Winter days are always especially short. Just around five o'clock in the afternoon, the sky outside gradually darkened. Through the transparent glass door, he could see that the street, which had been swept clean that morning, was now covered anew with a thick layer of snow. The white snow on the ground gleamed brightly against the darkness.
Zhuang Rui let out a long sigh and carefully placed the book, which was so worn it was almost falling apart, onto the tea table in front of him. To be precise, this should be a manuscript written by an ancient person. After a rough flip-through, Zhuang Rui could determine that this was the notes of a predecessor, dating back to the early Qing Dynasty, because within the manuscript, the reign names of Kangxi and Shunzhi emperors appeared many times. As for the character '言' in '香祖笔言' on the cover, if Zhuang Rui hadn't guessed wrong, it should be the character '记' in '笔记', but due to damage, only half of the character remained.
The manuscript was not well preserved. In the first half, there was obvious mold caused by insect damage, sweat stains, grease, dust, and the like, making many characters blurry and hard to identify. The second half was in decent condition, but the text was written in classical Chinese, obscure and hard to understand. Moreover, Zhuang Rui didn't recognize many traditional characters, so he could only read on by guessing and inferring. Still, he roughly grasped the general meaning. The content was wide-ranging, mostly the author critically discussing various theories and expressing personal sentiments.
The last few pages of the manuscript were all poems, mostly seven-character quatrains, but Zhuang Rui felt a bit frustrated because he had been a bit unbalanced in his studies during school—strong in science but weak in liberal arts. When it came to poetry, he could only recite lines like ‘Hoeing the crops at noon’ or ‘Moonlight before the window’, and he couldn't tell whether these poems on the manuscript were good or bad. Although there was a red seal in seal script below the poems on the last few pages, unfortunately Zhuang Rui couldn't recognize those seal characters, so he had no way to identify the author.
Glancing over, Zhuang Rui saw Liu Chuan struggling with the computer, gritting his teeth in frustration. He stood up, walked over, pushed Liu Chuan aside, directly quit the game, opened the browser, typed in Baidu, hit enter, and after waiting a long time, found the computer showing ‘Page cannot be displayed’ in a few words.
“Hey, Blockhead, can't this computer get online？” Zhuang Rui turned his head and asked Liu Chuan next to him.
“Online? What net? How do I do that? Oh yeah, I heard them say you can play games online, but I don't know how to set it up.” Liu Chuan scratched his head; apparently, this question was way too deep for him.
“Damn, if you can't get online, why the hell did you buy a computer? Sticking green onions up a pig's nose—playing the elephant, huh?”
Zhuang Rui couldn't help but curse. A thing worth over ten thousand, he'd gritted his teeth several times but couldn't bring himself to buy it, and this guy bought one just to play games—and such low-level ones at that.
“A few shops on the street all bought one, so if I didn't, wouldn't I look like a loser? Can't lose face here. Hey, Blockhead, how do you get online?”
“You gotta fix it for me quick, so we can get on the internet too. I heard those guys say playing games online is awesome. There's this game called Legend—it's super hot. Those bastards are always bragging about it in front of me. Now I can finally get online myself.”
When Liu Chuan heard Zhuang Rui mention getting online, he perked up. Normally, he was too proud to ask—since they all ran in the same circles, he was embarrassed to go ask the shop owners next door. Now that he heard Zhuang Rui knew about this, he grabbed him and insisted he set up the internet right away.
"Get lost. If you want to get online, you have to go to the telecom bureau first to activate the service. Haven't you ever been to an internet café?" Zhuang Rui replied, half laughing, half exasperated.
"Ah, I only get a little free time during the New Year. When would I have time to go to an internet café? You think money's that easy to make? By the way, Blockhead, what do you need the internet for?" When Liu Chuan heard they couldn't get online right now, he immediately deflated, and only then remembered to ask why Zhuang Rui wanted to go online.
"There are some poems in this manuscript, but I don't know who wrote them. I want to look them up online and find out who the author is..."
Actually, Zhuang Rui had wanted to call Uncle De just now, but he held back. He had never cared about these things before, and now, if he kept asking for advice left and right, Uncle De would inevitably get suspicious. So he decided to first figure out who wrote the manuscript, and then ask about the price of that author's works—that would be much easier. Even though he could no longer absorb spiritual energy from the manuscript, it did cost him twenty thousand yuan, and it did sting a bit.
Liu Chuan wasn't interested in poetry or anything like that at all. After thinking it over, he said, "Let's ask my mom. She taught history before she retired, so she should know. Forget about the sauna tonight—let's go to my place for dinner."
Since there was nothing else to do at the shop, they packed up, pulled down the rolling shutter door, and got into Liu Chuan's car. But Zhuang Rui grabbed back the carton of cigarettes he had brought for Liu Chuan, saying, "That's for your old man. Don't even think about it, kid."
Liu Chuan's home was in an apartment building built years ago by the Public Security Bureau, now all bought out as private property. The place was three bedrooms and two living rooms, well over a hundred square meters—much bigger than Zhuang Rui's home. Liu Chuan's father hadn't retired yet, serving as deputy chief in some branch of the Public Security Bureau, so busy he was overwhelmed and wasn't home at the moment.
Like Zhuang Rui's mother, Liu Chuan's mom had taken early retirement in her fifties and was usually home alone. Seeing her godson Zhuang Rui come over, she was overjoyed and immediately started bustling about preparing dinner.
When dinner was ready, Liu's father returned. He had already heard from Zhuang Rui's mother about what happened in Shanghai. He showered Zhuang Rui with praise, while taking the opportunity to lecture his own son, who lazed around all day. This made Liu Chuan grind his teeth in anger, so he quickly tattled behind Zhuang Rui's back, spilling the beans about how he blew twenty thousand on a worthless book.
Liu's parents were merely a bit surprised when they heard this. They asked for the book, glanced through it, and after a few questions, didn't say much else. They all knew Zhuang Rui had always been very opinionated since childhood and generally didn't throw money away. Liu's mom even went to the study to look up information for Zhuang Rui. Liu Chuan watched, dumbfounded, and then burst into tears. He remembered that when he spent just over ten thousand on a computer, his mom had lectured him all day long while dragging him by the ear.
After dinner, Zhuang Rui, fully satisfied, was sent home by a resentful Liu Chuan. It wasn't just the free meal that pleased him—most importantly, the book "Biographies of Qing Dynasty Figures" that his godmother had found contained records of those poems. Now, with the book in hand, Zhuang Rui was ready to go home and read it carefully.
After taking out twenty thousand yuan and throwing it to Liu Chuan, Zhuang Rui kicked this guy who had just been tattling on him to his mother out of the house. Then he told his mother about buying the manuscript today. Zhuang Rui's mother knew her son worked in a pawnshop and often came across antiques, calligraphy, and paintings, so she didn't say much, just told him to be more careful in the future and not to get cheated by others.
After dealing with his mother, Zhuang Rui hid back in his room and carefully and preciously placed the manuscript along with the couplet left by his grandfather into a wooden box. The wooden box his grandfather left behind was made of camphorwood, which in ancient times was specially used to preserve calligraphy, paintings, and rare books. If this manuscript had always been stored in this camphorwood box, it wouldn't have become as worn and tattered as it is now.
After tidying up, Zhuang Rui slipped into bed and opened the Biographies of Qing Dynasty Figures he had gotten from his godmother.