liu Cheng the guest's seat, and several younger members of the Wang Clan sat in a row opposite them.
Compared with his experience across the lane yesterday, this was normal to an outrageous degree.
"Marquis Liu, you came in person yesterday to leave your name card. Was there something you needed?" Wang Biaozhi asked first. Even this opening was excessively normal.
"Well, it was like this," Liu Cheng said with a smile. "A few days ago, I built a water-powered mill at my home in Jiangcheng. It saves a great deal of effort compared with turning a mill by human or animal power. Yesterday, I ground two big buckets of soy milk and brought them over here early, thinking I would