Peerless ( Meng Xi Shi )

A few days went by in the blink of an eye.

If Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao were not familiar towards the two powers supporting Qiemo before, then on the day of the birthday party was the day they fully see for themselves the influence Xing Mao had in the city.

From the day they received the invitation, the city had begun to be decorated with lanterns and decors. Within a few short days, the entire city was filled with big red lanterns and red ribbons. Although Qiemo is not huge, these expenses can only be afforded by a rich and wealthy family.

A successful business is not enough to describe Xing Mao, for as the descendant of the Shanshan King, when the Shanshan Kingdom was annihilated, the Shanshan King took four thousand survivors and fled to Qiemo. He also relocated the Shanshan Kingdom's national treasury to this place, and after three generations, Xing Mao's business did not only spread across Qiemo, but also to the City of Six Crafts, even reaching into the capital of the Sui Empire and the Southern Dynasty where a few of their branches operated.

When one had money, they would naturally need an even bigger manpower to guard their treasury. They say that ever since Xing Mao was five, a skilled martial artist was invited to teach all those in his family. It was a pity that Xing Mao's talents were only so-so, until now he was only a third-tier martial artist, but at his side, he lacked no bodyguards, and every one of them followed him whenever he went, it was an incredible sight.

Once Feng Xiao and Cui Buqu arrived at the Xing manor's gates, it was already crowded beyond imagination. Xing manor's bodyguards lined the gates in one straight row, heavily guarding the entire Xing manor and turning it into a nigh impenetrable fortress. The third in charge they saw last time stood outside the gates to welcome the guests, behind him also stood two bodyguards.

Once Cui Buqu saw it, he smiled, "This kind of scenery is not very much different from the Crown Prince or Prince Jin when they leave the capital. It is expected of a king in a land far away. Although Xing Mao no longer has the Shanshan Kingdom, he still behaved like a king."

Feng Xiao touched his chin, "They say that his subordinates indeed calls him 'Your Majesty' in front of him."

All around them, a few carriages stopped, and among them none weren't beautiful or elegant. They were the only guests that came from an inn, who brought no one bodyguards with them. Those who came to wish Xing Mao's mother for her day of birth were mostly famed and prestigious people from the city. It was even said that people Xing Mao knew from the Jianghu province were also among them. In this situation, Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao both were considered quite unsightly, for they have to even hold the present they've brought with their own hands.

The one invited by Xing Mao is the nephew of the Kucha King, if Jin Lian came together, it would not be appropriate for her to masquerade as a maidservant, and they couldn't think of any identity that was suitable for her. So, to avoid giving Fo Er the chance to kill her, Cui Buqu left Qiao Xian behind to protect her. Yet because of this, with only himself and Feng Xiao, compared to the other guests who had maidservants all around them, they looked even more poor and unsightly.

As they ignored the gazes from all around them, their thick skins came into effect. They acted very naturally as they queued behind everyone without any embarrassment at all, instead they were interested in using the chance to observe others.

Everyone brought gifts that were large and small, some of them even wanted to gift something that was obvious to the eye, carrying a tree as tall as a grown man that was hung with gold and silver. This attracted shocked and surprised gasps of amusement. Cui Buqu, however, only held a box that was as long as his hand to his elbow.

Perhaps those three in charge were used to seeing glorious and invaluable gifts, once they saw how this gift looked as if it was bought from a small, unknown stall by the streets, they looked stunned for a moment.

Once they saw the invitation, they knew who this guest was. The Kingdom of Kucha produces metal, their foundation was thick and full of wealth, and they were not a small country that was poor. Yet Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao's attire, though they didn't looked too poor, was still far from the lavish and silk that the third in charge had imagined.

They knew how to hide their surprises a little bit, but the servants next to them, however, did not managed to avert their gazes.

"Halt!" Cui Buqu said in displeasure, "Who allow you to just take it like that?"

The servant who took the gift turned around to look at him.

Cui Buqu spoke proudly, "A-Feng, open the box and show them what gift we brought."

Under the eyes of everyone, it was rare that Feng Xiao was obedient, he took the box from the servant and undid the ribbon outside, taking out a very ordinary short dagger.

"Look carefully." Feng Xiao said.

He unsheathed the dagger, and all the audiences could only see the white glare of the dagger, as if ice and snow surrounded it. They only saw Feng Xiao raise his hand lightly, and with a sweep, it turned the servant's clothes into dust. The servant has yet to even come to respond.

Once he heard the shouts of women, only was his consciousness pulled back. His face brimmed red with shyness as he quickly ran away.

Cui Buqu smiled and said, "Master Xing has seen enough of pearls and gold. Who do you think we are, and how would we give just a simple gift? If we did, then how are we different from those farmers, or stray cats and dogs?"

Everyone saw the power of the dagger and mumbled among themselves that the invitation to the Kucha nephew was definitely not a rumour, and dared not look down on Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao.

The third in charge came to himself, quickly receiving the dagger with both his hands and carefully gave it to a servant next to him, smiling, "I apologize for my rudeness and delayed your Lordship, I beg for your mercy and generousity to not be calculative with us seeing it's the day of birth of my Master's mother. I have arranged a place for both of you, I will guide you there now. Please come!"

Everyone was guided by servants, and only Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao was special, for they were guided by the third in charge himself.

There was no need to describe how spacious the Xing manor was. Because the guests that came today were more than usual, they could not arrange for all of them to sit in the same hall. They had no choice but to separate the Xing manor into the outside hall and inner hall. Those who sat inside were not much, and it looked more spacious and less crowded, for those who sat inside were all important guests of Xing Mao. On the outside, it was much more crowded compared to those who sat inside, their importance were obviously a little less.

Although Cui Buqu was guided by the third in charge himself, they still could not go into the inner hall. They could only remain at a place near the hall leading to the inner hall.

Perhaps this is already not a bad place, Cui Buqu knew that in the beginning, their seats should be quite far in the back, but because of what they've done just now, only did the third in charge moved them forward.

Then he looked at the inner hall, other than the seats of both hosts, and four seats on their left and right, there were eight very important guests in total, and one of them should be Duan Qigu.

Cui Buqu gave a look of displeasure and asked, "Why? Even with my identity, I cannot have a seat in the inner hall?"

The third in charge's smile did not waver, he bend his back and said, "I apologize, My Lord, those eight seats belong to people my Master has known for years, they are not arranged according to the rank of a person. Among the people who are in the outside hall, there are the Sect Leader of the Qionghai Sect, disciples from the Guanzhong Wei Sect, and the Sect Leader of the Xianlin Sect, all of their seats are far behind compared to you two!"

Cui Buqu pretended to be impatient and waved his hand, "Fine, fine. The old woman's celebrating her sixtieth birthday, so I shall refrain from being calculative with you!"

The third in charge smiled, "Your Lordship really is generous!"

He still needed to tend to other guests, so he immediately bid them farewell. Feng Xiao held Cui Buqu as he guided him to seat, then he took two grapes from the table and toss it into his mouth, before beginning to observe this surroundings.

The guests all came and sat on their seats. Four people already occupied the eight seats that were in the inner hall. Feng Xiao did not recognize even one of them, so he listened to Cui Buqu who said, "In the inner hall there is one, from the way he looks, he might be the Guanzhong Wei Sect's Wei Huofang. As for the others, I don't know them either, they might not be from the Jianghu province."

Feng Xiao, "Xing Mao will definitely arrange Duan Qigu's seat to be just underneath himself, to imply that he is serious about coming to a truce. Now we are still a bit far away from him, nothing would be convenient for us even if we wanted to do something."

Cui Buqu, "When the party begins, we compromise. But speaking of which, where did you find such a sharp dagger?"

Feng Xiao had finished one string of grapes, then he used a silver fork to dig up piece of honeydew and put it into his mouth, he smiled upon hearing that, "I infused some of my inner strength into the blade. So let alone a dagger that could turn metal into sand, even if you use it to split mountains, it can be done."

Cui Buqu asked suspiciously, "But when you took out the dagger, didn't it have a white glare?"

Feng Xiao laughed, "Haha. This dagger was placed in the snow for three to four month, added with a bit of inner strength, wouldn't it have a white glare? I bought this thing on my last trip from a stall in the west of the city. With only three hundred coins, we bought a grand feast such as this, this is incredibly worth it!"

After a moment of silence, Cui Buqu said, "The Jiejian Bureau is so poor now they couldn't even bring out a proper gift?"

Feng Xiao fumed, "Don't we need money to travel a few thousand miles here to investigate a case? The outskirts have strong sandstorms and winds, don't I need to use money to purchase flowers and hair oil? Otherwise, how could I maintain the grace and elegance of my face and my hair? Your Qiao Xian is so tricky. Asking her to buy me some hair oil is like asking her to risk her life for me, so of course I have to spend my own money."

Cui Buqu: "…."

If Feng Xiao pretended to act like a woman, he could still mock him with sarcasm, but when the other wasn't acting strangely, he looked really serious and determined. When Cui Buqu imagined a scenery of Feng Xiao spreading his knees apart in an 'L' shape, sitting in the room, shaving his moustache on one hand, and with the other, spreading hair oil onto his hair, he couldn't felt feeling his face getting a cramp.

Feng Xiao lectured him with a serious tone, "Don't you dare think that men needn't care about their looks. Like me, who possessed such peerless beauty and elegance, won't I have betrayed Heaven's blessing on me if I didn't care about my looks? Although you are not like me, you are still considered pleasant-looking, but your body is weak and you often succumb to illness, this means that you would naturally age faster than other men. If you still refuse to maintain your looks, I'm afraid that after two years—"

He chuckled softly.

Cui Buqu knew that he wasn't thinking of anything good, but he still asked in a deep tone, "What?"

Feng Xiao, "By then I can really call you 'Dad'."

Cui Buqu glared at plate of fruit in front of him for a moment. He was really afraid that he couldn't stand it any longer, and would really slam Feng Xiao's face into the plate of fruit and wipe his face all over it.

At that moment, a sound broke his dangerous thought.

"I am Chen Ji, may I inquire the name of this maiden and gentleman?"

Cui Buqu raised his head.

The young man called Chen Ji was sitting next to Feng Xiao. His words were obviously meant for Feng Xiao, and Cui Buqu was simply a convenience to mention.

"Ji, which character 'Ji'?" Feng Xiao had lost the mischevious smile he had when he was bickering with Cui Buqu just now. Instead, he gave a shy looking smile, purposely taking a half-hearted peak at Chen Ji. Feng Xiao's eyelids fluttered, as if he has just gave Chen Ji a wink.

This expression is useless towards Cui Buqu, but towards men who didn't know of his true identity, it was quite effective.

At the very least, Chen Ji was obviously interested. His gaze on Feng Xiao became more passionate.

"The 'Ji' that means after the rain, when the sky clears up once more."

Chen Ji.

Cui Buqu engrave that name to memory, and very quickly he found who this person is in his sea of memories.

The Guanzhong's Xianlin Sect's Sect Leader's son.

The Xianlin Sect wasn't a unique sect like the Tiantai Sect, but in the Jianghu province, they were rather popular. Chen Ji's martial arts are only so-so, and he was a free-spirited man similar to Yandang Sect's Lin Wei. Perhaps he was coddled and spoiled since he was young, he had never experienced any form of hardships.

Although his martial arts are not outstanding, he still has a sect leader father, so the Xing manor granted him a seat just next to Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao.

They looked at the people in the inner hall, it seemed that the host and all the guests have all arrived.

Duan Qigu, Gao Yi, sat on Xing Mao's left and right, and beside Xing Mao there was also an old woman, they guessed that she is the one this birthday party was meant for.

Cui Buqu was still thinking of ways to get closer to Duan Qigu, and now that Chen Ji is here, a plan sparked in his head.

It was as if Feng Xiao knew what he was thinking about, he smiled and gave him a wink, then pushed the plate of fruits on the table towards Cui Buqu's direction.

Cui Buqu felt the other man's excitement and impatience to see an interesting show unfolding before his eyes, so he couldn't help rolling his eyes in his heart, before immediately flipping the plate of fruits into the air.

Splat, splat, splat!

Not only the plate broke into a thousand pieces, but the fruits also fell all over the ground.

It wasn't difficult for this scene to gather the attention of everyone. The entire hall sank into silence, even Xing Mao and his people looked in Cui Buqu's direction.