Lotus in a Bottle - Chapter 8

Section 13

The third day of the third lunar month was the Shangsi Festival. According to custom, people were supposed to dress in colorful clothes and visit the flower market.

Shen Huaihuan came looking for me well in advance.

“It’s not like I particularly want to go out and have fun with you. I’m just worried you’ll be bored, that’s all.” Shen Huaihuan sat with one leg crossed over the other, peeking at me with his almond-shaped eyes from behind his teacup. “So, do you want to come with me?”

Tan Lian might have been approachable, but perhaps because he drew far too much attention, he always stayed home and read during loud, bustling festivals like this one.

Without exception.

Besides, apart from our wedding day, I had never seen him wear anything but pale blue or white. Getting him to go out and celebrate the Shangsi Festival was simply impossible…

Shen Huaihuan and I looked at each other.

His eyes slowly widened. “No way. Brother Tan has never liked joining this sort of excitement.”

I covered my mouth with a fake smile. “If he refuses, I’ll throw a tantrum.”

After all, Shen Huaihuan himself was the one who had suggested being unreasonable.

Shen Huaihuan truly did understand Tan Lian, and Tan Lian truly did love cleanliness and tranquility.

Thus, when I presented him with a floral outfit so colorful it hurt the eyes and made a fuss about him accompanying me to the busiest street in the city, even Tan Lian’s expression darkened for a moment.

The perpetually gentle, amiable man stopped smiling. Somehow, he looked even more frightening than that Black-Faced Ghost, Gu Nanzhou.

I unconsciously held my breath and instinctively took a step back.

That small movement broke the frozen atmosphere.

Before I could speak, Tan Lian took the bizarre outfit from me as though nothing had happened. His features were warm and mild, and his voice indulgent.

“My wife’s tastes are certainly unusual.”

The White Lotus was still the same White Lotus. His frightening expression just now seemed to have been nothing but my imagination.

I blinked and gave an awkward laugh. “It’s tradition.”

It might have been tradition, but in truth, very few people wore floral clothes quite this outrageous. It was even rarer among men.

After all, no one could possibly look good in something like this… except the man beside me.

Before Tan Lian appeared, the stars of the Shangsi Festival had been the spring blossoms in all their myriad colors. After he appeared, the entire street fell briefly silent.

Then came wave after wave of shrill screams.

No one had any attention left to spare for pale greens or deep reds. Every gaze fixed involuntarily upon the Big White Lotus beside me.

Er, he was a Colorful Lotus now.

The gaudy outfit should have been fit only for amusing one’s parents, yet his excessively handsome face forcibly suppressed every hint of frivolity and absurdity, elevating the clothes’ worth and elegance out of thin air.

I even saw someone faint from the sheer force of his beauty. Before collapsing, the person was still howling,

“I’ve done good deeds and accumulated virtue all my life! I deserve to behold Lord Flower God!”

Tan Lian, who had just been called Lord Flower God to his face: “…”

Me, after repeatedly being shoved away from Tan Lian, my hair so disheveled I looked like I’d just emerged from the birth canal: “…”

I had completely lost faith in this shallow, looks-obsessed world. Ha. Ha.

Fortunately, Tan Lian reacted quickly and grabbed me just as I was about to be squeezed out of the crowd yet again.

As though he had seen through my thoughts, he gently smoothed the hair that had been mussed by the crowd.

“Most people value appearances above all else at first. They simply don’t understand you yet. It isn’t because Baoping isn’t good enough.”

Was he saying I had inner beauty?

At that moment, his clear, limpid eyes reflected only a tiny version of me. It was as though, even surrounded by a dazzling profusion of flowers, I was the only person he could see.

I pressed my lips together, conflicted.

“But… my father said that not only am I kindhearted, I’m also as beautiful as a heavenly fairy.”

My father said so.

My father couldn’t have lied to me.

Tan Lian: “…”

Expressionless, Tan Lian withdrew the hand that had been resting in my hair.

“Yes. My esteemed father-in-law is correct.”