The lamplight was dim and yellow.

The wooden window was half-closed, allowing the sound of night wind outside the door to be heard softly.

The young man walked toward her step by step in the hazy lamplight.

Lu Tong’s heart was beating very fast.

She had long guessed that her identity would be exposed sooner or later—this was beyond doubt—but she hadn’t expected it to come so quickly.

Fearing discovery by the Grand Tutor’s Manor, afraid of having her identity exposed in the midst of revenge, she had always hidden herself outside all events. When she went to the Ke Chengxing mansion for her dowry, diagnosed Scholar Wu’s mother, performed acupuncture on the judicial officer’s wife—she had never directly confronted anyone from the Grand Tutor’s Manor.

The only time she encountered Qi Yutai, that night he hadn’t even seen her face clearly.

In all these events, she had seamlessly removed herself from them, like an insignificant passerby in a farce, a humble and insignificant ant before the great drama, unable to withstand anyone’s attention.

Yet she had been noticed by Pei Yunying.

Even when he recognized her was earlier—before she had acted against Ke Chengxing, before she had begun her first revenge plan—the moment he helped her beneath Baoxiang Tower, their ill-fated connection was destined.

He had stumbled into this game from the very beginning.

Pei Yunying stopped in front of her.

Lu Tong’s entire body was shrouded beneath his shadow. The young man even smiled slightly, flicking the name list in his fingers and asking: “Why did you write my name?”

Why did she write his name?

Lu Tong’s gaze fell on that name list.

The list contained many names: the Ke family, Liu family, Fan family… these were crossed out.

There were also many newly added ones: Grand Tutor’s Manor, Qi Yutai, Hanlin Medical Academy… these were not crossed out.

The habits and routines of those involved, anecdotes and trivial matters, useful or useless, all meticulously recorded on an entire sheet. Among this densely written name list, the three characters “Pei Yunying” were prominently listed.

“Just curious,” she heard her own voice say.

“Curious about what?”

“Curious about which side Lord Pei would stand on if faced with today’s circumstances.”

Pei Yunying was slightly stunned.

Lu Tong looked up, calmly gazing at him.

When Pei Yunying became suspicious of her during the Wan’en Temple incident and repeatedly tested her afterward, before she framed him at Wangchun Mountain, Lu Tong had considered simply killing him.

However, given his position as Commander of the Palace Guard, setting aside whether she could successfully approach him, just dealing with the officials afterward would be very troublesome.

Later, she saved Pei Yunshu and her mother, and their relationship somewhat eased. In outsiders’ eyes—such as Du Changqing’s—she and Pei Yunying had a good relationship and could be called friends.

But Lu Tong had never truly trusted him.

The powerful and noble—she had a natural aversion and disgust toward them. Whether it was prejudice or stubbornness, deep in her heart, Lu Tong absolutely didn’t believe that the lofty heir of Duke Zhaoning could understand her determination for revenge.

So she wrote down this person’s name, this person who was neither quite friend nor enemy. Even though they could drink together under the moon, as long as he obstructed her, he would be her next enemy.

This paper was supposed to be burned today, but Du Changqing and the others came too suddenly. She didn’t have time and could only hastily tuck it among the poetry pages on the desk, never expecting him to discover it.

He had always been very perceptive.

The wick had burned too long, the candlelight swayed unsteadily. In the dim, flickering yellow light, Pei Yunying looked at her with what seemed like a smile but wasn’t: “You wouldn’t also want to kill me, would you?”

His eyes were beautiful. When he looked down, her reflection was clearly visible in his dark pupils.

Lu Tong smiled slightly, walked past Pei Yunying to the window, took scissors and trimmed the wick on the table shorter.

The lamplight then steadied.

She picked up the lamp and lit the half-burned incense in the room’s incense burner, then turned to face him.

She said: “That depends on which side you want to stand on.”

He raised his eyebrows slightly: “What if I stand on the other side?”

The room suddenly fell silent.

The warm candlelight spread inch by inch. The woman stood in the lamp’s shadow without speaking, her frail shoulders seeming made of ice and snow, ready to dissipate into heaven and earth under winter’s destruction.

After a long while, she finally spoke: “As expected.”

Lu Tong sneered inwardly.

She shouldn’t have hoped.

She shouldn’t have held any expectations for any nobles, any so-called upper-class people.

He was the Commander of the Palace Guard, heir of Duke Zhaoning. To families like the Grand Tutor’s Manor, Fan Zhenglian fawned over them extensively, and the Ke family worshipped them like gods. He served in court alongside Qi Qing. That day at Yuxian Tower, when Qi Yutai burst in to chat with Pei Yunying, his words were full of attempts to curry favor.

Perhaps they were already in collusion, and in the future he might even become the Grand Tutor’s Manor’s prized son-in-law—they would be family.

The woman sighed, but a shallow smile bloomed on her face as she slowly walked up to Pei Yunying, saying softly: “Now you know my secret, my lord.”

She raised her head, her ending tone gentle and ambiguous: “Do you plan to turn me over to the authorities? Like Liu Kun did to my brother?”

Pei Yunying froze.

The woman stood under the lamplight, light-bodied and slender-waisted, graceful as a willow, fragile and coldly resilient like a winding stream after spring snow melts. Those beautiful eyes looked at him pleadingly, her moth eyebrows slightly frowning, evoking pity.

The scene of a beauty’s spring melancholy, yet it immediately flashed a hint of something unusual in Pei Yunying’s heart. As if something swept by quickly. In the moment his thoughts flickered, Pei Yunying suddenly struck out.

“Bang—”

A bright dagger cut a silver arc through the air. The woman’s knife-wielding hand was tightly clamped by Pei Yunying and forcefully pushed away.

“Incorrigible,” Pei Yunying withdrew his hand, looking coldly at Lu Tong.

She was pushed back several steps, nearly hitting the table behind her. That delicate, pale hand that looked like it could only play piano and embroider had somehow produced a dagger from her sleeve.

While she spoke to him in gentle tones, murderous intent had already emerged.

There was no pleading, no resignation. The gaze she cast was gloomy and cold, carrying a hint of mutual destruction’s madness.

That wasn’t some fragile, peaceful stream at all—it was a whirlpool, a mad and terrifying whirlpool capable of tearing people apart.

“My lord reacts so quickly,” she mocked.

Pei Yunying was about to speak when his mouth opened, he suddenly felt his body stiffen for an instant. His heart tightened, and in the next moment, the incense burner on the table was swept by a strong wind and fell to the ground. The half-burned incense stick broke into several pieces, releasing a faint lily fragrance—very light, yet causing momentary dizziness.

“Despicable,” his expression grew cold.

She had never intended to talk properly from the beginning. From the moment Lu Tong lit that incense, she had already decided to kill him.

His steps faltered momentarily, and that woman had already gripped her dagger tightly and rushed toward him!

Her eyes held no expression, cold as if looking at a corpse.

Pei Yunying’s face darkened. His silver Wuye long knife unsheathed, forcibly breaking through the numb, stiff sensation with internal energy. The long knife brought up a strong wind as it charged straight toward her.

“I already warned you before, my lord,” with the long knife before her, she still showed no fear, even speaking mockingly, “the medical hall is full of poisons everywhere. If you carelessly enter and die, you can’t blame anyone else.”

He laughed instead of getting angry: “You think I’m as useless as them?”

The Silver Wuye knife lightly swept, and the dagger in Lu Tong’s hand broke in half.

Her heart sank.

Too short.

The incense burning time was too short.

This person was sharp and alert too quickly. The incense hadn’t had time to reach its full potency. Otherwise, after another half stick of incense, no matter how skilled Pei Yunying was, he could only be slaughtered here.

If it were anyone else, they would have already collapsed by now.

“My lord is naturally different from those worthless people. Don’t worry, when you die, I’ll bury you under that plum tree. Your body is much more beautiful than that dead pork from before—used as fertilizer, it will surely make the plum tree bloom more enchantingly.”

Just now, being pushed and bumped, her finger was cut by the knife wind from the silver blade, blood flowing like a stream. However, Lu Tong paid no attention at all, only gripping the broken dagger and rushing toward him, her eyes frighteningly bright.

She didn’t dodge at all.

Like a desperate ball of fire, burning madly.

“If you block the way, then die—” she said.

The dagger’s tip was sharp and cold, silver light shooting straight toward the vulnerable heart. At the critical moment, he suddenly stopped, abruptly turned his blade tip, facing the rushing person, firmly grasped her arm, and pushed back with his other hand.

Lu Tong was pushed so that her spine hit the altar table. The kind-faced white-robed Guanyin couldn’t withstand such force, swayed, and toppled head-first from the Buddhist cabinet.

“Crack—”

“No—” the woman suddenly startled.

In the cold, silent night came the crisp sound of porcelain shattering. From the neighboring room, Yin Zheng’s drunken sleep-talking seemed to sound faintly, quickly returning to quiet.

A scene of devastation.

Incense ash from the altar table’s shrine scattered all over the floor. Probably morning offerings had been made, as those oranges and persimmons with red characters stuck on them rolled to Pei Yunying’s feet.

The young man’s gaze shook.

The white-robed Guanyin that had always been enshrined in that small Buddhist cabinet lay broken into several pieces on the ground. Hidden inside were actually several palm-sized porcelain jars, four in total, also shattered, spilling out soil from within. One jar contained water, now spilled everywhere.

“This is…” he stared intently.

Lu Tong was gathering the soil from those broken porcelain jars.

She gathered frantically and anxiously, as if afraid that being a moment later would mean she couldn’t gather it up. She even tried to scoop up the water that had already spilled, but it flowed through her fingers, dripping into the soil fragments, making it impossible to distinguish which jar was which.

Blood flowed from her finger wound. Lu Tong was completely unaware, also forgetting about Pei Yunying beside her, as if in this world, only the matter before her eyes was most important.

This was the first time Pei Yunying had seen her panic.

Even when he pressed her with questions at Wan’en Temple, when night patrols raided the medical hall after the imperial examination case, even earlier when she was held hostage by bandits beneath Baoxiang Tower at the moment between life and death, he had never seen her show such panic.

But now, she was gathering those broken soil fragments, gathering them distractedly and frantically.

Pei Yunying narrowed his eyes.

An absurd thought rose in his mind.

Looking at the woman carefully collecting the soil, the young man hesitated before saying: “This is… grave soil?”

In the secret letter Qing Feng had sent, it was mentioned that all four members of the Lu family had died. Besides Lu Rou being properly buried, the other three had no remains.

Madam Lu perished in the fire, Old Master Lu was buried at the bottom of the water, Lu Qian was executed and his body abandoned in mass graves, devoured by wild beasts. Even though Lu Rou was properly buried, as the Lu family daughter hiding in the shadows, Lu Tong couldn’t openly go to pay respects.

Pei Yunying’s gaze swept over the four porcelain jars on the ground.

Four porcelain jars, four spirit tablets.

No wonder she enshrined such a Guanyin in the small Buddhist cabinet in her room.

Though her hands were stained with blood and she didn’t believe in gods or Buddha, she still pretended to worship Guanyin—because what she was worshipping wasn’t some Guanyin at all, but the Lu family’s memorial tablets.

Lu Tong didn’t answer.

She desperately reached out to gather those mixed-together grave soils.

Those grave soils she had searched for from various places, perhaps carrying her family’s essence.

She brought back fire ashes from the old residence in Changwu County, scooped up rolling river water from the canal boats in Shangjing. She dug up rain-soaked, damp black mud from mass graves surrounded by wild dogs. She secretly went to her sister’s unattended grave and brought back a small piece of yellow earth.

She couldn’t find any other traces they had left behind, so she could only put this mud and water into porcelain jars and place them in her room, as if this way she could gather with her family.

And now, that mud and river water mixed together, murky and chaotic, like dirtied tears, slipping through her fingers.

Nothing could be held onto.

The movements to salvage that mud gradually slowed until finally freezing motionless. She knelt on the ground, staring blankly at the devastation everywhere.

A blurry scene suddenly flashed before her eyes.

That was probably a scene from long, long ago.

There were father, mother, brother, and sister. In the small courtyard on a summer evening, she sat with her sister and brother, discussing a recent court case from a neighboring county.

A wealthy landlord had seized the young, beautiful daughter of a long-term worker. The county magistrate was hearing this case, and the lawsuit was the talk of the entire county.

Young as she was, she bit into wild grapes that had been cooled in well water and sighed: “How hateful! If someday there were people like that landlord who wanted to harm our family, what would we do?”

“That would never happen,” her sister replied.

“But what if it did?”

“Then we’d report it to the authorities!” Lu Qian said dismissively. “The law will handle it.”

Mother laughed: “Yes, we don’t make enemies with anyone. For no reason, who would harm us?”

She wasn’t quite satisfied with this answer. After thinking, she clenched her fist and said: “If someone really wanted to harm our family, then I’d go get revenge!”

“Pfft—” Lu Qian pinched her round, chubby cheeks. “Little ghost, you’re not even as tall as the table, and you want revenge? With what? With the slingshot I bought you?”

Everyone burst into laughter.

Those sounds of laughter gradually faded, became blurred, and finally transformed into the muddy yellow soil everywhere before her eyes, and that drop of crystal clarity like broken jade on the back of her hand.

Pei Yunying was startled.

She sat silently on the ground, in the mud everywhere, like a flower about to wither.

He finally spoke: “You want to enter the Hanlin Medical Academy to deal with the Grand Tutor’s Manor?”

“Haven’t you already investigated everything clearly?”

“Qi Yutai is Qi Qing’s son. Killing him is a fool’s dream.”

Fan Hong was merely a judicial officer at the Court of Judicial Review, while Qi Yutai was the Grand Tutor’s son. Anyone who approached him would be repeatedly investigated. Lu Tong could approach Fan Hong using the same methods, but might not necessarily approach Qi Yutai. Even if she entered the Hanlin Medical Academy, revenge would be fraught with difficulties.

“So what?”

“Our family were ordinary people. Should several lives just be written off like this? Why?”

She smiled bitterly, her voice very cold: “Only in the eyes of you noble offspring are people ranked in hierarchy. In the King of Hell’s eyes, there are only the dead and the living.”

“A life for a life—that’s natural justice.”

Such ignorance of how high heaven and thick earth are. Pei Yunying frowned slightly: “Don’t you want to obtain justice?”

“Justice?”

Lu Tong raised her head.

Her black and white eyes showed an amazing transparency in the dim lamplight, making her appear resolute and stubborn. Just like when she was pushed down and injured but didn’t cry out in pain and immediately charged up again, just like now in this constrained and wretched predicament, she showed not the slightest bit of weakness.

She only looked coldly at the person before her.

Lu Tong said: “My lord knows very well that even if this case were handed over to the Court of Judicial Review, there wouldn’t be the slightest difference.”

She remembered that lawsuit from many years ago in Changwu County. That lawsuit was actually quite simple—anyone with eyes could see what the truth was. But in the end, the county magistrate declared the landlord innocent. The violated girl carried a kitchen knife to assassinate the landlord and was beaten to death with clubs. Her aged father finally hanged himself on his daughter’s grave.

Lu Tong clenched her fist, her fingertips digging hard into her palm.

She absolutely refused to be a lamb for slaughter.

“He is the Grand Tutor’s son. There are plenty of scapegoats to die for him one after another. Even if truly convicted, they lift it heavily but set it down lightly—behind closed doors, they’re all family.”

“He won’t die.”

“How the truth is doesn’t matter. Clearing my family’s injustice doesn’t matter either. As long as they live for one day, justice will never come.”

“Justice?”

She laughed coldly, her tone carrying the obsession of a dead end: “I’ll tell you what justice means. Qi Yutai killed my sister, I kill Qi Yutai—a life for a life. That’s called justice.”

“I don’t need help. I can find justice myself.”

Pei Yunying looked at her.

She knelt numbly on the ground, her voice calm, hiding a barely suppressed sobbing tone. He understood clearly that this sobbing wasn’t for her secret being discovered, nor for the current powerless predicament, but for the people in this muddy grave soil everywhere.

Lu Tong lowered her head.

In her medical box still lay that rusty silver ring. If she took it out, perhaps she could gain a moment of Pei Yunying’s sympathy.

However, sympathy was never lasting. He already knew all her secrets. Whether his identity was friend or foe was unclear for the future.

Only dead people wouldn’t leak secrets.

She could take advantage of the moment of retrieving the silver ring to lower his guard, either poison his tea or pierce his Jianjing acupoint with a poison needle… This room was full of hidden poisons everywhere. In her sleeve was a packet of poison powder that could be used to blind his eyes.

From the distant end of streets and alleys, laughter and firecracker sounds faintly echoed, drifting into the small courtyard with the wind.

Lu Tong looked at the water clock on the table.

It was almost midnight. A’Cheng had said that to celebrate the festival, Dechun Stage would set off fireworks tonight.

The curtain reflected plum branches outside the window, bright moon quietly climbing the flower tips. On Shengjing’s New Year night, commoners and nobles would share this prosperous spectacular view without distinction of rank at this moment.

“Drip—drip—”

It was the sound of the water clock dripping.

Soon, it would be midnight very soon.

Her finger had already touched the poison powder in her sleeve. She was gradually peeling open the medicine paper, her fingertip about to touch that fine, gray powder…

Suddenly, a handkerchief embroidered with a hawk was handed to her.

Lu Tong’s hand hidden in her sleeve stiffened.

“Boom—”

At this very instant, from the distant Dechun Stage, fireworks exploded brilliantly across Shengjing’s night sky, like ten thousand lanterns lighting up the heavens. In an instant, brocade patterns overlapped, five colors interplaying.

The small courtyard was also illuminated by this momentary splendor.

Lu Tong squinted slightly, dazzled.

Midnight, New Year’s night, spring stage fireworks.

This was already a new year.

She looked up in confusion.

Pei Yunying stood before her. The brilliant light of fireworks outside illuminated his handsome features, dispersing some of the sharpness and coldness around him, making him appear bright and gentle.

The young man bent down, bringing the handkerchief closer, indicating for Lu Tong to bandage her still-bleeding finger.

“Wipe it,” he turned his face away, his voice flat.

“You’ve convinced me.”