Chapter 52

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Above the Sky Screen.

The scene from the pedestrian street was transmitted without omission across Jiuzhou.

The warm interaction was seen by later generations as childhood innocence and gratitude.

But in the Taiji Palace of the Tang Dynasty.

This scene ignited an extremely terrifying emotional storm.

The dignity of the Eternal Emperor vanished in this moment.

In its place was the most primal, purest extreme jealousy of an old father.

She was his daughter!

Jinyang Princess, whom Li Shimin cherished in his palms, never dared to speak a harsh word to, feared she might stumble while walking, and worried she might catch cold from a breeze!

She earned money for the first time.

She did not buy rouge, powder, gold, silver, or pearls.

She went to buy a cup of sweet drink.

The worst part was, she didn't drink it herself.

With both hands cradling it, standing on tiptoe, she personally fed it to a man in strange clothing!

"Lin Xuan brother? You drink first?" Li Shimin's lips trembled, his teeth grinding audibly.

A sourness surged straight to the crown of his head.

Li Shimin felt only bitterness filling his mouth.

He frantically recalled in his mind.

He had raised her for five years—when had this girl ever used money she earned to buy him, her father, even a drop of water?

The fire of jealousy burned through his reason.

He gathered strength in his palm and slammed it down hard.

Below the steps, the ministers were terrified out of their wits.

Beside him, Zhangsun Huanghou lifted her silk wide sleeve to cover the lower half of her face.

She barely held back her laughter.

Their daughter had learned gratitude and understood how to repay kindness.

As a mother, she felt deep satisfaction.

It was just hard on the emperor beside her, drowning in a vat of sourness.

She stepped forward, reached out, and gently patted Li Shimin's stiff back.

"Erlang, calm down."

"Xiao Sizi was stranded in a foreign land; Lin Xuan provided her food and shelter and kept her safe."

"Xiao Sizi repaid kindness with kindness—that is a sign of deep feeling and righteousness."

"This is a good thing."

After finishing the milk tea, Lin Xuan took Xiao Sizi's hand and walked into a large chain supermarket across the street.

Pushing a shopping cart, they moved between the fresh produce shelves.

"What do you want for dinner?" Lin Xuan picked up a box of exquisitely packaged black pork and checked the date.

"Do you have roasted lamb?" Xiao Sizi sat in the child seat of the cart, her feet dangling in the air.

"We don't have a charcoal grill at home; we can't get that flavor."

"I'll make you scallion-braised lamb instead."

Lin Xuan put the meat back in the fridge and pushed the cart toward the beef and lamb section.

His mobile phone vibrated again in his pocket.

Lin Xuan frowned.

Since turning off the platform's private messages last night, his virtual number had been bombarded nonstop by unknown calls.

The power of modern capital is everywhere; finding someone is as easy as pie for them.

He pulled out his mobile phone.

The screen showed a landline number from Jingcheng.

Lin Xuan pressed the answer button.

A smooth male voice came from the other end: "Hello, Mr. Lin."

"I'm the Business Director of Xingmang MCN."

"We're very interested in the calligraphy video you posted."

"No signing." Lin Xuan's tone was icy; he prepared to hang up.

"Mr. Lin, don't rush to refuse!" The man's voice suddenly sped up.

"We've done background checks—you're just an ordinary office worker, and you recently quit your job; you don't even have a job now, right?"

"The conditions Xingmang can offer will far exceed your imagination."

Lin Xuan stopped the shopping cart beside the seasoning shelves.

"Go on."

He wanted to hear just how disgusting their appetite could get.

"If you agree to sign an exclusive agency contract for that little girl."

"We'll pay you three million yuan upfront as a signing fee."

The man assumed Lin Xuan was swayed, his tone dripping with condescending charity.

"Not only that, we have even written the script. We will craft a persona of a 'National Studies Prodigy' for the child."

"We will schedule three live streams a week, provide a unified supply of the Four Treasures of the Study, and split the profits fifty-fifty."

"Mr. Lin, this is a business where you make money while lying down."

To have a four-and-a-half-year-old princess of the Great Tang recite a script in a live stream and sell those shoddily made, cheap brushes and ink?

A trace of extreme disgust flashed in Lin Xuan's eyes.

"Can the Four Treasures of the Study you provide compare to the old pit stone of Duanxi?"

The voice on the other end of the phone paused for a moment, then burst into a laugh of someone who was used to such things.

"Mr. Lin, aren't you being an outsider on this?"

"The audience in the live stream doesn't understand anything about old pit stone."

"As long as the packaging is exquisite, a nine-ninety-nine-yuan brush with free shipping will still sell out."

"Everyone is buying the gimmick of a 'prodigy's same style'; what we are selling is emotional value."

The male voice carried an extremely realistic scent of copper.

"Three million in cash is enough for you to pay a down payment in a first-tier city."

"Mr. Lin, will you consider it?"

Lin Xuan held the Mobile Phone, his gaze falling on Xiao Sizi sitting in the stroller.

The little girl was curiously staring at the colorful spice bottles on the shelf, her eyes clear as water.

Lin Xuan withdrew his gaze and spoke with decisive firmness: "Listen well."

"She writes characters because she likes it, because of the inheritance in her bones."

"She is not a monkey for your capital to use to raise money!"

"Once cultural inheritance gets tainted by the copper stench of people like you, it becomes sacrilege."

"Keep your three million to buy yourself a coffin. Do not call again."

He immediately added the number to the blacklist.

"Lin Xuan, who has provoked your anger?"

Xiao Sizi sensed his mood was off and looked up to ask.

Lin Xuan gently rubbed her soft hair.

"I met a few beggars, and I drove them away."

"Remember, the flying-white calligraphy you write is an priceless treasure your father taught you."

"It represents the royal backbone of your Great Tang."

"This backbone is worth more than a thousand gold and cannot be exchanged."

Lin Xuan spoke with deep earnestness, "In the future, no matter how great the difficulties you encounter, you must never use this skill to wag your tail and beg for pity from anyone."

"Do you remember?"

Although Xiao Sizi did not understand what "capital" was.

She understood the protective meaning in Lin Xuan's words.

She nodded vigorously, her expression solemn.

"I remember! A princess of the Great Tang does not bow for five pecks of rice!"

Above the Sky Screen.

Lin Xuan's hard-core rejection, accompanied by the bustling sounds of the supermarket, clearly spread throughout Jiuzhou.

There were no flowery words, only the purest backbone.

In the circles of scholars and ink-wash painters of past dynasties, a violent emotional resonance exploded.

The Ming Dynasty timeline.

Hai Rui sat in the simple rear hall of the county yamen.

He wore a coarse cloth official robe that had been washed until it turned white.

After hearing Lin Xuan's words that "cultural inheritance tainted by the scent of copper is sacrilege," he suddenly stood up.

Hai Rui adjusted his clothes and cap, faced the Sky Screen, and made a deep, long bow.

"Treating three million in vast wealth as nothing, solely to protect the innocent heart of a young child."

"This is a true gentleman of a later age!"

"I often worry that the customs of later ages are declining and human hearts are not as ancient as before."

"Seeing this youth today, I finally know that the backbone of Huaxia has continued for a thousand years without breaking!"

The Great Song timeline.

Ouyang Xiu put down the brush in his hand, lifted the wine cup, drank it in one gulp, and said with boldness:

"What a 'not bowing for five pecks of rice'! What a 'not being a money-raising monkey'!"

"Although there are merchants in later ages who chase profit, there are also such unyielding iron bones that protect the literary lineage!"

"I should raise a large cup of white wine!"

The intellectual class of ancient times valued integrity the most.

Lin Xuan's hesitation-free response to the million-yuan temptation completely won the collective favor and extremely high respect of this class.