However, who would have thought that the much-discussed The Carters Orphan case actually had such a dark history... After learning the truth by chance, he never dared to ask about it again.

Who would care about the chaotic sex life of an old grandmother for no reason!

With such a huge stain, how could The Carters still have the nerve to show their face? If it were him, after establishing the State of Zhao in the future, he would force the historians to completely erase this filthy affair, rewriting it as a tragic epic that would move the masses to tears and make them gnash their teeth at the villainous Tu Anjia.

However, before the transmigrator could even start feeling ambitious, he got himself into trouble. Call it bad luck, or perhaps the inherited memories were fragmented and chaotic, or maybe this William Carter had never received proper noble training. In the first few days after transmigrating, he repeatedly made mistakes in speech and etiquette, and was sent to the stables to reflect by the young lord—who happened to be the legitimate wife and didn't like him.

Fortunately, from the few remaining memories, William Carter managed to learn Old Chinese. The phonology of pre-Qin Huaxia was full of uvular trills, which to modern ears sounded almost like Tibetan—extremely strange. But perhaps thanks to the body's muscle memory, he didn't encounter any terrifying language barrier, and after a bit of practice, it felt fairly smooth.

After just a xun—that is, ten days—his tongue was nimble enough that he could sit here and tell stories to the stable boys and herdsmen.

The ancestors of The Carters were famous for horse herding and chariot driving during the times of Yu, Xia, Shang, and Zhou. Though their descendants became pampered nobles, they hadn't completely forgotten their roots. In this stable yard, there were plenty of fine horses from Yan and Dai, as well as horse experts invited from Qin.

The stable boys and herdsmen—those who tended horses and cattle—were countless. Most had messy, withered hair and wore short, coarse clothes. Now, in the rare leisure before breakfast, they all crowded around William Carter, eyes wide, waiting expectantly.

Seeing that everyone had gathered, William Carter cleared his throat and said to the stable boys and herdsmen, “Today, I’ll tell you the story of the Stone Monkey from the Eastern Sea following Tang Sanzang... no, assisting King Mu of the Great Zhou on his journey west!”

This opening made the stable boys and herdsmen squirm with nervous anticipation.

Wielding his horsewhip, Wu Xu began confidently, “Beyond the Eastern Sea of Qi, there is a land called Aolai. In the mountains there is a famous peak, called Flower-Fruit Mountain...”

“Little lord, where is Qi?” a tall, skinny stable boy blurted out.

William Carter tapped him on the head with the tip of his whip. “You always have the most questions. Qi is just east of our Jin, in the direction where the sun rises. Walk a thousand li and you’ll get there.”

The stable boys and herdsmen all gasped. For them, their whole lives rarely took them beyond a hundred li, or even ten.

A thousand li? Unimaginable, simply unimaginable.

To them, this young lord who knew stories from a thousand li away was almost like a messenger of Taiyi, all-knowing and all-seeing.

William Carter’s real purpose was simply to kill time. Entertainment in the pre-Qin era was pitifully scarce, and as an unappreciated illegitimate son of the family, things like beauties, bullying, or falconry were out of the question. Before he could use stories to amuse his sister, he decided to practice on these stable boys and herdsmen.

Hmm, maybe in the future he could have someone record the legendary story of the The Carters Orphan as well, to muddy the waters.

Fifth-century BC Huaxia still maintained a rather primitive mythological system.

People knew of the Eastern Emperor Taiyi, the Queen Mother of the West, Nuwa, and Fuxi, but in the Spring and Autumn period there was no Buddhism, let alone monks. Wu Xu didn’t know the exact birth and death years of Shakyamuni, but at least he was sure Buddhism hadn’t yet spread east.

So the role of Tang Monk was mischievously replaced by William Carter with King Mu of the Western Zhou, who once journeyed west to Kunlun Mountain to meet the Queen Mother of the West. As for the role of the loyal charioteer, he had already decided: The Carters’s ancestor Zhao Zaofu, driving the white dragon chariot, would be the stand-in for the ever-faithful Sha Wujing.

Unconsciously, the story reached the end of the first chapter: “The Stone Monkey closed his eyes and crouched, then with a leap, jumped straight into the waterfall spring...”

At this point, he abruptly stopped, stood up from the manger, and stretched. The herdboys in front of him were still squatting on the ground, eyes wide, waiting for more.

In their ten or twenty years of life, they had never heard such an interesting story. The tongue-twisting poems sung by the three elders at the archery rites left them confused; the hymns read by shamans at clan sacrifices were even more incomprehensible.

Seeing William Carter stop, the stable boys and herdsmen felt itchy with anticipation, as if their hearts were being tickled by foxtail grass. But someone was even more anxious than they were.

“And then? What’s in the waterfall? Did the Stone Monkey become the Monkey King?”

A silvery, bell-like girl’s voice rang out from behind William Carter.

Turning around, William Carter saw a stunningly beautiful young lady, listening to his story with great interest.

As the saying goes, “A charming smile, beautiful eyes.” Her hair was like dark clouds, her eyes clear and bright, lips like cherries. She wore a deep robe adorned with little red flowers, and her delicate feet—enough to make future foot-fetishists faint—were clad in white silk socks as thin as cicada wings, peeking out from beneath her skirt and resting on wooden clogs.

It was his elder sister, Henry Blake.