Chapter 95: You Can Have Some Ambition

Seeing Qin Yumo looking so adorable, Princess Pingyao smiled lightly, straightened up, hooked his chin to turn his face towards her, and then said seriously, “Take advantage of the time when I like you to seek more benefits for yourself. Within the scope I allow, I will try my best to satisfy you. But don’t do anything you shouldn’t. Once you displease me, there probably isn’t a second person in this world who can protect you.”

Qin Yumo shook his head slowly, “I wouldn’t dare to say I have no desires, but my desires are not great. As long as Your Highness hasn’t grown tired of me, I am willing to accompany you like this.”

Princess Pingyao frowned, “You can have some ambition.”

Qin Yumo thought for a moment, “Actually, I’ve come to terms with things.”

“Come to terms with things?”

“Even if I really passed the imperial examinations and entered officialdom, outsiders would say that I had this opportunity because of the princess’s power. Of course, I don’t care much about idle gossip. But if one day I do something wrong and displease Your Highness, even if I’ve already become a fifth-rank official, or even a third-rank official, Your Highness can still take everything away with a single word.” After saying this, Qin Yumo concluded, “So I think this is fine. Things I’ve never possessed, I won’t worry about losing in the future.”

“Your thoughts are really strange.” Princess Pingyao couldn’t help but laugh, shocked by his perspective. “If you’re certain that I will grow tired of you in the future, shouldn’t you use my current favor to seek some benefits for yourself? At least with some power or wealth in hand, you won’t be penniless and have nowhere to go when things happen in the future.”

Because he wouldn’t be her opponent in the future, he chose not to seek anything?

“The more you do, the more mistakes you make, the less you do, the fewer mistakes you make, if you do nothing, you make no mistakes.” Qin Yumo said. “If I stay quietly in the princess’s estate every day, I won’t have the opportunity to make mistakes, and Your Highness might like me for a longer time.”

Princess Pingyao was silent for a moment. “If you become a third-rank official and hold real power, and haven’t done anything against the laws of the court, I won’t make all of that disappear just because I don’t like you anymore.”

She paused, “And with power in your hands, you’ll have your own things to do. In the future, you won’t have to endure cold looks or rely on me to live. Even after you’re forty and your looks fade, you won’t have to worry about losing favor and having nothing.”

Qin Yumo thought about it and felt that she made sense.

However, the words “aging and losing one’s looks” made him feel inexplicably eerie. Qin Yumo looked up at Princess Pingyao, his eyes dim: “After I’ve aged and lost my looks, Your Highness will also be quite old.”

“So what?” Princess Pingyao patted his head, as if pitying his simplicity, “Even when I’m eighty, I’ll still be the princess, and there will still be young and handsome men willing to serve me.”

Qin Yumo pressed his lips together and was silent for a moment: “Will Your Highness continue to take male concubines in the future?”

“Not necessarily.” Princess Pingyao didn’t like making promises to anyone. “If I meet someone I particularly like, I might.”

Qin Yumo’s heart twisted slightly, and he couldn’t help but bite his lip.

What he actually wanted to ask was whether those male concubines could all be dismissed. However, he knew that his question was overstepping, so he changed it to a more tactful way of asking.

Qin Yumo had always known that the princess was not the type to be bound by others, and he shouldn’t harbor any illusions. Just like he said he didn’t want to enter officialdom, but in reality, one’s heart is impossible to control.

Desires for power and profit can be controlled, but what about desires of the heart?

Since entering the princess’s estate, Princess Pingyao had been different from what he had imagined. He had always thought she was promiscuous by nature, spending her days drinking and having fun with her male concubines, but the reality was not as he had thought.

What kind of person was Princess Pingyao?

He had been pondering this question for the past two days, and the more he thought about it, the more confused he became. Then, he realized that perhaps he was devoting too much energy to her.

Just like before the princess returned, when he learned about Prince Shen being whipped and humiliated, his first instinct was to think of Princess Pingyao, feeling that only she could help.

However, in the past…

Qin Yumo suppressed a sigh that almost escaped his throat and smiled, “I hope Your Highness will meet many more people you like in the future.”

“Are you sincere?” Princess Pingyao glanced at him sideways.

Qin Yumo lowered his eyes and remained silent. Of course, he wasn’t sincere, but he couldn’t say that.

Princess Pingyao looked at his slightly thin robe and pondered, “It’s about time to get you some new clothes. The princess’s husband can’t dress too shabbily.”

Qin Yumo was taken aback and then looked down at the clothes he was wearing. These were robes made for him by the princess’s orders before their marriage, a total of four sets from the inside out.

Was this considered shabby?

Princess Pingyao seemed to have guessed his thoughts and said indifferently, “The weather is getting colder. It’s time to prepare cloaks and fur coats, or else on those chilly days outside, when you’re having tea and composing poetry with others, wearing this thin outer robe, won’t you freeze into a human stick?”

Qin Yumo fell silent, imagining the scene of himself freezing into a human stick, and then thinking about his current identity and situation, he couldn’t help but sigh deeply.

He was indeed a kept man, a pretty boy living off a woman.