[Extra] 39 - The small loyal dog is hardworking and studious.
Since Jun Luoshu returned to Moling, I’ve often had to correspond with him.
Now that I am rich and imposing, I use high-quality stonemade ink, a fine writing brush, and fine writing paper, all my products are top-quality. To be honest, though, my writing is extremely, extremely ugly.
Ye Tan swiftly finished grinding some ink, and stood behind me, watching me write.
My pen freely snaked around the page, creating scribbles that were unbearable to look at.
He looked at it for a moment, and said: “Looks good.”
I was startled: “Are you blind, or are you illiterate.”
Ye Tan: “Illiterate.”
I: “.....that was rude of me.”
I said again: “That’s not right, I’ve seen you reading books before.”
Ye Tan: “Reporting to Master, that was a graphic novel.”
I: “......”
I pulled him to sit down, and crookedly wrote the words “Ye Tan”.
“This is your name. Can you remember it?”
Ye Tan gripped the pen with strength that almost punctured the paper, and following my lead wrote down an even more crooked “Ye Tan”.
I laughed so hard I tripped on my feet, then I patted him on the head and went back to sleep.
Three days later, Ye Tan suddenly said he learnt how to write his name.
I happily went to see, but unexpectedly, his writing was exactly the same as that tragically ugly “Ye Tan” I wrote on that day, he had created an exact copy down to every brushstroke.
Ye Tan held his breath while looking at me, waiting for me to praise him.
I was deeply aware that my half-baked skills should not hamper my student’s progress, especially for such a conscientious and good child like Ye Tan.
I invited a scholar to come and teach the both of us how to write.
The teacher saw that his face was cold and his sword aura was dense, so he trembled a bit as he asked: “I don’t know what level the two of you are at now?”
Ye Tan said: “I’ll write something so you can see.”
The teacher poked his head out to look, and was speechless: “Ho, that’s ugly.”
“Insolent!” Ye Tan coldly unsheathed his sword, looking like he was about to kill him. The teacher was so scared he covered his head and fled like a rat.
I hurriedly stopped him: “What are you scaring people for!!”
“My writing is exactly the same as Master’s, how could it be ugly!” Ye Tan angrily said, “This scholar is slandering Master, I will not tolerate it.”
Sigh, this unlucky child.
I spent some time fixing the misunderstanding with the teacher, and ordered Ye Tan that he was in no way allowed to use violence against the teacher, the two of them were very uncomfortable, but reluctantly agreed.
Ye Tan’s strokes looked as though they were carved with a knife, but he was earnest and hardworking, so he advanced by leaps and bounds. The teacher very quickly had a whole new level of respect for him.
I did not progress in the least, crawling like a confused earthworm. The teacher also had a whole new level of respect for me.
Ye Tan thought of a way to console me: “Master’s muscles and veins have suffered damage, so you are unable to control your strokes, that is also natural.”
I said: “That’s possible, it makes sense and makes me have some hope.”
In not even half a month, Ye Tan’s regular script was already very pretty. But his cursive and semi-cursive script hadn’t improved.
Ye Tan said: “This bending and twisting, it’s too hard to memorise.”
I found it very inexplicable: My dog-paddle characters weren’t any more twisty, how did you memorise those?
Afterwards, whenever I had to write Jun Luoshu a letter, I gave up the struggle and had Ye Tan write it for me.
One time, when we received a reply from Jun Luoshu, he praised: “With every letter you send, Young Master’s writing becomes better and better, forceful and vigorous, it must mean your body has improved a lot.”
Ye Tan helped me answer: “It’s not my writing, someone else is writing for me.”
Jun Luoshu replied with a question: “Young Master, has this person always been by your side? Do I know who it is?”
Ye Tan asked me as he spread out the paper: “Master, how do I reply?”
“You just write, ‘It’s the Sword Pavilion's other Master’.”