Gu Yunxi's words immediately surprised the five women. They looked at each other. Then Concubine Liang stood up with a smile, putting her delicate hand on Gu Yunxi's shoulder.

"Yunxi, you should not listen to Jieyu Jiang. She is young and rude. Please sit down, and let's just chat."

Jieyu Jiang pursed her red lips, moving restlessly and complaining.

"Sister Concubine Liang, you are being hypocritical. It is you who are curious about Jingyang Palace and want to know more about it, so you asked us all to come together. Yunxi is a sincere person, so why can't you tell her the truth? I helped you today, but you blame me for it."

"Er, this… This..."

She couldn't pretend anymore.

Concubine Liang's face made as smooth as boiled egg white by the rose makeup, suddenly became red and flushed. Dodging eye contact, she turned to look at Gu Yunxi.

The two of them grinned in unison and laughed strangely for a while.

Concubine Liang held Gu Yunxi's hand, stuttering.

"Yunxi. Hehe, Yunxi. I... I really have nothing to do. So, I don't treat you as an outsider..."

Gu Yunxi smiled seeming beautiful as peach and plum blossom. Her voice was sweet and delicate. Without moving her mouth much, she quickly said.

"If you think there is something worth looking at, how could I let you leave in disappointment?"

"Ah? Ha-ha... Ha-ha…"

Concubine Liang felt so awkward that she didn't know where to put her hands and feet. Hastily covering half of her little mouth with a handkerchief, she tried hard to force a laugh which made her sweaty all over.

The other four women then followed Concubine Liang's expression. They looked down, giggling wildly in the face of this embarrassing situation.

There were all kinds of false expressions, all uglier than simply, openly, crying aloud.

Having seen enough of these disgusting displays, Gu Yunxi suddenly stopped laughing. She turned around, raised her arm inside the large sleeve, giving an order.

"Dong Zhu, go and bring out all the treasures from the cupboards at the back."

Dong Zhu hesitated slightly but said nothing. She nodded and went around the twelve-fold screens covered in gold and silver to the back of the hall.

The five women at the table immediately became quiet. To be more accurate, they were frightened by the cold sight of Gu Yunxi's back.

Gu Yunxi suddenly raised her voice.

"Zhiqi, call Che to bring down the objects from the shelves by the wall on the north side."

Zhiqi had been a maidservant in the imperial harem for a long time and had encountered all kinds of situations, so she knew that her master was in trouble today.

But her master had already made up her mind. Zhiqi couldn't disobey her.

She softly said "Certainly, Your Grace", pulled the curtains aside and went out to get the person she needed.

Soon, Che brought a stool. He took the antiques down from the rosewood shelves which bore a print of eight drunken immortals and handed them one by one to Zhiqi. Then Zhiqi took them to the square table.

At this moment, Dong Zhu returned with some maidservants and brought a dozen rectangular trays covered with bright red silk cloth.

There was not enough room on the table so they could only put them on the floor.

Zhiqi quietly read the situation and hurriedly made a gesture with her eyes to Che.

Che understood. He jumped down from the stool and stopped moving more things.

Having looked around, supported by Zhiqi, Gu Yunxi walked over the turquoise tiles with their golden passionflowers and reached the red glazed trays. She didn't bend over. Instead, she lifted the hem of her skirt and reached a foot out to lift a piece of red silk with her toes.

The entire tray was covered by gold-plated jewelry, all made using complex Tian-tsui (kingfisher feather art) techniques.

There were three full trays of different varieties of hairpins and coronets, such as gold hairpins inlaid with gemstones with a design of a phoenix flying through flowers, gold-plated Tian-tsui coronets with a design of bees and butterflies buzzing around chrysanthemum, and flower-shaped coronets inlaid with pearls and emeralds.

Gu Yunxi smiled, walking towards the trays with her hands on her hips. And very soon, she had removed all twelve pieces of cloth with her foot.

There were two trays of red gold bracelets with emerald flowers, and three trays of gold filigree Buddha-shaped earrings, necklaces with a chiselled eight-treasure pattern and rings adorned with various colored gemstones.

The five women were dumbfounded. All were dazzled by the shimmering, bright as sunglow, of the gold.

There were also ring-shaped pearl hairpins, precious hair clasps, hairpins, jade pendants, a sandalwood silk folding fan with turtle shell, a round silk fan with golden edges and soft jade, rouge and makeup imported from foreign countries, amber perfume in clear bottles, silk and so on. There was everything that one expected to find, colorful, exquisite and dazzling.

The women were so amazed that their eyes glowed with obsession and greed. They seemed to have forgotten to breathe.

Gu Yunxi gently glanced at each of their faces and found it annoying but funny.

Having returned to the square table, she stopped and smiled, saying, "Please be patient. Let's start with the things on this table. Here, have any of your seen the jade sailboat?"

The concubines leaned over and looked at the shiny green sailboat.

The sailboat was not very big in size. It was only as long as a typical woman's arm.

The whole boat was wonderfully carved. No matter whether it was the patterns on the hull, the mast, the chains or the expressions and clothing of the figures standing on the boat, every detail was rigorously and carefully presented.

The whole boat was seamlessly made. The jade was transparent and soft, smooth like cream. The color was even and pure as if it was flowing like a stream.

Lady Wan curiously moved a bit closer to the jade boat. All of a sudden, she felt a chill straight to her face. She felt numb as if there had been a hard ice block hitting her skin, hurting her face.

She suddenly sat up straight, holding her cool cheeks, saying in surprise, "Ah, this jade is so fresh. I hadn't touched it, but I felt I had been cut by a knife."

Gu Yunxi raised the corner of her eye, saying with a smile, "The jade is a specialty from Bo Ku. It is warm in winter and cool in summer. It's only spring now. When summer comes, this jade boat will become cooler and cooler, and it will be equivalent to two or three buckets of ice used to cool this hall!"

While she was talking, she knocked the boat with her silver fingernail guards decorated with their golden-edged indigo chrysanthemum patterns. Immediately, there was a deep sound. This was why the jade from Bo Ku was significantly different from any ordinary jade.

While they were paying all their attention to the boat, Gu Yunxi picked up a hollowed-out round pure gold box.

The box was as big as the palm of a hand. It was smooth outside, engraved with a dragon and phoenix pattern.

Having seen that, Concubine Liang pursed her lips and smiled faintly. She looked down a little, saying enviously, "It seems that His Majesty really wants to be with you for the rest of his life. All the things with phoenix patterns have come to your palace."

In the imperial harem, on things from clothing and accessories down to utensils and decorations, only the Empress in Kunning Palace could use phoenix motifs.

Meanwhile, Gu Yunxi was only a third rank concubine.

She ignored Concubine Liang and continued to present her treasures.

"Sisters, you come and see its inside."

When she opened the lid of a golden box with a flying dragon, a gleaming brightness poured out of the box.

Inside of it, there were colorful mermaid beads and turquoise cat's eye stones.

Concubine Xian was astonished, sighing, "This is the first opportunity in my life to see mermaid beads from the Eastern Sea. This is really a rare and wonderful thing!"

Gu Yunxi raised her head, showing her fair-skinned neck.

"They were offered by the people from the Eastern Sea region half a year ago. I was still in the Yonglu Temple then. His Majesty ordered someone to grind half of them for me to treat my wounds. The rest were mixed with cat's eye stones and given to me to entertain me."

To entertain you?

The five of them looked at each other, but no one spoke anymore.

Even though one cat's eye stone was worth half a city, there were only a few people in the palace who had actually seen mermaid beads from the Eastern Sea!

Most of the perfect round colorful crystal beads had already been ground and given to her for bathing. The remaining dozens of beads were something she regarded as just a kind of entertainment?

She sounded so arrogant!

This teenage girl spoke so arrogantly. Obviously, the Emperor spoiled her too much, so she had become like this.

The five people were so angry and jealous, but they could only hide their feelings, not daring to show any trace of them.

Gu Yunxi secretly laughed.

She knew exactly why these people wanted to come here. Since they wanted to find out how much she was loved by the Emperor, she had decided to put on a show, exaggerating the facts as much as possible to annoy them.

Anyway, none of them would dare to go to Huanan Xin to ask if everything here was true.

Gu Yunxi put down the hollowed out golden box and then picked up a long-necked golden pot, saying with a smile.

"This one is a golden ginko wine jug, and that one over there is a western enamel chrysanthemum flowerpot. Ah, and this one, a silver jewel case from Roufo Country."

Meiren Qi glanced at that egg-shaped jewelry case, pursed her lips, looking upset.

"Other treasures are rare. Roufo Country has a lot of tin, so things made of tin are common. I have one of the silver tin jewelry cases they offered to our country as well. His Majesty gave it to me and I use it to store my makeup."

Gu Yunxi put the case into her hand, gently saying, "This one must be different from yours. If you don't believe me, open it and take a look."

Meiren Qi smiled. The moment she opened the lid, there was sudden music. beautiful and pleasant, but still surprised the woman a lot.

She shrieked and threw the case away. She put her hand on her chest, breathing quickly.

"Oh my God, this box... It can sing!"

Zhiqi looked unhappy and went to pick the case up. She wiped it carefully with her sleeve, frowning and saying, "Your Grace, please be careful. This is His Majesty's gift. Thankfully, it fell onto the soft carpet. If it had fallen on the hard surface, it might have been damaged!"

Meiren Qi's face turned red, looking down and not saying anything.

Concubine Liang's bright eyes glanced at Lady Wan. Lady Wan nodded as if she was agreeing with her.

When she looked up again, Lady Wan was smiling. Holding the hollowed-out golden box with a design of a dragon and phoenix, she asked casually.

"Yunxi, since His Majesty has been very kind to you, you will have more gifts in the future. Why don't you give me this box of mermaid beads today? You just said that you want to share the good things with us, didn't you?"