12 Chapter 12

As expected her father was aware of her marriage plans, he had already brought tutors to educate her on the culture of the Xiang Kingdom, while he went ahead to the imperial palace, she figured that he would wait until after the grand banquet before proposing the marriage, she was grateful, she had a few months to elevate her status and she was willing to use it. With the business, she had a vague idea of what she wanted to dabble in, a salon.

It sounded ridiculous but a salon was a never done thing, the idea of gathering the best seamstress, hairdressers and makeup artists in the world to one high-end salon, females would flock to the area.

She wrote down the plans she could think up and made it a point of action to go and search for a good building to use and put up posters looking for employees, the only issue was the fact that some people may send spies, she sighed and decided to leave the recruiting to her father, he should know how to do an accurate background check on those people. Due to these plans, her next few days were mostly busy as she bustled in and out of the manor trying to see things up, she was happy she had something to do, it distracted her from her tumbling thoughts.

"An invitation?" she was confused as she looked at the card in her hand, an invitation from the empress? She felt herself get a headache, she really didn't want to go.

"The master has already ordered a new set of clothes for you, apparently there'll be a lot of high-class ladies, he says keep on the lookout for someone the young master would like." Her headache intensified, wasn't she meant to be an innocent lady? How would he ask her for something that shameless? She decided to ignore Mei li and focus on her chants, she'd worry about the invitation when it was time to worry.

She spent her free time praying in the temple with her stepmother who was praying for her sister's soul, she also prayed for her sister albeit not to the same God. Her stepmother hadn't said a word and she understood the emotional turmoil she must be feeling about this stepdaughter that was joining her to mourn. Jilian honestly felt like it was the least she could do, this woman hadn't made her life too difficult she just didn't like her which was understandable. She finished her prayers and left the woman alone. She hoped she could see her goodwill and not try and kill her, she wasn't confident in evading assassination attempts so she would rather avoid them for the time being.

Apart from setting up a source of income, there was something else she wanted to do, she wanted to see the world, but unfortunately, she was confined to her father's house apart from certain exemptions such as shopping or socialising, not only that but she had no martial arts ability whatsoever and she couldn't afford to hire a master, she was truly a good for nothing but she wasn't bothered, she had her own strengths, all she needed was enough time.

The days passed slowly and she savoured the peace she was able to have, she truly felt like the pampered miss of an aristocratic family, she left ate, has her classes and played with mei li at the pond, she had never experienced this kind of unique leisure that came with no technology. Of course, mei li made sure she did her daily breathing exercises but there wasn't much to do apart from that, most things her father took care of, he even came to have dinner with her a few times to ask her about her preparations for the upcoming final competition, she assured him it would be ok, singing was something she enjoyed to do in her past life but it wasn't the career path for her, so now she had the opportunity to win a singing competition, why not? There was also something she wanted to test, her hypothesis on the monks being transmigrators like her, they could be from various times so she aimed to sing an old song, a hymn, specifically a Christmas hymn, Christmas hymns were rather wide-spreading the west and one or two should have heard those hymns if they didn't recognise it then they may be from a different era, non-western or simply not transmigrators. She paused to think before writing down the lyrics she knew and attempted to translate it appropriately.

The imperial palace was more impressive than she could imagine, it was absolutely massive which explained why people used sedans to move around, it took them around 3 hours to get to the palace, she had to wake up at the crack of dawn to get there on time, she really hated every part of this and was in a sour mood the entire time, she got some sleep on the carriage but the lack of quality further aggravated her. Her tired eyes were hidden under a formal veil which was useful in concealing her sour expression, she only had to voice our greetings to higher servants and any concubines she came across, this would be her first official banquet since she transmigrated, all she had to do was keep as far away as possible from anyone as If it was that easy. The first person that recognised her was the princess.

"Jilian!" she was a princess who was doted on, it was only natural for her to ignore protocol, but Liu Jilian was just a noble lady, bowing appropriately she lowered her head, "greeting to the Xiang princess", she was a bit confused as to why she was here in the capital but she didn't dwell on it much and only smiled as she exchanged greetings. She had a nagging feeling she'd have to take out all her knowledge gathered from the transmigration novels she had read as a teen. If she actually got forced to fall into a pond she couldn't trust that she wouldn't try and kill whoever did it.

Thinking about the upcoming entertainment her mood was cut down a bit, seeing the princess fawning over her it would be weird if people didn't realise what was going on, the princess was considering her as the next crown prince consort.