Chapter 5

No matter how Eastern Wu fussed and fretted, you steadily continued your once-every-half-month “One Thousand and One Nights” sessions. This time, you learned your lesson and started reciting The Peacock Flies Southeast. After all, it was a story from the Jian’an period—well-received by the ladies and without causing any new controversies. The only downside: after hearing it, the male god no longer had you recite from memory—he wanted you to write it out for him.

…Except for a calligraphy class back in elementary school, your entire decade-plus of schooling had been with pens and pencils! Typing? Sure, you were fast—you could easily pump out 10,000 words a day on your “CEO falls for me” serialized novel online—but writing by hand seriously? Not happening.

A beautiful maid came over to trim the lampwick and added some incense whose name you didn’t even know. The male god sat at the desk, smiling, watching you. Under the lamplight… oh my, he even ground the ink for you!

Then nothing more happened. You glanced at the few characters you’d written—they were actually quite neat. You looked at him, he looked at you, you looked back down at your writing.

“Shall I have the maid write it for me?” you said timidly.

The male god got up and left. You thought class must be over. You were about to get up too and asked the maid to prepare bathwater, plus some ice-chilled plums from the well to get a vitamin C boost—but then the male god returned, holding a scroll.

“Ah… sir?”

He smiled like a homeroom teacher. “Madam, this is The Book of Rites copied by Liang.”

The Book of Rites?
The male god didn’t wait for you to react and continued, “Starting tomorrow, Madam, please copy this twenty times a day.”

“…………” Your tearful face didn’t move him in the slightest.

Finally, you thought of another question. “Sir… why are you copying this yourself?”

“It was originally for my son,” he stroked his beard. “I haven’t had the chance to finish copying the entire Book of Rites, so you’ll start with this chapter first.”

Copying books wasn’t a problem for you—any child who endured nine years of compulsory education wouldn’t fear this—but your wrists still ached for days. To be honest, if this weren’t an assignment from the male god, you probably would’ve flipped the desk by now.

He came every five days, which conveniently made a total of one hundred copies of The Book of Rites for you. You neatly stacked your work in front of him. He nodded with a smile and began reviewing it, then suddenly asked:

“After copying The Book of Rites so many times, Madam, have you gained any insights?”

“Insights?” You were shocked. So not only were you practicing calligraphy—you also had to do reading comprehension? “This is a classic written by a great scholar. How could I possibly have insights?”

“Liang once heard someone say, ‘Read a book a hundred times and the meaning will reveal itself.’ Since you’ve copied it a hundred times, surely you must have some reflections?”
The male god finished reviewing your work and set it aside. The maid brought a plate of snacks—your newly invented knockoff fruit mousse. Extracting some bovine gelatin for it hadn’t been easy! He stared at your makeshift dessert with a suspicious look, then hesitantly picked up a piece and put it in his mouth. At that moment, you—doing reading comprehension here—felt a surge of indignation.

“I can hardly say,” you thought for a moment, “but there are many renowned scholars from Yingchuan serving by Chancellor Cao’s side in Xuchang. In studying the classics, their knowledge surely surpasses mine by far.”

Your dessert seemed to choke him. You saw his brows furrow as he stared at you—oh no, is he about to call your parents?

No—he merely sighed and stood up to leave. After a while, you faintly heard zither music from the garden. Even with your zero musical intuition, you could tell his mood was unsettled.

…You deeply reflected on your earlier mouthiness and, feeling guilty, quietly crept over to kneel beside him. When he finished his piece, he glanced at you.

“Madam, you need not behave like this,” he said evenly. “The Han dynasty has collapsed, the world is dark, rites are broken and music corrupted—Liang is merely old-fashioned.”

“No, no, no—it is I who am stubborn,” you forced yourself to admit. “But sir need not be so melancholy. I believe you will assist the Lord and help restore the Han dynasty!”

“Oh?” He looked at you, his eyes unreadable. “Why do you have such faith in Liang?”

How were you supposed to answer that? There were so many possible replies, but as a devoted fangirl, you decided to follow your heart.

“Because… sir is handsome.”
You answered with all your sincerity, only to see the male god’s eyes widen in disbelief as he stared at you.

It seemed your flattery hadn’t landed correctly, because after a brief silence, he suddenly let out a couple of “heh heh” laughs, and then said—

“In less than a month, Liang may leave Chengdu. Since Madam has such deep affection, how about personally spinning, weaving, and tailoring a new outfit for me?”

What?

Arriving in late Han Chengdu, this was the first time you truly felt cornered.

The reason he might leave Chengdu was likely to go to the Jingzhou front. You knew that summer your lord and the 100,000 troops by the Yangtze were on the brink of conflict. Although they barely reconciled in the end, the paper-thin truce could have easily been torn. From this perspective, bringing him clothes seemed pointless—bringing a bottle of “disease-removing” potion for Lu Su as a gift might actually be more useful.

But back on topic: you were supposed to make an outfit. First…

You realized you had never woven cloth by hand. You’d only spun a single roll of thread! Far from enough to make fabric!

“Madam, coming from a noble family, not being skilled in needlework matters little,” your maid Hong Luo reassured you. “I’ll fetch several rolls of silk and Shu brocade from the storeroom. You can choose a set, finalize the design, and the servants skilled in tailoring will have the new clothes ready in three to five days. You’ll only need to add a few stitches on the sleeves or hem.”

Your personal maid concluded proudly, “Then even the strategist will know the excellence of Shu women’s needlework.”

“No,” you said firmly. “Have you ever heard the story of Sima Zhong?”
“Sima Zhong?”

…Sorry, you had traveled through time. But you still briefly explained the core of the story. The male god knew your tendency to be “unskilled in both mind and body,” so rather than letting the maids tailor a fancy robe for you, it was better for you to try yourself. Whatever you managed to make would do. After all, Jia Nanfeng had even hired a barely literate eunuch to answer Sima Zhong’s questions—surely a modern youth like you couldn’t be dumber.

As for delaying the male god’s departure… think too much. He had a legitimate wife, after all.

Back to the first problem: how much thread do you need to weave a bolt of cloth?

No matter the exact amount, you were certain that at your current speed—spinning less than one roll of thread in a whole day—you wouldn’t have enough to weave a bolt of cloth even in a month. Your imagined scenario of “five bolts in three days, yet the master complains of delay!” was impossible.

Besides, after a day of spinning, your back and waist ached. You needed a way to improve efficiency.

…Fine, you’d better learn from the experience of predecessors.

Who was best at rapid spinning? Of course, the spinning jenny!

The problem was… you weren’t a carpenter, and none of your servants were either. They were just ordinary coachmen, gardeners, cooks, and laundresses. Even if you had the blueprints for a spinning jenny in your head, how could you turn it into reality?
You never imagined that finding a carpenter would be such a hassle.

You brought bamboo rulers, ink, brush, paper, and inkstone—you even had to thank Qin Shi Huang for standardizing measurements. Just drawing the blueprints took three days, wasting a bunch of hard work from Cai Hou’s inventions. In the end, you finally marked every part and its dimensions clearly. For hand-drawn, workshop-level blueprints made by a humanities student like you, the maids were amazed: “How could the lady draw something so precise? Surely no craftsman in Chengdu can match this!”

But if you couldn’t even build a spinning jenny, what would happen to your weaving project? You even considered going all out and making a water-powered loom to automate the weaving too.

You decided to be self-reliant. With two servants, wearing your hat and veil, you set out carrying the blueprints.

The streets were mostly empty, and the workshops were easy to find. Surprisingly, the craftsmen were much more honest than you expected—straightforward and truthful, without trying to cheat you.

“Can’t learn it, can’t make it, move along,”—you got this blunt three-line response from workshop after workshop, walking half a street with no luck.

Finally, you found a woodworking shop in Chengdu known for fine craftsmanship. After carefully examining your blueprints, a carpenter hesitated but agreed to put aside his work and try your “Western marvel,” giving you a price. You didn’t understand it; you had no concept of cost. But your maid did. She pulled you aside and whispered in your ear:

“Milady, he’s asking quite a lot. For such an expense, we must discuss it with the master first.”
Asking your husband for money? NOOOOOOO! You’re not some downtrodden lady—you wouldn’t beg, even if your husband happens to be your idol.

The silver and cloth your adoptive father left you were all in the hands of the steward sent by your beloved, but even his reach couldn’t cover jewelry. Without hesitation, you signed a contract with the master carpenter, paying the full deposit plus an extra ten percent, and stipulated that he must not leak the blueprints—otherwise, you’d claim ten times the compensation.

When you carried out a box of jewels, gold, and silver to sell, you didn’t expect to see them again. Sure, you liked the sparkling trinkets, but you liked even more that they would be transformed into solid gold and silver—it made you feel safe.

But just a few days after your handmade spinning jenny frame arrived at home, while you were still clumsily fitting the drive belts, he appeared—your idol—followed by the steward, carrying that familiar lacquered wooden box.

“Milady, what are you doing?”

Crap. You’d been up early doing crafts and had forgotten to wash your face. But today wasn’t even a day he was supposed to visit! What wind had blown him here? You looked up and saw him frowning, glancing at you, then at the partially assembled spinning jenny.

“What is this thing?”
“My spinning is slow,” you explained awkwardly. “I wanted to add more spindles so I could spin several threads at once…”

Your idol was stunned again. He rushed over in three quick steps, and you hurriedly made way. The genius strategist stared at the half-built spinning jenny and asked, “Do you have the blueprints?”

You quickly handed them over. He grabbed them and began studying them intensely. Just as you were wondering whether to take the opportunity to freshen up, he suddenly stood up.

“What’s next?”

“Um… I, no, I was just about to attach this belt,” you said, holding up the buffalo leather belt you had spent a fortune on—but which was slightly the wrong size—for him to see.

He looked at the belt, then at you, and took it in his hand. “Milady, you may rest for a while. I’ll give it a try.”

You were about to step aside when he called you back. With a wave of his hand, the steward, head bowed, brought over your box of jewelry.

“Next time you have a new idea, just ask the steward to buy it,” he said with a sigh. “Do not sell your jewelry again.”

You fled in panic.