16 The Beauty Trap (part 2)

The queen ordered Ying to stay at a house several li east of Mount Kuaji. There, Ying met many beautiful girls who had the same fate as her. Among those girls were Xi Shi and Zheng Dan.

Three girls stayed in one room, and Ying happened to be in one place with Xi Shi and Zheng Dan.

That night when Ying took off her shoes, she saw her jade bracelet on her left foot and became sentimental. "Father, the queen said that I'm an unpolished jade. Three years from now, I would be a well-polished jade. Today I talked with the queen, three years from now, I will have a banquet not only with the queen but also with the king!" She said in her mind.

When Ying lived in her mother's house, sometimes she would not be able to eat because they were too poor. She had to weave and work in the field to help her mother. Living in the palace, she didn't have to worry about what to eat. But life wasn't easy too. Every day she had to learn how to dance and play music, how to walk elegantly, how to dress up, how to read and write, and other things. That's the first time for Ying to learn how to read and write.

Among the other girls, Ying was the most backward one.

Shi Yiguang and Zheng Dan came from pretty well families. At least they had learned about manners before. They could quickly get along. While for Ying, she didn't even know how to eat correctly. The girls often amazed when they saw how uneducated she was.

One day, Shi Yiguang saw a cat. She thought that the cat was cute and was about to approach the cat. She had never thought that the cat was a mother cat who was breastfeeding her kitten.

Shi Yiguang was about to squat to caress the cat when the cat jumped and about to scratch her face. Luckily she managed to cover her face. Yet the cat was still scratching her hands.

The other girls were panic and afraid, but they could only scream and didn't know what to do. Ying saw the incident, and she used her hand to grasp the cat's neck and moved it away from Shi Yiguang. Yet the cat was very ferocious and started to shift its target to Ying. The cat struggled to get free, and Ying had to throw the cat far away.

Shi Yiguang cried as she's shocked. Meanwhile, Zheng Dan saw that Ying's hand also got scratch from the cat and bled some blood. "Ying, are you alright?"

"I'm alright!" Ying said, and she asked Shi Yiguang, "Xi Shi, don't cry! Come, let's go and have your wound treated!"

The other two girls then realized that although Ying was a bit backward, inside her heart, she was a kindhearted girl. Those three girls became good friends after since.

Shi Yiguang and Zheng Dan had the opposite character. Shi Yiguang was gentle and loved girly things, while Zheng Dan had a strong personality. Shi Yiguang loved embroidery, while Zheng Dan loved swordplay. Shi Yiguang was quiet and melancholy, while Zheng Dan was cheerful and outgoing.

Ying was a combination of those two girls. She loved swordplay, music, and reading. She loved to learn a lot of things. She was even interested to learn how to embroider when she saw Shi Yiguang made an exquisite handkerchief embroidery. But unlike Shi Yiguang, who loved dancing, Ying hated dancing.

In the second year, from sixty-five girls, only thirty girls could continue the training. And the next training was at Fan Li's house, where the girls would learn further on literature and music. Fan Li had the responsibility to teach the girls how to compose songs in guqin, poems, and teach them how to convey their feelings through their eyes. After all, only men knew what men want. And Fan Li had the responsibility to teach the girls how to be the most enchanting and irresistible girls on earth.

That was the second time for Ying to see Fan Li again after a few years earlier when Fan Li and King Goujian just returned from Wu. She thought that Fan Li was the most dashing man she had ever seen in her life.

Living in Fan Li's house with free access to the library was a great joy for Ying. If she's not learning music and literature with the girls, she would go to the library to read. Otherwise, she would learn some swordplay from Zheng Dan.

Ying was only learning how to read and write for a year. Yet she developed a keen interest in literature. If she had no class, she would learn by herself how to write on the sandbox and memorize characters that she had never learned before.

Sometimes when she didn't understand what she read, she would go to seek Fan Li and asked him to explain the books she read. Fan Li was a smart, wise young man. Therefore Ying often sought his tutorials.

"You're such a hungry bookworm!" said Fan Li laughed when Ying came to him and asked about the Book of Documents. Fan Li saw how this young girl liked to study. If the other two girls were interested in literature and poems, she's more interested in reading history books and philosophy.

That year her hair had already grown although still short. Yet with her beautiful sweet face, her short hair only articulated her innocent young face. Yet she's not a simple girl at all.

Ying was very quiet as she seldom communicated with people since she was a child. She only had one friend as nobody wanted to be her friends. Therefore whenever the girls were chit-chatting, she would only watch them and said nothing. On the contrary, she pondered often. And being in Fan Li's house with access to the library with so many books, Ying pondered a lot on the books she read. And mostly what she learned were philosophy and history books.

Probably, Ying was the most complicated girl that Fan Li ever met in his entire life. One day, she looked for Fan Li.

"Minister Fan, I have a question for you!" Ying said.

"Go ahead!" Fan Li said.

"A few years ago, when Confucius' disciple - Zigong came to your house and gave some teachings. He mentioned that his teacher once said: that life and death are preordained; wealth and honor come from heaven! If life and death are preordained, then what's the point of working hard? Will not the result be the same?"

Fan Li gasped. He had never expected this girl would ask something like that. "Hmm! You have to work hard; since you might never know that you are preordained to get wealth and honor after your hard work!"

Ying nodded and asked again, "But what about slaves? Even if they work hard, they could not become official or be a noble person! How do you explain that?"

Fan Li looked at the girl who was staring at him with her curious eyes. He couldn't answer her. He had never thought about that too.

As she came from an unfortunate background, Ying often pondered on justice. She dreamed that she would be a hero or a minister like Fan Li, who brought prosperity to the people.

"But I'm a girl! Father said girls couldn't be a king or official. I could only be a king's woman! But then why am I preordained to be a girl?" Ying kept on pondering in her mind on many things.

Those unanswered philosophical questions and her aspirations changed Ying's personality and physically. Her eyes were no longer the same as before. She had had innocent, naive eyes. But after two and a half years, her eyes expression changed. They were no more naive innocent eyes. Her beautiful eyes now had a glimpse of sadness and determination. There's also a glimpse of compassion and hatred that could not be described.