Quick Travel: Dream Hunt

While men are still shouting that women cannot show up in public and must stay at home, women have already woken up and started their own party.

Ting He saw that the halo had spread almost completely, so he held a flower-viewing banquet in the palace with the help of the empress dowager, and also invited the wives, daughters and mothers of my officials to come.

At the banquet.

His Majesty first invited the ladies of the aristocratic families to perform, but the girls all declined to perform, saying that a woman's virtue lies in her lack of talent.

His Majesty suppressed his smile and once again invited the ladies from the aristocratic families to perform music, chess, calligraphy and painting, but of course the girls resolutely refused.

Until His Majesty said that each noble lady needed to recite a poem and write a poem for today's banquet.

The daughters of the Vice Minister of War were the first to step forward, bow and say:

"Your Majesty, we girls are not suitable for public appearances. We are not suitable for performing in public to please others. Please don't be offended. If you really want to perform, we sisters will have to make a fool of ourselves."

Soon, the daughter of the Minister of War looked at the blooming peony with a dazed look in her eyes and said with a smile:

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Three, two, one, three, two, one. But it turns out to be four, five, six. Oh, there's still a seven missing."

After the Minister of War's woman finished her performance, the men stopped drinking and looked at her in disbelief.

More and more ladies began to perform:

"One peony is one, two peonies blossom together, and three peonies together look like a single peony when viewed from a distance."

"The peony says one, two, one, but the rose insists on three, four, five. The peony doesn't agree with the rose, so which is it, one, two, or three, four, five?"

……

The entire banquet was full of competition for beauty, and all the noble ladies were demonstrating what it meant that a woman's virtue lies in her lack of talent. There was nothing to say, just one word: obedient, steady, and sensible.

The officials stared at their daughters and wives in amazement, but the old woman stared back at them. After a disagreement, they complained to His Majesty:

"Your Majesty, I am old now. I have been without talent or virtue for most of my life. When I was young, I was scolded by my parents. When I got married, I was scolded by my parents-in-law. When I became a mother, I was despised by my son. I don't know when this will end."

"Yes, Your Majesty, I am already over fifty years old. I have come this far whether I am educated or not. My sons all came from my belly, but it is my fault that I raised them. If I hadn't shown my face, I would not have been able to raise my three sons. Now that my sons have achieved success, they have begun to negate my efforts as a mother and blame and despise me for being a son-in-law."

"Your Majesty, I have something to say. Establishing a girls' school will not make me rich, and abolishing a girls' school will not affect me. After all, an old mother like me who has no talent or virtue and relied on selling tofu to support her children's education when she was young is not worthy of arguing with the children. If women's rights really exist, they are for us women to seek a livelihood and status."

……

More and more old ladies came forward to tell their stories, making the officials furious and angry. They could hardly believe their ears and eyes.

First, the spoiled daughter embarrassed herself in front of Your Majesty, and second, the mean old mother spoke nonsense in front of Your Majesty.

His Majesty is very satisfied with the current situation. To be honest, he is not advocating women's rights, but he thinks that men and women are equally important and need to work together to create something more valuable that will be passed down through the ages, rather than advocating only one and suppressing the other at the bottom, where they suffer grievances day and night.

The flower-viewing banquet did not cause any big commotion, but the mansion after returning home was the real battlefield.

Fearing that those men would become desperate and beat their wives and daughters when they return, His Majesty also assigned a guard to each official to protect his wife, daughter and mother.

There was a bastard who was going to attack his wife and daughter as soon as he got home. He felt that he had lost face in front of His Majesty today. Especially his wife, it would have been fine if he couldn't discipline his daughter, but he didn't stop it in time. It was a disgrace to their family.

With the close protection of the guards, the officials really had no way to start. After returning, the old ladies went to the small Buddhist temple on their own and ignored what was happening in the outside world.

The first day was fine, as the guards could keep an eye on things, but as time went by, the struggle for gender rights intensified, and His Majesty the Emperor had no choice but to set aside a palace complex and bring in the wives and daughters of all officials, allowing them to play to their heart's content and avoid the abuse of the officials.

But within two days, news came from the palace that many maids had died. His Majesty had no choice but to set up a maid's quarters in the imperial farm again, and brought all the officials' maids there to stay temporarily. If anyone did not want to be a maid, His Majesty would spend his own money to buy a contract of sale and give it to the maid, setting them free.

Those officials lost both their wives and their soldiers. Without their wives to handle the affairs of the mansion, without their maids to serve them attentively, and without their daughters to act coquettishly, their lives were extremely miserable.

Some lustful officials in particular, without women to satisfy their physiological needs, even had their concubines and maids run away and were protected by His Majesty. They didn't even have anyone to serve them personally when they wanted to eat hot meals, wear new clothes and shoes, or drink hot soup.

Some officials secretly went to Wanhua Tower to vent their anger on the top prostitutes, but were told that the virtuous concubine had sent people to pick them up to practice musical instruments and dancing. Suddenly, there was no one there, and only the prostitutes were left.

Those women who work as prostitutes are all pitiful people. Once someone offers to redeem them and teach them how to make a living, they will all happily follow him.

The girls' school did not close down. There were still men who went there to throw feces, but they were beaten up by the female students who learned women's self-defense in the school.

As the situation escalated and the system was not around to discuss things, Concubine Xian was panicked for many days. She always felt that it was wrong to provoke confrontation between men and women in ancient times. Her original intention was just to let men know the importance of women and let men experience the consequences of a world dominated by male power.

This battle lasted for two whole months. Every day the women talked about everything under the sun with radiant faces, learned everything they wanted to learn, and had a blast playing in the palace complex.

The officials could hardly bear it anymore after two months of hard work. Their clothes were ruined by the servants, their shoes were not clean and still smelled of feet, and they were angry all day long because they could not satisfy their physiological needs. The leg massage by the servants was different. The force was too strong. They felt their bodies falling apart after just a few hits.

When he was taking a shower, a group of men stood behind him and scrubbed his body, which made him very angry.

I want to eat cakes, but the ones made by men are not as delicious as those made by women. I want to eat some vegetables, but they are tasteless. They are all heavy in oil, salt and spicy. I am so angry that I can't vent it. I can only hold it in until my face turns red and my neck becomes thick, and my complexion looks much more haggard.

However, those officials were unwilling to bow their heads, unwilling to withdraw the memorial to overthrow women's schools, and unwilling to admit that their lives would be a mess without women. They forced the emperor to execute the virtuous concubine, close the women's schools, send their wives and daughters back home, restore the patriarchal system, and deprive women of their right to go out.