Baozi was startled by the sound and opened his mouth wide. The crystal dumpling slipped out with a “plop.” Blinking his big eyes, he looked at Xiao Jue. Eh, it was just eating a dumpling—was it worth staring at him with such a strange look?

Shivering, Xiao Baozi rolled his eyes… He couldn’t be regretting it and wanting to take back the silver note but being too embarrassed, so now he was plotting to kill and silence him… No way… Snacks are precious, but life is worth more…

“That…” With an ingratiating smile, Xiao Baozi leaned his head over. “You like eating dumplings? It’s fine, I’ll give them to you.” He grabbed the half-dumpling that had fallen from his mouth earlier and handed it over. Xiao Jue’s mind was in chaos. He took it in a daze, not knowing what he was doing, and looked at the dumpling with a complex expression for a long while before asking, “Where is your mother?”

“At the nunnery.” Baozi looked up at the sky. Come on, Your Imperial Majesty, you just asked this question about a quarter-hour ago.

Xiao Jue immediately stood up and was about to leave. After taking one step, he immediately turned back and looked at Xiao Baozi: “Would you… would you be willing to come back to the palace with me?”

“Gah!” Xiao Baozi’s eyes went wide. Wasn’t this the line emperors used in operas when they met beautiful commoner women and wanted to make them consorts? How did it end up being used on him? Go back to the palace—what would I do going back to the palace with you?

Suddenly remembering the bedtime stories his stinky mother often told him before sleep—something about corrupt women, little bottoms, beautiful men and wolves, perverted shotas and younger tops… Ah, no way, Young Master me is only four years old!

“Not going!” His head shook like a rattle drum. After thinking, he was afraid the Emperor might get angry and take back that silver note, so he added, “If my mother goes, then I’ll go.”

Xiao Baozi shyly calculated… In case of that this or that… just send Mother up, she could probably manage.

What were mothers for? When necessary, they were to be pushed out to put out fires!

Xiao Jue only saw his face full of strange expressions with an odd gleam in his eyes, those big watery eyes sneakily glancing at him up and down. How could he know the dirty thoughts in the child’s mind? After thinking, he called over the guard commander and gave some instructions, leaving a squad of guards to protect Baozi. Such a small child wandering the streets alone—who would guarantee his safety? Ming Shuang was really too careless.

Without realizing it, he had already begun treating Baozi as his son.

Thinking of the possibility raised by that earlier statement, he became increasingly anxious and hurriedly rushed to Shanglin Nunnery.

Here, as soon as Xiao Baozi saw him leave, he immediately held up his empty plate and looked up at the shop owner with a villainous grin.

“Another pot of thousand-layer cakes!”

Rong Xiaotian pressed his lips together, looking at the person sitting in a wheelchair in the garden ahead, slightly lowering his head to look at the ants at his feet. His eyes changed like rolling angry waves.

It really was him.

He wasn’t dead, he wasn’t dead…

He actually wasn’t dead.

He stood outside the garden gate, watching Su Xuan beside that person, talking and laughing enthusiastically. That person seemed to be listening yet not listening, his expression indifferent. Occasionally turning his head, showing a beautiful, elegant profile like a painting.

It was him, yet it wasn’t him. Much thinner than in memory, his chin sharper, his face shape somewhat changed. His slender body was wrapped in pale blue robes, and though it wasn’t yet early winter, he already wore white fur. The robe wasn’t particularly large, but still seemed somewhat empty on him. Delicate and thin as a chrysanthemum, the wind stirred the snow fox fur trimming his collar and sleeves. Between the snow-colored long fur showed even whiter cheeks and fingers, making his naturally cold temperament appear even more cold as deep water.

His gaze moved down to fall on the legs covered by thick blankets—they could no longer move, could they? The consequence of forcibly driving the Soul-Destroying Palm force downward, fighting with ruined legs to preserve his life. No matter what, he was indeed worthy of being the martial genius Chu Feihuan, able to escape alive from the Soul-Destroying Palm—that was a miracle by any measure.

Rong Xiaotian’s fingers dug deeply into his palms.

Beside him, Song Beichen, the Xuanmu Hall Master of the Blazing Flame Gang who had come with him, had originally been happy. Today he had been sent by the gang leader to deliver a message, inviting that Miss Ming who managed Heng Records to visit the gang. Unexpectedly, during their conversation, when he casually mentioned the medicine the gang leader had been desperately seeking, Master Qi immediately said he had it. It was truly like finding something after wearing out iron shoes searching—effortless to obtain. He thought the gang leader would be overjoyed to know, and was excitedly about to announce the good news loudly when the person in front pulled him back.

Turning his head, Song Beichen was stunned.

What was wrong with Master Rong? His face looked terrible…

After three years, Rong Xiaotian bore the blood vengeance for the Empress and had been keeping a low profile with Huang Meng. His temperament was no longer as violent as before. Moreover, though Qin Chang Ge’s words that day hadn’t shaken his firm belief that Chu Feihuan was a traitor, they had planted some seeds of doubt. That’s why today, upon seeing him, he didn’t immediately explode.

However, he still couldn’t control his agitation. Staring at that person who should have died long ago but was actually still living well, he felt even his heart and lungs burning. That scorching fire reached his face, yet it was deathly pale. His fingers clenched tightly, and he could faintly hear the crackling of his knuckles.

He was hesitating whether to rush out and give him a good scolding, or first ask why he hadn’t died.

…

But a pair of hands gently rested on his shoulders. Startled, he turned to look and saw Qi Fan, who had been worried and rushed over. His face wore a strange expression—seeming happy yet sad, hateful yet doubtful—also staring intently at Chu Feihuan. His lips moved but he said nothing.

Seeing him, Rong Xiaotian calmed down somewhat. The two had cooperated for years and understood each other’s thoughts. They no longer needed verbal communication—a single look conveyed their intentions.

He asked, “Attack?” Qi Fan replied, “Don’t be hasty.”

But before they could discuss it clearly, that person who had clearly been listening to someone speak in the distance suddenly turned to look their way.

Cold eyes met Rong Xiaotian’s gaze directly.

Rong Xiaotian’s hand immediately went to his sword hilt.

But Chu Feihuan only glanced coldly, then looked away, as if he hadn’t seen these two at all, as if those who had fought him to the death that year, knocking him off the bridge and causing him to narrowly escape death through countless hardships and suffer all manner of worldly pain, were not these two people who had once been his brothers.

Su Xuan, unaware of the situation, was already approaching with a smile.

Seeing the Golden Viper Pearl in Song Beichen’s arms, his eyes lit up with great joy: “Beichen, where did you find this? Heavens! I’ve been looking for this for so long!” He reached out to take it.

Rong Xiaotian pressed down with his hand, stopping the box.

Su Xuan looked up, raising an eyebrow.

Rong Xiaotian said heavily: “I’m sorry, Gang Leader Su. I’ve changed my mind. This Golden Viper Pearl cannot be given to you.”

Su Xuan looked at his expression, slowly turned to glance at Chu Feihuan, his expression understanding, yet still said slowly: “Why?”

“This is a traitor from our Heng Records,” Rong Xiaotian said through gritted teeth. “Not only can’t we give you the medicine, I must also clean up our organization.”

“Clean up your organization?” Su Xuan smiled. “Here?”

“I wouldn’t dare,” Rong Xiaotian said stiffly. “I ask the Gang Leader to hand this traitor over to us for disposal.”

Su Xuan stopped smiling and said slowly but clearly: “He is my friend.”

“My friend,” he said word by word, “how could there be any reason to hand him over to others for disposal?”

Anger flashed in Rong Xiaotian’s eyes, but he also knew that in the Blazing Flame Gang’s headquarters, asking the gang leader to hand over the gang leader’s friend was absolutely impossible. Martial artists valued loyalty above all—if word got out, Su Xuan and the Blazing Flame Gang would no longer be able to survive in the martial world.

But he was absolutely unwilling to withdraw now.

“Clang!”

His long sword left its sheath with fierce radiance. Rong Xiaotian placed the sword across his wrist, following proper martial etiquette, and said coldly: “Today I challenge Gang Leader Su to combat here, life and death irrelevant. If I’m fortunate enough to win even half a move, please allow me to take this person away.”

“Why should I fight you?” Su Xuan completely ignored him. “This is not a matter for negotiation. He will not be taken away by you. He is my friend, and I won’t gamble with my friend’s life in combat with others. I don’t have that right.”

He looked at Rong Xiaotian without a smile. “Do you often gamble with friends’ lives and deaths in combat with others?”

Stuttering, Rong Xiaotian angrily said: “He’s a traitor!”

“That’s your family affair,” Su Xuan yielded not an inch. “It has nothing to do with my making friends.”

Taking a deep breath, Rong Xiaotian said grimly: “So Gang Leader Su intends to protect this person to the end?”

“This isn’t protection,” Su Xuan said frankly. “You’re just unilaterally deciding he’s guilty. And you—are you necessarily correct? From my understanding of him, he would never be a traitor, regardless of the circumstances.”

“Understanding?” Rong Xiaotian sneered. “How long has the Gang Leader known him? One month? Two months? Does the Gang Leader know how long I’ve known him?”

“Some meet and become instant friends, others know each other for years yet remain strangers,” Su Xuan didn’t get angry. “Whether one truly knows another isn’t determined by time.”

“You…” Rong Xiaotian swept his sword across, unable to bear it any longer and wanting to attack. His arrogant nature had already been restrained during their earlier conversation, not wanting to be disrespectful in someone else’s headquarters. Now truly enraged, he acted regardless of consequences. His long sword’s cold radiance suddenly rose like moonlight soaring to heaven, like silk flying forward horizontally.

Cold light swept across in a startling rainbow.

But Su Xuan didn’t engage, retreating three zhang like a wisp of light smoke. Qi Fan, who had been silently listening to their argument while quietly contemplating Chu Feihuan who seemed to wander in thought as if the matter didn’t concern him, had long since raised his arm, his golden mace striking out to block Rong Xiaotian.

With a grating sound, sparks flew everywhere.

Amid the flying sparks, someone smiled and said: “What’s this? Internal fighting?”

They turned around abruptly.

Today had been gloomy weather with a dim sun and floating clouds blocking all sides. Rolling dark clouds accumulated in waves at the horizon like galloping gray horses, layer upon layer, crowding and jostling, shouting and burning at the sky’s edge, making heaven and earth completely dark.

From this dark, chaotic background emerged a graceful, beautiful woman in light silk gauze with jade sashes fluttering in the wind. In an instant, everyone felt the sky brighten.

But Qin Chang Ge didn’t look at anyone else. Her gaze fell first on Chu Feihuan.

That youth who had once been somewhat cold but beautiful and bright, standing straight as bamboo, was now so thin as to be fragile in the wind. Though this made his features even more startlingly beautiful, those legs covered by fox fur blankets that had never moved filled even Qin Chang Ge—who had experienced three lifetimes and bore deep vengeance without ever being moved—with rare sorrow.

Feihuan, I never thought that the seriously ill person Su Xuan so praised would be you.

In just three years, everything had changed. You, who had heard of Ruiyi’s death and then been surrounded and attacked by brothers, ending up disabled for life—how have you passed these years?

That year walking on Zhan Du Bridge, peach blossoms blooming like snow marking your footsteps—who could have thought those were the last steps I’d remember.

Zhan Du, Zhan Du—it could ferry you across life and death, but couldn’t ferry you across fate and human hearts.

Was it that late-blooming peach blossom that year that extinguished the last prosperity of your life?

A precautionary escape route became your life raft by accident, a casual joking prediction became the gray prophecy blocking your path. I don’t know whether to thank heaven’s mercy or resent fate’s cruelty, but in the end I can only remain silent and melancholy.

Meeting again across worlds, with mixed feelings.

All I can do is smile without words.

Perhaps there were countless words in Qin Chang Ge’s gaze. The man who had remained indifferent and unmoved finally raised his head, his gaze lightly sweeping across her face.

His eyes were so deep and black, black as a thousand-year-old silent abyss without a ripple. Such eyes seemed to have swallowed all things in the world, burying them permanently beyond struggle or escape. All those once lively years, flickering flames, spring-colored misty smiles, the resolute bearing of crossing rivers and seas—all had turned into the last wisp of overnight incense ash in a bronze censer, cold and cool, no longer finding a trace of warm red.

If Chu Feihuan’s silence in the past had been peaceful and cool silence, his current silence was the silence of death and desolation.

Qin Chang Ge sighed silently and turned to Qi Fan, who looked somewhat embarrassed and smiled reluctantly: “Miss Ming, how did you come here too…”

“If I didn’t come, would I watch you commit another foolish act? Repeat that enormous mistake again?” Qin Chang Ge rudely interrupted him—she was in a very bad mood, like a little girl!

Qi Fan’s eyebrows twitched as he slowly turned toward Chu Feihuan: “Enormous—mistake?”

But Rong Xiaotian angrily said: “What? Where was the mistake?”

Qin Chang Ge ignored him and looked at Su Xuan: “Gang Leader invited me—was it because there’s news about that assassin?”

“Yes,” Su Xuan smiled. “We found out that person was from Longdong, and there are some interesting things I’d like to tell you about.”

“Good,” Qin Chang Ge nodded. “Gang Leader is indeed a hero—finding clues in just a few days. Since that’s the case, I also have some interesting things to reciprocate with the Gang Leader. But this place isn’t convenient—let’s go inside to talk.”

Su Xuan smiled in agreement and went to push Chu Feihuan’s wheelchair. Qin Chang Ge stopped him: “Let me.”

She reached out and grasped the chair back. Su Xuan looked somewhat uneasy, clearly worried that Chu Feihuan would refuse and embarrass Qin Chang Ge. But in an instant, his eyes widened—Chu Feihuan silently allowed her to push him inside.

Qin Chang Ge stood behind Chu Feihuan, gently pushing him, looking at his thin shoulders, lowering her eyelashes and sighing silently.

But Chu Feihuan sensed it.

“You’re sighing,” he didn’t turn back. “Why?”

“For you.” Qin Chang Ge spoke honestly.

“For me?” Chu Feihuan repeated quietly, as if savoring the words, then smiled mockingly. “Yes, anyone seeing a young cripple would react this way.”

“A few days ago, right here, I personally blinded a man’s eyes.” Qin Chang Ge answered irrelevantly.

“Hmm?”

“I’m telling you that I’m not one of those girls or young wives who shed tears seeing others in poor circumstances. When necessary, I can personally create others’ disabilities—why would I sigh over your little problem?” Qin Chang Ge bent down. “Brother Chu, Chu Feihuan, life is just a play of rights and wrongs and joy. Everyone faces the suffering of cycles and setbacks—why do you abandon yourself like this?”

Fragrant breath brushed his ear, the rose-like fresh scent seeming to carry a slight mint coolness. Chu Feihuan’s heart stirred, and he finally turned to really look at the woman beside him. That beautiful yet unfamiliar face made him silent. He quietly looked up, as if trying to find his beloved’s features in the vast sky.

At this time, after Qi Fan and Rong Xiaotian looked at each other, they also followed. Qin Chang Ge said no more—there was plenty of time ahead, no need to rush.

Su Xuan led them into the room, looked around, and very tactfully said: “This is Heng Records’ family affair—I won’t participate. I’ll wait outside, but please promise me you won’t harm a single hair on my brother’s head.”

“Don’t worry,” Qin Chang Ge smiled with meaning. “I guarantee they won’t attack again.”

Rong Xiaotian snorted and was about to speak, but Qi Fan grabbed his sleeve.

Looking seriously at Qin Chang Ge, Qi Fan put away his usually informal expression and said gravely: “Miss Ming, how do you know Chu Feihuan? If you know something, please tell us immediately, otherwise my brother won’t back down.”

Qin Chang Ge took out the paper slip Qi Fan had given her earlier: “Look at this first.”

The two took it and quickly read it. Qi Fan read aloud softly: “…In the second year of Tianbi, there was civil unrest in Li Country. Princess Yucui, who was most favored by the old king, and the palace consort Dan Consort plotted rebellion, using chronic poison to control the old king’s mind, intending to hold the emperor hostage to command the vassals. The princess’s power grew, the princes fought for position, and Li Country’s political situation fell into bloody chaos… In the second month, a red broken rainbow appeared in the southwestern sky. The Imperial Observatory reported: Female calamity, inauspicious…”

He read slower and slower. By the end, his fingers were trembling and sweat was beading on his nose.

A terrifying thought was gradually forming in his mind, but it was so chilling that he didn’t dare face it.

The rough Rong Xiaotian still hadn’t noticed and said dissatisfiedly: “So what? What does Li Country’s affairs have to do with us!”

“You’ve been blinded by hatred,” Qin Chang Ge sighed softly. “Brother Rong, the late Empress told me about you three. In my memory, you shouldn’t have been like this.”

Rong Xiaotian was stunned, his face suddenly changing.

“The so-called ‘On the yiwei day of the second month, heaven sent down a hanging rainbow, the cock crowed at dawn, heaven’s way does not permit’—now you should know what it refers to—it wasn’t referring to the Empress’s monopolizing power, nor the Great Joy Fire, but Li Country’s princess causing political chaos, with heaven showing a broken rainbow.”

“As for Li Country having nothing to do with you,” Qin Chang Ge said lightly, “it has nothing to do with you, but it certainly relates to him, to Chu Feihuan, this Prince of Liyuan.”

Rong Xiaotian stumbled back a large step, while Qi Fan gave a short “Ah!”

Chu Feihuan still looked as if he hadn’t heard anything. The room fell silent as death. After a long while, Qi Fan asked hoarsely: “Then how do you explain ‘The request I make, I earnestly hope you will grant. I pray for your precious care and cannot express my hope enough’?”

His face was pale, still clinging to the last shred of hope, but as he spoke, even his lips were trembling. Rong Xiaotian’s fingers gripped the table behind him tightly, his lips blue-white, staring deadly at Chu Feihuan who refused to look at him.

“How to explain it—do you need to ask me?” Qin Chang Ge said lazily. “The princess’s power was great, the princes formed alliances, and as a prince abroad with high martial skills and close friendship with Xiliang’s Empress, using brotherly affection to seek some assistance would be quite normal, wouldn’t it?”

With a crash, Rong Xiaotian couldn’t stand steady and knocked over the table.

The teacups and porcelain on the table clattered and fell, breaking into pieces, the spilled tea wetting Rong Xiaotian’s robe hem. He stood there dazed, completely unaware.

Su Xuan quickly poked his head in, saw nothing was wrong, and immediately disappeared again.

But Qi Fan was breathing deeply, his face pale as paper, clearly trying hard to regulate his breathing. After a long while, he said: “Proof. Proof that he is a prince of Li Country.”

Qin Chang Ge reached out to pull at Chu Feihuan’s clothes.