Quick Wear Dream Qiqi

On the morning of the Xinyou day, Yongqi knelt in the Golden Palace holding the "Proposal for the Improvement of Horse Equipment of the Imperial Stables", his palms still slightly sweaty.

Last night, he repeatedly pondered the wording of his memorial and deleted all the secret notes involving the Queen in the account book, keeping only the record of the money transactions between Eunuch Li, the head of the Imperial Household Department, and the Embroidery Guild, which he wrote in tiny calligraphy on the folded pages.

"Your Majesty, I recently accompanied Concubine Xinrong on an inspection of a folk embroidery workshop and discovered serious corruption in the leather goods purchased by the Imperial Stables."

He deliberately pronounced the words "Xinrong Fujin" clearly, his eyes sweeping over Eunuch Li's instantly pale face. "The embroidery workshop guild used inferior cowhide instead of high-quality deerskin, making huge profits from it, causing the girths of many imperial horses to break."

Qianlong opened the memorial and frowned slightly when he saw the picture of the worn horse harness.

Yongqi noticed the emperor's fingertips paused at the mezzanine level, knowing he had discovered the account book summary. He continued, "I suggest that from now on, horse harnesses be directly supplied by the Jiangnan Weaving Bureau. At the same time, a 'quality inspection room' be established within the Imperial Horse Administration, with embroiderers from the Women's Craft School participating in the inspections. Their ability to discern materials is far more refined than men's."

This reminded Qianlong of the three-dimensional embroidery at the night embroidery party. His fingers unconsciously stroked the golden swallow pattern on his cuffs. "Is it inappropriate for a woman to participate in the inspection?"

"My Lord," Yongqi prepared, pulling out the "Leather Identification Atlas" designed by Meng Qiqi from his sleeve. "This is Xinrong's 'Twelve Leather Identifications', which uses embroidery stitches to mark the grain characteristics of different leathers. Having embroiderers follow this atlas will not only prevent corruption but also showcase the talent of our women."

Eunuch Li suddenly knelt down, his voice filled with tears, "Your Majesty, please understand! This is all the instigation of the Embroidery Workshop Guild. I was just... just confused for a moment!"

Qianlong stared at his trembling shoulders and suddenly remembered what Empress Dowager Cixi said during dinner in the Cining Palace about "vermicelli absorbing the smell".

He twirled his jade ring and spoke slowly, "In consideration of your many years of service, I will spare your death sentence and send you to the Ministry of Punishment to do hard labor. Regarding the purchase of the Imperial Stables, I will do as Yongqi ordered."

When leaving the court, Yongqi met Meng Qiqi at Qianqing Gate. The golden swallow hairpins on her temples swayed gently: "Thank you, Fifth Prince, for winning the right to inspect the school."

He lowered his voice and said, "In the account book, I referred to the Queen as 'Western Merchants'. But..."

He saw the leather identification pattern on her sleeve and asked, "How do you know the emperor cares about 'showcasing women's talent'?"

Meng Qiqi chuckled, her fingertips tracing the gear purse at his waist. "Because last night, the Empress Dowager specially asked Qing'er to send the Emperor a plate of steamed yogurt with the theme 'A Woman's Virtue is Her Talentlessness,' but she hid the manuscript of 'Questioning the Female Rings' that you wrote when you were a child inside the plate."

Yongqi looked up suddenly, remembering the time when he was eight years old and was punished by his teacher for questioning that "girls should not study".

The sunlight passed through the pillars, weaving a golden grid on her face. He suddenly realized that the woman in the deep palace had already woven a fine net, using family affection, talent, and even the emperor's childhood memories as the network lines, making every reform seem natural.

At three quarters past noon, various leather scraps were placed under the grape racks in Shufangzhai.

Xiaoyanzi bit the leather rope, and suddenly her eyes lit up: "Xinrong, look, does this rope look like the whistle I saw in the martial arts world?"

She picked up a brass bell, strung it with a cowhide cord, and tied it to her wristband. "If you're in danger, just pull the cord and the bell will ring. It's much more effective than your spring mechanism!"

Meng Qiqi looked at the bell in her hand, remembering the "sound wave vibration principle" provided by the system. She suddenly pulled out a miniature copper whistle from her embroidered bag. It was an 18th-century nautical whistle that she had exchanged for system points. "This whistle has a sharper sound and can be heard three miles away. But I have to find a way to hide it in my wristband so that it doesn't hurt my hand and can be used at any time."

The little swallow grabbed a piece of soft sheepskin and cut it into the shape of a butterfly in a few seconds: "Hide it in the butterfly's wings! Look, if you press the wings like this, the whistle will pop out."

She suddenly remembered something and pulled out an embroidery frame from her bosom. On it were the words "Safety First" embroidered crookedly. "Ziwei taught me how to embroider this. Does it look good?"

Meng Qiqi took the embroidery frame and saw that the character "全" was missing a horizontal stroke. She felt that it was more precious than any other embroidery by a famous artist. "It looks great. Let's embroider these four words on the inside of the wristband so that every girl who wears it will know that her safety is more important than anything else."

The two were talking animatedly when Yongqi suddenly rushed in with Erkang and Benjamin, holding a wooden box. "I heard you were working on improving your wrist guards, so I had someone find some Western springs and thin steel wire."

He took out a piece of silver-gleaming steel wire and said, "This is the spring steel used to make clocks. It has excellent toughness."

Xiaoyanzi's eyes lit up, and she immediately used steel wire to make a skeleton for the butterfly's wings. "This way the wings won't droop! Xinrong, look, does it look like a flying butterfly?"

Meng Qiqi embedded the copper whistle into the butterfly's abdomen and gently pressed its wings. The sharp whistle sounded immediately throughout Shufangzhai.

Ziwei, who was reading under the grape trellis, looked up in surprise and dropped the Qi Min Yao Shu in her hand. "That sound... sounds exactly like the guard whistle we used when I was a kid!"

Erkang picked up the book and saw the words "Women's Weaving" circled in fluorescent pen on the title page. He suddenly smiled and said, "If Ziwei can improve the weaving techniques in this book, she might be able to write a 'New Scripture of Women's Weaving'."

Ziwei blushed slightly, but she took the leather material from Xiaoyanzi. "I dreamed of the Weaver Girl last night. She said she would give some handy things to the women in the world. Perhaps... this wristband is the gift from the Weaver Girl in my dream."

Everyone burst into laughter, and the sunlight shone through the gaps in the grape leaves onto the leather goods, giving them a warm golden hue.

Meng Qiqi watched Xiaoyanzi carefully sewing butterfly wings and Yongqi concentrating on adjusting the angle of the spring. She felt that this small Shufangzhai had become the freest corner in the deep palace - there were no rules to bind her, only the desire to make the world a better place.

The system interface quietly appeared: "Wristband improvement completion +80%, triggering the 'Folk Wisdom Entering the Palace' event. Detection of the Queen's forces planting new spies in the Imperial Stables. Should the 'Butterfly Whistle Warning' mechanism be activated?"

She touched the tentacles of the butterfly wristband, where there were extremely thin fluorescent threads hidden that glowed faintly in the dark.

Perhaps in this deep palace, every seemingly small improvement is a flap of wings. One day, the wings of millions of butterflies will stir up a hurricane of change, allowing all women to hear the whistle in their hearts.

At the first quarter of the evening, the Queen stared at the wristband that had just been sent by the Imperial Stables. She lightly pressed her fingertips on the butterfly wings, and the lingering sound of the copper whistle made her temples throb.

Rong Mama came forward, her voice filled with resentment: "Look, Your Majesty, these butterfly wings are powered by Western springs. They're clearly imitating the Westerners' perverse notion of 'female independence'!"

"Shut up!" The Queen slammed her wristband onto the table, the jade bracelet clattering against the rosewood surface. "Now the whole palace is praising Xinrong's virtue. Even the Emperor praises her for her 'virtuous character and elegant mind.' Do you want me to be known as an intolerant palace?"

Rong Mama quickly knelt down, her eyes fixed on the words "Safety First" embroidered on the inside of her wristband. "But, Your Majesty, Yongqi's memorial openly impeached Eunuch Li, but secretly cut off our financial resources. And then there's the Women's Craft School, and now they've even let them interfere with the Imperial Stables. If this continues..."

The Empress suddenly raised her hand to stop him, her gaze fixed on the "Female Precepts" screen on the wall. She recalled the approval in Emperor Qianlong's eyes when he had examined the wristband, and the Empress Dowager's partiality for Xinrong at the night embroidery party. Suddenly, she sneered, "Since they want to portray themselves as 'virtuous,' I'll give them a chance. Next month, there's a birthday banquet for the wife of Prince Khorchin. I want Xinrong to bring the embroiderers from the school to perform a 'Women's Horse Harness Improvement Show' at the banquet."

Rong Mama looked up and saw the sneer on the queen's lips. She suddenly understood her master's intention - the Princess of Khorchin hated women showing up in public the most. If Xinrong made a fool of herself at the banquet, she would be guilty of "disrespecting the emperor's order"; if she refused, she would be accused of "disobeying the emperor's order."

"Your Majesty is wise," Rong Mama smiled flatteringly, "This is called 'returning the favor'. Use their 'talent' to slap them in the face."

The Queen picked up the wristband and gently stroked the butterfly's wings with her fingertips. "I want to show everyone that women are women after all. Even if they learn to tinker with machines, they are not worthy of being in a formal place."

She suddenly threw the wristband into the charcoal brazier, and the copper whistle shrieked piercingly in the flames. "It's like this butterfly, it can fly across the Imperial Garden, but it can't fly out of the high walls of the Forbidden City."

At the same time, Meng Qiqi was instructing the embroiderers in the Imperial Stables to identify the leather materials for horse harnesses.

Chuntao held up a piece of deerskin and examined it carefully under the fluorescent light. "Fujin, the holes on this leather are artificial. Real holes would have hair around them."

"That's right," Meng Qiqi picked up a fine hair with tweezers. "This is called 'fake antique leather.' Eunuch Li and his men use this kind of leather to pass off as aged deerskin."

She suddenly heard the sound of a copper whistle in the distance. It was Xiaoyanzi testing the sound transmission range of the wristband.

Yongqi's voice came from behind: "The Emperor asked me to tell you that you must attend the birthday banquet of the Princess of Khorchin."

She turned and saw him holding the Empress's imperial edict in his hand, with ink stains on the corners of his mouth. He had obviously just come from the Qianqing Palace. "I guess the Empress wants us to demonstrate horse harness improvement at the banquet, right?"

Yongqi raised an eyebrow: "How do you know?"

"Because this is the perfect opportunity to flatter us," she pulled out her butterfly wristband and twirled it in the moonlight. "The more the princess dislikes women being in the spotlight, the more the queen wants to appear to support women's talent. That way, even if we make a fool of ourselves, it'll be proof of her magnanimity."

Yongqi suddenly remembered the "Khorchin Customs" he had read this morning, which recorded that the prince's wife had broken the hand bones of a maid because she could read.

He reached out and grasped her wrist, his voice filled with rare urgency: "Don't go, this is a trap."

Meng Qiqi chuckled and tapped the gear pouch on his chest with her fingertips: "Don't worry, I've prepared a 'double insurance' - Chuntao and the others will sew Khorchin totem patterns into the harness, which is both in accordance with the rules and shows respect. As for the butterfly wristband..."

She suddenly whistled, and from a distance, Little Swallow responded, "For this performance, we won't be riding horses. Instead, we'll have the horse trainers demonstrate the 'emergency rescue' function of their wrist guards. It's both safe and a great way to show off."

Yongqi looked at the light in her eyes and realized that she had already seen through the Queen's plan.

The moonlight shone on the golden swallow in her hair, and its wings trembled slightly, as if it would break through the night at any time.

He suddenly thought of the "golden swallow" in folklore, which is said to be able to bring spring seeds and make flowers bloom on the frozen soil.

The system prompt sounded in Meng Qiqi's ears: "The Queen's 'Praise and Kill Plan' has been detected, triggering the 'Cultural Decoding' mission: Successfully combine the Khorchin totem with modern security design to unlock the 'National Integration' hidden achievement."

She gently stroked the totem embroidery on the butterfly wristband, where the system provided an analysis of the Mongolian auspicious pattern.

Perhaps in this deep palace, every crisis is a seed. As long as it is buried in the right soil, new hope will grow.

What she has to do is to let this butterfly spread its most dazzling wings in the Golden Palace of the birthday banquet, carrying the wind of the grassland, the rain of the south of the Yangtze River, and the expectations of millions of women.