All for the Brothers

The wine was clear, but drink it down and your face flushes red. Silver or gold is cool to the touch, but clenched in the palm it grows warm. That gold ingot Brother Sun gave... it works... In just a moment, the madam had led over a dozen girls in at once. Luckily the private room was spacious; even with a dozen-odd people filing in and lining up in two rows, they still all fit. I have to say, the caliber of the girls at Qiliu Youran really was high. Brother Sun needed only to sweep a narrowed gaze across them to see that every one was quite lovely—and not just in looks: their makeup, their figures, even their bearing were all rather fine. Of course, the two of them had come today to investigate a case; the merrymaking was only a cover. Whether these girls were rare beauties of heaven's making or the kind whose looks could make fish sink and geese fall from the sky, they had no interest in any of it. "Heh heh... let me have a look..." Once the girls had all taken their places, Sun Yixie opened with a lecherous grin once more, then beckoned to the first girl in the front row. "Little miss, what should I call you?" The madam's reactions were quick. Seeing this, she glided over to the girl's side in a single step and gave her arm a light tap. "The young master is calling you—hurry over and pay your respects!" Receiving the order, the girl at once moved her lotus steps with delicate grace, swaying gently as she came to Sun Yixie's side. Courtesan though she was, in that moment her coquettish, half-reluctant, half-encouraging manner managed to act out a bashfulness as though she had never set eyes on a man in her life. "This humble one is called Luan Qing. I greet you, young master, and wish you boundless fortune." As Luan Qing spoke, she loosely clasped her hands, moved them gently up and down at the lower right of her chest, and gave a slight bow—performing a quite standard wanfu salute. With that, she lowered her head a touch, her cheeks tinged peach-pink, striking a very shy pose—yet those eyes of hers kept stealing glances at Sun and Huang. For all that it was just a few seconds' greeting on meeting, every single motion within it—from the look in her eyes to the tone of her voice, from the angle of her face to where she stood—was the product of specialized training. Whether the girl herself was pretty was secondary; it was this high standard on the "professional" level that, at least in Xuzhou and the surrounding region, nothing could surpass Qiliu Youran. That was why people like Zheng Mukai and Ge Shi, whose homes weren't in Xuzhou at all, were still reluctant to leave the place. "Oh? Luan Qing... a fine name, a fine name." Sun Yixie stared straight at her, without the slightest restraint. "Lift your head and let me have a look." Luan Qing acted coy once more, then did as she was told. "Mm... a beauty indeed." Sun Yixie took a sip of the wine on the table. "It's only that... I wonder, Miss Luan Qing, besides being lovely as a flower, do you have any other talents?" Every girl at Qiliu Youran had some talent—only the level varied. So when Luan Qing was asked this, she was not put out in the least. "Replying to the young master: this humble one has a passing knowledge of music, is skilled at song and dance, and knows a thing or two about poetry and verse." "Whoa~" Listening to this, Huang Donglai at once chimed in. "Then you'd better chat with Brother Sun a good while. He's just the opposite of you—tone-deaf, all thumbs, and can't read a single word..." Before Sun Yixie could even retort with a "Shut up," Luan Qing had already burst into a giggle. That laugh, too, was something they were trained in—in this world there actually aren't many beauties who can keep their looks from falling apart while howling with laughter or weeping; a great many lovely women look good only when their faces are expressionless, and the moment their expressions shift even a little too far, it's ruined. So the girls here, when they laughed, would generally use a silk fan to cover half their faces, leaving only the brows and eyes showing, so as not to spoil their image. After a few laughs, Luan Qing spoke again. "Master Huang really does love to joke. I imagine... you and Master Sun must be very good friends." Clearly, she was a woman who knew how to talk. As a stranger who had only just met them, Luan Qing naturally could not know how close Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai were—much less could she know that the two of them treated this mutual volley of trash talk like breathing. By ordinary logic, if a man badmouthed another man in front of a woman, then even if the two didn't fall out on the spot, it would easily breed some unpleasantness. But Luan Qing's laugh and words in that moment could dissolve any such thing at once. First, she used her laughter to show she hadn't taken the words seriously; then she directly defined the "badmouthing" as a joke; and then she went a step further, implying that only people who are very good friends would trade such jokes—effectively handing both men a way to save face at once. That sort of tact and quick wit—many a soul who has roamed the jianghu for years doesn't possess it. Only a woman of such lowly station as Luan Qing, yet one forced to rub shoulders with the rich and powerful, could grow so practiced at it. "Yes, yes... though we two don't share a surname, we're closer than blood brothers." As Sun Yixie spoke, he vengefully kicked Huang Donglai a few times under the table. "Uh... right, Miss Luan Qing, if I were to choose you to keep me company today, I wonder what you could do for me?" This remark—even the madam could hardly bear to hear it. She cursed inwardly: "Nonsense—why the hell else would you come to a brothel, if not for what she does for you? And you'd make the girl say it herself?" "I..." Luan Qing hesitated a moment, her whole face flushed, and answered in a soft voice. "I can sing for the young master, drink and make merry with the young master, and I can also..." As she spoke she picked up her silk fan again—this time nearly covering her whole face. "...can coax the young master to sleep." "Damn..." Hearing this, Huang Donglai blurted out the curse, and quickly took a sip of wine to steady his nerves. Sun Yixie, however, didn't so much as change expression, and replied in an even tone. "Oh? You can coax me to sleep too? That good, is it?" Luan Qing couldn't even find a reply to that, thinking: surely you don't mean to make me say it again? "Aiyo! Young Master Sun... my dear boy!" At this point even the madam could no longer stand it. She came over and caught hold of Sun Yixie. "So many eyes are watching—just look how you've made our Luan Qing blush. Come, come, Luan Qing, you go stand back first." "Yes, Mama." Luan Qing acknowledged her and, with a salute, returned to the line. As she walked back, the madam bent down to Sun and Huang's ears and said softly, "You two masters might pick a little faster. At this rate, chatting them up one by one, you won't have time to do anything else tonight." "Mm... fair enough." Sun Yixie nodded, then at once turned to the second girl in the front row and asked outright, "This girl—I want to ask you, can you coax people to sleep?" This time the madam was well and truly stunned, thinking inwardly: so this is all you ever wanted to ask, is it? And Huang Donglai, by now, was slumped over the table howling with laughter, unable to speak, on the very verge of suffocating—only he and Sun Yixie knew what he was laughing at. To make a long story short... After mentally torturing the madam and those girls for about an hour, in the end... Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai didn't pick a single one, and sent them all back. The madam asked them just what they wanted. Sun Yixie said he wasn't satisfied with any of them, and told her to "think of another way"; if she truly had nothing "presentable," then never mind—tonight they'd just treat it as the two brothers coming here for a midnight snack. What he said... the madam understood it well enough: the meaning was, none of my dozen-odd girls meet your fancy, is that it? You're playing the goading game on old me, trying to force out my trump card? Fine, then—you two just wait. And so the madam, worked into a temper, really did go off to fetch her own "four aces." Once she had left the room and pulled the door shut, Huang Donglai—free at last to speak his mind—immediately came out with, "Brother Sun, you are too damn fierce! The way you work a brothel—right at home, completely in your element!" "Aiyo..." Sun Yixie drew the sound out long, putting on an earnest, heartfelt air. "It's all for the brother... just putting on a show for the occasion." "You've gotten a bit too deep into that act, haven't you? I'd wager it's not an act at all—more like the real you," Huang Donglai came back. "Bull!" Sun Yixie took a sip of wine, then promptly changed the subject. "But hand on my heart, these girls really are wretched. From their expressions to their speech, they're trained so flawlessly not a drop leaks... sigh—it's all for the sake of a living." "A living, you say? For them it's at most survival, and the brothel trains them for the sake of business... In any case, this world is nothing kind to women." At this, Huang Donglai couldn't help recalling the universe the two of them had originally come from, and said with feeling, "Back in our old world, men and women were more nearly equal. Look at you—back then, when your wife told you to wash the dishes, you didn't dare breathe a word of protest before you went and did them..." "Screw off! In my last life I was master of my own house!" Sun Yixie cut him off. "I only washed dishes because I wanted to. Who'd dare force me to wash dishes? I'd slap them clean across the face!" "Yeah, yeah, everyone knows—your face just went flying to meet your wife's hand, and that's a slap right there, isn't it?" Huang Donglai laughed. Sun Yixie tilted his head, and that catchphrase of his came round again: "Son of a— you'd better shut your—" Creak— Just as he was about to let loose a stream of curses, the door was suddenly pushed open once more. Before the person even arrived, a gust of fragrant air blew in first. Right after, the madam could be seen leading a peerless beauty by the arm, slowly stepping over the threshold and coming to their table. The one who came was the girl called "Chun Yu"—one of Qiliu Youran's four signboards. There was surely good reason the signboards were signboards. Chun Yu had only to stand there, without so much as speaking, and her presence, her allure, her whole aura... made all the dozen-odd who had come before pale beside her. So-called "beauty," aside from objective factors like features, face shape, and figure, is more than anything a kind of subjective feeling. To be the top courtesan of a brothel, one must understand what feeling others are looking to find in her. That feeling, summed up, is this—from the lowest of stations, to be the one most beyond reach. Chun Yu was very clear on this point, which was why she was nothing like those girls just now. "Two masters, allow me to make the introduction..." Seeing the two fall silent at the sight of Chun Yu, the madam supposed these two boys had finally been struck dumb with awe, and came forward with a smug look. "This one here is our..." "I take it... this must be Miss Chun Yu." This time it was actually Huang Donglai who cut the madam off, having guessed the newcomer's identity exactly. "Your fair name has long reached my ears, Miss. Meeting you today, it truly lives up to its renown." How did he know this was Chun Yu? Simple—Dong Wan had mentioned her. As a regular patron of Qiliu Youran, Dong Wan had sought an audience with all four—Chun Yu, Xia Yang, Qiu Ye, and Chu Xue. Pity, though: he did get to see them, but not one of the four hit it off with him, so he never managed to spend a night in any of their chambers. But in any case, since he had seen them, there was intelligence to be had. A beauty like that, once seen, could never be forgotten—at least Dong Wan couldn't forget her. Not only couldn't he forget; he also remembered clearly, for each of the four, her looks and figure, even down to the clothes she wore and the scent of her powder when she received him. And so, having heard Dong Wan describe them all in detail, though Sun and Huang had yet to set eyes on these Four Great Beauties of the four seasons, they already had a rough notion of their looks, their bearing, even their scent. It was no wonder, then, that the one Huang Donglai could name was Chun Yu. "Master Huang flatters me. I am but a lowly courtesan; that Master Huang knows my name already contents me greatly." So Chun Yu was taking the rather aloof, cold road: though in her words she set herself very low, her tone was neither warm nor cool, neither servile nor proud. Ordinarily, once she said something like that, the other party would take the bait nine times out of ten, and at once that feeling of a warm face pressed to a cold rump would come over them. But Huang Donglai's reply was, unexpectedly: "Oh, is that so... then, no thanks needed. Please." He had actually said "no thanks needed," and as he said "please," he extended a hand toward the door—meaning to show her out. Never mind now that she was one of this place's signboards; even before that, Chun Yu had never met such treatment. She thought: I've barely stepped in and traded two sentences, and you tell me to leave? Shouldn't it be me, normally, telling others to leave? What is going on? The madam was equally dumbstruck, thinking inwardly: What's this? Could these two boys have come to wreck the house? And to tell me to leave the moment they lay eyes on my trump card? You two... don't tell me you like men? While she was still puzzling over it, the girl Chun Yu behind her could no longer hold her face; without so much as a word, she gave a humph, turned, and swept out. Seeing the girl had taken offense, the madam was just about to hurry after her when Sun Yixie called her to a halt. "Sister, please stay a moment." Hearing Young Master Sun's tone suddenly turn serious, the madam seemed to sense something as well, and put on a grave face herself. "Young Master Sun... what else would you have of me?" "I can see you're rather busy, Sister, so the two of us won't beat around the bush with you..." Sun Yixie said in a low voice. "The truth is, we didn't come here today to see anyone else. We only wish to see Miss Chu Xue." At these words, the madam's face darkened too, and she gave a cold snort. "Heh... so that's how it is." What sort of place was Qiliu Youran? How great was the power of the forces behind it? Never mind Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai—even Dong Wan, constable head of Xuzhou, and even the county magistrate here... were not fit to know. So the madam here surely had a temper of her own. Don't let her money-grubbing, honey-tongued manner of these past moments fool you—in truth, should she ever truly turn on them, Sun and Huang would likely be no match. This old woman practiced a set of "Plum Blossom Brand" lightness skill, to which she added forty-eight routines of the "Branch-Plucking, Leaf-Picking Hand." Against those of the martial world beneath second-rate—fellows of the Zheng Mukai and Ge Shi sort—it was more than enough. If she set out to deal with Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai, two or three moves should do it. "Then this is where you two masters erred." The madam's tone had finally turned cold as well. "Had you stated your purpose from the very start, that would have been that; and take one step back—your dragging this old bag of bones of mine to and fro, that, too, I wouldn't have minded." Here there ought to have been a "but." "But you two, leaning on that bit of silver, deliberately toyed with and humiliated my girls... now that is something we really must have a good talk about, don't you think?" With that, she suddenly raised her hand and brought it down upon the table. The table... was fine. Every plate of food and every wine pot and cup upon it had shattered.