Ji Qingwu pretended not to notice Lan Zhi’s unusual expression.
She calmly reached out and took a fresh set of clothes from the rack by the screen.
It was a light turquoise top of cloud brocade, densely embroidered with mottled bamboo, paired with a crescent-white skirt intricately embroidered with ocean waves.
At first glance, it seed ordinary, but a closer look revealed the extraordinary needlework.
Mrs. Qiao had specially commissioned it from an embroiderer in Jiangnan not long after Ji Qingwu returned ho. Compared to palace attire, the outfit was less ornate, but its true value lay in the artistry of the needlework.
Ji Qingwu had tried it on once before putting it away. Though simple in style, the embroidery was so exquisite that she worried about accidentally snagging or scuffing it while handling her dicinal herbs.
As Ji Qingwu dressed, Lan Zhi stole glances at her. It was clearly the sa face, yet sothing about it seed different.
The genius of the Disguise Technique Ji Qingwu had mastered was that it altered the bone structure. Looking only at the individual features, one could see no difference from before.
True beauty lies in the bone, not the skin.
"Lan Zhi?"
Ji Qingwu had to call her na several tis before the maidservant snapped out of her daze.
She sat before the dressing table, but Lan Zhi, holding a small box of face powder, was at a loss.
’What do I do?’ Lan Zhi fretted inwardly. ’Every part of this face is perfect. How am I supposed to apply makeup to it?’
Ji Qingwu looked at the woman in the mirror, whose face was as lovely as a hibiscus in bloom, and felt a sense of familiar strangeness herself.
She had spent too long on the run, hiding and fleeing, ever since leaving the military camp—so long that she had almost forgotten her own original appearance.
Over the past few years, her looks seed to have blossod. Her gaze was gentle and expressive, her delicate cheeks softly flushed.
She tilted her lips into a smile, and the person in the mirror smiled back, her serene grace like that of a flower reflected in water.
"Lan Zhi, let’s begin with the makeup."
She turned her head slightly and instructed, "Just a light dusting of powder and paint my brows in the distant-mountain style. That will be all."
As Ji Qingwu left Wutong Garden, Lan Zhi stood at the entrance, her face flushed red, watching her lady’s departing figure.
In the end, Lan Zhi hadn’t been able to display her skills. On a face like Fifth Missy’s, rouge and powder would have only marred its natural beauty.
She just didn’t understand why Fifth Missy needed to bathe and dress so exquisitely just to pick up the little princess from her lessons.
As Ji Qingwu passed the gate to Old Madam Ji’s courtyard, she ran right into soone walking in the opposite direction.
"Fifth Sister?"
The woman’s voice was filled with clear confusion.
Ji Qingyuan, who had just finished helping their grandmother take her dicine and lie down to rest, called out to the light-turquoise figure about to drift past.
Ji Qingwu stopped and turned. "Fourth Sister."
Her tone was neither warm nor cold; servants were watching, after all, and they were at the entrance to Old Madam Ji’s Shou’an Hall.
Ji Qingyuan stared at her face, utterly astonished.
She said, "You look... different from before."
Ji Qingyuan had always been beautiful. In her youth, she was known as one of the great beauties of Lin’an City. She was suprely confident in her appearance, feeling she was in no way inferior even when compared to the peerlessly beautiful Princess Consort Wei of the Imperial Palace.
She took no small number of pills to preserve her youth and had studied such thods extensively, so she could tell at a glance that Ji Qingwu’s face was vastly different from before.
Ji Qingwu replied nonchalantly, "I tried a new style of makeup today. Don’t you think it suits , Fourth Sister?"
Ji Qingyuan stared at her face, which seed to glow in the sunlight, her skin as smooth and flawless as fine jade.
’What kind of powder is so fine and smooth, making the skin glow like jade? But it’s not just that her skin is lustrous—her features have beco more delicate and harmonious, too.’
’Has so new youth-preserving formula appeared recently? One that I haven’t been able to find?’
Seeing her frowning and lost in thought, Ji Qingwu said, "Fourth Sister, was there anything else? I’m in a hurry to pick up Jiu Jiu from her lessons."
Ji Qingyuan wanted to ask about her beauty regin, but hearing she was in a hurry, she didn’t dare delay her.
Her wrist, which had been injured by that man who had appeared so suddenly, still ached faintly on damp, rainy days. Clutching her right wrist, she stepped aside to let her pass.
Not daring to delay any longer, Ji Qingwu took a carriage to the palace gates. After presenting her waist-token, she had just stepped through the imposing, solemn entrance when she was startled by soone who appeared out of nowhere.
"Fifth Cousin?!"
Princess Qingyun’s tone was full of pleasant surprise.
"I’ve been watching you from the palace gate for a while. I thought that person’s build and gait looked a lot like yours, but I wasn’t sure it was you."
If they hadn’t been at the main entrance to the Imperial Palace, Ji Qingwu might have thought an assassin had just leaped out at her.
She took a mont to compose herself before asking, "So you recognize now?"
Princess Qingyun said, "The guards at the gate announced your na just now."
Ji Qingwu asked, puzzled, "I thought you were still confined to your quarters. Why are you here?"
The corners of Princess Qingyun’s lips curled up uncontrollably. "My mother, the Empress Dowager, summoned ."
Seeing the unrestrained joy on her face and her irrepressible smile, Ji Qingwu guessed the reason. "Congratulations, Princess."
Princess Qingyun asked, "Fifth Cousin, you know why the Empress Dowager summoned ?"
Ji Qingwu said, "Joy is written all over your face."
The Empress Dowager had summoned Qingyun about her grand wedding to Li Chengxun, for which the Imperial Household and Guanglu Temple had nearly completed preparations. The Empress Dowager doted on her and had prepared several sets of wedding gowns and coronets for her to choose from, summoning her today to personally select her favorites.
Princess Qingyun looked at Ji Qingwu and said hesitantly, "Fifth Cousin, your face..."
’I dressed simply today, so there shouldn’t be anything wrong,’ Ji Qingwu thought. ’And I only applied a light layer of powder.’
But when Ji Qingwu rembered where she was headed, she touched her cheek and asked with a hint of nervousness, "What is it?"
Princess Qingyun’s eyes lit up. "You look good enough to eat."
Ji Qingwu suddenly had the strange feeling of being flirted with.
Princess Qingyun was also secretly puzzled. Perhaps it was because the debt of having her life saved was as great as the heavens, but ever since recovering from her grave illness, she found that her cousin was not only kind and good-tempered, but the more she looked at her, the more beautiful she seed.
She hadn’t felt it so strongly yesterday at Liangxiang Pavilion, but after just one night, looking at Ji Qingwu again, she felt her cousin’s face wasn’t just pretty as a flower under the moon.
It was an unparalleled, world-stunning beauty that made her want to stare and never look away.
The stare was becoming too intense. Ji Qingwu said, "Princess, you should hurry to the Empress Dowager’s palace, or she will grow anxious waiting."
Princess Qingyun started to board her palanquin, but then, as if rembering sothing, she got back down and walked over to Ji Qingwu.
"Fifth Cousin."
Princess Qingyun called her na softly, using the sa wheedling tone she used with the Empress Dowager. Ji Qingwu saw a hesitant, timid look on the young princess’s face.
It was just that Jiu Jiu’s wheedling was on another level entirely compared to Qingyun’s, so Ji Qingwu remained perfectly straight-faced.
Princess Qingyun said, "I have an improper request to make."
Ji Qingwu shook her head decisively. "If the Princess knows it’s an improper request, then she shouldn’t make it."
Princess Qingyun said, "Fifth Cousin, when my wedding ceremony is held, will you please co attend?"
As if afraid of being imdiately refused, she rushed on, "I’ll have the invitation sent to the Ji Mansion. I want to ask you to co on my wedding day... to paint the floral mark on my forehead."
After saying her piece, Princess Qingyun scurried back to her palanquin, giving Ji Qingwu no chance to refuse.
Ji Qingwu had never been married, but she had seen how others’ weddings were conducted.
’It seed there was a custom,’ she mused, ’that a new bride’s floral forehead mark should be painted by her sister-in-law, to symbolize a harmonious and prosperous marriage.’
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