The Concubine's Daughter Travels Through Time and Space and Takes the Road of Confrontation

After the spring, Cai He often took his daughter out for walks, as instructed by his mistress. One day, the master and servant reached the Red Maple Garden. Lu Yun slipped in unnoticed, and Cai He had no choice but to follow. The Red Maple Garden wasn't large, but it got its name from the dozen or so red maple trees that lined it.

Yuan Caohua heard the noise, looked up and saw that it was the third young lady, so she smiled and asked Yun'er to go into the house and move a few stools out.

Lu Yun curiously grabbed a piece of gauze, tugged at it, and then crumpled it into a ball.

Gauze is expensive and precious. Yun'er felt a little distressed. Caihe also felt embarrassed and wanted to take the gauze out of the young lady's hand. Yuan Caohua hurriedly stopped her and said, "Sister, you don't have to. Madam has given you a lot. Let this piece be given to the third young lady to play with."

Gauze is transparent and thin, but its texture is hard and wrinkles easily. It is similar to modern organza, but its texture is far less smooth and delicate. Lu Yun made a flower in a few strokes. She held it in her hand and showed it to Caihe, "Sister Caihe, a flower." Caihe looked at it carefully and was a little surprised, "It really looks like a flower." She asked Miss Yuan to take a look. Yuan Caohua stared at the wrinkled little flower and suddenly an idea came to her. She excitedly dropped the flower frame in her hand and brought out the two pieces of gauze in the room. After a moment's thought, she started to cut with the scissors.

With a few "clicks," she cut off pieces of gauze, each sized like a raindrop. After she had cut enough, she pieced the pieces together, starting with the inner pieces smaller and the outer pieces larger. A double-petaled crabapple blossom gradually took shape in her hands.

Caihe was puzzled. “Are they making silk flowers?” But—“Silk flowers are mostly made of silk and gauze, and the emphasis is on the shape, but she has never seen flowers made of gauze.”

After a while, a crystal clear white crabapple flower appeared in Miss Yuan's hand.

"Yun'er, bring me my painting brushes and a box of watercolor red paint left over from yesterday." Yuan instructed carefully.

After painting the flower in her hand with a brush, Yuan Caohua smiled and finished. Then she hurried to the main courtyard holding the flower.

Seven days later, a light and elegant pink gauze peony with yellow stamens, about the size of an adult's fist, appeared before Zhang.

Zhang's eyes were filled with amazement as she held it up to the sunlight for a closer look. The shape of the petals imitated the natural form of real flowers, but the petals were as thin as cicada wings, making it look as if they were made of extremely thin jade. They were clear, elegant, and dreamy, just like a young lady in the boudoir who was just beginning to fall in love, with an indescribable hazy feeling in her heart.

"It's so beautiful!" Zhang praised sincerely. Compared with the gold and silver jewelry that are expensive but too artificial, the gauze flowers are fresh, natural, elegant and unconventional, and are bound to be sought after by young ladies and wives.

The most important thing is that the art of making flowers out of gauze is currently only possessed by Xiefang Pavilion. Zhang lowered her eyes and began to think about the manpower, material resources, and time required to make a single gauze flower.

It's well known that gauze is thin and translucent, making it unsuitable for clothing. Its production is low and its price is high. A single flower requires at least one foot and up to three feet of gauze, which then undergoes more than a dozen steps of cutting, sizing, drying, dyeing, and ironing before it takes shape, requiring both labor and material. For pieces larger than a fist, extremely fine gold or silver threads are used as a support structure. Zhang silently calculated the costs and decided on a sales strategy that valued scarcity. After a moment's deliberation, she wrote a letter and asked Madam Chang to deliver it.

Returning to Red Maple Garden, Yuan Caohua had already begun crafting new gauze flowers. The peony she had given her mistress was merely a practice piece. Inspired by the Third Young Lady, she followed the same method used for silk flowers, documenting key steps along the way. Her main priorities now were to verify the reliability of her recorded steps and to refine the process and expand the variety and color of the gauze flowers.

Yuan Caohua was very happy that he never thought that one day he would be able to do something for his wife.

"Miss, the third lady is here." Yun'er walked in from outside.

When Lu Yun walked into the house, she saw Yuan Caohua sitting on the rag-covered kang under the south window, looking at her with sparkling eyes.

The room felt a bit messy. She avoided the drawings scattered on the floor that looked like drafts. Lu Yun took out a radish from her arms and said, "Sister, make a bag for Yunjie to put the radish in."

Yuan Caohua agreed with a smile. There happened to be a half-made pomegranate-shaped purse in the needlework plaque. Yuan Caohua added a few stitches to the original and finished a plain purse. Then she took a fan with a white rabbit looking at the moon that she had made for her mistress, compared them, and seeing that they were the right size, she carefully cut out the pattern and fitted it onto the purse.

On the palm-sized red purse, there was a rabbit lying down and a rabbit standing up, praying to the full moon in the sky. It was very cute.

Lu Yun was very satisfied. She threw away the radish she had brought from the kitchen, tied her purse, and smiled sweetly, "Thank you, sister."

Caihe turned around and found that her young lady was missing. She was anxiously wondering where to look for her when she saw a chubby figure walking out of the red maple forest.

"Miss, where have you been?" I was almost scared to death. Caihe was anxious and angry.

Lu Yun pointed to the purse on her body and said to her, "The purse was made by my sister." Caihe then discovered that the young lady had a red purse on her body. This place was close to the Red Maple Garden, so it must have been given by Miss Yuan.

"Caihe? What are you doing here?" A familiar voice suddenly rang out. Caihe turned around and found it was Aunt Yao. She stood up and bowed, saying, "Madam said that spring has arrived and asked me to take the young lady for more walks. It's good for her health."

Aunt Yao nodded and smiled, "What a coincidence! I was also taking Wang'er out for a walk. I happened to be planning to go back, so why not take the Third Miss to sit in my yard?"

Caihe hesitated for a moment and nodded in agreement.

Wang'er's new sister seemed very curious. She lay in the wet nurse's arms and kept looking at Lu Yun.

When they arrived at Yingchun Courtyard, Caiping saw the visitor and a look of surprise flashed across her face. She served a few plates of snacks as instructed by her aunt.

"I heard from the servants that the third young lady likes to eat snacks. It just so happens that we have just made some in the yard. Please give it a try." Aunt Yao said gently.

Lu Yun was very considerate and picked up a piece and put it in her mouth. It was sweet but not greasy and melted in her mouth. It was really good.

Lu Wang, sitting next to Aunt Yao, was about to reach for the snacks on the plate when the nurse took him away and took out a rattle, making a dong dong sound to attract his attention.

"Auntie, brother, have some snacks." Lu Yun pointed at Lu Wang, who was standing on the ground, held by the hand of his wet nurse.

Aunt Yao took out a piece and asked the wet nurse to feed it to her son, and Lu Wang ate it very sweetly.

After Lu Wang finished eating, he slowly came over and reached out to grab the White Rabbit Moon-Watching Purse. "Yes, yes, Brother Wang wants it."

Lu Yun nervously grabbed the purse and said, "I can't give you this. She went to Hongfeng Garden just to get a purse to put the black knife in. As soon as she got the purse, she put the black knife in it."