Volume 4: Gathering of Sages Chapter 588: Settlement of Revenge?
There were not many guests at Lu Sanlang's ceremony, but there were many relatives and friends. Originally, it was not considered a big event in the capital city, which had been in turmoil recently. However, the emperor's personal visit in plain clothes was like a bolt from the blue. Although Lu Wan tried his best to control it and did not spread the news during the ceremony, the news spread quickly after the ceremony, causing an uproar in the court and the public.
Several astronomical experts who were summoned to Beijing came to challenge Lu Sanlang, but they were defeated by Lu Sanlang first, and then they were speechless when facing Zhang Shou's solution in public. In the end, Zhang Shou and Lu Sanlang, the teacher and student, put aside their past grudges, repaid the grievance with kindness, and entertained them warmly. After Zhang Chen, Zhu Er and others left Lu's house, this incident became a hot topic on the streets.
While others were talking about the ceremony, Lu Sanlang was not idle either. Today, he had officially become an adult, and the first thing he did after seeing off the guests was to call a few of his confidants to hurry back to the hall where the banquet had just been held, and directly ordered them to move away the ten blackboards that Zhang Shou had written all over.
When Lu Wan, who had come back a little late after seeing off his relative, Minister of Works Liu, saw the empty hall, he called someone to ask and learned that Lu Sanlang had personally led people to deliver the ten blackboards to Jiuzhang Hall. He was immediately furious: "Such a big thing, and no one came to report it to me. Is there no discipline in this family anymore?"
Lu Dalang and Lu Erlang, who followed their father to see the guests off, exchanged glances. Lu Erlang smiled and said, "Dad, don't be angry. My third brother has always been a person who respects his teachers. It's not surprising that he solemnly moved the calligraphy left by Dr. Zhang back to Jiuzhang Hall to worship it..."
Before Lu Erlang finished speaking, Lu Wan turned around and glared at him coldly, and he immediately stopped talking. Seeing his brother hit a snag in front of his father, Lu Dalang couldn't help but laugh at how his father was trying so hard to suppress his younger brother that he even said something like "respecting teachers" which was supposed to be a compliment but was actually ironic.
He coughed lightly, intending to say a few "fair words" to show his broad-mindedness and responsibility as an eldest brother, but as soon as he finished coughing, he was met with Lu Wan's cold look.
"Why are you coughing? You didn't say a word during the coming-of-age ceremony, so how come you're hoarse now? You're putting on airs in front of me, your old man. I don't think I've ever taught you this!"
Seeing that the two sons were silent, Lu Wan scolded them angrily: "Don't think I don't know what's on your mind. You looked down on your brother in the past, but today, the emperor is here for the ceremony, and he has given that kid enough face. You are still playing those unpresentable tricks... stupid!"
The two brothers' faces turned pale after being scolded by Lu Wan. Lu Erlang was even more impatient and couldn't keep his temper. He whispered, "What's wrong with us? The eldest brother was his supporter throughout the whole process, and I was also there to welcome and see him off. For his coming-of-age ceremony, haven't we two brothers done our best?"
Lu Wan sneered and said, "We welcome and send off guests, but in the end, we put a few people who came to provoke us in this ceremony?"
Lu Erlang's heart skipped a beat , but he immediately forced a smile and said, "Dad, my elder brother and I were busy entertaining other guests at the time and were not outside. I heard that it was the follower that Dr. Zhang brought...his name is Ah Liu, who is said to be very powerful and good at fighting. He let the person in on his own initiative. It really had nothing to do with my elder brother and me."
Seeing that his brother was at least trying to clear himself, Lu Dalang quickly chimed in, "That's right, that Ah Liu treated the Lu family as if it were his own and kept giving orders. At that time, Dad and we were entertaining guests, and the servants couldn't barge in to ask for instructions, so naturally we had to listen to him..."
"Oh, he acted on his own. Didn't you tell the servants at home long ago to let guests in directly and not to worry about anything else?" Lu Wan interrupted the two brothers' explanations impatiently. Seeing that their faces looked unnatural after hearing what he said, he couldn't help but sneer.
"Don't push everything onto others! That Ah Liu beside Zhang Shou did let someone in on purpose. When he left, he told me clearly that it was Zhu Ying who ordered him to do so. Zhang Shou didn't pay attention and casually used Lu Zhu's courtesy name on the spot. Zhu Ying was probably afraid that others would find fault with etiquette, so since the emperor had originally given this matter to Lu Zhu, she wanted to disrupt the situation."
"But what Zhu Ying thinks is her business. What Ah Liu does is also his business. However, when Ah Liu let the people in, the servants of the Lu Mansion turned a blind eye as if they were deaf and blind. No one even tried to stop them. Even a fool would find it strange, not to mention that this kid is very smart!"
Seeing that his eldest and second sons finally changed their expressions this time, Lu Wan angrily reprimanded: "Don't think that just because he doesn't like to talk, you can easily put the blame on him. That kid usually likes to pretend to be ignorant, so the emperor has always trusted him! There are two people in Zhang Shou's family who receive the court salary, one of whom is Zhang Shou himself, the doctor of the Imperial College..."
"The other one is Ah Liu who is paid as a coach in the Ruiqi Battalion! Why don't you just take a portion of the Ruiqi Battalion's money and try? Humph, this time you have embarrassed not only the Zhang family, but also the emperor!"
Hearing that the emperor might also know their selfish intentions, the two brothers of the Lu family finally became flustered. After all, Lu Dalang was a few years older and had been pretending to be calm for many years, so he could still endure it at this time, but Lu Erlang was young and hot-tempered and could not hold back.
"How is this embarrassing? This fat guy Lu Zhu is always showing off how talented and hardworking he is. Now that someone has come to my house this time, even if I let him in, it will give him a chance to show off in public. Does this become my fault?" Lu Erlang had just said this when he saw Lu Wan's sharp eyes staring at him.
At that moment, he seemed to have an illusion that if he said one more word, his father would slap him in the face.
"You call him Fatty in front of me, so you can see how you call him outside! Why, he was insignificant before, but now he has met a noble man and has become capable. You can't stand seeing him being better than him in everything before?"
Lu Wan stared at the second son who looked dissatisfied, and then glanced at the eldest son who seemed to be submissive but also unwilling. After a while, he said calmly: "Think about it carefully, what happened to the first and second princes yesterday!"
When they heard the names of the eldest prince and the second prince, the two brothers of the Lu family were puzzled at first, but after Lu Wan said the next words, the arrogance on their faces suddenly turned into panic.
"Those two are true royal nobles, the emperor's biological sons, but they are greedy, naughty, and ignorant. They like to bully their younger brothers when they have nothing to do. What will happen to them in the end? As an elder brother, you don't behave like an elder brother. This is the emperor's taboo. In addition, you have already entered the court as officials. Even your own brothers hate you. What do you think of such officials in the emperor's mind?"
Lu Wan used a series of punches to beat his two self-righteous sons until they looked ashen, and then he left in anger. However, when he walked through the front yard and arrived at the door of Mrs. Lu's house in the inner courtyard, he heard his usually gentle wife talking to several maids in a sharp voice, and he frowned immediately, and then he heard words that were simply unbelievable to him.
"Tell the tailor to do it this way, and when it's done, send it to the house over there. Pack two boxes of my clothes and send them there too, because I want to stay there often in the future anyway!"
Lu Wan also heard from his wife that when Lu Sanlang got married, he and Liu Qing moved out to avoid the whole family being crowded in this house, and the quarrels between brothers and sisters-in-law became more and more serious. His wife told him that she would visit from time to time in the future and stay for two days occasionally. But now from the tone of voice, it turned out that it was not just occasionally, but she planned to live there permanently!
He did not notice that there was no maid or servant guarding the door at this time. He subconsciously walked to the door and was about to go in. Unexpectedly, Mrs. Lu's voice was heard in the room again.
"That fat boy Sanlang has been disliked by his father and his two brothers since he was young. He was bullied all the time. Now that he has grown up and has a promising future, of course he doesn't want to have to face other people's faces. If I, as a mother, don't run around in both directions, who knows how much of the father-son and brotherly love will be left in the future? Take today's coming-of-age ceremony for example. To put it nicely, Sanlang and his teacher are invincible. To put it bluntly..."
"Others will definitely laugh at our Lu family for not keeping a clean record and letting in all kinds of people! If someone didn't indulge them, how could they let in such uninvited guests! It's all because of my poor discipline. I didn't teach the two older ones well, but it was also because their father indulged them because he saw that they were successful in their studies. Now he thinks I'm biased!"
"I am biased, but Sanlang's father didn't love him before. If I, his mother, don't love him anymore, how will he live? Now that he has a promising future, I am happier than anyone else! One family is living like two families. It will be a joke if it gets out!"
As Lu Wan listened, he felt that if he barged in like this, his wife might scold him directly, and it might become a joke. With a gloomy face, he could only turn around and leave, but unexpectedly, as soon as he walked out of the courtyard, the door curtain at the door of the house over there moved slightly.
The maid who had been watching through the crack in the door came to Madam Lu and whispered that the master had left. Madam Lu, who had just put her hands on her waist and acted like a shrew, breathed a sigh of relief and sat down. After patting her waist, she sighed, "This family is really terrible. In the past, no one looked up to Sanlang except me, his mother. Now that he has become successful, he is hated by everyone."
"If we don't teach those two elder brothers a lesson today, they will do something even more outrageous tomorrow! I don't know who they inherited this narrow-minded and tolerant heart from! Their father knew that one step back would open up a new world and that retreat is the way to advance, but how could these two be so stupid!"
Mrs. Lu scolded him, but after she finished, she couldn't help but hesitate. Of course, she was not completely helpless. She could use the excuse of disciplining her daughter-in-law to discipline her son, but she didn't like to do that. After all, the eldest and second daughters-in-law were also from famous families. But if her husband was going to keep the peace, she had to step in even if she had to lose face.
If she didn't teach those two older brothers a lesson now, when they died and the couple started quarreling, wouldn't that be a joke in the whole capital? Even if they didn't quarrel, they would be strangers to each other, and she would not be at ease even if she died!
After much thought, she ordered her maid to get information outside. When she learned that Lu Sanlang had been called to the study by Lu Wan as soon as he returned, her eldest son and second son were also called. Although she knew that as a mother, it would be best not to take sides to avoid embarrassing the four of them, she couldn't help herself after thinking about it, and finally went there in person.
As a result, just like Lu Wan stopped in front of her door before, she heard a noise before she even reached the study room, and she stopped immediately. Because from the voices inside, it was the eldest and second sons who always thought highly of themselves, apologizing to their younger brother in a humble manner!
The fat boy never expected that his two brothers would actually apologize to him, especially the eldest brother who was reviewing with a heavy face his selfishness of letting people in to cause trouble for him, and the second brother who was reflecting on not being blinded by envy, jealousy and hatred. He couldn't help but want to turn his head to look outside the door to see if the sun was rising from the west.
However, seeing his father's gloomy face, the little fat boy finally said very obediently: "My two brothers were just joking with me. It's just a small matter. Why do you need to apologize?"
However, after saying such a beautiful thing, he suddenly changed the subject and said, "Besides, the emperor is here today, and I will give them a taste of their own medicine and beat those four troublemakers into a pulp. The blackboards that my teacher and I have have proved our victory. It is worth it that I had thirty or fifty blackboards made in advance to prevent this from happening."
"After today, anyone who wants to provoke our teachers and students will think twice before doing so!"
I made thirty or fifty blackboards in advance...
This time, it was Lu Wan's turn to feel the majestic expression on his face freeze. He felt that Ah Liu's blackboards on the left and right were very strange, just like a street magic trick, but he didn't expect that his fat son was well prepared, and Ye Mengqiu and the other four just happened to hit the sharp spearhead!
After Lu Sanlang finished his sharp words, he smiled and bowed to his two brothers who were smiling unnaturally: "I was ignorant in the past, and my elder and second brothers also suffered a lot. I haven't apologized to you yet, but today's matter is over. Not to mention you, even those four Ye Mengqiu, we don't know each other without fighting. I just sent someone to send them a few boxes of books."
In Lu Wan's opinion, the smile on her fat son's face at this moment was as cunning as a fox's when it was planning to eat a fat chicken.
"In that box of books, there are not only the Four Elements Jade Mirror and the Mirror of the Sea that I mentioned at the coming-of-age ceremony, but also all the books in the Ten Mathematical Classics that have not been lost, and there are also many other mathematical classics. I dare say that in this capital, apart from my San San Bookstore, no one else can produce as many mathematical books as I can."
"As for the New Edition of Ge's Mathematics, I won't give it to you, lest others accuse me of having ulterior motives."
The little fat boy said with a chuckle: "Besides, I sent it in the name of a teacher, and also sent a message that it is not easy to find talented people in mathematics, and everyone should help each other. In this way, repaying evil with kindness, if someone talks nonsense outside, I wonder if Ye Mengqiu and the others will go out and speak fair words, or keep silent , or speak ill of them?"
