“Did you remember something about Auntie Qianqian?” Xiong Xiaobao asked nervously.
Baili Weisheng shrugged. That familiar feeling—he didn’t even know how to describe it, and even if he did, this kid probably wouldn’t understand.
“It’s nothing. I just haven’t heard that name before,” Baili Weisheng said flatly.
“You’re lying. It’s because of Auntie Qianqian’s name that your head hurt, isn’t it!” Xiong Xiaobao said seriously.
If something familiar could trigger this guy’s memories, then at least there was still hope for him.
If Uncle Scholar never remembered his past for the rest of his life, that would be far too unfair to him.
“Ugh, I don’t really know how to put it. There’s just a tiny impression—no, not even an impression, more like a feeling. Like… like this name feels deeply familiar. No, wait, that’s not it either! Ugh…”
Baili Weisheng wasn’t holding back—he genuinely couldn’t articulate it.
Xiong Xiaobao grew even more confused. Even if something felt deeply familiar, it should be Mommy’s name, or his own, or Baili Xiaosheng’s—there was no way it should be Auntie Qianqian’s.
Those two weren’t even particularly close.
“You’re not even that close with her,” Xiong Xiaobao said honestly.
Baili Weisheng found this strange too. “Then who am I close with?”
“You’re closest with my mommy.” At least, that was what Xiong Xiaobao believed.
“Your mommy is called Han Ziqing,” Baili Weisheng said.
“Yeah!”
“Han Ziqing, Han Ziqing… I really feel nothing at all…”
“You—!”
Suddenly Baili Weisheng had an idea, growing quite excited.
Xiong Xiaobao tensed up along with him, only for Baili Weisheng to say, “That—I don’t owe Qianqian any money, do I?”
Xiong Xiaobao was completely defeated by this man.
Xiong Xiaobao tried many more times, bringing up Baili Weisheng himself, the elders of the poison den, the Gu nanny, and many other names.
At first, Baili Weisheng showed nothing but blank unfamiliarity toward every single one.
Finally, Xiong Xiaobao took a deep breath and said, “Uncle Scholar, why don’t you come fight the enemy with me? You used to kill without blinking an eye—you’re bound to recover that feeling, remember something.”
Baili Weisheng instinctively started to nod, but then a thought struck him, and he immediately sensed something was off. He hurriedly pushed Xiong Xiaobao away, keeping his distance, straightened his robes, cleared his throat, and put on a solemn expression.
“Young friend Xiong Bao, as the ancients said: the strong shall not attack the weak, the powerful shall not humiliate the powerless, the many shall not plunder the few, the cunning shall not deceive the simple, the noble shall not look down on the lowly, the vigorous shall not seize from the old—thus all the states under heaven shall not harm one another with water, fire, poison, or blade! Do you understand?”
Xiong Xiaobao tilted his head at him, breathing hard. Was this guy reciting some kind of incantation? Section after section, all rhythmic and cadenced.
Except he didn’t understand a word of it, and he couldn’t be bothered arguing with Baili Weisheng, so he just blinked his big eyes at him.
“Don’t understand?” Baili Weisheng said earnestly. “Put simply, what the ancients meant by this saying is that those in power, the ruler of a state, must practice universal love and reject aggression.”
Xiong Xiaobao was still blinking.
“Still don’t understand?” Baili Weisheng was endlessly patient, a model of tireless instruction.
“Can you just talk like a normal person?” Xiong Xiaobao finally lost his patience.
“It simply means: love all people of every nation, and don’t casually invade others,” Baili Weisheng explained, word by careful word.
At this, Xiong Xiaobao nearly toppled over. Had he heard that right? This guy, who used to rob and kill without so much as a blink, was now lecturing him about universal love and rejecting aggression?
Forget it, forget this whole thing!
“Fine, I get it,” Xiong Xiaobao said, nodding, secretly vowing that if he didn’t drag this man onto the battlefield, he’d change his surname.
He was the one who’d helped plan the troop deployments in the first place—how could this guy not personally join the fight?
Over in the southern territories, everything was proceeding at full speed, secretly prepared. Soon, sealed dispatches were sent to the northern and western borders as well, the entire net slowly spreading wide.
Meanwhile, Jun Beiyue and Ziqing had already arrived at the Ancient Music Temple.
A group traveling together had its own advantages, and two people traveling alone had theirs. The couple’s pace was perfectly matched—a journey that should have taken seven or eight days, they covered in just five.
The Ancient Music Temple stood near the Ancient Music Cavern they had visited before, a temple built atop a great mountain peak.
Countless massive stone pillars supported the shrine, solemn and magnificent—even from a distance, it inspired a sense of reverent awe.
And yet this small temple could hardly overawe Ziqing and Jun Beiyue.
At the moment, they sat perched in a large tree just outside the temple.
“Five days—given your son’s temperament, at the very least, everything on the southern front should be ready by now,” Jun Beiyue said with a smile.
“Three days should be enough, if he’s in good form,” Ziqing said with a matching smile. She understood Xiong Xiaobao even better than Jun Beiyue did, which was why she felt at ease leaving the war preparations to him—it was good training for him too.
For someone destined to sit upon the imperial throne one day, the ability to adapt and grasp the overall situation was fundamental, something that had to be cultivated from childhood.
Xiong Xiaobao was nearly six now—time for him to start learning.
Worst case, if the boy really couldn’t manage it, several of Jun Beiyue’s generals knew exactly what to do.
Seeing Jun Beiyue smiling without a word, Ziqing said flatly, “This time, was I being too impulsive?”
They’d only just left Nanzhao, and now they were rushing right back. The moment they’d received the news, they’d charged over immediately.
In truth, even if this battle was unavoidable, they could have made thorough preparations before coming.
“As long as you’re at ease, I’ll stand beside you through mountains of blades and seas of fire,” Jun Beiyue said with a doting smile, leaning down to press a kiss to Ziqing’s lips—light, soft, and lingering. Ziqing responded gently, and Jun Beiyue immediately deepened the kiss, lips and tongues entwining, the kind of kiss that made hearts race and faces flush.
As always, he was either gentle and fleeting with his kisses, or, once she responded, utterly unwilling to let her go, inevitably growing possessive and thorough.
Jun Beiyue hooked an arm around Ziqing’s waist, cradling the back of her head, kissing her deeper and deeper, more and more commanding, as if he meant to devour her whole.
Only when Ziqing gently bit his lip to stop him did he finally pull back, smiling softly.
“Woman, I’ve never told you this, but I, Jun Beiyue, belong to you first, and to the realm second. You don’t need to overthink anything. Just remember—everything I do is exactly as it should be. Including this war,” Jun Beiyue said flatly. He always spoke his heaviest words with such effortless ease.
He wanted the world, and he wanted this woman too—but he belonged to this woman first.
That had never changed.
Jun Beiyue understood Ziqing so well that a few words were enough to untangle every knot in her heart.
Ziqing took a deep breath, then leaned forward at once, pressing her hands against his chest, planting a firm kiss on his lips, declaring proudly, “I told you long ago—you’re mine! Let’s go declare war! No one retreats, no one has regrets, and no one dies!”
With that, the couple joined hands and dropped down from the tree, making no attempt to hide themselves, instead striding boldly and openly toward the main gate of the Ancient Music Temple.
Even though they’d come in haste, they hadn’t lost their reason—they could see clearly that this was a trap.
They’d searched so long without finding any trace of the Meng Clan’s fall, and then, right after they’d left, news conveniently surfaced.
This was surely deliberate information leaked by Xuanyuan Lige’s inside man in Nanzhao.
Whatever this person intended, Ziqing and Jun Beiyue understood perfectly well—they had come to rescue someone, and even more so, to declare war.