Both Nangong Suxin and the Young Miss took riddles from the topmost level, and after looking to confirm they couldn't guess the answers, they took them down to give to their opponents.
Of course, the Young Miss not being able to guess seemed meaningless. When collecting it, she suddenly thought she should ask Xiaoyao.
"Xiaoyao, do you know this lantern riddle?"
"Yes," Xiaoyao replied.
"Then let's change to another one," The Young Miss wanted to switch - if she knew it, she should put it back.
This wasn't just because others might also know it, but more importantly, if the opponents chose this one, she'd have one more correct answer. Of course, she wanted to find ones she didn't know to give others, thus eliminating things she couldn't solve.
"No need, this one is good. Right, just this one," Xiaoyao said with a smile that seemed to have other meanings.
"But..." The Young Miss didn't notice this and just said hesitantly.
"Young Miss, we're ready!" Xiaoyao pulled the Young Miss to meet up with the Nangong sisters.
"But..." The Young Miss wanted to say something but was stopped by Xiaoyao.
"No buts!"
"However..."
"No howevers - listen to me, it won't be wrong!!"
"??"
...
On one side, Xiaoyao and the Young Miss ate snacks while standing before the answer wall, waiting for the Nangong sisters to finish selecting riddles.
"Xiaoyao, can we do this?" the Young Miss asked somewhat worriedly.
"Don't worry," Xiaoyao continued eating and waiting.
Soon the Nangong sisters came over. Seeing Xiaoyao and the Young Miss waiting, they weren't surprised since the two had left first and naturally could finish selecting earlier.
They perhaps didn't know that Xiaoyao and the Young Miss had been waiting quite a while, basically went and returned immediately. If they knew, they'd definitely think the two were too casual and looked down on them.
Or perhaps Xiaoyao and the Young Miss had simply given up their plans.
"Give us your lantern riddle," After arriving, Nangong Suxin said very directly.
"Here! What about yours?" The Young Miss handed over the riddle slip while also taking the slip from Nangong Suxin's group.
"Do you want to give them one by one? That's fine too!"
Nangong Suxin noticed the Young Miss only gave her one riddle, unlike her giving all at once. She thought the Young Miss was giving them one by one.
"Garden flowers turn to ash, setting sun falls to the west. Tears of longing, heart is broken, empty listening to horse hooves return. Autumn moon's red glow, fireflies fly. Guess one character..." Nangong Suxin frowned, looking at the riddle and thinking of the answer.
The other Nangong misses simply gave up and looked to Miss Nangong Third.
"The character 'Su'! Su as in awakening!!" After thinking for a long while, Miss Nangong Third answered.
The Young Miss tore down the corresponding answer from the answer wall, looked at it, then said: "Correct! Susu truly deserves to be Qingyun City’s foremost talented woman - guessing such a difficult riddle immediately,"
Regarding Miss Nangong Third, the Young Miss naturally praised her since she wanted to pursue her. At the same time, she shamelessly directly called her by a nickname.
"Miss Mo Yu, please don't call me Susu..." Miss Nangong Third corrected.
"Alright, Susu. I'll listen to everything you say, Susu..."
"..."
"Ahem! Our turn! Near the end of April, beginning of May, window paper torn and re-pasted, husband in capital for three years, not half a word in letters! Name four medicine types..." Xiaoyao began reciting.
"Pinellia, Bupleurum, Angelica, White Angelica!" the Young Miss spoke up.
"??" Nangong Suxin looked at the two. She clearly knew this answer came from Xiaoyao, but didn't seem to notice how they transmitted information.
Could this small servant know sound transmission techniques?
How was that possible? This was a very difficult skill to master. Even she found it somewhat challenging, could he be stronger than her?
While Nangong Suxin was thinking, the Nangong sisters had already revealed the answer.
Indeed exactly right.
"Didn't expect Miss Mo Yu to understand medicinal materials so well. Admirable!" While speaking, Nangong Suxin's eyes stared at Xiaoyao, clearly saying, I know it was you.
"So-so!" The Young Miss completely ignored the other's attitude and readily accepted the praise.
“Next one! ‘Heart like a monkey, mind like a horse.’ Guess the character…” Xiaoyao read, hesitating a little—this one was clearly harder for him.
Hmph! Let's see if you can guess this one! The previous was just warm-up. I thought you knew history well but didn't understand medicinal materials.
Even my third sister couldn't handle this one - you're even more impossible!!
“Chong (重)! As in ‘Chongyang’!” the Young Miss suddenly blurted out.
“What? You got it? Are you just guessing?!” Nangong Suxin looked at her in disbelief, thinking she must’ve guessed randomly.
“Chong? How does that work?” Nangong Third Miss asked, puzzled.
“They’re just bluffing. Let me check the answer… This…” Nangong Suxin looked and was shocked to see the answer was “重”!
"How so?" Miss Nangong Third asked again.
“How does that make sense?” Third Miss asked again.
“‘Chong (重)’ contains the character ‘申’ as its heart. In Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches, ‘申’ represents the monkey—that’s the ‘heart like a monkey.’ And ‘重’ can be split into ‘千’ and ‘里’ (thousand and mile), which implies ‘rushing horses’—that’s the ‘mind like a horse.’” the Young Miss explained. “Don’t be discouraged, Susu. You did great!”
"..." The Nangong sisters fell silent, looking at the Young Miss and Xiaoyao for various reasons.
"Good, let's continue!" Nangong Suxin said through gritted teeth.
"What will continue? We've already won," Xiaoyao said at this moment.
"What won? You only guessed two of our riddles. There are still others coming, don't think you've definitely won," Nangong Suxin said irritably.
"We don't think. We've already won!" Xiaoyao said again.
"What do you mean? You only answered two riddles correctly, we answered one, it's just the beginning. Quickly give us the other riddles," Nangong Suxin said impatiently.
"There are none," Xiaoyao waved his hand.
"What do you mean 'none'?" Nangong Suxin demanded.
"None means none. There won't be other riddles. We only have one riddle. Now we answered two correctly, you only answered one correctly, so we won," Xiaoyao said with a smile.
"..." The Nangong sisters fell silent. Some didn't understand at first, but quickly got it. This kid was playing tricks.
The Young Miss seemed confused by Xiaoyao, she didn't know how she'd won either...
Nangong Suxin now understood why Xiaoyao had repeatedly confirmed the rules earlier. He was catching loopholes here.
"Shameless!! Winning like this is meaningful," Nangong Suxin looked at Xiaoyao accusingly.
Xiaoyao waved his hand: "Winning is winning. Whether it's meaningful or not, the result is the same..."
"Hmph!! Shameless little servant. I really want to cut you down with my sword," Nangong Suxin stared at Xiaoyao viciously.
"We won?" the Young Miss asked very inappropriately at this moment.
"No!"
"Yes!"
Both sides spoke simultaneously, of course giving completely different answers.
"I'm a bit confused, but Xiaoyao says we won, so we should have won! Susu, let's go have a late-night snack together. There are still seats at Myriad Flowers Tower now." the Young Miss said to Miss Nangong Third.
"...Young Miss, Myriad Flowers Tower is a brothel..." Xiaoyao reminded.
"I know. I'm a regular there!" the Young Miss said carelessly.
"Young Miss, if you're dating, you shouldn't go to such places. Women don't like 'men' going there and won't go together with 'men'! Fine, simply put, if you're dating Third Miss, would you like a bunch of men getting intimate with Third Miss beside you?" Seeing the Young Miss's confusion, Xiaoyao immediately explained.
"Of course not. She's my person! Right, that really won't work. Where should we go?"
"At this time, normal restaurants are closed, but there are still quite a few roadside stalls. There's a famous roasted lamb place in the west district, you could go eat there..." Xiaoyao said.
"Mm, that's settled then!" The Young Miss nodded and prepared to pull Miss Nangong Third.
"Settled your head, Did we admit you won?" Nangong Suxin slapped away the Young Miss's hand irritably.
These two were talking to themselves, completely ignoring them.
"Nangong Suxin, honor your wager," the Young Miss said.
"We did lose. Though you shamelessly exploited loopholes, we're magnanimous and won't argue with you two villains!" Nangong Suxin said, while Miss Nangong Third hid behind her as if the Young Miss were some villain.
"Then what do you mean by blocking me?" the Young Miss asked.
"Nothing. We previously agreed Third Sister would eat a late-night snack with you, but we didn't say the place was your choice, nor that she'd go alone with you." Nangong Suxin said with a smile.
"What do you mean?" The Young Miss frowned, very displeased.
"I mean we choose the place, and we all eat the snack together," Nangong Suxin said with a smile.
"Damn! You're being shameless, even more shameless than Xiaoyao!!" the Young Miss said angrily. She'd figured it out but didn't expect Nangong Suxin to actually do this.
"...Young Miss, why say you are more shameless than me..." Xiaoyao said very innocently.
"Do you need to ask? Because you're very shameless.”
This sentence was spoken in unison at this moment. The Young Miss and Nangong Suxin said the same words at the same time. After speaking, they looked at each other, seemingly with a feeling of "great minds think alike."
At this moment, they suddenly felt the other wasn't so detestable, quite pleasing to the eye!!
At the same moment, Miss Nangong Third and the other sisters nodded approvingly in their hearts.
This little servant was quite shameless.
(End of Chapter)