Wu Ruo set his eyes on them. One of the young men, who looked absolutely handsome and light-hearted, was precisely his tangge Wu Anrun, and also his target for coming to Xishan Theatre.
He called out: “Run-ge.”
Wu Anrun heard someone calling him, turned towards the source of the voice, and immediately found the person who called him: “Xiao-Ruo?”
Wu Anrun’s friends also looked over and very quickly understood who Wu Anrun was referring to11很快就明白乌安润嘴里的小若是谁 more directly translates as “very quickly understood who was the Xiao-Ruo that Wu Anrun was referring to”. Normally, I try to reduce translation edits to retain as much of the original text as possible, but this is a bit unwieldy and hard to understand and I couldn’t think of a better way to phrase it., because Wu Ruo and Hei Xuanyi’s appearances were too eye-catching.
“Anrun, is that your tangdi?”
Wu Anrun’s friend, Liu Ding, asked jokingly. His other three friends looked at him with derisive expressions. Suddenly, it made Wu Anrun feel like it was very embarrassing2丢脸 (diulian): literally means to “throw face”, where ‘face’ here is about your pride/dignity. ‘Saving face’ in English also means ‘to try to regain favorable standing after something embarrassing has happened’, so this is the opposite of that. I don’t think there’s an actual English idiom for it though. to have such a fat and useless little cousin3Here, Anrun uses the phrase 弟弟 (didi) younger brother, because Wu Ruo is his tangdi. For clarity and to reduce confusion, I did not translate it directly because the context here is clear that Wu Ruo is his little cousin, not his little brother., his expression immediately darkened, and he asked Wu Ruo who was walking over: “What are you doing here?”
“I’m here to watch a show.” Wu Ruo introduced to him: “Run-ge, this is my husband, Hei Xuanyi.”
In his previous lifetime, Wu Ruo had put absolute importance on his reputation, and also, he hid from the things he didn’t want to face even more. On the contrary, it gave people more things to talk about to make fun of him. So, to prevent those things in his previous lifetime that he didn’t want happening, he had to erase away all his previous embarrassing pasts.
Since everyone knew by now that Hei Xuanyi was his husband, then he should unaffectedly and straightforwardly face things. Even if other people wanted to laugh at him, after not being able to see his embarrassment and inferiority, then it would slowly feel dull. Then they wouldn’t do this sort of senseless thing.
Hei Xuanyi raised his eyebrows, he didn’t think that Wu Ruo would introduce him to other people so calmly.
It wouldn’t be polite to turn his cheek and walk away from them in front of his friends, so Wu Anrun nodded at Hei Xuanyi stiffly.
Wu Ruo smiled and said: “Run-ge, I heard from my dad that you’re about to get married. I’ll just congratulate you here first, congratulate you on finding a beautiful and lovely wife.”
Wu Anrun’s eyebrows pinched together: “You’ve seen her before?”
Actually, he wasn’t pleased with this marriage arrangement at all. From the engagement till now, he only knew that the woman was the legitimate daughter4I think it’s been mentioned before in chapter 18? The long chapter about Wu family relations and history (the author was explaining Wu Ruo’s genealogy), but as a refresher, children by one’s formal wife are considered more legitimate than children by concubines. Sometimes if a formal wife can’t bear children, some favoured children by concubines, or children of favoured concubines are chosen to inherit instead. of the Zhunan City Zhuang family.
Wu Ruo shook his head ‘no’: “I haven’t.”
“Then if you’ve never seen her before, how do you know she’s a beautiful and lovely wife?”
“I heard the servants in the Southern main estate saying Miss Zhuang is very beautiful. Perhaps someone among them has seen her, that’s why they’d say that.”
Wu Anrun opened his mouth, wanting to reprimand him with a few lines, when Liu Ding who was by his side discreetly tugged on his clothes, and then, laughed as he said to Wu Ruo: “Young master Ruo5公子 (gong zi): a term used to refer to sons of noble families. There’s another term 少爷 (shao ye) which is also similarly translated as ‘young master’. I think shaoye has the nuance of referring to the person as “son of the household”, whereas gongzi has a closer nuance to “son of a noble family”. You will still hear people use shaoye in families of status, but gongzi refers to sons of nobility. Since there are no more noble classes in modern China, it’s much less commonly used., the show6戏曲 (xiqu) refers to traditional Chinese opera, with the most common being Peking opera. The closest thing I can compare it to is a musical. Peking opera is specifically the style of Chinese opera in what is now modern-day Beijing. Different regions have different styles, but it is essentially a musical theatre of sorts with acting/singing to convey storytelling. There are some classics that often get performed again and again, but for the vague Ancient China time period the author is referencing, it is common for theatres to make a story out of the latest town/city gossip. is about to start, let me get some people to guide you upstairs.”
“Alright, then I’ll have to trouble you.”
Wu Ruo and Hei Xuanyi followed Liu Ding’s people upstairs. Thanks to the fact that his body was on the fatter side, so, he walked very slowly. Naturally, he could hear what Wu Anrun and the others who were behind them were saying.
Wu Anrun said unhappily: “Liu Ding, why didn’t you let me speak just now?”
Liu Ding said: “What your tangdi said gave me a good idea.”
“What good idea?”
“Just now, weren’t you against getting married because you didn’t know how the maiden you were getting married to looks like? We can find someone to go and take a look, or if your Wu family has someone in Zhunan City, let them produce a portrait of Miss Zhuang and bring it back. If you’re dissatisfied with her looks, then find an excuse to call off the wedding.”
“Is that reliable?” Wu Anrun thought about it hesitantly: “I remember that there’s a tangdi from the Southern main estate, he’s interning at Zhunan City. Perhaps I can tell him to go and take a look. That’s right, who knows, maybe the rumours that Zhuang Qiurong is beautiful were spread by him.”
Wu Anrun’s other friend laughed coldly: “I think it’s still more reliable to go and take a look yourself. Anyway, since we have nothing to do now, we can accompany you for a trip.”
Wu Ruo listened up to this point, the corners of his lips quirking up.
The aim for coming today had been reached.
