Harem for a living

Chapter 3

"Then Miss Chen can draw a picture for us." The smiling old lady said, Chen Manrou responded, and a little eunuch came over and led Chen Manrou to the side.There are quite a lot of beautiful women who are outstanding in calligraphy and painting, so there are brushes, ink, paper and inkstones on the other side that are convenient for beautiful women to write and paint.

Chen Manrou rubbed the ink strips herself, and smeared them on the paper casually.She has studied serious Chinese painting in her life, that is, the kind of brush and ink painting that values ​​charm, so this layer of black ink is the most basic.

Taking advantage of this time, the third show girl was also asked to paint. Her talent is dancing, accompanied by her own little maid.Chen Manrou listened to the music and painted, but her speed was much faster. When the beautiful girl finished dancing, she also stopped her pen.

"Miss Liu is really good at dancing. Have you been practicing for many years?" The kind old lady asked with a smile. years."

"It's a person who can bear his temper, and I will reward you with this pearl hairpin." The kind old lady rewarded the pearl hairpin directly without asking other people's opinions. Liu Qingqing was a little nervous, but she didn't dare to look at the other The expressions of the two of them hurriedly took the pearl hairpin from the maid's hand, and hurried out.

At this moment, the little eunuch came over and sent Chen Manrou's painting up, and unfolded it for the three people above to see.The kind one nodded with a smile on his face: "That's right, the pen is written with spirit, and the plum blossoms bloom freely and unrestrainedly, it's a free and easy one."

"It's really good. How long have you been learning to paint?" asked the serious old lady. Chen Manrou muttered in her heart that the old lady's eyes were very sharp, and she replied softly: "My daughter has been learning to paint for more than ten years. , From the moment you start holding a pen, you start to learn to paint.”

"Yo, this one is even more patient." The queen raised her eyebrows and smiled slightly: "Can you teach me, sir?"

"My daughter has been loved by her parents since she was a child. My father asked my daughter to worship Master Lu as her husband when she was three years old." Chen Manrou expressed her attitude, pointing out that she is still very useful. Doted on by the whole family, with Chen Manrou in hand, the Chen family must have their heart for the emperor.

The smile on the queen's face couldn't tell what it meant, but the kindly smiling old lady smiled more happily, but it was still the sullen old lady who asked, "Master Lu? But Lu Caiyi?"

"Mr.'s name is the top color and the bottom clothes." Chen Manrou was slightly surprised, her husband had been in Zhending Mansion when she was three years old, this old lady didn't come out of the deep palace, but she still knew her husband's name, could it be that, What was the relationship between the two?Or, is my husband so famous?

"Is the old lady okay now?" Before Chen Manrou could analyze anything, the sullen old lady seemed to relax a little, and asked casually. Chen Manrou lowered her head and replied: "Mr. I just like to draw a few strokes, and occasionally go out for an outing, life is very pleasant."

The sullen old lady nodded and said nothing more.Then the smiling and kind old lady said: "It's not bad, this pearl hairpin will reward you, go back and get ready."

"Yes, my servant thanked the Empress Dowager, and thanked the Empress." Chen Manrou took the pearl hairpin, saluted, walked back behind the little eunuch, and followed out the door.Just when I went out, I heard a sharp voice from the gate of the yard: "The emperor is here!"

The girls in the yard immediately knelt together, some of them shrunk their bodies as much as possible, some deliberately showed their snow-white necks, some showed their flexible waists, and some even pouted their buttocks high.

Chen Manrou also knelt down, letting the railings outside the house block her, and then secretly looked at the light blue figure that walked in. The first thing she saw was the feet, which were also light blue, with auspicious clouds embroidered with gold thread.On the belt is a green dragon jade pendant, and on the other side is a plain purse. The white jade buckle is very beautiful. The waist of the light blue belt is very thin, but it also has a very powerful feeling. .

Visually, the height is about 1.8 meters, but not more than two meters.As for the face, Chen Manrou didn't see it because she was kneeling in the wrong direction. Although she could see the gate of the courtyard, the emperor had already walked to the gate of the main hall.

When the emperor entered the hall, a large group of beautiful women lying on their stomachs in the courtyard got up one after another.Chen Manrou also got up very simply, stuffed a purse into the little eunuch who brought her out, then turned around and left, her eldest brother might still be waiting at the gate of the palace.

"Brother!" Sure enough, as soon as she came out of the palace gate, Chen Manrou saw her elder brother's figure. As soon as she saw her go out of the palace gate, she ran over quickly and stretched out her hand to rub Chen Manrou's head: "How is it? Can someone make things difficult for you? "

"No, I don't know anyone, and they don't know me, so why would they embarrass me?" Chen Manrou wrinkled her nose and hugged Chen Huaijin's arm: "Brother, let's go back quickly, I'm hungry."

She entered the palace early in the morning, it was already past noon, and her stomach was almost rumbling with hunger.As soon as Chen Huaijin heard that her baby sister was hungry, she quickly pulled Chen Manrou to the side of her carriage, helped Chen Manrou into the carriage, and followed her up. After giving a few orders to the servant, the carriage turned around and left for Chen's residence.

In the lobby of the Chen Mansion, old Mrs. Chen and Mrs. Chen, who had half white hair, were very nervous. Mrs. Chen would get up from time to time to go to the door to have a look. Mrs. Chen was very helpless: "Just sit down, didn't you Have you seen the sign of Manrou? It’s noon for Manrou’s turn, and it’s just after noon, so I’m sure I’ll have to wait a while before coming back.”

"That's not necessarily the case. What if the ones in front are sent out as soon as they go in?" Mrs. Chen turned her head and glanced at Mrs. Chen, turned the prayer beads in her hand, and asked with some concern: "Old man, tell me, Will our Manrou be made things difficult for me?"

"Who dares to make things difficult?" Mrs. Chen snorted, "Although our Chen family has not been very prominent in the past two years, we are still a big family. When Kaihua comes back in two years, the emperor will definitely give Kaihua a title. Who is not a human being? Who would offend our Chen family if they don't have eyes?"

"You old man, the older you get, the more you can't figure it out!" Mrs. Chen walked up to Mrs. Chen, and said with a bit of resentment: "You are talking about your men outside, and I am talking about the inner house and harem! But women have the final say! You said that our Kaihua will be promoted, but who would know about those seventeen-year-old girls?"

When Mrs. Chen said this, Mrs. Chen was also a little worried: "No way, isn't the emperor's attitude quite obvious? He even rewarded us with things a few days ago, and the holy family is in full swing..."

Mrs. Chen had nothing to say to this man who never interfered in the backyard, so she went to guard the door again.This time it was a coincidence, not long after watching it, I saw my precious granddaughter bouncing back with her elder brother.

"Grandmother, do you miss me?" Chen Manrou was very excited when she saw Mrs. Chen. She jumped in front of Mrs. Chen and smiled with her face up. Mrs. Chen nodded with a smile and was about to speak when she suddenly tensed face, and tapped Chen Manrou's forehead: "How old are you, and you still don't have the strength to walk steadily! When you go back to the palace, if you continue to behave like this, those people won't find you a nanny to reason with!"

"Oh, grandma, am I at my own home?" Chen Manrou shook old lady Chen's arm and made a face at old lady Chen. Old lady Chen coughed lightly: "Manrou was a smart girl since childhood, Don't worry too much, she knows what to do."

Mrs. Chen glared at Mrs. Chen again, then turned her head and ordered the maid to bring the lunch, and then seized the time to ask Chen Manrou about her experience in the palace.When Chen Manrou mentioned Su Rongrong and Zhang Wanting, Mrs. Chen frowned.

After Chen Manrou had lunch, the old lady Chen pulled Chen Manrou and said: "I know you are smart, otherwise, if I asked you to enter the palace, you would not easily agree. At the beginning, you blamed me, right? "

"Grandmother..." Chen Manrou didn't know what to say, if she wanted to complain, there must be some.Originally, I thought that I was traveling through time as a rich and idle person. After all, since childhood, my parents doted on me, my elder brother loved me, and my younger brother was caring and caring. I didn't even have an aunt in my family.That life was like a dream.

But when he was 15 years old, suddenly there was a bolt from the blue. In order to survive the family, he had to enter the palace for a draft, and then become one of the emperor's many women.A beautiful and free life, I said goodbye to myself before it even started, and there is a trap of life and death waiting for me, can I not resent it?
After thinking for two months, I finally figured out that there has never been a free lunch in this world.Since childhood, he grew up in fine clothes and fine food, and he has never been wronged in the slightest. When the family is in trouble, unless he is made of stone, who can bear to ignore the family because of his own selfishness?

Having lived in this era for more than ten years, she deeply understands the weight of the word clan. It can be said that there is a clan and there is an individual.No clan is like duckweed without roots.After enjoying wealth and leisure for more than ten years, isn't it normal to use entering the palace to repay the love and sympathy of relatives?

"Grandmother, I really didn't figure it out at first, but later I realized that my Chen family, like Duke An and Ying Ying, also made great contributions to the founding of the country. It's just that Gaozu's generation was on the wrong team, and the Chen family just now He didn't fall down. In grandfather's life, the Chen family no longer has any titles, and it's all thanks to grandfather and father's hard work that father has come to the present."

What Chen Manrou knew was all said by her mother.She was unwilling to enter the palace back then, and then Mother Chen put her arms around her and told little by little what happened to the Chen family before.

(End of this chapter)