When Dreams Wake Up

  Yang Er deliberately let Su You say the cooking method, of course, he endured asking the latter "why there is no fish in the fish-flavored eggplant" this question. Looking at the big brother and sister opposite him, as if they were about to bite their tongues off, his heart gained unprecedented satisfaction. Su You was like a toy in his hands, inevitably wanting to show off to his brother, only thinking that the "South Sea Eggplant" intended for the emperor's ancestors would ultimately be destroyed for the sake of showing off, and then felt some regret.

  "Ah, kid, but I don't know where you got this great chef from? What's his name? Can he lend him to me for a few days?" Yang Er had always neglected to ask Su You's surname, and now Yang Zhao saw the goodness in Su You, of course, still coming for Su You's culinary skills.

  Yang Er also realized his own oversight at this time, but threw the problem to Su You and nodded to Su You.

  As for Yang Zhao, Su You still has some memories of him. Yang Zhao is a tragic emperor, neither his grandfather nor father loved him. Although he later became the crown prince of Yang Guang, he died of heatstroke in less than a year due to frequent travel between Daxing and Luoyang. Various historical books record this crown prince who died because of obesity, an obese dead guy!

  Of course, this dead fat man got a posthumous title of "Yuande", known as Crown Prince Yuande; his sons were respectively supported by Li Yuan and Wang Shichong to become puppet emperors.

  "Can this small butterfly change the direction of the wind in this parallel space?" Su You hesitated for a few seconds, and then made up his mind.

  "Returning to the palace, I am Su You, with the courtesy name... Hengbo, from Nanhai. Because my ancestors were refugees, I have no particular talent and my spirit is depressed. I like good food, so I learned how to make this dish of purple melon." Su You reported his own name, thinking that he should pretend to be a scholar-official, which must include having a courtesy name. Suddenly three characters "Gu Hengpo" appeared in his mind, and he took them as his own without hesitation. However, he was somewhat nervous at the time and didn't think about the fact that this "Gu Hengpo" originally came from one of the eight famous courtesans.

  But the refusal in Su You's words was understood by several people present. He claimed to only know how to make eggplant, but Yang Zhao was the King of Jin, and this was his first time eating such a thing - where would he even find it growing, and where could he get some? Even if they were to summon Su You, it would be nothing more than keeping an idle person around.

  "Strolling with the maiden by the nine rivers, the stormy wind rises and the waves surge. Ah, what a wonderful phrase!" Yang Er shook his head and swayed back and forth, giving Su You's name a rather poetic interpretation.

  "Let His Highness know that the words in the table below are taken from 'Carefree Wandering'. 'The wise worry, the clever labor, those without ability have no desires, drifting like a boat untethered.' The meaning of this horizontal wave is probably just a beautiful wish for being content with one's circumstances." Su You also shook his head, but this shake of the head indicated disagreement.

  Yang Er listened to Su You's few words of complaint, thinking that it might be because he had driven him into the kitchen and hurt his self-esteem, but he didn't get angry, just laughed "haha" and waved his hand at Su You. They were about to start eating, and according to etiquette, "don't talk while eating or sleeping", so naturally they would eat in silence.

  Su You naturally went to cook for himself, and suddenly thought of offending the two princes today, wondering if he would be in trouble later. After finishing his egg fried rice and drinking clear soup, he took a piece of charcoal and started drawing in the kitchen, with Yang Er's face still on his mind.

  "Who?" The applause suddenly rang out, but Su You was startled and shouted in a low voice.

  Su You turned his head, only to see Yang Er and Shang De entering the kitchen, having already seen his work from afar. They were lavish in their praise, "I said that Hengbo has great talent! As the ancients said, 'Heaven will confer great responsibilities on this person...'".

  Su You hastily stood up, nodding and bowing, but in his heart he didn't think much of it. "You know I have great talent, so you rush me to the kitchen to cook for you?" He said with a flattering tone, chatting with him, while half of the painting had only roughly outlined the contours, but the vividness under the sketch still made Yang Er jump off the paper. After the painting was handed over to Shang De, it also left him sighing in admiration.

  "What are your orders, Your Highness? Please make it brief." Su You didn't quite like this kind of idle chit-chat, perhaps because the setting wasn't right, or their identities weren't equal. The allusions in his mind were a jumbled mess, and he couldn't tell which ones could be used, or which ones only became popular after this dynasty.

  "Starting from tomorrow, what if Hengbo becomes the king's advisor?" Yang Er saw that Su You had a strong guard against himself, so he could only speak straightforwardly.

  "With an unclear future, not even a glimpse of what's to come, my life ideal is just traveling the world, warmth and flowers blooming, I don't know which point you're looking at, above or below?" Su You said with some pretension, but more so out of fear for the uncertainty of his future life.

  Being clever but not pedantic, daring to face oneself, being clear-headed in handling matters, and being able to endure are all good qualities of a participant. Not familiar with military affairs? Who is born knowing everything? I'll find some military books for you later." Yang said this in one breath, leaving Su You no room to refuse, and it seemed that he had been testing himself by letting him do chores and exercises.

  "So, Your Highness, what are your thoughts on the current situation?" Su You asked with a nod.

  "Now Your Majesty is old, and it will soon be my father's world. As for me, I am favored by my parents, governing the town of Yu, actually being the general manager of the south; with elder brother's jade in front, perhaps there is no place for me to stand on the court, but east of Donghai, there is a vast world for you and me to gallop; when we have great achievements, it is today!" Yang Er's words stirred Su You, and the latter finally understood. The famous sentence in Wang Anshi's "Memorial of No Event in the Imperial Court for a Hundred Years" when he inspired the emperor to reform was actually borrowed from Yang Er's.

  He nodded involuntarily, unable to believe that he had been fooled like this. He wanted to shout "My lord!" and bow his head, but then thought that this was a scene from the Three Kingdoms, and didn't know how people nowadays expressed loyalty - it seemed that saying "My respected leader" would be out of place. In his heart, he thought "Let the leader go first!", but in the end, he silently stepped aside, his face full of the color of devotion to duty until death...

  Yang Erjin went out and came back, patted Su You's shoulder and said slowly, "Hengbo, you're not bad."

  Yang Er finished speaking and left Su You and the moonlight that filled the ground.

  "It's also not doing boring things, how to spend the years of life?" Su You had already sat into the wooden barrel, the flower petals in the water made this hot soup more like a bucket of rose tea, and the tea in the bowl was more like a post-dinner drink of seaweed soup because it had added oil and salt.

  Lu Yu wrote the "Tea Classics" around the time of the An Shi Rebellion, roughly 800 years ago, which is about 200 years before now. At that time, Europe was probably still boiling fruit and eating raw vegetables. Ah, at least several hundred years later, not bathing for years became the most fashionable French style, while Paris was a city surrounded by feces.

  Su You thought and thought, almost falling asleep in the bathtub. That night, he had a long dream, dreaming that he entered the prosperous Chang'an City. Of course, there were elegant clothes and angry horses, inviting shadows to drink under the moonlight.

  There have been experts who published papers saying that the longest time a dream can last is no more than 40 minutes, but others believe that in fact, human reality is originally in a dream, and people's dreams belong to a four-dimensional parallel space. Anyway, Su You didn't wake up naturally from his sleep, but was woken up by Qing Wei knocking on the door. Su You's consciousness finally returned to reality - here is the Sui Dynasty, just before dawn, out of habit he raised his wrist, it was past 4 o'clock in the morning.

  "Damn nightmare, damn 4 am!" Su You muttered, still quickly putting on his clothes.

  After all, the sun is about to rise, and a new day is coming...