In the blink of an eye, it was time for the Dragon Boat Festival.

Tian Qi loved the festival because, after the celebration, the eunuchs would be rewarded for their work, and the Qian Qing Palace"s rewards were especially rich. In addition to the set rewards, Tian Qi also received a reward from Ji Heng for her meritorious achievement of becoming the most "popular person" in the Imperial Palace. Therefore he used five (5) parts to forge a littlezongzi worth 5 taels of gold, its size as small as a red date. The leaf and middle rope vivid and lifelike, looking very delicate. Ji Heng also thought that this kind of workmans.h.i.+p was not suitable enough, not presentable. However, solid gold and in sufficient quant.i.ty, was the best reward for those who loved money.

zongzi = glutinous rice and choice of filling wrapped in leaves and boiled

Thus Ji Heng easily gave Tian Qi two of the gold items and was satisfied seeing him as he clasped his hands around both gold zongzi, then swallowed his saliva.

At today"s Dragon Boat Festival, Tian Qi conspired with RuYi to partic.i.p.ate in other events apart from the custom celebrations. In some places, the common people called the Dragon Boat Festival "Daughter"s Day". On this day, married women return to their parents" homes. In their homes, they are always considered little girls, so they can also dress as ones once again. 

RuYi almost instinctively rejected wearing a dress, but he was just a child, ma. She coaxed him with the promise of sweets and he immediately turned around and accepted the dress, trying to show he is no less than her. After wearing the dress for a while, he completely forgot he was dressed in female clothes. It was time the two of them went out, ate and played. 

ma - modal particle indicating something is obvious; pause for emphasis

RuYi was a prince. Although there was no order that said "The prince could not wear female clothes", but doing this kind of thing was quite risky. Only, Tian Qi was not afraid. RuYi, although young, was a reliable teammate. As long as he was the one who admitted to taking the initiative to wearing it, then it can be looked at as a child playing around, ma. What"s more, he was extremely pretty dressed up as a young lady, once the Empress Dowager saw it she would surely like it. And if the Empress Dowager liked it, who dared say half a word against it?

After Tian Qi finished dressing RuYi properly, she took him out to Ci Ning Palace. As expected, as soon as the Empress Dowager met such pleasant "young girl", her heart was gone and she immediately held RuYi  in her bosom, grinning from ear to ear.

In addition to their agreed on words, RuYi also added "I often hear Empress grandmother saying how much she wants a granddaughter. Tian Qi was saying that today is daughter"s day so I wanted to dress up as your granddaughter. Grandmother, do you like it?"   

These words, spoken like a small DaRen, made everyone in the room unable to restrain their smiles.

"Like, of course I like it!" the Empress Dowager lightly stroked RuYi"s head, and smiled "My small RuYi, ya. Truly clever."

y particle equivalent to "a", expressing surprise or doubt

As they came out of Ci Ning Palace, Tian Qi led the way for RuYi then turned around and gave him a thumbs up, "Your Highness, you are the best." This time it wasn"t merely flattering, as she was absolutely convinced.

As RuYi heard Tian Qi"s praise, he was very happy, his footsteps becoming somewhat excited and, bouncing, he started pulling him towards Qian Qing Palace. They just pa.s.sed the moon gate when they b.u.mped into Ji Heng.

Ji Heng did not recognize RuYi at first glance. Right before his eyes there was a baby girl dressed up prettily, her hair combed simply, with two tufts of hair that stood up. Those two hairs looked very similar to cat ears, bound with red silk. Dangling from the ends of the silk were pearls and yellow ta.s.sels, and they softly swayed with every footstep. The little girl was wearing a cherry red dress, embroidered with countless types of b.u.t.terflies and flowers; a bright golden lock was hanging around her neck, a small strand of pearls on her left wrist, a strand of golden bells on the right wrist, their ringing sound crisp and sweet. 

Even as he was still far away, he could see the little girl"s face was fair, and had a pair of big watery and lively eyes. Ji Heng was wondering who"s child was this? Truly adorable, he must make sure to give her a hug. 

Although he did not recognise RuYi, Ji Heng did recognise Tian Qi, hence was able to a.s.sociate him with a certain little guy who always used to show up around Tian Qi...

As he drew near them, sure enough - it was his own child.

He didn"t even need to think about who came up with this idea. Ji Heng quickly glared at Tian Qi.

This time, Tian Qi did not shrink back her neck.

Sure enough, RuYi was loyal to his friends and, seeing his Emperor father glaring at Tian Qi, he immediately admitted he was the one who wanted to wear a dress.

Ji Heng was not as easy to fool as the Empress Dowager, he only chose not to expose them this time, because RuYi disguised as a little girl was really adorable. His heart was also a bit soft. He stooped down and picked RuYi up in his arms, his face fit snugly to his and RuYi"s tiny face rubbing against his as they slowly started walking.

RuYi happily shook his hand, the jingling sound from the small golden bells on his wrist intensifying. Seeing that his Emperor father did not appear to want to let go of him, he extended his hand towards Tian Qi "Tian Qi, hug."

Ji Heng"s face darkened as he felt his son didn"t give him any face. Incidentally both him and Tian Qi looked at each other and he glared at him.

He still couldn"t understand. Of all the eunuchs and palace maids playing with his child, why did RuYi like and never got tired of Tian Qi, always being by his side?

Later on he summed up a regular pattern: all those with the surname Ji were all moved by Tian Qi"s skills.

Truly a foe.

Tian Qi received Ji Heng"s discontent, hence she didn"t dare to pick RuYi up, and just said "Your Highness, I cannot hug you..."

RuYi reluctantly withdrew his hand.

Ji Heng took a quick look at Tian Qi"s thin and weak physique. "In the future, you can"t be so noisy." As he said this, he put RuYi down so he could go and play.

After Ji Heng left, Tian Qi took RuYi to Dai SanShan to play. In fact, RuYi did not follow Tian Qi around and play blindly. Tian Qi had the advantages of both eunuchs and palace maids, there was no need to mention how she was a quick-witted person to play with. Even more, she was thoughtful and meticulous. The way she treated children was with a woman"s gentle and soft personality. To put it plainly, it was maternal love. RuYi"s wet nurse also had maternal feelings towards him, however she was painstakingly cautious. She didn"t dare let go of his hand so he could happily run around. Tian Qi had the courage to let him play whilst she was also gentle.

RuYi wasn"t even four (4) years old yet, so he naturally had no way to express these reasons in his own words. He only knew he liked to play with Tian Qi.

Put simply, as far as RuYi was concerned, Tian Qi was his best companion.

At this moment, the two small companions drew Dai SanShan out of the water and the two of them rode on the tortoise"s sh.e.l.l around the pond for a few laps. RuYi saw someone pa.s.sing through holding some zongzi, he got up for a moment and walked to them. The person let him take as many zongzi as he wanted, thinking he was going to share them with Tian Qi. Tian Qi knew that RuYi had already eaten dumplings at the Ci Ning Palace, and was afraid RuYi would get indigestion from eating too much. She didn"t let him eat much and coaxed RuYi into peeling the leaves off some of them and feeding them to Dai SanShan. 

Dai SanShan has been fed dumplings with all types of stuffing, none of them were foreign to her, and now became a picky eater: it wouldn"t eat the ones stuffed with vegetables.

And the tortoise was getting better, as it could sniff out the stuffing without having to take one single bite of the glutinous rice. If the stuffing is plain, it would lower its head and lay motionless like an old monk.

After feeding it for a while, there were a lot of dumplings left behind that have been stripped of their leaves but haven"t been touched. Tian Qi thought it would be a pity to throw them away and, since she couldn"t eat them all on her own, she asked the people around her. But wouldn"t they be unwilling to eat food that had been sniffed out by the tortoise? Everyone expressed their desire to be touched the deity - tortoise"s magic breath, therefore those dumplings were not wasted; they all entered the bellies of these palace maids and eunuchs. 

RuYi saw that Dai SanShan was not eating, felt bored again, and pointed to the weeping willows on the sh.o.r.e "Tian Qi, use these to weave a Dai SanShan for me, ba."

Using willow branches to weave a tortoise seemed somewhat difficult, mainly because Tian Qi never tried it before. But today, the little RuYi was willing to wear a dress, so it was important she rewarded him for his efforts. Hence, she got up and pulled some willow branches to start weaving. 

The two of them sat side by side on Dai SanShan"s back. The people around them didn"t dare to get too close usually, because even though the tortoise was full, it never relaxed its guard, stretching its neck and opening its huge eyes, it appeared extremely terrifying. The incident where the deity - tortoise bit people has been experienced by some of these people, whilst others only heard of it. In short, the more the story was spread the more it was exaggerated. Besides, Tian Qi and RuYi were there now, and n.o.body dared approached it.

Oh, that"s right, there was another courageous person, and that was the Emperor. However, whenever Ji Heng approached Dai SanShan, the effect was always the tortoise quickly retracted into its sh.e.l.l.

Ji Heng couldn"t understand it either, in the end, was the turtle afraid of him or did it dislike him?