WangXian Forever 7

Chapter 62 Oasis

They entered the city, excited and happy. Zhengui De Chengshi looked like a wonderful place to live in, if a little extraordinary.

"Lan Zhan...?" Wei Ying whispered, as quietly as he could.

"Mn?"

"Um...did you think anything of it...about their moustaches?" He asked, praying he wouldn't be be overheard and inadvertently upset anyone.

"Facial hair can be...attractive." Lan Zhan replied.

With a straight face.

"But...those were men....and these...are women..." He finished with a nervous giggle. He didn't want to laugh...but it really was quite strange.

Every single person had a moustache, and not just a hairy-caterpillar upper lip, oh no, these people were serious about moustaches. And both men and women were sporting curled at the ends and wiry 'taches to pleated and plaited ones, ones that were expertly groomed, not a hair out of place, oiled and well-kept.

This was personal grooming at its very best.

Wei Ying was reminded of Porta Daven and her speaking beard.

And this was just the people; the entire city was decorated with blue silk, swathes of the turquoise fabrics hanging from the roofs and windows, across the houses. Sheer muslin and organzas decorated doorways and pillars, and they had even dyed chrysanthemums to varying degrees of vibrant blues, everywhere they looked, there was something blue.

Stalls were selling blue coloured foods, from blue coloured sticky toffee apples, to blue candy, and cotton candy, blue coloured popcorn, and sticky honeyed hawthorns dyed the same blue shades.

All the residents were wearing beautiful gowns of blue silks, linens and cottons. Floating, swaying and drifting along the streets, there was an ocean of blue shades spreading out from them. Women going to the markets, children playing in the streets, the merchant vendors with their blue items to sell, everything was blue.

So it was natural that these travellers stood out. For one thing, none of them had any excess facial hair; their clean shaven faces were already eye-catching, but as two of them were wearing blood red robes, the stark white of Lan Zhan's clothes, contrasting against black and red robes of Wei Ying, the white gowns their children wore, and the everyday common clothes of Xiao Zei in beige and brown, these were the colours of the strangers.

So people stopped to stare.

Wei Ying's mouth was already turning blue, something that seemed to fascinate his husband, Rumi's purple eyes were matching his tongue and Li XiWang was trying to convince Lan Zhan to try some blue ice cream. He politely declined, staring at it as if it were a letter of complaint from an angry villager.

Wei Ying was also busy admiring the city itself. Even as it was decorated so extravagantly, it would have been beautiful without the show anyway. These people were thriving in the middle of nowhere, prosperity kissing its many paved roads. There were little spots of cultivated land, patches of green with colourful flowers sporadically dotting their path, the streets were clean and devoid of rubbish and there was no trace of any beggars or homeless people.

The quality of the merchandise being sold in the street markets seemed to be of a high standard, too. Wei Ying paused at a stall selling pendants and brooches, fingering a beautiful cloud shaped orchid in a striking blue jade. Lan Zhan was paying for it even before he had opened his mouth to ask how much it was.

He quietly put it inside his sleeve for safe keeping, now in two minds about how to give it to him. After all, did it count if one gave a present to the one who paid for it? He was going to believe that yes, it certainly did. Lan Zhan had told him often enough that his money was Wei Ying's, not just because they were married...and Wei Ying tried not to think about it too hard.

Before too long, they noticed an absence of buildings and instead a golden gate closed with an ostentatious golden padlock barred their way.

Wei Ying tried to see beyond it, but the thick vegetation and the trees hid his view from whatever lay beyond.

"I wonder what's over there?" He mused aloud, not wanting to touch the gold bars preventing their progress.

"Our Divine Oasis lies beyond this gate." A friendly woman passing by, told them. "It will only be opened for the Queen in two hours. Then, she will go to receive blessings from our beloved Oasis. She is expected soon."

They smiled and nodded at her until she went away.

"Where's Xiao Zei?" Wei Ying asked, noticing for the first time that he wasn't with them.

"He asked if he could wander around and I saw no reason to keep him with us, so I said yes." Hongse replied, smiling.

"That's alright...I should stop seeing everyone as my responsibility." Wei Ying laughed awkwardly. "Of course he should go wherever he pleases."

"Young Master Wei," Hongse put a hand on his arm, ignoring a glowering Lan Zhan. "May I assure you, it's one of the sweetest things about you, how you absorb everyone into your family. Please don't change...not for anything." She blinked back the sudden moisture in her eyes and dropped her hand. "Anyway, shall we try some tea? I thought I saw a place over there?" She wandered back.

"Um...wow..." Wei Ying murmured.

"She is correct. Wei Ying is sweet." Lan Zhan kissed the top of his head before taking his hand and going to join the others.

They found Hongse paying for a pitcher of blue tea. They sat down outside the establishment at a table, pushing two together to accommodate everyone. A waiter came out with cakes and pastries, all blue, of course.

Wei Ying looked around at the people sitting around him and thought about how happy he felt right then. The only people missing were those left behind in Cloud Recesses and his children at Koi Tower... but this kind of bone-deep contentment was rare and just as valuable.

He smiled and bit into an ice cream horn and sipped his blue tea.