Chapter 124
Chapter 124
The diameter of the sun in this world was different from that on Earth. Shen Lang had roughly estimated this world's solar diameter based on Earth's. The great scholar stared at Shen Lang in disbelief.
‘What a truly remarkable man. An astonishing person.’
After a long moment, the great scholar posed a question to Shen Lang.
“Young Master, may I ask your age this year?”
“I’m nineteen. Ah, no. Eighteen.”
The great scholar did not understand Shen Lang’s humor. He continued his praise.
“A genius is a genius indeed! A genius, and a tremendous, magnificent one at that! I have never in my life seen such a young genius. Young Lady, it is now you who is unworthy of him.”
Mulan was speechless.
‘Master, you were saying something quite different just a moment ago.’
Shen Lang asked the great scholar.
“Master, may I now enter the Ends of the Earth Sea Pavilion?”
“Young Master, you are welcome. You have become a guest who may part the curtains of our Ends of the Earth Sea Pavilion.”
The Master's reference to a 'guest who could part the curtains' was an allusion to the kind of regular patron intimate enough to be welcomed past the curtains of a courtesan's bedchamber.
Even a master of academia knew humor. He simply chose his audience for such jests. Following the master’s lead, Shen Lang entered the hall of martial arts and scholarly works. He had stepped into a sea of countless martial arts manuals and academic texts.
“Yuniang, we have a guest.”
As the great scholar called out, a voluptuous beauty who looked to be over thirty swayed as she walked over. Dressed in a form-fitting scholar's robe, she looked quite alluring. But while her features were beautiful, her hair was a mess, and the dark circles under her eyes created an indescribable image. She cursed as she approached.
“Is it another old geezer? Have all the smart young men in the world died? What book does he want to borrow? Spit it out. This lady doesn’t have time to waste. I’ll give you two hours to find it yourself. My hands are too weak to help you look.”
After shrieking in a shrill voice, she lifted her head, and her large, beautiful eyes fell upon Shen Lang. For a moment, she seemed to lose her senses. Her lovely eyes appeared to brighten for an instant before she let out a startled cry and quickly fled. Shen Lang was taken aback.
‘What was that all about?’
But a moment later, she returned. As if she were a different person, her hair was now neatly arranged, and the dark circles were gone. She had applied rouge to her cheeks and colored her lips red. She had even changed into a more charming blue skirt. The female scholar spoke in a seductive, coquettish voice.
“Young Master, that disheveled woman you saw just now was my older sister. She’s always been coarse and rude, so I hope you’ll pay her no mind.”
‘Her older sister? The two of you have the same hip circumference, the same bust size, and even the trigonometric functions of your inner thighs are identical. But if you say so, I suppose it must be true.’
The beautiful scholar asked in a sweet voice.
“What book would you like to borrow? Or perhaps a manual you wish to see? You can rest comfortably here, and I will bring it to you. Young Master, may I bring you some tea or snacks?”
“I wish to borrow the *Heavenly Meteor* sword style.”
The beautiful scholar was surprised but answered sweetly.
“We have it. I’ll bring it to you right away.”
***
Inside the grand estate of the Xu Clan.
Countless bolts of silk were piled up like mountains. Sixty percent of it was purple silk, and forty percent was rainbow silk. Dozens of merchants from the Western Regions stared at the silks with entranced eyes.
‘So beautiful! This is a masterpiece from the heavens. This isn't silk; it's a mountain of gold coins.’
They could only imagine the sensation these silks would cause when they brought them back to their own countries. Why were there only merchants from the Western Regions? While the Xu Clan could sell directly in the markets of the State of Yue, they couldn't open their own shops in the western nations, so they had to sell wholesale to these merchants.
“Bring the goods!”
At Xu Qianqian’s command, servants brought out dozens of purple robes and rainbow skirts.
“This is a small gift to mark our first meeting.”
This, too, was an old custom. With every transaction, the Xu Clan would gift the merchants clothes made from their silk. Many of the merchants from the Western Regions had not come to Xuanwu City alone but had brought their lovers. That was why rainbow skirts were also presented as gifts. Upon receiving them, the dozens of merchants and their companions couldn't wait and returned to their rooms to change. As expected, the clothes were gorgeous and beautiful. The women in the rainbow skirts, in particular, looked like celestial fairies.
“Everyone, are they to your liking?”
The merchants from the Western Regions praised them endlessly.
“We like them. We are more than satisfied.”
“Then, shall we proceed with the official delivery and payment?”
The merchants from the Western Regions agreed one after another. They were extremely anxious. They wanted to take these silks back to their countries as quickly as possible, open up the market, and make a fortune. They prepared to make the official payment. This meant that over a hundred thousand gold coins would flow into the Xu Clan’s coffers at once. Even though they had bought the silkworm cocoons at three times the original price, it was still a profitable venture.
Rebuilding the workshop was not urgent; the Xu Clan intended to use this money to help Zhang Chong secure the position of Provincial Governor. Xu Qianqian let out a long sigh of relief. After so many days of struggle, she had finally succeeded. The Xu Clan had finally overcome this crisis. Not only was the Xu Clan’s reputation as the best in the silk industry intact, but it had grown even more renowned than before.
Lately, she had been having nightmares almost every night. The dream was always the same: the color would suddenly fade from the silk. So, before the delivery, she had selected silk samples and had her workers test them countless times. They dried them in the wind, exposed them to the sun, scorched them with fire, washed them with saltwater, boiled them in hot water—it seemed they had used every method imaginable. After confirming that the silk did not lose its color, all that remained was to successfully complete this transaction.
Xu Qianqian’s eyes grew moist. It had been so difficult. These had not been easy times. She turned to look at her fiancé, Zhang Jin, and gave him a tender smile. Zhang Jin responded with a smile full of deep affection, and he too finally felt a sense of relief. With the Xu Clan's success, the money needed for his father to ascend to the position of Provincial Governor of Yan Province would be secured. Most importantly for him, he could now marry Xu Qianqian, and he wouldn't have to do that terrible thing.
Xu Qianqian felt triumphant and thought to herself.
‘Shen Lang, you bastard. You blind fool, unable to distinguish value. How could you give me two priceless dyeing formulas? Did you think burning down our workshop would be the end of the Xu Clan? An ignorant fool like you would never understand. The two formulas are far more valuable than the workshop. You failed to destroy our Xu Clan; you only made us stronger. Especially me, Xu Qianqian.
Our Xu Clan has not fallen, so now it’s your turn to suffer, Shen Lang. Shen Lang, I’ll be waiting for the day you die! I’ll watch just how miserably you die. That day will come soon. The day you’re finished will come soon.’
Xu Qianqian reveled in her joy. But just then! One of the merchants from the Western Regions suddenly let out a scream.
“Agh, agh!”
Startled, Xu Qianqian saw the cause. Countless hives and blisters had broken out on the bodies of the merchants and their companions. Some of their faces turned red and began to swell, distorting their features. Some even seemed to be having an asthma attack, unable to breathe at all.
“Ah, agh!”
“This silk is poisoned, it’s poisoned…”
Of course, the silk was not poisoned. Shen Lang had simply added several allergens to the dye formulas. Substances specifically chosen to target the physiology of people from the Western Regions.
At that moment, it felt as if Shen Lang’s voice could be heard from somewhere.
‘Did you really think I, Shen Lang, would use a method you, Xu Qianqian, could detect?’
Allergies can be mild for some and severe for others. A mild case might just result in hives, but a severe one could be fatal. On Earth, there were countless allergens. Metal allergies, pollen allergies, mango allergies, dust mite allergies, and even latex allergies existed.
America’s *Medical Daily* had selected the four most dangerous allergens, which included alcohol, shellfish, and peanuts. In any case, allergies were generally divided by race and region. Typically, people living by the sea did not have severe seafood allergies, but those from landlocked countries far from the coast who did not eat seafood were more likely to have allergic reactions to it.
Eastern people were more prone to pollen or dust mite allergies, while Westerners were more susceptible to peanut allergies. That was why you often saw people with peanut allergies in American TV shows; for them, even touching a little peanut powder or peanut oil could cause their entire body to break out in hives and their face to swell up like a pig’s head.
There was even a real case where a woman died from an allergic reaction simply by kissing her boyfriend. Her boyfriend had eaten food containing peanut oil. Besides peanuts, another allergen that could pose a fatal risk to Westerners was the toxins from shellfish.
The merchants from the Western Regions who had come to purchase goods from Xu Qianqian were all Caucasian and from landlocked countries. They were more likely than Easterners to be allergic to things like peanuts and shellfish. Shen Lang had mixed these two types of substances into the dye formulas. The rainbow dye formula, in particular, contained dozens more allergens than the purple one. There were nine different allergens specifically targeting people from the Western Regions, including extracts from over three types of shellfish.
In ancient China, peanuts weren’t seen until the Ming Dynasty, but in this world, they had been available for about three hundred years. So, peanut oil was not left out of the formula. If Xu Qianqian had had enough time, she would have had her family's master dyers meticulously screen and test the ingredients of these formulas. They might have removed certain substances or changed the ratios. But she was short on time.
After the workshop burned down, she was pressed to prepare the goods by the delivery deadline, living with a sharp sword hanging over her head. She had spent a fortune to hire more than three times the usual number of workers, who toiled day and night to finally produce all the silk on time.
Worried that Shen Lang might try to sabotage her, she had focused solely on the possibility of the silk’s color fading. Fading was the most fatal flaw in the silk industry. So, when preparing countermeasures, she had only considered the possibility of the color running.
As for allergies? She didn't even have such a concept. In an ancient society, how many people would know about allergies? But why weren't any of the master dyers allergic?
These workers were from the lowest, most humble class. Who would care if their bodies broke out in hives? To put it sadly, allergies could be considered a disease of the rich. Even on Earth, just a decade or so ago, who would have paid any mind to common allergies, aside from fatal drug allergies?
For these lowest-class dyers, it was considered nothing even if they suffered burns from fire and had a layer of skin peel off, let alone breaking out in hives from an allergy. Thus, it was difficult to discover any allergenic substances in the workshop. Even if someone happened to have an allergic reaction, that person would have thought nothing of it.
But this time was different. This time, the allergies targeted the noble people handling the silk. When such reactions appeared on nobles, an allergy was no longer nothing—it became a very big deal.
The wicked Shen Lang had mixed eight or nine allergens specifically targeting Caucasians from the Western Regions into the dye formulas.
‘One of them is bound to be a perfect match for you.’