Chapter 20 Attending the Banquet
Gong Ruomei asked Zheng Wenjie to move a chair and sit in the yard. Zheng Wenjie first went to the kitchen to put the cakes in plates and bowls and brought them to the table before returning to the main house and moving a chair to sit in the yard.

"My father first learned Xingyi and then Bagua, and integrated the two martial arts into one. He was recognized as the number one master in the northern and southern martial arts circles. My father never lost in his life."

As Gong Ruomei spoke, she couldn't help but think of the fight between her father and Ip Man. After a moment of silence, she continued, "My senior brother Ma San is proficient in the Xingyiquan taught by my father. I learned Baguazhang, and I only have a rough understanding of Xingyi. I will teach you the basic Eight Palms first."

Zheng Wenjie nodded to show that he understood. It didn't really matter to him what kind of boxing he learned. What was important was to accumulate fighting experience. In his heart, he actually regarded Kuang Guohua as his imaginary enemy. As both were second-generation zombies, Zheng Wenjie didn't think that he could beat Kuang Guohua who had crawled out of the battlefield.

Gong Ruomei leaned back in her chair, feeling warm and comfortable in the winter sun. "You are alone now and have no job. What are your plans for the future?"

Zheng Wenjie leaned on the table with a smug look on his face: "Master, I'm unfamiliar with this place now, and you're the only one I can rely on."

"I won't accept you as my apprentice."

"Master, I was just thinking that your courtyard is so big, it would be lonely for you to live alone. I can come and live with you, so that I can serve you and learn martial arts in peace. What do you think?"

Gong Ruomei didn't say anything, she just looked at Zheng Wenjie quietly, her eyes showing her vindictiveness. "You want to live in the home of a girl like me who hasn't even married yet?"

Zheng Wenjie said with a look of deep sorrow: "Master, I am your direct disciple. You are my master. Living here is a serious matter. What does this have to do with whether you are married or not?"

Gong Ruomei raised her eyebrows, picked up the stick that had fallen on the ground and pointed it at Zheng Wenjie: "You not only have to learn art, but you also have to learn literature from me in the future. And what happened on the train, don't you know what you did to me?"

Zheng Wenjie took the short stick from Gong Ruomei and said, "Master, isn't that our normal sparring session on the train? Don't always want to fight and kill. It hurts the harmony."

Gong Ruomei snorted coldly: "You were sneaking up on me, which is not a martial arts ethics. This is called killing with a stick, and I need to temper your temper."

"Yes, yes, yes. But Master, how can I make money if I come to your place every day? The rent in Qincheng is not cheap."

"Before Laba, come back to Northeast China with me. After the apprenticeship ceremony, I will teach you the Gong family's sixty-four moves, and you can live with me. Before that, if you have no money, I will give it to you."

At this moment, Gong Ruomei is like a shining Bodhisattva in Zheng Wenjie's heart. This cheap master is a good person.

"Master, you have changed a lot towards me. At the beginning, you ignored me and even hit me with a stick, but now you provide me with food and shelter. Has it been revealed that I am the one-in-a-million martial arts genius?" Zheng Wenjie teased.

Gong Ruomei's snow-white cheeks flushed slightly, thinking that she had just treated Zheng Wenjie as a tumbler to vent her anger and brought him back to the yard, but now he was treated as a treasure. He was a gift from a disciple to become a master, so how could a master be a disciple? This was not a child disciple.

"Since you don't want to, then forget it."

"Of course I would. Master, you must be hungry. Eat some cakes first. I'll buy you whatever you want to eat later." Zheng Wenjie said flatteringly.

"No need, just eat some cakes. You and I will go to the banquet together in the evening." After saying this, Gong Ruomei took out a handkerchief and picked up a crystal cake with gold surface and silver casing.

"Master, what banquet?" Zheng Wenjie asked as he picked up the kettle and filled Gong Ruomei with water.

"Liu Yuanyi." Gong Ruomei finished eating a piece of cake and then said, "You have just stood for so long, you should eat something too."

"Just watching Master eat makes me full." Zheng Wenjie said with a smile

Gong Ruomei pursed her crystal clear lips, and the faint fragrance of roses and orange cakes filled her mouth. She drank a sip of water and said, "Am I a ginseng fruit? I don't need to eat it after just one look?" Zheng Wenjie changed the subject and said, "Master, when I went to school to look for you just now, I saw Liu Yuanyi."

Seeing Zheng Wenjie stop talking at this point, Gong Ruomei understood: "With his concubine? His concubine is leaving tomorrow, and today is the farewell banquet."

Zheng Wenjie asked curiously, "Master, are you accommodating Liu Yuanyi for marrying a concubine before marrying a wife?"

"It's my parents' order and the matchmaker's words, so what if I don't give in? My uncles and elders said this is a good match, and they all said that marrying into the Liu family is too high for my family. I don't want to and I don't like it, but I don't want to disobey my father."

"Master, it's already the 29th year of the Republic of China. How long has monogamy been in place? You are just being foolishly filial."

Gong Ruomei said nothing and lost her appetite for pastries. She looked at the blooming wintersweets beside her and said sadly, "I also want to be like a plum blossom."

Seeing Gong Ruomei acting out of character and looking a little sad, Zheng Wenjie didn't understand: "Master, your father passed on martial arts to you and Ma San, this doesn't mean he favors boys over girls, right? I understand, your father also married a concubine, so he didn't take it seriously. But your family is a martial artist, if you don't want to, just say it directly, now you are being so shy, this is just hypocrisy."

"My father only has my mother." Zheng Wenjie's words made Gong Ruomei angry, but she couldn't get angry because she knew that if Ye Wen had come to Northeast China to find her two years ago, she might have broken off the engagement. But now her father's health is getting worse and worse, and various hidden diseases are bothering him. She really doesn't want her father to worry about this anymore. It's hard to say whether this is hypocritical.

There was a sound of a car stalling outside the yard.

Gong Ruomei suppressed her chaotic thoughts and stood up: "Let's go."

"Master, don't you want to change your clothes?"

Gong Ruomei looked at Zheng Wenjie expressionlessly: "Why do you want to change clothes?"

Zheng Wenjie looked at Gong Ruomei's plain cotton jacket, cotton trousers and cotton shoes, and complained in his heart that Gong Ruomei wore a cheongsam with carved embroidery even when catching the train, and now she was going to wear this to a banquet. It seemed that she really didn't take Liu Yuanyi seriously. This marriage would probably be called off sooner or later.

"Because Master is naturally beautiful, beautiful and intelligent, this cotton-padded jacket makes Master look like a budding beauty."

Gong Ruomei tightened her collar, feeling uncomfortable listening to the flattery: "Stop talking nonsense, let's go."

Zheng Wenjie saw that there was only the driver outside the courtyard. Needless to say, Liu Yuanyi must still be with his concubine. At the call of the driver, Miss Gong Er, he got into the car. Zheng Wenjie looked at Gong Ruomei beside him and asked, "Master, why do you always call you Gong Er?"

Gong Ruomei didn't care about the driver and said, "The Liu family is engaged in traveling business, and they have some cooperation with our Gong family in the Northeast. In the Northeast, because my senior brother Ma San is my father's disciple, everyone calls me Gong Er."

The car passed through the courtyard, and a tall ginkgo tree in the courtyard attracted Zheng Wenjie's attention.

He patted Gong Ruomei beside him and said, "Master, whose yard is that with the ginkgo trees planted?"

"What happened to Professor Yang who studied abroad at our school?"

"It's okay. This ginkgo tree is probably hundreds of years old."

Zheng Wenjie thought of the ginkgo tree he had just seen. According to Feng Shui, the ginkgo tree should ward off evil spirits and protect the house, but this family's ginkgo tree was instead home to a ghost.

(End of this chapter)