“What kind of audacity is this? How dare someone break into the prison!” At that moment, the constables whom Chief Constable Wang had arranged in advance to act as reinforcements rushed in. Seeing the supposed assassins staged by Chief Constable Wang, they swarmed forward and surrounded everyone tightly. Chief Constable Wang and his men skillfully feigned defeat and allowed themselves to be captured.
A bailiff stepped forward, bowed respectfully to Bai Yiyan, and said, “Lord Liu, we are terribly sorry for startling you. I will report today’s incident to the county magistrate for a strict investigation and ensure these villains receive their punishment. I still have official business to attend to, so I must take my leave.” The moment those words fell, the group bolted out of the prison as if chased by ghosts. Watching their clumsy acting, Bai Yiyan’s mouth twitched.
Having successfully escaped the lion’s den, the group escorted the injured bailiffs to receive medical treatment after leaving the cell. Chief Constable Wang hurried to report the matter to Magistrate Liu.
“Sir, the mission failed. For some reason, that man was not knocked out by the sleeping potion. Three of our brothers were also injured and are still lying in bed unable to get up.” Chief Constable Wang reported the entire sequence of events to Magistrate Liu, who was waiting in the back hall with the legal advisor for good news.
“What? Where is he now?” Magistrate Liu slammed his hand onto the armrest of his chair and stood up in agitation.
“He is still inside the grand prison. Fearing something might go wrong, we all wore night-walking clothes and entered with our faces covered,” Chief Constable Wang replied respectfully.
“That is fine, that is fine. As long as the prisoner is not lost, everything else can be handled,” Magistrate Liu breathed a sigh of relief and sat back down in his chair.
“Do not be impatient, sir. Perhaps that man possesses formidable martial arts and the dosage of the sleeping potion was insufficient. We can still try another method.” The advisor revealed another slick, devious smile.
“What other method does the advisor have?”
“Use power-dispersing powder to cripple his martial arts.”
“Then let us proceed according to this plan. You are all dismissed to go back and rest early. Tomorrow, this matter must be successfully resolved.” Seeing that there was still a turnaround, Magistrate Liu felt sleepy and ordered everyone to return to their quarters to rest.
The next day, due to the excessive dose of sleeping potion, Zhao Yu did not wake up until evening, blinking sleepily with a daze and flashing a blank smile at Bai Yiyan, who was meditating nearby.
“Good morning, Brother Liu. I slept so comfortably yesterday that I did not even dream once.” Zhao Yu’s round face was flushed red from sleep, with a suspicious trace left at the corner of his mouth.
Bai Yiyan looked at the messy room, then looked at the naive child who claimed he had slept so wonderfully, and remained speechless.
“It is already almost time for evening dinner.”
“Oh, really? My nap sure was long.” Zhao Yu smiled sheepishly, his rosy cheeks turning even redder. Just then, he noticed the chaos strewn across the room, looking left and right with no idea what had happened, before finally furrowing his brow and asking, “Did an earthquake happen last night?”
“Indeed,” Bai Yiyan answered casually, watching the naive little rabbit’s fair, tender, and flushed round face, which unconsciously made someone want to pinch it.
“Huh? How come I did not feel a thing?” He looked around in utter confusion, then suddenly spotted bloodstains on the floor. “Ah, why is there blood on the ground?” Zhao Yu cried out in alarm, pointing a finger at the bloodstains on the floor.
“You slept soundly last night. I wanted to wake you up, but I ended up getting beaten instead. Your sleeping posture is truly something else.” Seeing the child’s adorable, silly expression, Bai Yiyan could not resist teasing him.
Zhao Yu scratched his head sheepishly and said, “Hehe, I am so sorry. By the way, where were you hurt? Let me see.” With that, he scurried over and reached out as if to peel open the other person’s clothes for an inspection. Bai Yiyan quickly stopped him.
“It is fine. I was just hit on the nose and bled a little. But that kick you landed on me was a bit serious.”
“Ah, what should we do then? What should we do?” The naive little rabbit panicked and grew flustered, completely forgetting whether his scrawny little arms and legs could possibly injure someone like that.
“It is nothing major, but my back and waist are aching terribly right now.” Watching the person scratching their head in anxiety and not knowing what to do, Bai Yiyan felt secretly amused inside.
“I will help you massage your back.” To make up for his mistake, Zhao Yu eagerly stepped forward to massage Bai Yiyan’s back. The result was that the naive little rabbit was completely played for a fool.
“A bit higher…” Bai Yiyan directed the naive rabbit behind him.
“Is it here?” Without a shred of suspicion, the naive rabbit earnestly massaged Bai Yiyan’s back.
“Yes, right there. That feels so good. Use a bit more strength.” He never expected this naive rabbit to actually have some skills.
“Is this strength enough? Do you want me to press harder?”
“Mm, press a bit harder.”
“Alright.”
“Good technique. Did you learn this before?”
“If you do it enough times, you just pick it up.” Zhao Yu remembered massaging his parents back in the past. Since he was always a source of worry for his family, he tried his best to do whatever was within his power for them.
On the other side, the jailer heard these sounds, spat contemptuously on the ground, and grumbled bitterly, “They hooked up so fast. A pair of adulterers.”
It was precisely this lovely misunderstanding that made Zhao Yu’s days in prison much more comfortable.
“So boring.” Having finished massaging Bai Yiyan, Zhao Yu slumped limply over the table and groaned. Before his transmigration, he would always be watching television around this time of day.
Bai Yiyan directly ignored his complaints, figuring it was about time to ask around regarding Scholar Zhang’s family heirloom jade, so he asked, “How did you even end up locked up in here?”
“I have no idea. When I woke up, I was already here.” Zhao Yu shook his head in absolute bewilderment.
“Then what crime were you sentenced for?”
“I heard something about killing a scholar and stealing a treasure or something. I do not even know that person. It is so baffling, and this magistrate even sentenced me to death.” Zhao Yu slouched listlessly over the table provided by the jailer, chatting desultorily, completely forgetting that he was inhabiting someone else’s body, not knowing the person did not mean the original owner of this body did not know them.
“Dinner is served.” At that moment, the jailer delivered two identical food boxes. Zhao Yu happily took them and opened them to find two meat dishes, one vegetable dish, and a soup, quite a decent treatment. Looking at these dishes, Bai Yiyan immediately wanted to slap his own forehead. Although sparse, these were all the signature dishes of Ami County’s famous Fragrant Pavilion, as well as renowned local delicacies. He thought to himself that these constables had truly spared no expense; in order to drug him, they even served up famous local dishes.
This time, Chief Constable Wang and his men had specifically prepared two identical sets of meals to prevent Cao Xiaohan from eating the spiked food first again.
Seeing that his meal was identical to Bai Yiyan’s, Zhao Yu broke into a smile, thinking that sharing a cell with a master really improved one’s living standards. He happily sat down at the table and began to eat. Bai Yiyan lifted his bowl, sniffed the contents, and smiled. Still not giving up, huh?
“These dishes are not cooked properly. Seasonings should only be used to enhance the flavor of the ingredients. When the taste of the seasonings overpowers the food itself, the dish has failed.” Zhao Yu critiqued as he ate. On the first day, he had been starving to death and had not savored the food properly, but today during lunch, he realized the culinary standards here were very low, missing many common seasonings, and the seasoning pairings were unreasonable either. Before coming here, he had loved cooking and frequently watched food shows before practicing himself, which was one of the few activities he could actually do.
Hearing this naive rabbit’s remarks, Bai Yiyan was secretly astonished, never expecting this naive rabbit to be such an expert on food.
“Can you cook?”
“Of course. And what I make is definitely tastier than this. Oh well, prison food reaching this level is nothing to complain about anyway.” Zhao Yu sighed as he spoke.
Bai Yiyan thought to himself that he might have just struck gold. These were arguably the finest dishes available in a county town like Ami County, yet in the eyes of this naive rabbit, they still only counted as decent prison food; one could only imagine how exceptional his cooking skills must be. He needed to find an opportunity to test it out. If it was truly as the kid claimed, would he not be able to enjoy fine cuisine anytime he wanted?
The two of them ate and chatted casually without any regard for the traditional rule of silence during meals.
When the jailer came to collect the food boxes and saw that both meals had been completely eaten, he revealed a triumphant smile, thinking to himself that this plan was bound to succeed this time.