After the Mid-Autumn Festival, the weather quickly turned cold, and by October, it was continuously drizzling and overcast without respite.
Zheng Lingbo recently spent time every day picking up the martial arts he learned when he was young, and has been doing so for a few months. As a result, his physical fitness has improved significantly.
Last year at this time, whenever it rained, she would be bound to catch a cold due to paying little attention. This year, because she had something to do, she was constantly running errands, and even when the weather was poor, she didn't stop moving around. Instead, she appeared more lively and energetic than ever.
Now, there are only three people in the household of the master of the mansion.
The eldest brother Zheng Jinluo takes attendance every day and goes to the court, while the eldest sister Shi Yueren organized a chamber of commerce last time when the official family's thousandth anniversary was celebrated, utilizing the human flow. In the past two months, the chamber of commerce is in full swing of development, and is also busy beyond words.
Next year, the imperial examination will be held with leniency, and my third brother, Zheng Jing, is frantically preparing for the spring examination.
There is only one idle person in the entire family, Zheng Lingbo.
Of course, this is just on the surface.
In reality, Zheng Lingbo is not very idle either.
She exercises her body every day, and goes out in disguise to investigate with Rong Yi. Even if she has time, she still needs to interact with the family's flowers and plants to let them absorb some of her own negative energy.
Although theoretically it should be a person with a lot of leisure time, recently, he is so busy that he has no time to rest properly.
On the contrary, his skills in dressing up as a man have gradually reached a divine level.
It is also due to the significant improvement in his physical fitness recently. With a stronger body, he has grown a bit taller. Nowadays, when Zheng Lingbo wears men's clothing outside, if one does not deliberately get close enough to touch, just by looking at him, one can see that his figure, demeanor, and posture are those of a graceful young boy.
After all, Jin'er swore that he couldn't see any loopholes.
Zheng Lingbo: "..."
This could also be considered a good thing...
Cough.
Later, with the help of Rong Yi's connection, Zheng Lingbo at least managed to have a conversation with Chen Tongling.
It seems that it is because Zheng Lingbo's early warning before the imperial banquet saved Chen Tongling from more serious consequences that Chen Tongling has a good impression of Zheng Lingbo.
Even though this person always seems to be impatient, as if everyone in the room owes him money, when Zheng Lingbo said that her father must be innocent, Chen Tongling still hinted at her in a roundabout way that the imperial family had not suspected the Zheng family.
This let Zheng Lingbo breathe a sigh of relief, like Xiao Song.
After Chen Tongling conducted an investigation, Zheng Lingbo also actively cooperated, and soon presented the evidence.
It turned out that the dancer's mother came from the Cloud Country, and this time the Cloud Country was defeated by General Zheng. She was deeply concerned about her home country and died of melancholy, so the dancer harbored a grudge and deliberately slandered him at the imperial banquet.
Whether the truth is in it or not is beside the point. The imperial family has already made a final judgment, cleared Zheng family's name, and there is nothing much for people to say.
Only Zheng Lingbo feels somewhat uneasy in her heart.
This sounds reasonable, but where did the dancer get the letter from? And where was the private message of Zheng Weimin printed from? Who was the elderly man who spoke at the imperial banquet before it began?
Although the Zheng family ended up unscathed, thinking back to the words she overheard at the imperial banquet and the great fire from her previous life, Zheng Lingbo doesn't think that this matter will simply end here.
But the imperial family has spoken and the matter is closed. On the surface, she cannot say anything else.
It was Mu Ronghuaiyan who handed over the invitation to the birthday banquet.
During this time, she had two small gatherings with Mu Ronghuaiyan. There was a precious maiden who hosted a chrysanthemum feast and sent an invitation to Zheng Lingbo, who couldn't refuse and attended the event once.
Years ago, she was closely followed by Liu Chenguang, which caused a lot of damage to her reputation. Although she and Liu Chenguang have since parted ways, her social circle has been narrowed down, and not many people know this.
Until the imperial banquet, the imperial family publicly favored General Zheng and praised Zheng Lingbo's style after his father.
Once this comment was spread, Zheng Lingbo's reputation in the past few years seemed to bottom out and then rebound instantly. People, upon reflection, began to think that the head daughter of the Zheng family was actually quite decent.
Although she had always followed the third son of the Li family without face, looking back, she had not done anything wrong. It was true that she had just followed him, occasionally even being teased by the third son of the Li family and his friends.
In reality, the third son of the Li family was even more heinous.
Overnight, it seemed that because of the seemingly insincere praise from the imperial family, all the noble girls and young gentlemen in the capital had finally come to their senses. They realized that even though Zheng Lingbo's actions lacked noble girl demeanor, she came from a military family and acted rather carelessly, which was perhaps something they could accept.
Therefore, when Zheng Lingbo attended this chrysanthemum feast, she felt that everyone's attitude towards her seemed to have become more friendly.
Even though the relationships that were supposed to be strained remained strained——such as that oblivious person, whose attitude towards Zheng Lingbo was still insincere.
But several previously aloof noble girls were even proactively greeted her this time. Zheng Lingbo was left speechless: "..."
Boring.
This caused Mu Ronghuaiyan to tease her once.
From then on, whenever someone sent an invitation, Zheng Lingbo would try her best to decline. She didn't attend until she received Mu Ronghuaiyan's invitation to her birthday banquet this time.
As close friends, this invitation could not be declined. Zheng Lingbo was ready to leave, but then turned to her study, sent her reply, and remembered the gift she had prepared earlier. Calculating the time, she realized it was only five days until the day arrived, and couldn't help but go to see the gardener again.
She has been so busy recently that she almost forgot to prepare a birthday gift for Mu Ronghuaiyan. Thank goodness Jin'er reminded her.
Of course, Jin'er, as a considerate maid, is meant to play a role when the master is overlooking something. Therefore, she reminded Zheng Lingbo about it a month in advance. When Zheng Lingbo was reminded, she hastily started preparing.
"Faulty of me, I almost forgot because of the busy schedule!"
She slapped her hands in frustration.
Jin'er smiled slightly, slightly proud and straightened her back: "Miss Zheng mentioned that Princess Gaozu loves chrysanthemums before. A few days ago, I heard that someone has raised a pot of green chrysanthemums with extremely beautiful appearance, but his family is ill and somewhat tight on money. He intends to find a lucky person, Miss Zheng, would you like to take a look?"
—— Because Zheng Lingbo often goes out without Jin'er recently, as a reliable maid who grew up with her, Jin'er felt a strong sense of crisis. Therefore, she had to refine her skills in household affairs as much as possible, considering all possible aspects, striving to be helpful outside but at least make sure that Miss Zheng can be at ease and worry-free at home.
It's really a stroke of genius for Jin'er to come up with this plan for Miss Zheng.
She immediately became elated and exclaimed with a slap of her hand: "Great, great!"
She then bought the pot of green chrysanthemum and had it carefully nurtured by the family gardener. She was thinking about the special dyed fabric sent by her second brother Zheng Jingwei from the frontier, saying that it was dyed with our precious plants, which would never fade for a lifetime.
Zheng Lingbo looked at the color and didn't think it was particularly rare, but the flower pattern was very special. After thinking for a while, she used this fabric to make a cloak according to Mu Ronghuaiyan's measurements.
Her embroidery skills were quite good. She used to make some small items for Liu Chenguang, even though his attitude was awful, but his technique had also trained her well. The stitches were both tight and flat, and it was easy for her to stitch a flower leaf at random.
