After the meal, lamps were lit in the room.

A’Ting must have received Lu Shi’s hint. As soon as it grew dark, she stopped clinging to her sister-in-law and went off cheerfully on her own.

Li Mu escorted Luoshen back to her room but didn’t enter, stopping outside the threshold and saying: “A’Mi, I still have some urgent business and must go out. You should rest early.”

Luoshen was stunned, disappointment welling up in her heart, but she nodded on the surface.

Li Mu smiled apologetically at her and left.

Luoshen felt quite dejected inside, but not wanting to show her mood in front of A’Ju and the maidservants, she acted as if nothing was wrong. When bathing, she didn’t want A’Ju nearby either, telling her to go out. She hugged her knees and sat curled up in the bath tub, her head resting against the tub wall with eyes closed in meditation.

The steamy mist rising from the bath tub slowly condensed in the air, turning into tiny crystalline water droplets that clung to her eyebrows and lashes.

Luoshen remained in this position, motionless, as if she had fallen asleep, but in her mind she was thinking about the confusion that had been secretly troubling her these past days.

During their journey of several days, Li Mu had shared the same cabin with her, and they had also shared the same bed.

He was naturally gentle and considerate toward her. He always had been.

But he had never touched her once.

Not even with a fingertip.

Every morning without exception, when she awakened, he had already risen at some unknown time. The bedside was empty, leaving only her alone on the bed.

Logically, they were husband and wife. Apart from initially refusing to let him approach, recently her attitude toward him had been, if not actively welcoming, at least compliant.

Luoshen had even thought that since she allowed him to sleep in the same bed as her, if he really couldn’t restrain himself and wanted to be intimate with her, to do what husbands do with wives, though she would be somewhat afraid, she would accept it.

But he hadn’t.

He seemed to have no interest whatsoever in touching her.

Since he had no interest in her, and from what she’d observed, it didn’t seem to be for the sake of gaining favor with the Gao family, then why had he initially been determined to break up her engagement with Lu Jianzhi and forcibly seek to marry her?

Luoshen was bewildered. Remembering how he had just promised Lu Shi at dinner but then immediately left her to go out again, her mood grew even more depressed.

Her long lashes, adorned with water droplets, trembled slightly. She opened her moist eyes and slowly stood up from the bath water, looking down to carefully examine her own body for the first time in her life.

A young girl’s skin was naturally smooth as silk, and after soaking in hot water, it showed a faint pink beneath the white, so tender it seemed water would drip from a pinch.

Below her slender willow waist, her legs emerged from the water standing together, white and straight.

Luoshen touched herself – her skin adorned with crystalline water droplets was like a newly peeled egg, impossibly smooth.

Her gaze finally settled on her chest.

Of her entire body, this was probably the only part she wasn’t entirely satisfied with…

She’d heard that men all preferred fullness?

Luoshen remembered that previously, a servant woman had joined their kitchen staff. Though her appearance was only ordinary, she was blessed with fair skin and a full bosom. Coming and going daily, she was quite eye-catching. It was said that the male servants in the household competed to curry favor with her, eventually causing two men to fight jealously over her and break each other’s heads. When A’Ju learned of this, she dismissed them all, and the household finally returned to peace.

Luoshen looked down at her small bosom that had grown for sixteen years – white, tender, and delicately sized.

Before this, she had never found anything wrong with it.

But now, she suddenly began to doubt.

In Li Mu’s eyes, was she completely without any attraction to him?

She couldn’t help raising her hand, wanting to try touching herself to see what it felt like…

“Young mistress, are you ready? I’m coming in!”

A’Ju’s voice suddenly came from outside. She must have been worried after not hearing any sound for a while.

Her footsteps also followed her words, coming thump, thump, thump.

Luoshen was badly startled and hastily lowered her hands, trying to sit back in the water. But her feet slipped, she couldn’t maintain her balance, and her whole body fell directly back down. With a splash, water overflowed from the tub’s rim, instantly flooding the floor.

A’Ju came in and seeing the situation, cried out and quickly stepped forward to grab Luoshen’s arm.

“Did you hurt yourself? What happened? You insisted on making me leave earlier, and now when getting up, you didn’t call me…”

Luoshen sat in the water, frowning and covering her right ankle: “It hurts here…”

…

Li Mu arrived at the Jingkou government office, dismounted, and went straight inside.

The Jingkou Prefect and Jiang Tao were waiting inside. Hearing of his arrival, they hurried to welcome him.

The Jingkou Prefect invited Li Mu to take the seat of honor, saying respectfully: “Commander just returned with your family today, and we shouldn’t disturb you, but this matter is quite urgent, and this official can’t decide on his own, so we requested your presence tonight. We hope Commander will forgive us.”

Li Mu said it was no problem and asked them to explain the situation.

It turned out that after Li Mu had left earlier, the Jingkou Prefect had followed his instructions and continued restricting the Celestial Master sect’s activities around Jingkou. Recently, those people had been gathering in remote locations late at night under the pretense of physical fitness, teaching so-called “great yin-yang harmony methods.” Jiang Tao had sent people disguised as believers to infiltrate and observe, discovering that besides preaching doctrine, there were scenes of sect men and women covering their heads with cloth and copulating publicly, calling themselves divine men and women – this was the so-called great yin-yang harmony method, which attracted countless people from all directions.

Since the activity location wasn’t within Jingkou’s jurisdiction, the Jingkou Prefect had notified the local government office, and that was all they could do.

Unexpectedly, recently villagers from Jingkou’s countryside had been coming to the office to report missing wives and daughters who had been gone for days. Jiang Tao led people to investigate everywhere. That night he took the victims’ families to spy on the Celestial Master sect’s activity site, where one victim happened to recognize a woman whose build resembled his wife, causing an immediate disturbance. With over a thousand people present and the scene extremely chaotic, everyone scattered, and those women weren’t recovered but were swept away by the sect’s disciples.

Jiang Tao said: “The magistrate and I deduce that those women who covered their faces and were called divine women were most likely the village women reported missing. The next day, I also led people to search the Celestial Master sect’s altar, but couldn’t find anyone. They insisted the divine women were all willing female disciples who offered their bodies to the teachings. We suspect they have other secret lairs besides the altar, but lacking evidence, and with the Celestial Master sect having connections in the court, and those people inciting nearby believers to cause trouble and fearing civil unrest, we could only desist at the time. But since this involves missing women and isn’t a small matter, we summoned you overnight to discuss what should be done.”

Li Mu frowned: “These demons all deserve to die. I understand the situation and will handle it. Once we find evidence, I’ll drive all these demons out – not one will be allowed to remain in Jingkou!”

The Jingkou Prefect had been at his wit’s end regarding this matter, but hearing Li Mu’s declaration, he finally breathed a sigh of relief and thanked him.

When business was concluded, Li Mu and Jiang Tao came out, agreeing to gather Guo Zhan, Sun Fangzhi, and Dai Yuan tomorrow, then bid farewell and went their separate ways.

…

This fall had accidentally sprained Luoshen’s right ankle.

Fortunately it probably hadn’t injured the bone, but the tendons were strained.

Luoshen told A’Ju not to alarm Lu Shi.

A’Ju fetched the ready medicine for bruises and sprains, applied it to Luoshen’s ankle, then gently massaged it while blaming herself for leaving as instructed.

Look what happened – as soon as she left, the young mistress acted like a child and immediately fell.

With her ankle throbbing dully and A’Ju chattering in her ear, Luoshen was agitated and said with closed eyes that she wanted to sleep.

A’Ju tucked her in, lowered the bed curtains, and went out with the maidservants.

How could Luoshen sleep lying alone on the bed? She tossed and turned until the middle of the hai hour – so late – before finally hearing soft conversation outside.

Li Mu had finally returned. A’Ju was outside the door, apparently telling him about her accidentally slipping and spraining her ankle while bathing.

Soon the door was pushed open and Li Mu entered.

Luoshen heard him walking toward the bed. She lay facing inward as usual, motionless.

One side of the bed curtain was hooked up. He seemed to sit on the bed edge by her feet, then a hand reached over, gently cupping her poor ankle and bringing it out from under the covers.

Luoshen pretended to have just been awakened by him, rubbed her eyes a few times, and turned her face.

He looked up at her.

“Does it still hurt badly? What happened – how could you be so careless as to slip and fall in the bath?”

Feeling guilty, Luoshen slowly sat up, hugging the covers, and said with lowered eyes: “I don’t know what happened – my feet slipped and I fell. It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

Li Mu said no more, only studying the foot held in his palm – clean and crystalline, though the sprained area on her ankle and instep was swollen. He placed his fingers over it and probed gently, then rotated the joint. Hearing her soft hiss, he put it down and went out. A moment later he returned with something that looked like medicinal ointment, sitting back down and saying: “The tendons are strained, but it’s nothing serious. With medicine and daily massage, and avoiding walking, it will heal after some rest.”

He applied medicine for her, then massaged her ankle.

His technique allowed her to feel the applied pressure from his fingers, but it didn’t hurt and was very comfortable.

She sat hugging her knees, letting him massage her foot.

Inside the curtains seemed to suddenly become quiet – unusually quiet, so that Luoshen could even hear his breathing.

She couldn’t help secretly lifting her eyes to look at him, seeing him keeping his head lowered with his gaze always on her foot, his expression focused. After continuing to massage for a while, he released his hands and looked up asking: “Is it better?”

Luoshen withdrew her gaze and nodded.

He smiled, tucked that small plump foot back under the covers, then stood up and went to the bathhouse.

After coming out, he extinguished the lamp and lay beside her.

Luoshen saw him remain motionless as before, clearly about to fall asleep, but she couldn’t help asking: “Where did you go tonight?”

She paused, her tone becoming more serious.

“It’s not that I want to know. It’s just in case A’Jia finds out you went out and asks tomorrow, I can answer her.”

“I went to the Jingkou Prefect’s office.”

Li Mu turned to face her and explained his whereabouts.

In front of her, he naturally didn’t mention a word about the Celestial Master sect’s lewd practices used to bewitch people, only saying those people had committed evil deeds harming the community and needed early cleansing, or the poison would spread endlessly.

Hearing that he truly had urgent business, the stuffiness in Luoshen’s heart diminished somewhat.

During the silence, she heard him say gently in the darkness: “You must be tired from traveling these days. It’s late – sleep.”

Since he said so, what else could Luoshen do?

She could only obediently hum in agreement and close her eyes.

Li Mu also closed his eyes, motionless.

After a long while, hearing her finally emit steady, fine breathing sounds, knowing she must be asleep, he unconsciously clenched the hand that had held her foot, slowly turned his face to look at the sleeping girl’s silhouette beside him in the dim light, and slowly exhaled.

Seeing her innocent appearance, knowing nothing, Li Mu really couldn’t imagine laying hands on her.

What if she resisted…

He stopped thinking and quickly drove the scene from his mind.

But continuing to share a bed with her like this, within reach night after night, if something like that morning’s dream happened again, would he be able to maintain control?

At this moment, he suddenly became uncertain.

…

From the next day on, Li Mu was naturally busy again, leaving early and returning late. Luoshen’s sprained foot became increasingly swollen today and she couldn’t move around, so she had to stay in her room recovering.

Fortunately A’Ting came to keep her company. Sometimes bringing a spinning wheel to spin thread with a humming sound, sometimes doing needlework together, or Luoshen teaching her writing and flute playing.

A’Ting had learned some characters from Lu Shi before. Though she usually seemed carefree, she was actually very clever with a good memory and eager to learn. She learned quickly – after a few days, understanding prosody and rhyme books, she began learning poetry composition quite competently. Luoshen was very pleased and also taught her flute playing.

Luoshen had studied music since childhood – playing qin and flute came naturally to her.

She was especially skilled at flute playing.

She remembered at fourteen during the Winding Water gathering, she sat under a peach tree by the upstream, while Lu Jianzhi was at the downstream bank. Hearing her play the famous piece “East Wind Invitation,” he took his qin to accompany her.

One flute, one qin – jade sounds resonating. When the duet ended, the lingering notes made everyone in the garden listen in rapture.

It was after that time that the reputation of the Gao family daughter and Lu family’s Jianzhi as a heaven-made pair spread throughout Jiankang – everyone knew, everyone had heard.

But now, all that had become the past.

Luoshen hadn’t felt like playing flute for a long time.

She naturally carried a jade flute with her. That afternoon, on a whim, she had someone fetch it and played a piece. A’Ting listened in rapture and clamored to learn too.

Having nothing else to do, Luoshen patiently taught her. With one teaching and one learning, time passed quickly.

This year’s end passed thus – quietly and happily amid A’Ting’s daily pre-dawn discordant flute practice.

Entering the first month, after just a few days, Luoshen, still recovering her foot, heard some news.

Li Mu had found a secret cave the Celestial Master sect had hidden in the mountains. There they had not only stockpiled shocking amounts of money and grain – all from believers’ offerings – but also hundreds of weapons strictly forbidden by the court for private storage.

That aside, they indeed found the village women previously reported missing. After rescuing and bringing those women back, the women slept heavily, unconscious. When they awoke the next day and were questioned, each was bewildered about what they had experienced, only saying they had heard joining the sect could provide rice and grain, so they went to the altar to receive it. At the time they were led to the back hall and drank a cup of blessed talisman water, after which they remembered nothing. Learning the truth, the weak wailed and declared they didn’t want to live, while the strong flew into rages, grabbing kitchen knives to fight the Celestial Master sect people desperately, not to mention the women’s families.

That day, villagers from several nearby villages all poured out, each holding carrying poles and hoes, rushing to the Celestial Master sect’s altar. Seeing the female celestial master and those trusted followers had already fled somewhere unknown, in their fury they smashed everything inside to pieces. Still unsatisfied, they set a fire and burned the altar completely.

The Jingkou Prefect seized the opportunity to order the Celestial Master sect expelled from the area, leaving none behind.

Jingkou people mostly came from the north with rough temperaments – few believed in the Celestial Master sect to begin with. Among those believers, except for a few core members and die-hard followers, the rest were believers in name only, actually just greedy for the benefits of joining the sect. Now seeing such a major incident that aroused public anger, with the government openly expelling them, who would truly follow the female celestial master to the end? They all left the sect.

In just a few days, the originally mighty Celestial Master sect followers vanished without trace around Jingkou.

Amid the people’s cursing and beating the drowning dog, the fifteenth of the first month arrived as scheduled.

This day, southern households were busy cooking porridge to worship the silkworm god in the morning, and in the evening carried straw figures to latrines or pig pens to welcome the divine Zigu, divining the year’s silkworm and mulberry prospects and family fortune.

Besides this, customs originally from the north had gradually moved south. In Jiankang and many prosperous southern cities, on the full moon night of the fifteenth first month, the entire city blazed with fire and torches while drums thundered.

Jingkou was separated from the north by only water, and its people mostly came from the north, so naturally the fifteenth night wouldn’t lack celebration. People brought homemade various lanterns, supporting old and leading young as they poured from homes to stroll and play in the streets, with entertainers and acrobats mixed among them.

The area around the eastern City God Temple was especially bright with lights as people filled the streets – extremely lively.

Luoshen’s sprained foot had long since healed and she could walk freely.

Tonight being the Lantern Festival, with A’Ting loving excitement, how could she possibly stay home quietly? Just in the morning, she brought her homemade rabbit lantern and urged Luoshen to go out on the streets that evening.

Luoshen herself was only half-grown, and having been cooped up at home for so long, with Li Mu barely staying around her except for sleeping at night and giving her foot massages. Being urged by A’Ting, she couldn’t help being tempted.

Lu Shi spoke up at the right moment, telling her son to take Luoshen and little sister out for a stroll. Li Mu agreed.

Luoshen couldn’t help feeling elated, almost like A’Ting, only hoping it would get dark soon. Finally when they could go out, she told A’Ju, Qiongshu and others not to follow – they could go out and have fun freely. She changed into ordinary clothes and dressed like a gentle new wife from a small household, linked arms with A’Ting, and the two went out together.

Li Mu also wore common clothes, the only difference from ordinary people being the long sword hanging at his waist.

He followed behind the two of them, remaining silent throughout the journey, only answering a sentence or two when A’Ting turned back to ask him something.

Luoshen and A’Ting reached the City God Temple area, which was extremely lively. Looking here and there, A’Ting was attracted by a stall selling beast masks and stopped.

Luoshen watched for a while and also found it interesting.

The stall owner was a young man. Seeing an extremely beautiful young married woman approach his stall, judging by her dress she seemed from a small household, he initially didn’t recognize who she was. He just kept stealing glances, then glancing again, unable to look away. Suddenly seeing her extend a white tender hand, pointing at two masks saying she wanted to buy them, he snapped back to attention and hurriedly brought them over, blushing as he said: “I made these myself – they’re not worth much. If young mistress likes them, I can give you two for free.”

A’Ting was delighted and quickly nodded, reaching out to take them, but was blocked by a hand reaching from behind.

Looking back, she saw her brother had already handed over money and asked the young man: “Is this enough?”

The local people who had seen Luoshen’s face were limited, but everyone knew Li Mu. The young man suddenly saw him appear and finally reacted.

So this beautiful young woman was actually the legendary Gao family daughter who had married down to him.

The young man didn’t dare look at Luoshen again, hastily took the money, and mumbled: “Enough, enough…”

Li Mu smiled faintly, took the beast masks, and handed them to Luoshen.

A’Ting felt bad about the money, leaning close to Luoshen’s ear to whisper a complaint about her brother wasting money unnecessarily.

Luoshen bit her lip to suppress laughter, took the masks he bought, and shared them with A’Ting.

A’Ting chose a golden toad while hers was a Bi’an.

She put on the beast mask and looked through the two round holes at the lantern-lit streets and coming and going people, feeling extremely happy.

This evening, this moment, she was carefree, setting aside all worries.

…

After continuing to browse for a while, they met Jiang Tao and his wife with their two children. After brief pleasantries, the children’s leader A’Ting took the two little ones and went off with the Jiang couple, leaving only Luoshen and Li Mu.

Luoshen, wearing her beast mask, continued walking and browsing, looking and stopping.

Li Mu still followed behind her, silent but never leaving her side.

Luoshen bought several small figurines and sugar figures, then casually turned and asked him to hold them for her.

This was in front of the City God Temple, the most crowded place. Almost every few steps, they would encounter a Jingkou person coming to greet Li Mu.

He stared at the figurines and sugar figures Luoshen handed him, quickly glanced left and right, seeming to hesitate, but finally reached out and took them.

Luoshen didn’t think much of it. Seeing him take them, she continued browsing. After a while, turning back unconsciously, she discovered he had somehow also acquired a beast mask.

He wore a Yaozi – a black, fierce and imposing beast mask that surprisingly suited him well.

It looked good and fit the evening’s atmosphere.

But Luoshen suddenly understood.

Clearly he felt embarrassed carrying those things for her, so he used the mask to hide his face to avoid being recognized, right?

She stared at him once and secretly huffed, thinking of how these days he had been cold toward her except for massaging her feet each night. Suddenly getting an idea to tease him, she turned and squeezed toward the crowd, ducked low, and quietly hid behind the stone stele in front of the City God Temple.

Li Mu immediately noticed she was gone.

He looked around, pulled off his beast mask, showing anxious expression as he searched for her in the crowd. In his urgency, he stopped several passing women wearing similar clothes and the same beast mask, ignoring their startled cries as he lifted their masks.

He was usually so mature and steady before her… well, that didn’t sound right – better to say steady as a mountain.

Luoshen had never seen him show such anxiety. Hiding behind the stele with half her head peeking out to secretly observe, she finally felt somewhat vindicated.

Thinking it was about enough, she was about to come out when in a blink she discovered he had vanished!

Now it was Luoshen’s turn to panic.

He was very tall and stood out in crowds – the type you could spot at a glance.

But just now, in truly just a blink of an eye when she opened her eyes again, he – a living person – had disappeared.

Where had he gone?

Luoshen hurriedly came out from behind the stele, standing there desperately on tiptoes, looking everywhere.

Before her was a sea of heads.

Some wearing beast masks like her, some with smiling faces, some turning to look at her – one by one passing by her, none stopping.

This was the first time in her life she was alone.

Among the crowd, she felt even more lonely.

She was a bit frightened and deeply regretful. Just as she was about to remove her beast mask and squeeze into the crowd for a clearer look, before she could move, a man’s arm suddenly reached from behind.

A large hand gripped her arm tightly, yanking her almost roughly. Luoshen stumbled involuntarily and was pulled behind the stone stele where she had been hiding.

A tall male figure loomed over her from above, instantly burying her in the shadow between him and the stele.

The beast mask on her face was also torn off by him.

With the stele behind her and the man in front, Luoshen had nowhere to escape. Terrified, she lifted her face about to scream for help, but her mouth formed a round shape and stopped.

She finally recognized that the person was Li Mu.

He lowered his head, almost pressing her body hard against the stele, and through gritted teeth scolded her in a low voice: “You deliberately hid earlier, making me search everywhere for you – was that very amusing?”