Pengmo had no idea his master was currently secretly despising his cooking, so he went about preparing the table and laying out all the dishes Su Tang had prepared as normal. As he was finishing up, he saw Su Tang accompanying Song Yi into the dining room, so he saluted and said, “Master, young miss, everything’s ready. You can both eat now. This small one will excuse himself.”
There weren’t many people living in the Song residence and Song Yi wasn’t interested in having Pengmo wait at the side like an attendant during meals, so these days it was normal for him to take his meals with Su Tang while Pengmo went off to eat outside.
Thus, Song Yi nodded to excuse Pengmo before sitting down to eat. Song Yi felt very satisfied when he saw all the fresh green vegetables on the table. Seeing that he seemed to be in a good mood, Su Tang spoke up again: “Master, in a few more days this disciple will need to…”
“No!”
Without waiting for Su Tang to finish her sentence, Song Yi directly refused. He snorted, if his disciple was constantly asking for leave all the time, how could she learn anything?
“Ah, before this disciple could even ask, master has already refused?” Su Tang could see Song Yi was determined, but she truly needed the time off. After all, although the farms had been bought, there were still many matters that needed her attention. The previous tenants on the smaller farms needed to be dealt with, and the farmers sold to her by the Zhang family also needed her to make arrangements.
She also still needed to buy some more people to work on those smaller farms. Thus, there was no way she could just sit around in town doing nothing but studying. Of course, she understood Song Yi’s feelings, but she couldn’t let that stop her.
In the first place Song Yi had originally only accepted her as his disciple because he was stuck in this remote place and was feeling bored every day. Then Su Tang, who vaguely reminded him of his late wife, who was able to cook well, and who was a little bit clever, had appeared, which had caused him to decide to take her in. But now that they had reached a point where Su Tang simply didn’t have time to accompany him every day anymore, obviously, Song Yi felt a bit lost and unwilling.
However, Su Tang also knew that the old man was just throwing a bit of a tantrum. He understood that Su Tang had her own matters to handle, so he would definitely compromise eventually. Just before that Su Tang would need to agree to some conditions and coax him properly.
“It’s because I already know what you’re going to say. Last time you said would read the Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance with me, but before we even got halfway through you ran off to play around outside.” In recent days, Song Yi had been reading the Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance with Su Tang, and he actually quite enjoyed these sessions. He felt that both of them were gaining from their exchanges. His disciple’s unique and interesting perspectives were quite enlightening, to the point that he almost wanted to tie her up so he could discuss with her all the time.
“Once I’m done with this bit of work I won’t have to run around so much anymore in the future. But if I don’t handle it now, I will just have to go out to handle it later, and at that time it might take up even more time to finish. I’m still in the early stages of setting up this business so it’s natural that I have to run around and work hard to get everything running smoothly. However, master, I’ll stay here with you today to read more of the Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance. Also, later this evening after she heads home this disciple also plans to make some new spring clothes for master as well.”
Su Tang coaxed Song Yi patiently. When it came to minor things like studying Su Tang didn’t mind playing some small tricks behind her master’s back, but for a serious matter like this she sincerely explained the situation.
When Song Yi saw the determined look in the little fox’s eyes, he knew he couldn’t stop her. Finally, he hmphed and said, “Don’t bother making any spring clothes, just stay and read with me all day once your matters are settled.”
“Alright! When I come back, I’ll definitely read with master every day. And since master asked me to settle all of my matters, I’ll definitely do so, but it might take me a slightly longer amount of time.” Su Tang agreed to Song Yi’s request, but also added a sentence of her own.
Song Yi pointed at her, his finger trembling with anger, “Y-you little fox!”
“Heh, thank you for your praise!” Su Tang blinked and decided to interpret this as a compliment.
Song Yi sighed. He had nothing more to say to this unworthy disciple!
Meanwhile, shortly after Su Tang had left for the Song residence, Zhang Cuilan and the rest all got up one after another. After learning that Su Tang had already left to find her master, Zhang Cuilan went to Su Tang’s room to do some cleaning and found a letter that Su Tang had left for her to find on the desk. This had already happened a few times in the past, so she hurriedly picked the letter up and took it with her.
Once breakfast was done, Zhang Cuilan dutifully took the letter over to the Lu family and passed it to the Lu family butler.
Thus, when the letter finally made its way to Lu Wan’er’s hands, she had just gotten up and was having breakfast. Currently, her mother was lecturing her about properly learning her etiquette because she would need to think about marriage in just a few short years.
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