But aside from her muted acupoint being sealed, several major acupoints on her body were also blocked, making movement completely impossible.

Su Zhen was both shocked and furious. Lian Yu’s body temperature and breath, mixed with strong wine fragrance, continuously entered her nose. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was nearly driving her mad! How could she share a bed with her father’s killer like this!

Among these people, she had originally liked Xuanwu the most, but now she hated him the most.

She tried to break through the sealed acupoints with internal energy, but her martial arts weren’t sufficient. Sweat continuously flowed from her head into her eyes, causing stinging pain.

Beside her, Lian Yu suddenly moved slightly. Her head was resting on his chest, and she could clearly feel his every movement!

She was startled, knowing the drug’s effects were beginning to wear off. This medicine was made by her own hands, with numbing and stupefying effects. Once inhaled, one would fall into deep sleep and become unable to move – more potent than ordinary drugs, but with advantages and disadvantages, its duration wasn’t long.

Very well, it was fine for him to wake up. Once her acupoints were released, she would leave.

Here, Lian Yu slowly sat up, helped her up and placed her on the pillow, then half-loomed over her, squinting down at her.

Their four eyes met. He held his forehead with one hand, his cheeks flushed. His usually clear and sharp eyes now showed a hazy quality as he stared directly at her.

She hoped he would release her acupoints, but only now realized he was still drunk and completely unaware of her condition.

Unable to speak and truly unwilling to maintain such eye contact, she closed her eyes.

Unexpectedly, her cheeks were suddenly cupped by his hands. Her heart jumped as his rough fingertips moved to her forehead, then explored inch by inch downward.

He touched her forcefully, from forehead to nose to both cheeks, rubbing, caressing, pressing, and fondling. She was extremely shocked and angry, opening her eyes to see him gazing at her hazily, his eyes soft and dark. Seeing her glaring at him, his Adam’s apple quickly swallowed, and he suddenly bent down to kiss her lips.

Su Zhen’s mind went blank!

But he lingered with her, breathing heavily, his hands skillfully exploring inside her clothes…

Almost her entire body was caressed by him. He seemed unsatisfied with such touching, pressing his entire body onto hers, holding her tightly, grasping her hand and guiding it to touch his own body.

“It hurts.”

His voice was low and hoarse, but the force applied to her hand was unambiguous, extremely fierce, as if to prevent her from escaping. Su Zhen couldn’t resist at all, only feeling that everywhere her hand touched was a thick layer of cloth bandages – where she had stabbed him. His body was rapidly changing, that heat pressing between her legs… She was already in pain and anger, now with blood surging, yet unable to make any sound, tears pouring out.

But he seemed completely unaware, reaching out to untie her sash, then guiding her hand to undo his own, just as he had done in the past when passion ran high.

Perhaps realizing her fingers were strangely stiff, he suddenly stopped his movements, reached between her eyes and pinched hard, half-propping himself up from her body and staring at her intently!

Gradually, the mist in his eyes cleared, his hand trembling almost imperceptibly, then he patted several places on her body.

“I just now…” His tall frame still loomed over her, his lips slightly moving.

Su Zhen said nothing, slapping him hard across the face with one palm, pushing him away and getting up from the bed. She covered her loose clothing with her hand, saying word by word: “Have them let me go.”

“They… wait until you’re well.”

Lian Yu’s gaze moved, quickly realizing something. He also quickly got down from the bed and walked toward her. Though his last words were still forceful in tone, perhaps due to guilt over his impropriety just now, his gaze was momentarily uncommonly soft.

“No!”

Su Zhen hated him, and hated herself even more. Though this final word wasn’t spoken with intensity, even somewhat calmly, she clearly saw the change in his eyes, as if something had suddenly grown in her pupils.

She pulled her clothes together and turned to leave.

He was silent for a moment, then followed closely behind.

Reaching the mansion’s gate, Xuanwu and the others came to pay respects. Qinglong, seeing that Lian Yu only wore cloud socks on his feet, couldn’t help but speak with surprise: “Master, your shoes…”

Lian Yu raised his hand to stop him from speaking, his gaze falling on Su Zhen.

But Su Zhen said nothing, brushing past him.

Not knowing how long she had walked – four hours, or five hours – she finally returned to the familiar streets of the capital.

Her legs were numb, every bone in her body ached, yet she didn’t want to stop walking.

She actually wanted to stop, but couldn’t find a place.

She couldn’t return to the Ministry of Justice office or residence. At Huo’s villa, Wuqing and the others had already left, and even if they were still there, she couldn’t possibly go back to find them.

No one could redeem her, nor did she want to stay with anyone anymore, bringing trouble to their lives. Better to disappear with happy memories.

No need to know whether it was Wuqing or Little Zhou, who was good or bad, who was whose spy, or even whether Zhui Ming and Tie Shou were also false.

Since truth wasn’t necessarily beautiful, why insist on clarity? As long as the time spent together had laughter and tears, wasn’t that enough?

Just like that year when she first met Lian Yu in the cave dwelling, met fellow travelers, and parted ways at the crossroads.

All relationships in the world were nothing more than this.

Having gathered, they would eventually scatter.

Perhaps in life, perhaps in death. Perhaps long, perhaps short.

Standing on the streets of the capital at night, on this country’s busiest thoroughfare, with countless people flowing like water past her, Su Zhen bent over in pain.

“Miss, are you all right?” Occasionally, someone would cast concerned, puzzled glances.

Su Zhen wanted to thank them, but couldn’t say a word. After an unknown time, she finally slowly straightened up, moving forward aimlessly. She pickpocketed several seemingly wealthy purses, gathered the banknotes together, and went to the capital’s largest pleasure house.

The doorkeeper outside saw she was a woman and wanted to drive her away, but he was accustomed to seeing the wealthy and powerful, with good judgment. He almost immediately noticed her clothing was exceptionally expensive. The capital had many notable figures, so while hesitating, Su Zhen pulled two banknotes from her chest and stuffed them into his hands: “I don’t want girls, just need the finest wine. One note for the wine, one for you.”

The two notes – one for a thousand taels, one for a hundred – made the man’s eyes immediately brighten. He didn’t care whether she was male or female anymore, neither male nor female was fine, saying hurriedly: “Please, Miss, I’ll arrange it right away.”

Su Zhen took up residence here, getting dead drunk every day. But no one from the madam to the top courtesan dared drive her away, and they even prepared a guest room for her.

This was because a merchant drinking here had taken interest in this girl with flushed cheeks from drinking, but was scared away by a few words from her. She hadn’t said much, just commented on the interior design of Prime Minister Quan’s residence. Additionally, she told the madam that if the wine money wasn’t enough, they could collect it from Marquis Xiao Yao’s mansion.

Because the court had recently imposed strict controls on officials, no court officials frequented such places, so they didn’t know this disgraced former magistrate had disguised herself as a young lady and hidden here.

Initially, some guests were curious about her, but were “kindly” dissuaded by the madam, who mentioned her connections to the Quan and Huo residences. No one dared cause trouble anymore, thinking this young lady must be royalty – after all, there weren’t many women who dared drink so freely in pleasure houses.

At first, she feared Lian Yu would come after her, but soon relaxed – he didn’t. When it came to being heartless, she could never match him.

He probably saw she had mostly recovered and no longer bothered with her.

Before leaving, she had wanted so much to loudly question him, but clever as he was, he would think of who had told her. She couldn’t let him know her brother was still alive in this world.

His not killing her didn’t mean he wouldn’t eliminate her brother completely.

The pleasure house was a world of wine and gold, extremely noisy, but only this place could give her momentary peace.

Her mind couldn’t be empty; she could only be drunk, only sleep with cacophonous sounds, buying drinks at night, sleeping during the day, day after day.

Otherwise, she would go mad.

She had nightmares every night, seeing her blood-soaked parents and Hong Xiao.

She had thought of death countless times, but remembering this life was saved through their utmost efforts, she didn’t dare. She was already heavily sinful, failing them. Moreover, if her brother were captured, she would be his life-saving bargaining chip.

But living made her feel worse than death.

She didn’t tend to the wound on her hand, letting it fester and rot. Actually, even in the moment before striking, deep down she knew she couldn’t do it, so she reached out to block it, to accept this punishment.

But this punishment was ultimately too light.

This evening, she was still drinking alone in a corner when she heard five or six men at the next table loudly discussing national examinations.

Usually, she had no interest in these men’s boastful talk, but today her empty mind finally had something to focus on.

It turned out another round of examinations had reached the palace examination stage in full swing, with the great test just two days away.

Indeed, she had been living here for some time.

They discussed the Son of Heaven who looked down on the world and promoted reforms, and outstanding tribute scholars from various regions. Among these tribute scholars, there were actually several women, all performing quite well.

Of course, though their names were mentioned with relish, she didn’t recognize a single one.

But she couldn’t help finding it strange – she had heard before that Gu Xiluo wanted to take the examination. How was there no mention of her name? With her abilities, standing out in the metropolitan examination shouldn’t be difficult.

Meanwhile, at their peak of discussion, they began betting on the top three in the palace examination. Two people again mentioned a tribute scholar named Yu Sheng, saying that barring accidents, this man who topped the metropolitan examination would surely be first this time. They said that in both county and metropolitan examinations, his literary talent was outstanding and highly praised by examiners. In the end, men were still superior.

At this point, the men couldn’t help feeling smug, embracing girls and toasting each other.