CHAPTER 194: 132, I’M SU, NOT WRITING POEMS ANYMORE (6K CHAPTERS)_4

"Let’s have a chat at the Roadside teahouse."

Xu Xing became interested.

He never expected that the storyteller regaling the street with tales about him was none other than Scholar Su, with whom he shared a bond from their time as prison friends.

"Please."

Scholar Su stuffed the reward money from the large ceramic bowl into his pocket and tucked the white paper fan into his waist. With his hands clasped behind his back, he followed Xu Xing into a Roadside teahouse, where they ordered a high seat and a pot of premium tea.

After a few cups of tea, Scholar Su opened up. "I don’t want to be an official anymore. In the first year of Tiande, when you conquered the realm, you invited me to serve in the new court. I deliberately avoided the Imperial Envoy you sent and hid outside my house. I waited for three days and nights until the Imperial Envoy left before I returned home."

"Later, I came to Shenjing. Finding storytelling interesting, I took it up."

"Being an official holds no real appeal."

"As the saying goes, ’A great hermit hides in the city, a lesser one in the wilderness.’"

He laughed heartily, though his laughter was tinged with bitterness.

After several setbacks in his official career, he realized he simply wasn’t cut out to be an official. If he entered the court, he would only end up writing poetry and songs for the New Emperor. Not become a Zaifu and serve the country and its people. He understood that his attempts to serve the country and its people would actually harm the common people. He knew he was incapable of truly supporting the state. When Emperor Chongming was in power, he could at least rail against the unenlightened ruler and lament how his own ambitions were stifled. However, after Xu Xing rescued the populace from their suffering and established a New dynasty, Xu Xing, who knew him well, sent an Imperial Envoy to offer him an idle position. He immediately understood his own limitations. From then on, he abandoned any thought of entering the court to become an official.

"Storytelling..."

Seeing that the tea was finished, Xu Xing took out Illusion Mist Spiritual Tea from his Storage Bag, pinched a few leaves, and tossed them into the pot. Then, he cast a spell, summoning fresh spring water, and began to brew the tea with focused attention.

While using a spell to maintain the perfect temperature for brewing, he advised, "Storytelling is something most scholars consider beneath them. The proper path for a man of letters is poetry. Storytelling can hardly be considered high art. Scholar Su, why subject yourself to this?"

Storytelling was considered a lowly profession. Let alone a former Hanlin Academician like Scholar Su, even ordinary scholars without official titles would not willingly degrade themselves by going to the streets to tell stories. At most, they might resort to selling their calligraphy. To abandon oneself so completely was unthinkable.

"Mr. Xu..." Scholar Su retorted, "So what if it’s poetry, and so what if it’s storytelling? They’re both just ways of peddling words. What real difference is there between high and low, noble and base?"

Scholar Su’s eyes were fixed on the teapot hovering above the Table cases. Those tea leaves Xu Xing just pinched... if I’m not mistaken, that must be immortal tea!

He had few particular pleasures in life, but he was quite fond of satisfying his palate.

Wiping drool from the corner of his mouth, he scoffed, "This Su no longer writes poetry!"

He snorted a few times.

Not writing poetry anymore?

Xu Xing silently regarded Scholar Su.

He didn’t know if Scholar Su was speaking in a fit of pique or if he truly meant it. But he suspected the reason Scholar Su no longer wrote poetry was likely connected to the poem Princess Anren had sought from him. A scholar’s integrity, though seemingly intangible, could sometimes be palpably real. Emperor Chongming had lost his empire due to his incompetence. But it was also closely related to the way Emperor Chongming treated his ministers, refusing to grant them any dignity. He treated his ministers like his personal slaves!

"Mr. Xu..." Scholar Su began, then paused.

After a moment of silence, he broached a new topic, asking about the matter that concerned him most. "Were you truly recuperating from an injury In the palace all this time? Or... did you go to seek the Immortal Path?"

In his view, Xu Xing was no unenlightened or mediocre ruler. Having been an official himself, Xu Xing understood not only the ways of officialdom but also the principle that a country could not go a single day without its sovereign. He wouldn’t have easily ceased governing. Especially not when the dynasty had only recently been established. Now, seeing the spell Xu Xing had cast so effortlessly, he had a rough idea of what Xu Xing might have been doing these past twelve years. But he couldn’t be certain, so he hoped to get an answer directly from Xu Xing.

"Seeking the Immortal Path..." Xu Xing replied calmly, glancing at Scholar Su.

Although the Flying Feather Immortal Palace decreed that immortals and mortals should not interfere with one another, these prohibitions weren’t overly strict. If not for his Human King physique and Bright King Body, Ye Jeming would have slain him with a single sword strike long ago. He would never have had the chance to attack Shenjing and overthrow the Song Family Dynasty. Therefore, revealing a little about it wouldn’t violate the Sect prohibitions.