11 Chapter 10 - The Faint Smell of Ink and Oil

Hearing these words, the cup in Jing Wen's hands almost slipped out, and he fell into a long silence. Faintly, Zhou Aimin could observe that the white cloth that covered his eyes had become slightly damp, and his shoulders were trembling.

Zhou Aimin, while drunk, could easily sense Jing Wen's disturbance of mood. He promptly said, "My apologies Fellow Jing… I had misspoken and forgotten your father's death in service to the nation. Please, forgive me."

Jing Wen forced a smile and softly said, "No, this is not the fault of the venerable Taoist. Rather, I must thank you for finally providing an answer that I had been seeking for the past month."

Drunkenly, Zhou Aimin conveyed with a sigh, "Then that is good."

He then shook his head and declared, "No, regardless of that, I should apologies to fellow Jing. I had planned to take advantage of you with all forms of schemes, going against the virtues of man and the proper conducts… if fellow Jing truly wishes to remain in Jing village, I promise I will no longer disturb you."

To Zhou Aimin's surprise, Jing Wen said after some hesitation, "There is no need. I shall return to the capital."

Zhou Aimin could not hide his excitement, which caused him to instinctively stand up from his chair. Overcome with emotion, it took him quite a while to answer, "That's good… that's good."

He suddenly gave a strange yell, leaving the tablet, he ran outside to the estate's courtyard and lifted his head to the skies, letting wind and snow to cool his undoubtedly scarlet face. The snow melted as it made contact with the little Taoist's skin, making him appear like a child who had just finished playing in the local pond.

Jing Wen recovered his calm at an astonishingly fast speed, so he could roughly understand why Zhou Aimin was so excited. The little Taoist was still young and naive, having suffered no setback in his life. Although he was talented, and his grasp of a human's heart was far better than most, Zhou Aimin had probably spent most of his life in Prince Qiao's household or the Taoist temple.

Thinking about this, Jing Wen absentmindedly played with the wine cup he had drunk. He at some point, turned his head towards the small mound with a few sticks of incense still burning.

His father was, of course, buried there.

He was buried in a deep, deep place.

Although Jing Wen's emotion could no longer be concealed by the white cloth, his thoughts remain hidden, buried in a deep, deep place.

---

The estate in Jing village had the exact layout as Jing Ping's estate in the capital. The height of the wall was exactly the same, the width of the walls was exactly the same, and even the materials came from the same quarry.

However, it was not the estate in the capital.

The capital's estate was dirty, fouled by the red dust of the mundane world, it's walls were dirty, and from Jing Wen's memory, there exists a few cracks from his mischievous acts during his earlier childhood.

Despite Jing Ping frequenting this estate increasingly more as he aged, there is simply some difference both estates lacked compared to the other, such as the door hinges of this estate, which seemed to have been oiled a few days prior.

A gust of wind blew past the opened door, stopping as it hit the bodies of Jing Wen and Jing An.

"I will be leaving after mid-noon."

Hearing this, Jing An stared at Jing Wen intensively, as though she was trying to burn his image into her mind. It was a fortunate matter that Jing Wen was blind, or else he would likely have felt uncomfortable under the prolonged gaze, no matter how stoic he was.

Jing An then warmly said, "Help me grind some ink."

After saying these words, she turned and retrieved a set of writing instruments from somewhere. The brush was thin and delicate, akin to a willow branch, while its hairs were as straight as a soldier, causing the brush to appear both steadfast and supple.

Spreading a thin piece of Xuan paper, Jing An untied her hair, letting it spill over her graceful shoulders.

At the beginning of Jing An's studies, Princess Kang had opposed Jing Ping's choice to educate a woman, flavouring to instead teach her embroidery and tea arts. The argument between the couple had at one point become so fierce that Jing An was too afraid to openly pick up a pen in fear of Jing Ping and Princess Kang beginning an argument once more because of its presence.

During that time, Jing Wen would secretly invite her to his room to practice writing during mid-night, when the estate was asleep. Because it was so late, Jing An had chosen to forgo tying her hair when she visited. During those times, Jing Wen would help her grind the inkstone as she wrote.

After the argument between Princess Kang and Jing Ping was resolved, Jing An gradually stopped visiting Jing Wen's room to practice calligraphy. However, her habit of having hair be undone whenever she was writing remained.

Jing Wen picked up the dark inkstone between his fingers, beginning to slowly grind it clockwise on the inkstone. When the ink became a little lake, Jing Wen stopped his motion and allowed Jing An to dip her brush into the ink.

The black characters shined under the morning sun, appearing truly splendid.

When the two used to practice calligraphy, Jing Wen would watch as Jing An's pen danced on the Xuan paper. But since he was now blind, he could only pretend to focus on the paper, his thoughts elsewhere.

Jing An knew that he could not see her expression. Her expression relaxed, revealing a silent smile. The smile was not particularly beautiful, and certainly not shocking enough to destroy entire cities. However, the faint affection that exists within the smile was undeniable.

Perhaps it was precisely because Jing Wen was so close, yet still could not see her face that she allowed herself to reveal such emotions.

Perhaps indulging in this emotion, Jing An's body remained completely still, say for her hand moving on the Xuan paper. Even though a strand of her hair fell before her forehead, did she still not move it.

It was only when the sound of the brush disturbing the surface of the ink lake was heard, did Jing Wen break the silence.

"It's good."

Jing An looked up at him and said without a pause or any unnaturalness, "It indeed is."

"But it is a shame that time is too short," Jing An added.

Jing Wen calmly replied, "It can also be too long."

Jing An was silent for a long time. Suddenly, she said, "But in the end, whether time is fast or slow, it is impossible to reverse time."

Jing Wen was confused by the sudden sentence. In the end, he replied directly, "Of course."

"But we can always look back at the past."

Jing Wen made another sound of acknowledgement.

Jing An smiled. She then looked at the characters on the paper and shook her head.

The characters were not good at all. For the first character, horizontal lines were crooked like earthworms.

Anyone would have found its appearance rather humourous and cute, however, no one would call it good, even an amateur would know that the character was truly ugly.

However, after this character, there were almost ten more lines of equally misshaped characters.

For Jing An, these tangled characters were so ugly that she could have written better when she was five years old.

Yet she called her writing good, continuing to hold onto that brush and kept writing.

Jing An was known to be a girl of good breeding and well educated in the arts, how could she lie blatantly with a straight face, and not feel ashamed at such twisted calligraphy?

Of course, it was to prolong the time she can spend before Jing Wen would leave through that recently lubricated door.

A few pedals of snow entered through the window, it's path guided by a gentle breeze that lifted up the edge of the Xuan paper. The snow primarily landed on Jing Wen's shoulder, while others landed into the small ink lake, becoming disappearing in a mere few moments.

Jing An finally placed down her brush and reached out at the paper marked with seemingly childlike scribbles, turning it into a paper roll.

"It should be time," Jing Wen said calmly.

Jing An smiled at these words. Moving closer to Jing Wen, she gently brushed the small gathering of snow off his shoulders.

After returning two steps away from Jing Wen, she said, "I suspect that you do not want me to go with you?"

Jing Wen nodded. "Even though father has allowed you to study in the arts, he has never taught you martial arts. It's better to leave the fighting to us dumb men."

Jing An chuckled, her laughter sounding akin to soft pearls. She said after a short moment, "Be cautious."

It was a mere two words, but it was enough. Jing Wen made a sound of an acknowledgement as he turned to leave the building, and as he entered the corridor, he gently closed the open door.

The door hinges were well oiled, but Jing An is used to holding a pen, her hands not very clever in regards to housework. As such, a faint noise was made as the door closed. This distant sound somehow penetrated through Jing An's chest, paining her heart.