Five, if not for past fate, how could there be present luck?

  Gao returned quickly, and the news he brought back made Yu Guozhen feel more confident.

  Qingming has passed, and Yu Guozhen's mourning period is officially over. However, his life remains unchanged - he still runs every day, teaches Dazhu and Erzhu to read and do math, and rarely goes to town. As for the previous incident, except for a few days of commotion in the fourth house, it seems to have fallen into the water like a stone, causing ripples but quickly returning to calmness.

  On the tenth day of April in the fifth year of Chongzhen of the Great Ming, the originally clear sky suddenly changed to strong winds and waves at noon. The river surface of Xihai was turbulent, and the passing boats had to dock and anchor temporarily to avoid the wind and waves.

  "Miss, the wind and rain are too strong. If we're not careful, the boat might capsize. There's a house on the shore, shall we go ashore to take shelter?" A woman who was sticking her head out from behind a curtain on the boat asked those in the cabin.

  "Take a look at that household to see if there are any women." A soft voice came from the cabin, and the voice was extremely clear. It sounded like the "young lady" was not very old.

  The woman waved her hand at the boatman: "Old Ma, go and take a look. If there are women on board, ask if it's convenient for us to avoid the wind and waves!"

  The boatman, wearing a raincoat and barefoot, jumped directly to the shore. He rushed into the rain, and after a moment, he rushed back: "The owner of this house has specially set aside the main room, and there are also maidservants in the house. The young lady can go ashore to avoid the wind for a while - this wind is really strong!"

  Before long, a small boy about half grown came running up, bringing five raincoats and three oil-paper umbrellas. However, in such strong winds, the oil-paper umbrellas were hard to open.

  It was exactly Erzhu who came, he was tall and big in stature, but had a childish face. The boatman set up the gangway, but the ship was swaying back and forth in the strong wind, so the gangway was unstable. Erzhu saw this and jumped into the water to hold down the gangway firmly, the boatman thanked him hastily, then Erzhu saw a little girl like white jade coming out of the cabin.

  "It's really raining heavily, sister!" The little girl turned her head and shouted towards the cabin: "Come quickly, come and see!"

  She was only seven or eight years old, with a delicate and lovely appearance. When she smiled, her eyes curved like crescent moons. The strong wind and rain outside didn't make her feel afraid, but instead made her feel excited.

  She shouted and stumbled onto the gangway, scaring the maid who had just come out of the boat so much that her eyes were wide with fear, and hastily came to support her ashore, fortunately not falling into the Xihai River.

  This river is connected to the Yangtze River, and at this time the wind is strong and the waves are urgent. If you fall in carelessly, you will be left with no bones. The servant woman turned her head and helped another girl out of the cabin. This girl was about 13 or 14 years old, looked very similar to the little girl who came out earlier, but was much more gentle and dignified. She carefully got ashore and thanked Gao Erzhu, who smiled foolishly and said: "My master has instructed me."

  "What is your family's surname?" The servant woman asked after hearing that the young master was still quite honest.

  "Yu, my family's master said that it was during the Yellow Emperor's time that Yu was a descendant of the Yu who assisted in the creation of the calendar, and has no relation to the Yu families of the two dukes and two marquises."

  That servant woman didn't understand why he had to emphasize that he had nothing to do with the Yu family of Er Gong and Er Hou. After all, in the surrounding area of Chaohu Lake, the Yu family who helped the Taizu Emperor and his three sons, two dukes and two marquises was the most famous! On the other hand, the 13 or 14-year-old girl's eyes slightly condensed, as if she was thinking.

  "Sister, come quickly, there are flowers everywhere here!"

  The little girl who got off the boat first had been cooped up in the yard for a long time, so everything looked new and interesting to her. The muddy road and heavy rain couldn't dampen her good mood, and she skipped and jumped towards Yu Guozhen's house, occasionally stopping to call out to her sister. The 13- or 14-year-old girl had no choice but to roll up her sleeves and hurry after her.

  When the two sisters ran to the eaves, Yu Guozhen happened to walk out. The little girl almost bumped into his body. Seeing this delicate and lovely little girl, Yu Guozhen felt a sudden joy in his heart. Then he saw the young girl following behind the little girl.

  The girl was only thirteen or fourteen years old, her body not yet fully grown, hidden under a large raincoat, and it was hard to see anything, but a face like jade, a pair of eyes like stars, a straight nose like a gemstone, and a small mouth like a cherry, Yu Guozhen was stunned at first sight, feeling as if he had seen the people in the painting come to life.

  When she saw him, the girl immediately put down her skirt, but in that brief glance, Yu Guozhen realized that she didn't have bound feet.

  It was the late Ming dynasty, when the custom of footbinding was at its peak. In the Jianghuai region, there were not many young women who did not bind their feet. The girl's cheeks flushed red with shame, her face filled with embarrassment. Although her family had fallen on hard times and she had to rely on relatives for support, she was still a daughter of a noble family. Being looked at in this way was truly most improper.

  "Xiao Lian, bring these two ladies in." Yu Guozhen ordered from behind: "Gao Auntie, light the charcoal fire and let our guests warm up."

  His mouth instructed, but his heart was racing, and his eyes were also a little confused. Fortunately, the girl happened to hear his instructions and knew he was the master, so she bowed to him without seeing that otherwise she would have taken him for a beggar and didn't dare enter the house.

  Although his body was only fifteen years old, he could already appreciate the beauty of a young girl. Although this girl couldn't be considered a stunning beauty that could topple cities, for some reason, he found her pleasing to the eye.

  Fortunately, the atmosphere in Jianghuai is more open than elsewhere, otherwise this girl would not have been able to enter Yu Guozhen's home.

  Three maidservants followed the young girl, one of whom was a rough and rustic servant girl. The two sisters were led into the main house, where Old Lady Gao immediately brought in some hot coals. They looked around in all directions, and although the room was simple, it was spotlessly clean, unlike most farmhouses where chickens and ducks would leave their droppings on the floor. The little girl was lively and curious, and after taking off her rain cape, she didn't go to warm herself by the fire but instead ran around the main room, then spotted a pile of papers on the table. She curiously flipped through them, and suddenly seemed to have made a great discovery, grabbing hold of something and running over to her sister: "Sister, sister, look at this writing!"

  "Don't touch other people's things!" The girl's face sank.

  The little girl, however, was not too afraid, she just stuck out her tongue and took another look at the paper, and finally couldn't hold back her curiosity: "Sister, they put it here, so they must not be afraid of people seeing it. Look, what's written on this? Why can't I recognize a few characters?"

  The girl, although teaching her younger sister, was after all only thirteen or fourteen years old. If placed in a later era, she could still catch the last bus of the term "Lolita". How could she not be curious? She couldn't help but take a peek. As soon as she did, her eyes lit up: "Huh, this is... Western numerals!"

  She saw the dense characters on the paper, which were Arabic numerals. At that time, it was the first time Western learning had spread to the East, and some scholars and progressive scholars in the Ming Dynasty were actively learning these scientific technologies from the West, rather than being defeated like the Qing Dynasty later on, they thought of learning from the barbarians to defeat them. The girl's family had a deep foundation in learning, although her family was a generation of great Confucian scholars, but her elder brother had studied some Western learning with Xiong Mingyu in Fujian, so she knew these numbers. And she had always admired her elder brother and often asked him for guidance, so she could barely recognize some of them.

  It was astonishing to her that someone in this desolate wilderness actually understood Western numerals.

  "This is our young master teaching Dazhu and Erzhu arithmetic." The little lotus next to her, who was only a few years younger than her, looked at her with surprise and naturally said proudly: "My young master knows the most things, whether it's the Western Barbarians or the Eastern Yi, as well as the Northern Di and the Southern Man, there's nothing in the world that my young master doesn't know!"

  The young master should be the fifteen or sixteen year old boy I saw just now, the girl listened to her say it with such admiration, and felt amused in her heart, of course also a little unconvinced, after all, in her heart, even her famous elder cousin couldn't live up to the praise of being omniscient, let alone this country boy?

  But she didn't like to argue, just hiding the fun in her heart without saying it out. On the contrary, her younger sister, that 8 or 9-year-old little girl, didn't quite understand how to conceal what was on her mind, and directly pouted: "I don't believe it, it's impossible, your young master must not be more knowledgeable than my older brother!"

  Xiao Lian's mouth moved slightly, but she thought that the other person was a guest, so she didn't say anything. The little girl knew she wasn't convinced, her eyes rolled around and thought of some interesting things her older brother had said: "Does your young master know if the earth is square or... flat?"

  It is said that the heaven is round and the earth is square, so people often think that the earth is square. The little girl asked this question because of this. Xiaolian heard it and slightly twitched the corner of her mouth: "It's not square or flat, but round. My young master not only knows that the earth is round, but also knows that the diameter of the earth is about 25,440 miles... Three years ago, my young master had already said this!"

  As soon as this was said, the little girl rummaged through her mind to find new questions, while the girl beside her stared wide-eyed. If understanding those Western numerals could be considered a skill imparted by the Westerners, knowing that the earth is round might just pass as ordinary knowledge, but accurately calculating the diameter of the Earth was absolutely beyond the capabilities of an ordinary person!

  Was it this little servant girl who was talking nonsense or that young master who made it up at will?

  Thinking of this, the girl couldn't help but want to verify it, so she turned her gaze and remembered a question she saw in her older cousin's new manuscript, and asked: "If you know that the earth is round, do you know about the equator?"

  "The circle equidistant from the North and South Poles is the Equator...... However, the young master said that it should be the longest circumference when the Earth rotates!"

  The girl's mind was a bit confused by this remark, but what she wanted to ask was not that. As long as she knew the equator, it would be easy: "So is China south of the equator or north of the equator, and between how many degrees?"

  Xiao Lian was taken aback, she thought for a moment: "The young master said that China is located north of the equator, as for how many degrees... I'll go ask the young master and then come back to you two misses."

  She finished speaking and quickly walked out of the door. The little girl giggled: "Sister is still smart, can't fool her!"

  The young girl slightly furrowed her delicate eyebrows; could this question really stump that little master?