The Empress’s Gigolo

After Ren Baqian stopped his car in his neighborhood, he went into a daze for quite some time.

It was impossible for him to return home with mixed emotions.

However, after fleeing abroad and making a trip back home, his emotions were somewhat stirred.

At this time, many children were setting off firecrackers; others, sticking couplets and hanging lanterns.

Although the celebratory atmosphere of the Chinese New Year has faded over the years, in this neighborhood, however, that the atmosphere of Chinese New Year was still going quite strong. This might be due to the vast number of elders living here.

Not long later, Ren Baqian’s phone began to ring. Once the call connected, he heard his father yelling, “Why are you standing there in a daze and not coming up? Did your girlfriend come along?”

Ren Baqian’s parents were extremely concerned with regards to that woman, who was with Ren Baqian even when he was a fugitive.

“No!” Ren Baqian only said one word before he was interrupted by his father, “Then hurry up and help me paste the couplets up.”

Ren Baqian raised his head and saw a silhouette passing by the house’s window.

It seemed that Papa Ren had been waiting over there all along.

Ren Baqian got down from the car, gathered the things inside, and carried them upstairs.

Before he could knock the on the door, Papa Ren had already opened the door and got up to let him in.

Mama Ren hurriedly came up to Ren Baqian and inspected him from head to toe. “You have become tanner! Did you go through a period of hardship?”

Speaking about hardships, Ren Baqian was helpless and miserable. He felt that he had gone through a lot of hardships, such as being thrashed single-handedly—and both-handedly—by a Lolita. He was also hung and beaten up by that Lolita. In any case, he had been given a beating once every two days.

In addition to that, there had also been the occasional hammering of the empress’s fist, which always left him severely injured as well.

Indeed, he had suffered a whole lot.

At present, Ren Baqian had confirmed that the first serious injury he sustained was caused by the empress. It was just that he couldn’t recall why it happened…

As for him getting tanner, it was because of the intense sun rays in Dayao. Instead, it would be weird if he didn’t get tanned.

He put the things down, spread his hands and said, “Look at my face, does it look like I suffered? My main aim was to go on a scenic tour of Europe and take a look at the scenery outside.”

“You actually gained some weight, how heavy are you now?” Papa Ren sized up Ren Baqian and casually asked.

“160 pounds…” Recently, Ren Baqian had bulked up quite a bit. It wasn’t obvious while he was clothed, but when he undressed, his entire back was filled with muscles.

“In the past, I used to eat at home every day and didn’t gain weight. On the contrary, I gained weight after going overseas this time…” Mama Ren was full of complaints with regards to Ren Baqian not being able to gain weight during the times he used to eat at home.

“There are many junk foods in Europe, and there was a variety of high calories food every day. Fortunately, I have recently been working out daily. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even look like this.”

“You still have the cheek to talk about working out? You still have the mood to work out? Do you know how worried we were?” Mama Chen prodded Ren Baqian’s forehead as she spoke.

“I was assisting the nation.” Ren Baqian supplemented his response, “Your son is now a government official.”

“Eh?” Papa Ren and Mama Ren were a little astounded.

“Just a staff member in a certain department, there is no danger. I’m responsible for some simple things only,” Ren Baqian said.

“How about your business?”

“It’s not affected. This post is actually a part-time job, and I just have the identity of an official.”

“Is there such a good thing?” Papa Ren and Mama Ren felt that it was a little unbelievable. It was hard to even secure a position as a government employee, but he could actually do it part-time.

“This time, I have brought some things back for all of you.” Ren Baqian opened his bag and took a wooden box out. “This is the product that our company will soon launch, it’s the black jade intermittent cream. If any of you get wounded, just smear the black mud cream over the wound and it will heal immediately.”

[Black jade intermittent cream – used in Jin Yong’s wuxia novel and has the same effects as the black mud cream in this story.]

“Pooh!” Mama Ren spat. “I have read the new Jin Yong’s novels. This rascal is getting out of line.”

Ren Baqian thought for a while and didn’t tell his mum that Jin Yong and the new Jing Yong were two different people.

[Jin Yong and the new Jin Yong are both China top-notch authors, the former born in 1924 and the latter born in 1964]

It was said that the new Jin Yong was pretty awesome. As long as it was a book written by him and his name was printed on it, no other authors were comparable to him.

“The name of the medicine hasn’t been settled yet. However, the efficacy is true. As long as you smear this cream on any injury, there will not even be scars. Keep it properly.”

“The other things are clothes that I bought for you. Try it on whenever you all are free. I thought we were going to paste couplets? Where’s Wannian?” Ren Baqian curiously asked. It was the eve of Chinese New Year, yet he wasn’t home.

“It seems like he has a girlfriend. They were high school classmates, I reckon that they will get tired of each other in a while.” Mama Ren was somewhat dissatisfied as she felt that it was too early for him to date during his freshman year in university.

“Not bad, otherwise a good cabbage will be destroyed by a pig.” Ren Baqian nodded.

[Ren Baqian is saying that a good girl would be “destroyed” in the hands of his brother.] After which, he suffered a blow from the [Six Arteries Divine Sword].

([Six Arteries Divine Sword] is a martial art from “Demigods and Semi-Devils”, a wuxia novel.)

“I nearly forgot to ask, what’s the name of your girlfriend? Where is she from? Why didn’t you invite her back?” Mama Ren’s eyes were bright and full of expression.

“She’s lives in another part of the nation and needs to celebrate Chinese New Year with her family too.” Ren Baqian waved his hand.

“What’s her name? What is she working as? During the time when you were in Europe, why was she there too.” Ultimately, Mama Ren didn’t let him off.

“Her surname is Qi and her name is Zixiao. She is also a government employee and is my superior. Remember I still have that part-time job? That’s the one.” With great difficulty, Ren Baqian finally dealt with all his mum’s questions and went to the corridor to paste rhyming couplets as well as the word “Fu”.

[During Chinese New Year, most Chinese would paste the word “Fu” which signifies good fortune.]

Ren Wannian returned home around 2 p.m.

Ren Baqian was sitting on the couch talking to his father. He was telling him about the things that he saw and experienced during his Europe trip. Of course, he excluded many things that weren’t suitable for children. For example, the fact that he created a lot of sachima that were drenched with tomato sauce.

Based on what he said, he was basically enjoying a scenic tour in Europe.

Of course, in reality, it was almost the same.

During the meal, Papa Ren and Mama Ren asked a bunch of questions about his girlfriend again. The questions included what her Four Pillars of Destiny was as well as how her family situation was. All these questions gave Ren Baqian a headache.

[The Four Pillars of Destiny – Chinese astrological concept that a person’s destiny or fate can be divided by the two sexagenary cycle characters assigned to their birth year, month, day, and hour.]

The Four Pillars of Destiny, the other world didn’t even have anything like that.

As for her family situation, her grandfather was the founding emperor and absorbed in cultivating to be an immortal. Ren Baqian didn’t even know if he was dead or alive. Her father, who was the late emperor, was also absorbed in cultivating to be an immortal and disappeared after he was seriously injured.

Can I say all these? If I dare to say it, will you all dare to believe it?

The family spent the first day of the Chinese New Year together. On the second day, Ren Baqian began to wander the streets and visited his friends and relatives.

After something happened to him, his relatives were really good. Nothing melodramatic happened. Instead, they helped Papa Ren and Mama Ren make some inquiries.

In order to clarify things, Ren Baqian had to pay visits to others. Then, he would conveniently mention his identity as a government employee.

It made his family feel that he was similar to 007.

[007 – the codename of James Bond of the James Bond franchise]

After all, he escaped with a record of killing over ten men and returned half a year later as if nothing happened. This made it hard for people not to have doubts over what he said.

As far as commoners were concerned, Ren Baqian was already considered a legendary character.

Ren Baqian declined to comment. If he were to reveal his girlfriend, he would be able to carve the word “legendary” on his forehead.

Even if he didn’t reveal his girlfriend, Mama Ren already helped him to do so.

Now that Ren Baqian’s business had succeeded and he became a government employee with the five insurance and housing fund, there were many people who wanted to introduce marriage partners for him.

Then, Mama Ren showed them the Moments that Ren Baqian had uploaded, and there wasn’t any sign of people wanting to introduce marriage partners anymore.

“Brother!” Ren Wannian stealthily moved to Ren Baqian’s side.

“Does sister-in-law have a younger sister?”

“No, get out of here.” Ren Baqian slapped the back of his head.