Chapter 36

Chapter 36: The Male Courtesan Has a Problem (Part 1)

Shen Tang’s temper flared the moment he said it.

You could tell her she couldn’t sing and she might swallow it. But insult her painting? Not a chance. This used to be how she ate.

Question her craft, and she’d bite back.

“How is my ‘painting’ not good?” she snapped.

Qi Shan almost wanted to ask how it was good anywhere. It looked like a toddler had grabbed a brush and gone to war with the paper.

He answered, brutally honest. “It’s bad everywhere. There isn’t a single thing worth praising.”

Whoever taught Young Master Shen to paint had truly harmed their descendants.

Shen Tang slapped the table so hard the teacups rattled. “Qi Yuan Liang—if you’re so capable, then you do it!”

Seeing her still refusing to admit it, something in Qi Shan finally stirred—an old competitiveness he’d buried under years of running and surviving.

He set down his books, reached for the brush, and spread a fresh sheet. The tip soaked in ink, he drew without hesitation. “Since Young Master Shen invites me so warmly, I’ll embarrass myself.”

A few strokes—mountains, water, flowers, birds.

It was simple enough to trick you into thinking you could do it too. But set beside Shen Tang’s little stick-figure scene, it was the difference between mud and clouds.

Qi Shan lifted the brush, mildly satisfied. Good. His hand hadn’t rusted completely.

Shen Tang snorted. “That’s it?”

Qi Shan’s eyelid twitched. With a gap that wide, she was still talking?

“I’m not especially gifted,” he said, “and I’ve wandered for years. My skill has gone stale. But compared to you, Young Master Shen…” He let the rest hang. Anyone with eyes could tell which was better.

Few people knew that when he was young, he’d painted even better. A master once praised his work for capturing the spirit of a famous line—color in the distant mountains, silence in the nearby water; spring gone but flowers still there, people come but birds don’t startle.

A pity the world had no “painting spirit” or “painting heart.” If such a thing existed, it would surely be high-ranked.

Shen Tang still refused to fold. “Hmph. It’s time to show you my real skill.”

Qi Shan leaned back, interest flickering. “By all means.”

Shen Tang picked up her original draft and started adding strokes with fierce confidence, as if she were about to turn trash into treasure.

Qi Shan shifted aside to give her space and watched.

His expression grew stranger by the minute.

He’d thought she was setting him up—starting ugly so the improvement would shock him.

Instead, it was still the same stick-figure work. The figures had more little details now, but the black round heads remained, and the bodies were still nothing but a few slashes of ink.

If there was any difference, it was that the “heated” atmosphere was even stronger.

And somehow even raunchier.

Qi Shan watched for a long while as Shen Tang drew the sequence: enter the room, loosen clothing, undress, climb onto the bed and pose. Then a second figure arrived and did the same—undress, climb, pose…

Qi Shan suddenly grabbed her wrist. “Stop.”

He stared at the page, then at her. “What are you drawing?”

Shen Tang blinked, genuinely puzzled by the question. “An erotic painting.”

Qi Shan went dead silent.

He looked at her face, then back at the linked little figures on the paper—so many of them, strung together like a crude flipbook—and for a long moment he couldn’t force a single word out.

He’d never imagined it. Not once. Young Master Shen was drawing an erotic painting with actions.

Qi Shan inhaled, jaw tight. “If erotic paintings were all at this level, men and women everywhere would lose interest.”

There was no mood, no artistry, not even a faint veil of suggestion.

If newlyweds used this as “instruction,” they’d grow old with white hair and still have no idea what bedroom harmony even meant.

Shen Tang’s eyes narrowed. “Yuan Liang, that’s because you don’t know how to appreciate it.”

She lifted her chin as if lecturing him. “Look at my brushwork. The lines. The composition. The mood.”

If she painted badly, how had she ever made a living with it?

Qi Shan stared at her. Then, slowly, an awful realization dawned.

She wasn’t being stubborn for pride. Her gaze was clear, righteous—almost wounded, like he was the one with a broken sense of beauty.

She truly believed she painted well.

Qi Shan tested the thought with a few careful questions.

It was exactly that.

He didn’t know whether to laugh or sigh.

He studied her head with the kind of pity you reserved for someone doomed and unaware, and said, very solemnly, “When our finances improve, I’ll find a good doctor to examine you properly. The sooner it’s treated, the better. If you drag it out, it could get worse.”

Shen Tang’s expression turned dangerous. Her instincts screamed that this was not a compliment.

Was he calling her brain sick?

Qi Shan, wisely, changed the subject before she exploded. “Why are you suddenly interested in erotic paintings?”

Calling her lustful didn’t fit. What spoiled brat drew this and thought it was beautiful?

But calling her proper didn’t fit either. What proper gentleman could be watched while drawing erotic paintings and stay so calm?

Shen Tang answered without shame. “I took a job from the bookshop. I’m drawing for a male courtesan at Moonlight Tower. The pay is good.”

Life was hard. She could sigh all she wanted; it wouldn’t get easier.

Qi Shan’s expression turned even more complicated. “Did the shopkeeper test your painting skill?”

Since when were bookshop shopkeepers that easygoing?

When Qi Shan had been desperate, he’d taken jobs too—copying word-spirit books, writing letters for others. Portrait work paid better, and commissions from pleasure houses paid best of all.

But that money was never easy.

They paid more, they demanded more.

With skill like hers… how had she gotten the job?

Shen Tang blinked. “No.”

Qi Shan’s worry sharpened. “Then tell me exactly what happened.”

She recounted it all.

Qi Shan listened, then exhaled through his nose. He understood.

Luck. And the shopkeeper being blind.

Maybe she’d slipped past the shopkeeper, but that male courtesan wouldn’t be so easy to fool. A picture like this affected business, reputation, pride. They were ruthless about quality.

And Young Master Shen was so poor her purse probably jingled with air. Where had all this paper and ink even come from?

Shen Tang scowled. “I got this job with my own ability. Yuan Liang, you’re really—”

“I’m thinking about your life,” Qi Shan cut in, voice flat. “If you take those drawings to deliver, do you believe that male courtesan won’t explode on the spot? Do you believe he won’t call in the thugs from Moonlight Tower to tear you apart?”