Chapter 51: A Stirring Song of Defiance and Grief

In the private room on the third floor, Zhou Jin had long since lost any desire to continue playing chess with Yan Shifan. With a sharp snap, he dropped a Go piece onto the board, picked up his teacup, and gulped down the tea in one breath.

Though it was fine tea, at this moment it tasted utterly tasteless.

Nearly half an hour had passed with no news from below. Could the scholar downstairs have been stumped by the seventh couplet?

"Instructor Zhou, why don't we wager another round?" Yan Shifan, rarely seeing this old pedant unable to sit still, could not help teasing him.

Zhou Jin shook his head like a rattling drum and repeatedly declined, "No bets, no bets."

Hearing this, Yan Shifan did not press the matter further. Inwardly, he thought that this old pedant enjoyed considerable prestige among the literati, and the Imperial Academy was a crucial link through which his father, Yan Song, maintained control over scholarly discourse. It would be unwise to offend him at present and risk stirring up unnecessary complications.

"In that case, let us wait a little longer," Yan Shifan said. With a sweeping motion of his arm, he pulled a charming young maiden into his embrace.

Witnessing all this, Zhou Jin’s eyelids twitched violently, and he nearly flicked his sleeves and stormed out on the spot. Instead, he half-covered his face with his hand, muttering repeatedly about the degradation of propriety.

Afterward, he sent his elderly servant out to keep watch, instructing him to invite the scholar upstairs the very moment he solved the sixth couplet.

Downstairs in the main hall.

Ever since Fan Jin had suspended his brush, everyone had held their breath, staring fixedly at the tip of it.

Fan Jin gently exhaled a breath of stale air, then flicked his wrist. Lines of delicate, slender calligraphy flowed as smoothly as drifting clouds and flowing water:

"Thousands of years of bygone events, rushing to the heart as I lift my wine cup and gaze into the void.
Sighing where have all the billowing heroes gone: Han dynasty practiced naval battles; Tang dynasty erected iron pillars; Song dynasty waved jade axes; Yuan dynasty crossed leather sacks—such magnificent feats and glorious achievements.
Having exhausted the heart and strength to move mountains, amidst pearl curtains and painted rafters, none can roll away the morning clouds and evening rain, leaving only broken steles and crumbling monuments, all surrendered to pale smoke and setting sun."

"He matched it! The upper stanza has been matched!"

Before Fan Jin could finish his stroke in one breath, a scholar in the crowd let out a piercing squeak like a marmot, dancing about with excitement.

However, the very next moment, several other scholars hurriedly clamped a hand over his mouth and dragged him away in disarray, leaving a trail behind them.

Fan Jin’s train of thought was interrupted. His brows furrowed instinctively as he picked up a teacup nearby, intending to moisten his throat. But before it reached his lips, he set it down again and shouted loudly, "Bring wine!"

With such an unsurpassed masterpiece of an absolute couplet, how could it be without fine wine?

Hearing this, the crowd quickly cleared a pathway to allow the tavern waiters, carrying wine vessels and holding wine jugs, to come forward.

Fan Jin snatched the wine jug directly from the waiter's hand. Dispensing with the wine cup entirely, he tilted his head back and drank deep draughts.

After a moment, a flush of red appeared on his cheeks, his long robe was stained with splashes, and his entire person reeked of alcohol.

Fan Jin paid no mind to any of this. He shook the wine jug, then tossed it aside with a dull thud.

Immediately afterward, he raised his brush, took seven steps forward, turned right back around, and swept his brush with flying ink to write the lower stanza:

"Only winning: a few strokes of distant temple bells; half a river of fishing fires; two lines of autumn geese; one pillow of crisp frost."

The moment the final stroke fell, he exerted a slight pressure with his hand, snapping the brush in two so that it fell limply onto the desk.

Silence.

A dead silence.

The fall of a pin could be heard throughout the hall, save for the increasingly heavy and ragged breathing that betrayed the churning thoughts within everyone's minds.

They remembered clearly that they had merely come to attend an ordinary literary gathering and perhaps make a few like-minded friends along the way. Never had they imagined they would be fortunate enough to witness such a scene.

This Fan Jin was by no means ordinary, nor was he conventional.

He was a "heavenly prodigy," one destined like Li Bai and Du Fu to tower across the annals of history, leaving later generations forever out of reach!

While he stood, the bright moon shone alone and the stars grew dim, his towering figure seemingly standing at the crest of the waves of the literary Dao, invincible and unstoppable.

"Creak..."

A desolate, clear tune drifted over from the pleasure quarters lining the street, slowly pulling the crowd out from their numb and dazed state.

Someone sighed inwardly, wondering whether coexisting in the same era as such a figure was a blessing or a curse.

The only certain thing was that at this moment, they were profoundly shaken.

This was no longer a simple matter of matching a couplet.

Li Sanyuan took a deep breath. "Brother Fan's matching stanza can perhaps rival Mr. Xin's *Po Zhen Zi - Written to Express a Grand Theme for Chen Tongfu*, and will surely become yet another literary masterpiece passed down through the ages!"

Everyone else remained silent, their turbulent emotions evidently difficult to calm for a long time.

Even a child just starting school could easily distinguish the difference between the upper couplet set by the prompter and the lower couplet matched by Fan Jin.

The former, about "selecting scenic spots for a high climb," seemed carefree and spirited, but ultimately could not escape the suspicion of being a frivolous verse.

If judged purely by craft and cleverness, it could be called top-tier, a rare sight indeed.

Yet the lower couplet composed by Fan Jin was full of heroic and mournful songs about establishing merits, building careers, and returning wrapped in horse hides.

At this moment, they even harbored a vague, absurd feeling that the upper couplet provided by the prompter actually degraded Fan Jin's matching lower couplet.

Fan Jin had no time to ponder what was on everyone's minds; instead, he instinctively massaged his somewhat throbbing temples.

At that moment, he vaguely sensed that the root of wisdom attribute gained from absorbing national fortune was not merely a matter of sharpening his senses and quickening his wits.

He discovered that this attribute seemed to cause a sort of "overload effect" in his brain under special circumstances.

As for the side effect, it was equally obvious: he was now ravenously hungry.

If he remembered correctly, he had eaten two steamed buns and a bowl of wontons that morning. Under normal circumstances, such a violent sensation of hunger should not be rising within his belly right now.

With that thought, he immediately instructed the tavern keeper to have a table of fine banquet dishes prepared, ordering only the most expensive items.

The tavern keeper did not decline; with an eager assent, he hurried off to carry it out.

The smooth success of the Moon Gazing Tower's "gathering scholars through literature" event was entirely thanks to Fan Jin. Otherwise, if consecutive couplets went unanswered, it would undoubtedly have ruined their establishment's reputation.

However, before the banquet could even be prepared, an elderly man dressed as a steward walked up to the group of luxuriously attired and elegantly bearing scholars. Cupping his hands slightly, he asked:

"Might I ask which of you talented scholars just solved six upper couplets in succession?"

The crowd felt a sense of wonder. Having vaguely guessed the old man's identity, they turned their gazes unanimously toward Fan Jin.

Following the crowd's gaze, the old man looked over and saw that Fan Jin had already removed his gauze cap and kicked off one of his black leather boots. Casually picking up the newly replaced teapot on the table, he poured some tea into a cup and took a delicate sip.

Just as everyone thought he was merely tasting the tea, Fan Jin downed the contents of the cup in a single gulp.

Then, seemingly finding this too troublesome, he simply raised the teapot spout directly to his mouth and drank gulp after gulp without stopping.

Li Sanyuan muttered, "It seems when Brother Fan was drinking wine earlier, he was just as... just as unconstrained and free-spirited."

If an ordinary person had witnessed Fan Jin acting in such a manner, they would have deemed it utterly vulgar. Yet the steward-dressed elder’s expression remained unchanged as he stepped forward to offer a bow and asked, "May I ask..."