“I’ll go with you.” Lu Tong was stunned, thinking she had misheard.

“Didn’t understand?” He glanced at her. “I said, I’ll accompany you.”

Lu Tong’s brows furrowed.

This year, Sunan City was covered in heavy snow, with the mountains completely sealed off. The journey to Luomei Peak was indeed dangerous; Li Wenhu’s concerns were not mere alarmism. If the situation wasn’t urgent, she wouldn’t have chosen to travel at this time.

Pei Yunying often traveled abroad and would be even more aware of the conditions. She thought he would try to stop her, but unexpectedly, he offered to go together.

“Are you going to keep standing there?”

Pei Yunying tilted his head and reminded her, “In another quarter hour, when the other medical officers wake up, you won’t be able to leave even if you want to.”

Lu Tong: “…”

What he said was true.

If someone reported to Chang Jin, Chang Jin would stop her.

She stared at Pei Yunying for a moment. He casually allowed her scrutiny. Lu Tong really couldn’t do anything about him. After a moment, she looked away and walked past him with her head down: “Let’s go.”

Pei Yunying raised his eyebrows, seemingly quite pleased at her resigned manner, and leisurely caught up with her, taking the basket and bundle from her hands.

Lu Tong turned back, tugged a couple of times but couldn’t pull them back, and said, “I can carry them myself.”

“Doctor Lu.” He turned sideways to avoid her hand and lifted his chin, gesturing for her to look at the distant mountain peaks.

“The mountain path is treacherous, deep with snow, and slippery. We can’t ride horses, and I see you’re planning to walk up the mountain.”

He said, “Carrying so many things, do you think you’re a beast of burden?”

Though his words showed concern, they weren’t particularly pleasant to hear. Lu Tong retorted, “I’m very strong, as the Commander knows, I’ve practiced killing and burying bodies.”

“Then you should save your strength even more,” Pei Yunying readily agreed. “We haven’t reached the place where force will be needed yet.”

Lu Tong: “…”

She had nothing more to say to this person.

Fortunately, although Pei Yunying took away most of the heavy items, he hadn’t presumed to take her medicine box. As they were about to pass the quarantine area, Lu Tong tugged on Pei Yunying’s sleeve. He turned around, and Lu Tong pointed to another small path not far from the quarantine area.

“Let’s take this path,” Lu Tong said softly. “To avoid being discovered by others.”

If the medical officers discovered them, there would be another round of argument. Li Wenhu wasn’t wrong – it was a dangerous undertaking, and it wasn’t appropriate to bring others along. It would be even better if the person behind her wasn’t following.

Pei Yunying glanced at Lu Tong but said nothing, allowing her to pull him by his sleeve onto a small path.

That path was some distance from the quarantine area, and the guards stationed there wouldn’t notice them.

Lu Tong walked while looking back towards the quarantine area, trying to make her figure as inconspicuous as possible.

Watching her movements, Pei Yunying suddenly laughed.

Lu Tong was puzzled: “What are you laughing at?”

“Even if people discovered us, if I wanted to take you up the mountain, they wouldn’t stop us.”

He sneered, “Rather, with you sneaking around like this, people might think we’re eloping.”

Lu Tong paused, her gaze falling on her fingers clutching his sleeve.

A man and a woman, acting suspiciously, sneaking around, being extremely careful – if someone were to discover them now, it would indeed seem like the furtiveness of an illicit affair.

But these words sounded familiar.

It seemed that when they had met at night in the Medical Officers’ Court before, Pei Yunying had said the same thing to her.

Lu Tong suddenly let go of his hand and said coldly, “The Commander overthinks.”

He straightened his sleeve and spoke unhurriedly: “After all, I’m still unmarried, my reputation is important.”

Lu Tong held back, swallowing the curse she wanted to utter, and turned to continue forward: “Let’s go.”

…

The sky gradually brightened.

The plague-prevention incense in the medical officers’ quarters had been changed, and Lin Danqing rubbed her hands, shrinking her neck as she knocked on the door. After a while with no response, she pushed hard, and the door opened.

She walked in, calling out: “Sister Lu!”

No one was in the room.

There was a paper on the table. Lin Danqing casually glanced at it, suddenly her expression changed, and the next moment, she ran out of the quarters holding the paper, shouting: “Medical Director, something’s wrong!”

Chang Jin was about to go to the quarantine area when Lin Danqing’s shout gave him a start: “What’s wrong, what’s wrong?”

“Medical Officer Lu went up the mountain!” Lin Danqing nearly slapped the paper in Chang Jin’s face. “Early this morning, she went by herself!”

“What?”

Chang Jin was startled, seeing the note Lu Tong had left, his face immediately turned pale with anxiety, “How could Medical Officer Lu go up the mountain alone!”

Lu Tong had mentioned going up the mountain to him once before, but residents Cai Fang and Li Wenhu had warned them that Luomei Snow Mountain was dangerous, with heavy snow making it easy to enter but difficult to leave, repeatedly cautioning them not to rashly enter the mountain. Lu Tong had been present at the time.

Lu Tong was usually most rational and calm, how had she lost her head today?

Chang Jin stamped his foot: “Quick, quick, go find Commander Pei, he has many men, if we hurry now, we might still be able to bring Medical Officer Lu back. Hurry!”

The medical officer who went returned in less than the time it takes to burn half an incense stick, with a dejected face: “Medical Director, Commander Pei is missing…”

“Missing?” Chang Jin was greatly shocked.

Duan Xiaoyan, who had followed after hearing the news, first searched around the Medical Officers’ Court, and said curiously: “I haven’t seen my brother since early this morning, I thought he was discussing something with someone in your Medical Officers’ Court, what, he’s not here?”

A young female medical officer and a young commander, both vanished early in the morning, leaving only a few words, Lin Danqing frowned: “Could these two have eloped?”

Such plots were written plenty in novels, though there weren’t any obstacles to their romance here.

Ji Xun, standing in the crowd, looked up, his gaze somewhat surprised.

Chang Jin said irritably: “Eloping up the mountain in such heavy snow, that’s not eloping, that’s dying together!”

Eloping wasn’t too outrageous, but dying together seemed unlikely.

Just as everything was in chaos, Pei Yunying’s guard Qingfeng arrived belatedly from outside the door, saying: “The master has accompanied Medical Officer Lu up the mountain.”

“Ah?” Everyone turned to him.

Qingfeng calmly said: “Medical Officer Lu wanted to go to Luomei Peak, the master happened to meet her when he went out, so he accompanied Medical Officer Lu up the mountain.”

The people in the courtyard looked at each other.

After a while, Lin Danqing said: “Has Pei Yunying gone mad?”

As a commander, Pei Yunying knew better than anyone how dangerous it was to enter the mountain at this time. Not only did he not stop Lu Tong when he heard she wanted to go up the mountain, but he went along himself, without any sense at all – this was even worse than eloping.

However, Duan Xiaoyan’s expression suddenly relaxed.

“Oh, my brother went with her,” his eyes curved. “Then there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Has your brain been burned too?” Lin Danqing was shocked. “Aren’t you worried about them getting into trouble on the mountain?”

“That’s my brother we’re talking about,” Duan Xiaoyan was confident. “My brother never does anything without being certain, and besides, he’s with Medical Officer Lu. Medical Officer Lu won’t come to any harm.”

The youth gazed into the distance, where faint spots of crimson could be seen among the vast snow-covered peaks.

He withdrew his gaze and spoke confidently: “Don’t worry, he’ll take perfect care of Medical Officer Lu.”

…

While the medical officers’ quarters were in an uproar over Lu Tong and Pei Yunying’s matter, the subjects of discussion had no time to care about it.

The path up Luomei Peak was steep and difficult to traverse. Lu Tong carried her medicine box through it, skillfully navigating every small path.

She had lived on this mountain for seven years, walking up and down countless times. Every rock, every tree, every stream here seemed to be exactly as she remembered, deeply engraved, impossible to forget. In past years, she had tried countless times to escape from this mountain by any means possible, and after Yun Niang’s death, she had sworn at Yun Niang’s grave never to return, but unexpectedly today, she was carrying her medicine box back along the old path.

This time it wasn’t escape, but her actively returning.

The feeling was somewhat strange.

Lu Tong walked very quickly and therefore didn’t notice the gaze of the person behind her.

Pei Yunying was lost in thought.

Luomei Peak was vast, with pristine white snow burying everything, making one place look particularly similar to another, yet Lu Tong seemed to always be able to accurately recognize every different location, finding the path that required the least effort.

As if she had lived here for many years.

After crossing a steep slope ahead, Lu Tong stopped in front of a green pine tree and turned back to hand him a black cloth.

Pei Yunying looked up.

“You can’t keep looking at the snow, it will cause temporary blindness after a while.” After explaining, she found a huge rock under a tree to sit on, took out another black cloth strip from her bosom, and covered her eyes.

“Wear this, let’s rest here for a moment.”

Pei Yunying thought briefly, smiled without saying anything, took the black cloth, and covered his eyes, sitting down beside Lu Tong.

The black cloth was made very cleverly, not heavy at all, thin as a cicada’s wing, turning the snow-covered ground gray, yet still allowing them to see each other, with just a hint of haziness, preventing snow blindness.

Lu Tong felt around in the bundle and took out a dry biscuit for him.

Pei Yunying pushed it away, “Not hungry.”

“Are you afraid I only brought enough for myself?” Lu Tong stuffed the biscuit into his hand and passed him a water pouch. “Don’t worry, I brought enough. Otherwise, if you starved to death here, I’d have to bury you, and that would take a lot of effort.”

Pei Yunying: “…”

It had been a long time since Lu Tong had been this sarcastic with him. However, this long-absent tone seemed to return to an even more distant past, when she hadn’t deliberately kept her distance from him, coldly isolating herself from him and others completely.

He glanced at Lu Tong’s bundle. It wasn’t light, bulging full, and he had been carrying it the whole way thinking it contained something else. Now looking at it, it was completely packed with dried food and water.

It seemed there was even enough to live on the mountain for over a month.

No wonder she was so generous with the dried food.

He found it somewhat bewildering, then found it amusing: “You came prepared. Are you planning to live on the mountain?”

Lu Tong: “Did you think I came up the mountain to die? Even if I got lost in the mountains, I wouldn’t die right away.”

“I can see that.” Pei Yunying said lazily. “You’re very familiar with this place.”

Lu Tong was very familiar with the mountain paths.

Her stamina was much better than he had expected; throughout the journey, she showed no signs of fatigue. Though the mountain path was steep and towering, she seemed accustomed to it. It was the same at the Mangming Village tea garden last time – she walked very quickly, like someone who had walked mountain paths for years, agile as a light-footed deer.

He casually picked up a tree branch and randomly drew a few lines in the snow, seemingly asking offhandedly: “Have you been here before?”

When Cai Fang and Li Wenhu mentioned Luomei Peak, they all said it was a desolate mountain, with rotting corpses among the mass graves, and even the red plum blossoms covering the mountains seemed somewhat bloody and eerie. Sunan hadn’t had heavy snow for many years; the snow cover concealed many traces, making it very easy for people to lose their sense of direction, but Lu Tong had a clear purpose, obviously not here for the first time.

Lu Tong gazed into the distance. The snow scene through the black cloth wasn’t very clear, hazy, and somehow different from her memories. She was silent for a moment, then said: “I used to live here.”

He started, turning his head: “By yourself?”

“With my master.”

Pei Yunying was somewhat surprised.

After thinking for a while, he asked: “So six years ago when I first met you, you were already living on Luomei Peak?”

“Yes.”

Pei Yunying looked at her: “Then why didn’t you invite me up for a visit? We were so close to your home.”

Lu Tong: “…”

She said: “I was afraid you wouldn’t survive.”

“What?” He raised his eyebrows: “Was your home a murder house? Anyone who entered would end up abandoned in the wilderness?”

Lu Tong: “Yes, you should thank me.”

“You speaking to me like this is much more normal,” Pei Yunying snorted. “The way you were avoiding me recently, I thought you planned to never associate with me again.”

Lu Tong paused, unconsciously looking up at him. Through the black cloth, they were both hazy to each other, unable to see expressions clearly, only able to hear voices. But perhaps precisely because they couldn’t see each other’s eyes, there was a sense of safety in not being exposed.

Her hand gripping the dried food tightened slightly, and Lu Tong changed the subject: “Why were you at the medical officers’ quarters today?”

“Didn’t I say? I felt unwell last night.”

“You’re lying.”

Pei Yunying examined the marks the tree branch had made in the snow and smiled faintly.

The night Ding Yong died, Lu Tong was very sad.

She rarely cried, and the few times she had shed tears were all related to family. After the Qi family fell, she seemed to have accomplished her main goal, always drifting aimlessly, but the night Ding Yong died, her tears falling on his shoulder suddenly let Pei Yunying touch a bit of her true heart.

Like something tightly wrapped having a small crack – perhaps it was a good thing, but also particularly dangerous.

When the true heart shows cracks, it becomes vulnerable.

So he had Qingfeng pay more attention to Lu Tong.

Yesterday evening, Lu Tong had gone to get a shovel and then asked Duan Xiaoyan for some dried food. She usually didn’t eat much and hadn’t wanted food when Duan Xiaoyan offered before, so this was quite unusual. Later, Qingfeng saw her seemingly packing a bundle from outside the window and reported this to him.

So he came to watch her personally.

This person Lu Tong always did big things quietly, like when she went to Sheng City alone for revenge, she was quiet about it too. He always felt that if he didn’t watch her closely, she might do something unexpected again.

As it turned out, his guess wasn’t wrong.

Pei Yunying picked up the water pouch and asked: “What did you come up the mountain for?”

“To gather herbs.”

“Gather herbs?”

“In the new prescription for treating the plague, there’s an ingredient called houbian. Houbian’s poison is difficult to neutralize. I remember that on Luomei Peak, some distance from the peak, there’s a stream, and north of the stream on the cliff face, there grows red wood vine. Redwood vine’s toxicity is similar to Houbian’s, perhaps we could try it.”

After Ji Xun told her about the redwood vine, Lu Tong had been thinking it might offer a glimmer of hope.

But Pingzhou had taken too long to deliver, and Cuicui didn’t have time.

She might not have time either.

She remembered there was a place on Luomei Peak where the redwood vine grew, but that was also a long time ago. Now they could only try their luck, going up to search first.

After listening, Pei Yunying nodded: “I see.” After thinking, he spoke again: “So you’re familiar with this place because you often gathered herbs on the mountain?”

Seeing how familiar she was with Luomei Peak, knowing every herb field well.

Lu Tong made an “mm” sound.

Pei Yunying lifted his gaze, “When you were with your master before, what kind of person was your master?”

“You’re asking too much.”

“You’re saying too little.” He narrowed his eyes, black pupils holding some inquiry. “Why do you never talk about yourself?”

Lu Tong rarely talked about herself.

Most of the time, she would only answer when he asked. Her answers were vague, begrudging to say even one extra word. She briefly glossed over her past in Chang Wu County, and he knew nothing about Lu Tong in Sunan.

Although the Qi family case was resolved and she no longer had a great vendetta, at certain moments Pei Yunying could still vaguely sense that she seemed to be hiding a secret, a deeper secret that she didn’t want anyone to discover.

She was too cunning, and habitually enduring, no matter how he probed and questioned, she didn’t show any flaws.

The young man’s gaze was too sharp; even through the black cloth, it seemed able to see through people.

Lu Tong turned her head away, as if to hide something, changing the subject: “That’s not important. Rather, what about you? I might not be able to find the redwood vine. You followed me up the mountain – aren’t you afraid of being trapped and dying here?”

“Not afraid.” Pei Yunying spoke carelessly. “After all, you brought enough supplies.”

“What if I can’t find the way?”

“Then I’ll die with you.”

Pei Yunying glanced at her with a smile, handing her the water pouch. “After all, you said before in the medical hall that you wanted to die with me.”

Lu Tong was stunned for a moment, momentarily forgetting to take the water pouch from his hand.

It seemed that even earlier, at Renxin Medical Hall when he came to confront her about the corpse at Wangchun Mountain that had been used to frame Duan Xiaoyan, he had come with ill intent, full of schemes, probing and sparring with every word. At that time, she had threatened to die together with Pei Yunying, but he had responded unhurriedly with a smile: “Sharing a bed in life and a grave in death, living together in one tomb after death – these things I only do with my wife.”

Those words of scheming and probing from back then, now spoken again, had an entirely different meaning.

While she was still in a daze, Pei Yunying’s faint laughing voice came from beside her.

“Doctor Lu, if you can’t find the way out today, we really can share a tomb after death.”

He said it playfully, but Lu Tong jumped up like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, saying: “Who wants to die with you?”

Pei Yunying was startled for a moment, somewhat puzzled: “It was just a joke, why are you so agitated?”

She pulled down the black cloth from her face in one motion, holding back her anger as she glared at him.

Pei Yunying sat under the tree, also removing his clothes, staring at her, his gaze flickering slightly.

The previously light atmosphere was instantly broken, creating a moment of stagnation in the surroundings.

“This isn’t funny.” After a stalemate, Lu Tong said coldly: “Don’t joke about life and death.”

Pei Yunying: “You…”

Lu Tong turned around wordlessly, lowered her head to put away the water pouch, shouldered her medicine box, and walked forward without looking back: “Let’s go.”

She rose so swiftly that Pei Yunying lowered his eyes in thought for a moment, said nothing, picked up the earlier bundle, and walked forward with her.

Luomei Peak was vast with snow, and except for the red plum blossoms covering the mountains, it was difficult to distinguish one place from another. No wonder Cai Fang and Lin Wenhu had repeatedly warned them; if ordinary people entered the mountain at this time, nine out of ten would get lost inside.

The wind and snow gradually increased.

The snow on the mountain came more suddenly than below, with flakes of snow howling and swooping down, almost blinding one’s eyes. Lu Tong wasn’t paying attention and stepped into a snow pit, stumbling.

“Careful.”

Pei Yunying steadied her. As Lu Tong stood firm, she suddenly felt dizzy for a moment. This dizziness came so forcefully that she could barely support herself, only managing to stand steady by grabbing his arm.

Pei Yunying looked down: “What’s wrong?”

Lu Tong shook her head, suppressing that moment of discomfort, and when her gaze passed over what was ahead, her eyes suddenly brightened.

“We’re here.”

Not far ahead, there was indeed a winding stream, now completely frozen over, blending with the snow-covered ground, impossible to notice without looking carefully. Unless someone was extremely familiar with this place, it would be very difficult to spot.

Lu Tong carried her medicine box and ran quickly over.

Pei Yunying followed behind her: “Slow down.”

When they got close, they indeed saw that north of the stream, there was a slanting cliff face, now covered with a thick layer of accumulated snow.

Lu Tong looked at the cliff face, her heart suddenly anxious.

Luomei Peak was vast, with different medicinal herbs and poisons in different areas. Yun Niang always had her running around, and over those years, she had memorized every plant on this mountain. Several years ago, she had indeed cut and gathered red wood vine here, but she didn’t know if it was still there now.

She walked to the cliff face and placed her palm against it, instantly feeling bone-chilling cold.

Pei Yunying glanced at her, pulled Lu Tong away, and reached out himself to brush away the snow from the cliff face.

The cleared cliff face was empty, with nothing there except for half a withered wooden vine stump, shriveled up, clinging to the cliff face.

Lu Tong was stunned for a moment, bending down to pick up the dead wood.

The withered vine in her hand was lifeless, like a rotted rope, curled up in her palm.

She stiffened for a moment, looking up at Pei Yunying.

Pei Yunying started: “What’s wrong?”

“…It’s withered.”

Lu Tong murmured: “The redwood vine here has withered.”