Old Madam Yang-shi extended her hand toward Yan Sanhe.

Yan Sanhe sat at the bedside, reached out to grasp it, and said gently, “Have you taken today’s medicine?”

“Too bitter—don’t want to drink it.”

Yang-shi’s lips moved and moved, as if she had much to say, as if she didn’t know how to say it.

After a long while, she suddenly sighed and said lowly, “Child, I know you hate me.”

“I don’t hate you.”

Yan Sanhe patted her hand. “Don’t overthink. I’m just not close to you.”

Yang-shi curved her lips, revealing a slight smile. “Yesterday I dreamed of him. He said he still has a place saved for me beside his bed.”

“Then you should feel even more at ease.”

Yan Sanhe: “Anyone he forgives, I won’t hate.”

Yang-shi’s face showed profound, heavy regret. “But I hate myself.”

“Why?”

“I shouldn’t have made him take the civil examinations, shouldn’t have made him become a high official.”

Yang-shi’s pair of turbid eyes looked at Yan Sanhe. “If he hadn’t become a high official, he could have lived another twenty years, lived even longer than me.”

But there was no turning back.

Never able to turn back.

After decades as mother and son, Yang-shi’s heart was very clear. Before dying, her son had taken out that letter Yan Xing wrote him because of one sentence Yan Xing had instructed him:

At court, it’s like walking a tightrope. At the pinnacle of power, it’s like treading on thin ice. You must be careful!

She was an inner quarters woman who only knew that being a commoner, one could be bullied. She didn’t know that being an official also meant walking tightropes, stepping on thin ice, being careful everywhere.

If only she’d known earlier…

What “if only she’d known earlier”? Tears slowly flowed from Yang-shi’s eyes.

It’s all fate!

Yan Sanhe actually wanted to tell Yang-shi: never mind being an official—even becoming Crown Prince, one couldn’t live very long.

But she said nothing, only speaking gently, “Old Madam, this isn’t your fault. It’s the world’s fault. This world isn’t good.”

A glimmer of light appeared in Yang-shi’s eyes. “Really?”

Yan Sanhe smiled at her.

“Really.”

…

Yang-shi died.

After seeing Yan Sanhe, she ate half a small bowl of rice porridge, pulled her young grandson to talk for a while, said she was tired, and lay down to sleep.

This sleep—she never woke again.

Zhu Yuanmo consulted the calendar. Seven days hence, the burial date was inauspicious, but three days hence was an auspicious day. Eldest Master Xie Erli made the decisive call—wake for three days, burial in three days.

Yan Sanhe still came silently to pay respects, then silently left. Before leaving, she couldn’t speak a word with Xie Zhifei. The two only exchanged a silent look in the mourning hall.

How are you?

I’m alive.

How are you?

I’m alive too.

Sometimes romantic love is very heavy—heavy enough that one person can skip meals, lose sleep, even wish to live or die for it.

Sometimes romantic love is also very light, especially when facing life’s partings and death’s separations—so light there’s no time to attend to it.

For Yan Sanhe and Xie Zhifei, there was also no need to attend to it.

Having walked through wind and rain all this way, they understood the same thing in their respective hearts: as long as they were alive, they wouldn’t part.

Leaving the Xie family, Yan Sanhe didn’t return to the villa.

In fact, these days she’d rarely been at the villa, spending most of her time running to the western outskirts.

Han Xu’s side had turned up nothing.

When Yan Xi was beside Yan Rurui, he never left the palace. When beside Zhao Yishi, he rarely went out either. Those who knew him could be counted on one hand.

So she decided to start investigating from where Yan Xi died.

The farming household where Yan Xi had been shot with an arrow—they’d accepted Xie Zhifei’s hush money. Afraid of getting into trouble, they packed up their valuable belongings, leaving three empty rooms, and fled.

These days, she’d brought paper and brush, examining every corner of this farming household inside and out, then drawing it bit by bit on paper.

“Sanhe, in three more days it’ll be the fifteenth of the seventh month.”

Besides that incense stick, Li Buyan’s heart was also concerned with another matter.

“This is your first birthday. We must celebrate properly. Invite Han Xu, invite Young Master Pei. Third Master probably can’t come since he’s in mourning. I’ll cook myself—what do you think?”

Yan Sanhe said absently, “That day is also Third Master’s birthday.”

“Don’t always think of him. Think of yourself.”

Li Buyan looked displeased.

“After this birthday, you’ll be a full eighteen. In my mother’s dynasty, that was a bigger deal than heaven—you’d be an adult!”

“In your mother’s dynasty, one only became an adult at eighteen?”

“Wasn’t it so?”

Li Buyan smiled. “Anyone under eighteen was a child.”

A child?

I’m still a child?

Yan Sanhe laughed. “However you want to handle it, I’ll go along with you. But in a moment when I ask you to do something, you must also go along with me.”

Li Buyan was straightforward. “Deal!”

…

Li Buyan never dreamed that Yan Sanhe would have her kneel where Yan Xi had knelt—playing dead.

Yan Sanhe glanced once, then lowered her head to make several strokes on paper.

As the sunset fell, the last stroke was completed. Yan Sanhe helped Li Buyan up.

Li Buyan’s legs were numb from kneeling. She limped to the Eight Immortals table, looked down, and saw this wasn’t a drawing of her at all—it was clearly Yan Xi kneeling.

“The drawing is of him, so why did I have to kneel?”

“Because of the angle.”

Yan Sanhe stood where she’d knelt and crouched down, looking from inside outward.

“Buyan, come see. From which direction would an arrow have to come to strike with one arrow…”

Li Buyan waited a while. Not seeing Yan Sanhe continue, she raised her head and was scared out of her wits.

She saw Yan Sanhe’s body slowly toppling over. Frightened, she rushed over and caught the person.

“What’s wrong?”

Yan Sanhe’s complexion was unspeakably pale, her voice even more feeble.

“Just now my vision suddenly went completely black, as if I lost consciousness.”

“That’s because you stay up late every night, don’t sleep properly, don’t eat properly.”

Li Buyan was angry. She hefted Yan Sanhe onto her back and strode outside.

“Hey, my drawing.”

“You’re nearly dead from exhaustion and still worried about your drawing.”

Li Buyan’s tone was harsh.

“The war horses are healed—Bu Liu rode them to the northern territories to fight.

The Zheng family’s vengeful spirits have dispersed—the walls have begun to be rebuilt.

Xie Daozhi personally admitted it himself—he did those filthy things for the sake of the empire and nation. What more are you investigating?”

She grabbed the drawings from the table. “Go home with me and properly recuperate.”

Empire and nation?

Yan Sanhe’s eyelid suddenly twitched.

Like a beam of light piercing through thick clouds, shooting directly into Yan Sanhe’s muddled mind, a resounding, powerful voice echoed in her brain, asking over and over:

Whose empire is this?

Whose nation is this?

Whose empire is this?

Whose nation is this?

Cold sweat instantly flowed from Yan Sanhe’s forehead, soaking her temples.

She remembered.

“Buyan, do you remember when we first entered the capital, someone shot an arrow at you?”

Yan Sanhe thought she was speaking loudly, but in reality, her lips only moved slightly without any sound emerging.

She didn’t know—

At this very moment in the Xie household, Xie Zhifei, who was keeping vigil, also had his vision go black as his whole body collapsed.

She knew even less—

A thousand miles away atop the East Terrace of Mount Wutai, Meditation Master Chanyue, who was meditating in a stone cave, suddenly opened his eyes. His fingers rapidly moved several times. His brows bent with dejection as he sighed:

“In a flash, it’s been ten years.”