In the end, under her mother's watchful eye, Jiang Mianmian wrote a proper, serious translation.
Because her mother would really hit her.
o(╥﹏╥)o
Inspector He looked at the rewritten translation with a complex expression.
Isn't this quite good?
How could she translate it like that before, constantly wishing death upon people? This child's thinking seems a bit problematic.
Meanwhile, her elder brother Jiang Feng saw those translations wishing death upon people and sighed inwardly.
It's not Mianmian's fault; she's just like him.
Sometimes he also wants people to die.
He still remembers that night when the family took refuge in a cave.
The things his father taught him in that cave.
After all this time, he had gained new insights.
He thought this was quite good.
Bullying others is always better than being bullied.
The Analects his sister read had great power.
Inspector He, with a conflicted expression, put the tea leaves back in his pocket.
This morning when he woke up, he counted the hairs on his pillow. Usually, there would be many fallen hairs, but today there were only half as many.
Although he didn't pursue immortality elixirs like the Emperor, he still valued health preservation.
How long an official can serve depends first on how long they can live.
He pondered for a moment and realized that the only thing noticeably different in his diet was that tea.
When he woke up in the morning, there was no bad breath. Previously, he would wake up with terrible breath, feeling like all the bad stuff in his stomach had risen to his mouth overnight.
This morning, his mouth felt clean and fresh.
When he sat up, he didn't feel the usual heaviness or dizziness in his head. Instead, it felt natural, like ten years ago, and he got up in one swift motion.
Inspector He felt that these tea leaves must be extraordinary.
So he took them back.
Learning that she had been teasing him, Inspector He found it a bit amusing.
This child is truly mischievous.
Then he thought, with such a mischievous daughter, Jiang Changtian would have his hands full in the future. Thinking this way, he felt much more balanced.
Today was also Jiang Mianmian's day off.
The sad thing was that her interest classes were basically all full.
She had to learn to play the zither, play chess, practice calligraphy, learn painting, horseback riding, carriage driving, archery, sword practice, soft whip techniques, and cultural studies were just a small part of it all.
It was really quite challenging.
Jiang Mianmian truly had no musical talent, being tone-deaf. Her chess skills were average, her calligraphy was mediocre, but her painting was passable, though her style was a bit unpredictable. She loved horseback riding, enjoyed carriage driving, liked archery, enjoyed sword practice, and her soft whip techniques made whooshing sounds.
It was clear that she had severe subject preferences, favoring physical education classes...
Her intelligence was average, with no genetic mutations.
She was just an ordinary girl.
The need to become someone, to meet everyone's expectations, to have a profession that could support oneself, was just a matter of course.
But now she found that she had no pressure to make a living, her parents doted on her excessively, and even her elder brother, sister, and great-aunt didn't really have any true expectations of her.
So she began to live more freely.
Growing up slowly, living her days slowly.
Finding ways to make her life more comfortable, slowly changing some aspects of her lifestyle.
No grand ambitions, but many small hobbies.
She didn't like embroidery, but she enjoyed drawing designs for others to embroider.
The advantage of being a young lady was that she could like or dislike things as she pleased.
Of course, she knew that when her father asked her to learn these things, he just wanted her to have a general understanding, enough to manage in public and avoid embarrassment. He was more concerned about her not feeling unhappy, everything else was secondary.
To be honest, she used to be a person who cared about others' opinions.
If someone said something negative about her, she would dwell on it for a long time, wondering if she should change, how to change, and if the person would approve after she changed.
Her father was much more open-minded in this regard.
He wasn't afraid of what people said.
If someone criticized him, he would make them find the reason themselves, insisting that the critic must be wrong.
Her perfunctory zither skills allowed her to pluck out half a tune. With another month of practice, she might be able to piece together a whole song.
In the future, she could use this song to entertain her parents, which should be barely sufficient.
She didn't need to learn singing.
Her voice was quite good, but she was always off-key. She sang happily, but the listeners wanted to cry.
Her family didn't want to applaud insincerely anymore, nor did they want to hurt her self-esteem.
Strangely, her elder brother actually had to learn this subject.
In this era, quite a few men could sing. According to her brother, when good friends dined together and were in high spirits, they would also sing a song, considering it a refined activity.
She had learned chess halfway, knowing just enough to play.
Calligraphy, however, was practiced daily, as it was part of her studies.
This required patience, and she treated it as a way to cultivate her temperament.
As for painting, after Jiang Mianmian had scared away several teachers, no more came. Jiang Changtian taught her personally.
Now her father had personally tricked a teacher into coming.
And even gifted him tea leaves.
Jiang Mianmian knew that this teacher must be very important.
Not so easy to fool.
Inspector He, having received good tea, knew that he wouldn't stay in Jingzhou for long. Even if he accepted this advantageous student, there wouldn't be many opportunities to teach.
He had to teach something; he couldn't just take advantage of people.
So Inspector He gave a one-on-one lesson.
This lesson was undoubtedly of high value.
It was almost equivalent to being personally taught by the modern-day Procurator-General of the Supreme People's Procuratorate or the Secretary of the Discipline Inspection Commission.
Inspector He was also the top scholar in the imperial examinations of his year.
For others, being the top scholar was the highest honor, but for him, it was just an insignificant starting point.
Being able to converse with such a person was certainly immensely beneficial.
Jiang Changtian felt that his living environment was narrow and his experience shallow. Even if he wanted to pour out all his knowledge to his children, there wasn't much he could offer. He hoped his children could receive better education, see further, and stand more firmly.
As for why he invited Inspector He to be a teacher for Mianmian instead of Feng, this showed Jiang Changtian's emotional intelligence.
Teaching a young girl had no need for avoiding suspicion, it all depended on Inspector He's mood.
If he were to teach young Feng, there would be many more complications, which would be troublesome for everyone.
Knowing what can't be done and refraining from it, knowing what can be done and making an effort to push it forward.
In the afternoon.
The sound of a spring bubbling.
The tea room could hear the spring.
Inspector He listened carefully to the sound of flowing water and asked Mianmian, "Why did you create this sound?"
Jiang Mianmian replied, "The gentle sound of the spring is good for sleep."
Inspector He nodded. He had already figured out this child's sensibilities. If she were his own daughter, he might not be able to resist reaching for the bamboo cane.
Fortunately, she was Jiang Changtian's child.
Thinking that she was someone else's child, to be honest, he quite appreciated her personality.
In this world where everyone is busy, being able to sleep well is actually a great blessing.
It's just that most people spend half their lives rushing around before realizing the importance of good sleep.
The young girl before him, whose beauty was already exceptional, surpassing her predecessors, with looks even more stunning than Jiang Changtian's, without the weathering of time, pure and lovely, was already thinking about how to sleep well.
"Life is short and full of wonders, how can you just think about sleeping?" Inspector He said.
Next door, the eavesdropping Jiang family... Father Jiang Changtian, Mother Qin Luoxia, elder brother Jiang Feng, and great-aunt Yin Ping. Jiang Yu wasn't there as she was too noisy and couldn't hold back, and neither was Meng Shaoxia, as his sense of morality made him uncomfortable with eavesdropping.
"Uncle He is right, why sleep long in life when we'll have eternal rest in death," Jiang Mianmian nodded. (Note 1)
Next door, Jiang Feng's eyes moistened.
Jiang Changtian remained silent. This was also why he couldn't bring himself to teach his daughter. The thought of her truly entering eternal rest at such a young age cut his heart like a knife. He couldn't bear to say a harsh word, but he was genuinely worried. If in the future, when he and Luoxia were gone, would she be able to live well?
Among all the children, Jiang Changtian felt that Mianmian had the most complex thoughts.
Those eyes, from the moment she was born, seemed to sparkle with ideas.
A child who is sensitive and thoughtful doesn't necessarily live happily.
It might be better to be like Yu, who was thick-skinned. As long as they were strong enough, they didn't worry about her being bullied.
Inspector He hadn't expected that a casual conversation would lead to such a profound statement: "Why sleep long in life when we'll have eternal rest in death."
It seemed ordinary at first, but the more he thought about it, the deeper its meaning became.
It could even be used to teach himself.
He was stunned for a moment.
Then he smiled and said, "Your translation of the Analects is very interesting, quite decisive and ruthless. If Confucius knew about it in the afterlife, he might crawl out of his grave to debate with you."
Jiang Mianmian said seriously, "Confucius was said to be from the State of Lu. He traveled to many countries with his students. During the Spring and Autumn period, there was constant warfare, so students speculate that Confucius must have been at least eight feet tall, physically strong, and extremely robust. He spent every day on the road, enduring wind and rain, scorching sun, so he must have been a burly man with dark, rough skin and a big beard. Only then could he have safely led his students to various countries to lecture."
Inspector He's face cracked open.
In his mind, Confucius was like himself: tall and thin, elegant, with a fine beard and long robe, speaking only in classics.
But after hearing this little one's explanation, he found it somewhat reasonable.
However, if Confucius was a dark, burly man, reading the Analects now... somehow, it became difficult to face.
It was over. He couldn't discuss classical literature with her anymore. Any further discussion would only ruin it.
He now dared not even think about Boyi and Zhong Ziqi.
Next door, Jiang Feng nodded, thinking his sister's words made sense. Confucius must have had superior combat skills to travel the world. At any time, martial prowess is fundamental.
Qin Luoxia thought, "The child's words may be rough, but the reasoning isn't wrong. She's right."
Jiang Changtian thought, "Confucius would cry if he heard this."
The great-aunt thought, "The young mistress is born rebellious, caring for no one's opinion."
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(Note 1: This sentence is from a work by Republican-era author Xiao Hong)
