Chapter 43: Merit
Chapter 43
The watermelon incident elevated Jiang Wenyuan's position in Emperor Xia Jing's heart to a new height, beginning the story.
With Jiang Yuqing successfully hanging a number in front of the Emperor as the middle part, and Tong Fuqiu successfully applying eye drops in front of the Emperor as the ending.
Long after, when Jiang Yuqing learned of this, he arrogantly summarized it.
That is: never offend the eunuchs.
They cannot influence the Emperor's decisions, but their objective words and deeds will, to a certain degree, affect the Emperor's subjective judgement.
Of course, this is a later story, we will mention it for now.
The fiery July. The scorching sun was as if wanting to bake dry every drop of moisture from the creatures on the ground.
Already six months old, Bai Xiaojiu was already two feet and two inches tall, about the same height as Jiang Yuqing.
From head to tail tip, the length had already reached a shocking five feet and four inches, it was half grown young tiger.
Only the thick fur coat made it extremely unbearable in this scorching summer heat.
Jiang Yuqing was afraid it would get sick from the heat, specially prepared an oval large wooden tub filled with cool well water under the big pomelo tree in the backyard.
It loved it immensely.
Other than morning and night, it spent most of the daytime soaking in its beloved bath tub, and would not move half a step unless necessary.
Jiang Yuqing did not dare to easily approach its tub, because as soon as she got close, it would excitedly splash her wet.
Or it would simply grab her into its big tub to bathe together, like grabbing a rabbit.
Although not cold, it was troublesome to keep changing clothes.
Because of the hot weather, Jiang Yuqing and Master also rarely went out.
But there were quite a few more patients coming to seek treatment for heat stroke.
Tuanzi on her own prepared cooling tea bags for preventing heat stroke, five coins per bag, placed in the small pharmacy to sell. One bag could be used for several days.
The villagers coming for consultations could decide for themselves whether to purchase, since the price was not expensive, they sold quite well.
With many people buying, the prepared medicinal materials were somewhat insufficient.
Luckily the cooling tea bags used very common herbal teas, which could be seen everywhere in the fields around Xijin Du.
So Jiang Yuqing and Master took advantage of the time before sunrise when the sun had not come up yet, and brought Bai Xiaojiu to gather herbs.
Master Qiu had to carry the medicine basket, so naturally could not carry her. Tuanzi also felt bad always getting carried by someone.
When they walked longer distances, her little short legs could not keep up.
She still wanted a means of transport.
Dad always said he would buy her a little pony, but after looking for a long time could not find one.
The donkey he had promised to buy her, now after several months had passed, she had not even seen a donkey hair.
She thought, she still had to look for Dad, otherwise who knows when she could ride a donkey.
She had actually considered Bai Xiaojiu.
But this thing had too playful a temper, and was still a baby. She felt a little heartache.
Just as she was racking her brains for a mount, her dad finally got a conscience, and led back for her a white-hooved donkey with a swirl on its forehead and slender limbs.
Jiang Yuqing was so happy. She immediately had someone support her onto the donkey's back, and rode it out for a spin.
Dad Jiang was afraid she would fall, so walked alongside holding the lead to escort his precious daughter.
Father and daughter circled the outskirts of Xijin Du, even running a round in the sweet potato fields, arousing envy in many children.
Tuanzi somehow strangely satisfied some strange vanity.
On the way back, passing through a stretch of east water fields, which was the muddy pool where the water buffaloes of the village most liked to wallow. From afar they saw a white animal running over fast.
That animal ran strangely fast, and soon raced over up close, it was actually Bai Xiaojiu.
Bai Xiaojiu was very displeased that Tuanzi had deserted it and gone out. Especially when seeing her now riding on a strange ugly thing, it became even angrier.
Running up close, it opened its big mouth and gave a "Roar!"
Now things had gone badly.
The donkey was startled by the roar, and gave a shriek as it leapt up high, its hooves flailing as it turned and ran off. Jiang Wenyuan pulled with all his might but could not hold on.
This Bai Xiaojiu, afraid things were not chaotic enough, roared another two times.
Although not enough to shake heaven and earth, it was enough to scare the inexperienced donkey witless.
At that time the situation became even more out of hand.
Tuanzi angrily scolded: "Bai Xiaojiu, don't..." Ah!
Tuanzi felt her small body flung high up, suspended in air, then quickly dropped down, then "Splash!" she was thrown by the donkey into the mud pool beside them.
Jiang Wenyuan was badly frightened, and quickly jumped in to fish out his daughter.
The donkey, having lost control, kicked open its hooves and raced off like a shooting star.
In his fluster to fish his daughter out of the muddy water and see that she was fine, only then did he feel relieved.
Tuanzi's head, face and whole body were covered in mud, even the tips of the little horns on her head were dripping mud.
The white Tuanzi had become a black mud ball, simply too awful to look at.
She arduously spit out the mud in her mouth, and was so angry she turned and cursed at the blank faced Bai Xiaojiu on the shore.
"Bai Xiaojiu, you're dead..."
It turned out this idiot tiger Bai Xiaojiu, hearing its name, thought the young mistress was calling it to come play. In its excitement it also leapt down, splashing her with another mouthful of mud.
The little Tuanzi was furious, and grabbed Bai Xiaojiu's tiger head to press it into the muddy water.
But she overestimated her own strength and underestimated Bai Xiaojiu's strength. In the end she was pounced on by the excited Bai Xiaojiu, and pressed into the mud once more...
The two balls of dough then lovingly played and tussled in the rotten mud puddle until forcibly suppressed through military force by dad Jiang who could endure no more.
When the two people and one tiger once more stood on the solid road,
and Jiang Wenyuan looked at the two small muddy monkeys, then looked at himself covered in mud, and the donkey that had disappeared, he could not help his temples throbbing violently.
It was over, when they got home they would surely be dealt with by his dear wife!
And that stupid donkey.
So stupid and cowardly!
He had said creatures like donkeys were unreliable. Sure enough there was an accident the first time she rode it!
On the way home, because of the strange appearance of these three, they did attract quite a few curious looks.
But due to Jiang dad's prestige, they did not dare to openly laugh. Though turning their backs to shake and laugh, they pretended not to see.
Having seen the father and daughter leave happily and return covered in mud,
Lu was barely able to hold back the volcano in her heart: "Did you two go roll in the mud pit?"
Father and daughter exchanged a guilty look. That's right, they did roll in the mud pit!
"Speak up, have you both been struck dumb?"
Dad Jiang saw he could not escape this, and steeled himself to say: "The donkey threw darling into the mud pool."
"Hey, you two really have made something of yourselves... Right, where's the donkey?"
"It ran away!" Afraid her mother would get angry, Tuanzi quickly added: "Bai Xiaojiu scared it away."
"Nonsense, Bai Xiaojiu was just... " Lu looked down at the energetic tail-wagging little mud tiger at her feet, and abruptly swallowed back the word she had not finished saying.
"What exactly happened, tell me from the start!"
"The truth is, as darling and I were riding the donkey home, Bai Xiaojiu for some reason ran out to meet us. It roared twice.
That donkey is timid and had never seen a tiger before, was frightened into a frenzy of leaping, and threw darling into the mud puddle.
I went down to fish out darling, then Bai Xiaojiu also jumped down, and started playing with darling in the mud puddle. In the end it became like this."
If you really looked into it, the culprit was Bai Xiaojiu.
Bai Xiaojiu was a tiger, tigers innately have a bloodline suppression over ordinary animals. Blaming it seemed useless too, it could only be said to be an accident.
After hearing her husband's words, Lu was also exasperated and amused.
Looking at her daughter standing there like a little mud monkey, she pretended to be angry and said: "Throw it out, I don't want this daughter anymore, too dirty."
Tuanzi knew her mother's anger had passed. She quickly went up and pulled at her mother's clothes, smiling ingratiatingly to admit her mistake: "Mother dearest, darling knows she was wrong. Don't abandon me, I can still be wanted if I'm washed."
With divine washing she could still be wanted.
Lu really could not hold back her laughter. Her last bit of anger also dispersed. She personally led her daughter to the back to wash up.
As for her husband, let him stay wherever is most comfortable! He couldn't even protect their daughter properly.
Humph!
After washing up, Jiang Yuqing once again became a clean, bright white Tuanzi.
As for the donkey that threw the precious daughter into a mud pond on its first day of work, Dad Jiang naturally no longer had any need to keep it. The day after finding it again, he had someone lead it away to sell.
Tuanzi was still a Tuanzi without a mount.
It was unknown whether Baby Dumpling's desire to have a mount was too strong, or for some other reason, but this day when she followed her master up the mountain again, she suddenly felt a ripple in her spirit realm.
Just as she was about to check what was going on, a flash of white light appeared before her eyes, and an extremely beautiful creature appeared before her.
This exotic beast was about 2 meters tall and around 6 meters long. Its whole body was snow white, with light golden markings on it.
It had a pair of majestic, white, fork-shaped horns on its head that were like beautiful jade. Around its neck was a flowing, silk-like mane, giving it an imposing and very beautiful appearance.
Jiang Yuqing almost fell in love with it at first sight.
But somehow, it looked very familiar.
Hmm... wasn't this the same as the carved statue by the spiritual spring?
Jiang Yuqing quickly looked into her spirit realm, and as expected, the place where the statue stood was now empty.
"You, you, you you you, came alive?" The realm master stammered in shock.
The White Deer came over and gently licked her hand, "Yes, master. It's me." A very cute loli voice sounded in her mind.
"Spirit artifact?" As a soul who had lived in modern society before, Baby Dumpling was naturally familiar with, and readily accepted, these two words.
"So you're a girl like me too?"
The Deer nodded, "If that's how master wishes to see me, then yes."
Baby Dumpling scratched her head embarrassedly, "I thought you were just a pretty statue before, I didn't expect you to be alive!"
The Deer said, "I wasn't supposed to awaken this quickly originally, but master, you did good deeds and accumulated virtues, which allowed me to awaken so soon."
"Virtues?" Baby Dumpling blinked her big eyes, when did I do any good deeds recently?
The Deer said, "Sweet potatoes. You brought sweet potatoes to this world. Promoting them will save countless lives, that is virtue!
Also, you taught people how to can fruits, reducing the losses of fruit farmers.
Because of the workshop, many job opportunities were also created indirectly for society. All these have virtue."
"And the Hibiscus Spirit Realm is much larger than what you see now. Those parts still need virtue to unlock."
The realm master's eyes instantly lit up, "So the Hibiscus Spirit Realm can still upgrade. As long as I keep doing good deeds?"
"That's right in principle."
"I'm in!" Baby Dumpling was elated in her heart. She decided she must do more good deeds from now on.