A pale hand extended from the carriage, and Lingxi placed her slender arm into it.
The Matriarch was dressed in a dark green robe that made her fair skin appear luminescent. Her beautiful features bore only a few faint crow’s feet at the corners of her eyes, giving her the appearance of a woman in her thirties, making it almost impossible to tell she was the grandmother of Mei Tingzhu.
Upon entering the house, the Matriarch surveyed the room with a sigh, “The Mei family has fallen this far.”
Mei Tingzhu poured her a cup of water and handed it to her. “It is as we expected. We have all prepared for this day.”
“Why have you come, Matriarch?” Mei Tingzhu interrupted as Lingxi was about to retort. “Let’s be direct – we all know your identity. Now that the Mei family has fallen, you should return to your original position. When the family was prosperous, we could not be of one mind, how could we be now?”
“Fourth Miss has always been perceptive,” the Matriarch said calmly, unperturbed by having her secret revealed. “Marrying into the Mei family was both the luckiest and most painful event of my life.”
Before marrying into the Mei family, she had been a member of the Dragon Warrior Guard. One by one, the female assassins around her were placed on the dragon couch to become the emperor’s immortal concubines. She had thought she would be trapped in this dark abyss forever, never seeing the light of day, until fate allowed her a glimmer of hope – the emperor bestowed her upon the Mei family as the main wife.
If there was no hope, there would be no greater despair. This false glimmer of light gave her a chance at rebirth, only to plunge her into another abyss, experiencing an even more painful and agonizing life.
Thinking of this, the Matriarch’s brow furrowed slightly, her tone as calm and slow as before. “Everyone has unspoken feelings. You need not ask why I have come. I swear on the grave of my departed daughter that I will not do anything to harm the Mei family.”
The Matriarch of the main house was not always this cold. It was only after the death of her only biological daughter that she had changed so drastically. If there was anything she cared about, it was undoubtedly that daughter.
“Although the Mei family has fallen, we can still provide for you. The west of the river is impoverished, you should return to the capital to live out your days,” Mei Tingzhu suggested.
The Matriarch smiled. “I have come today to acknowledge my kinship, for I still have this sentiment in my heart. I am the Matriarch of the main house, even if the main house has perished. It is not up to the younger generation of the second house to arrange my affairs, is that not so?”
“The Matriarch speaks rightly,” Mei Tingzhu replied with a smile. “If the Matriarch has any needs, you can come to me at any time. For now, the matters of the second house are in my hands.”
The Matriarch adjusted her sleeve cuffs. “Then please have the Fourth Miss find me a place to stay here in the west.”
Mei Tingzhu nodded. “It’s a small matter. The County Magistrate has allotted nineteen households to the Mei family, and two of the houses are empty. If the Matriarch doesn’t mind, you can stay there.”
“Good.” The Matriarch agreed without even looking, for even the most bitter of hardships could not surpass her past experiences of sleeping under the stars, and no amount of luxury could exceed her time dominating the Mei family.
Mei Tingzhu had originally led the clan to Wexian County to find a cure for the poison, but after arriving, she developed a desire to stay. In the capital of Bianjing, she could only cower and tread carefully, constantly fearing the emperor’s attention. But the vast lands of Wexian County, though not as impressive as Bianjing, offered a freer way of living. Now that An Jiu had control over the one thousand self-defense troops of Wexian County if the Mei family started to get involved…
In the capital of the Liao Kingdom, within a secret chamber, a beam of moonlight shone down on the feet of a man dressed in black.
He sat in a wheelchair. His well-fitted clothes outlined his tall, slender figure. His long hair hung loose over his broad shoulders. A silver half-mask was tightly affixed to his face, reflecting a faint, cold light and accentuating the elegant lines of his profile, giving him an aura of icy austerity.
“Grand Preceptor, the emperor has already sent someone to Wexian,” a shadowy figure crouched in the darkness, reporting Ye Lüquan’s movements. “That person was once the Matriarch of the Mei family’s main house, the grandmother of Miss An.”
The person in the shadows did not dare to disobey Xiao Che’s wishes, but secretly wondered, shouldn’t a genius like the Grand Preceptor focus his thoughts on great matters? Why was he so fixated on obtaining this obscure and unknown woman?
Xiao Che had a book resting on his lap, and his long, gloved fingers turned the pages of the worn manuscript one by one.
“What does she look like?” he asked.
He had asked this question no less than ten times before.
If he truly wanted to see An Jiu, he could have done so long ago, whether by capturing her or going to see her himself. The person in the shadows was puzzled, but still described An Jiu’s appearance as he had done previously.
Beautiful, and cold.
From the mouths of others, Xiao Che could only obtain these two vague descriptions.
“Go, continue to keep an eye on her,” Xiao Che said.
The person acknowledged and disappeared into the darkness.
Xiao Che paused his movements, tilting his head to gaze at the beam of moonlight, motionless like a magnificent statue.
“An Jiu…” Each time he spoke her name, a strange emotion stirred within him.
The book on his lap was one he had written himself, back when he still had some residual memories. He had hastily jotted down many things, and in the following years, he had used these fragmented memories to commit many shocking deeds, but his heart had grown increasingly hollow.
Confusion, like a shadow, followed him, deepening as his memories faded.
Until he learned of An Jiu’s existence.
He stubbornly, almost obsessively, pursued perfection, constantly pondering how to integrate her into his life. When he established the “Hunters”, An Jiu was the first person he thought of – from any perspective, she was the perfect weapon he sought. Yet, for some reason, he had eventually abandoned this idea.
Just as he was still struggling to explore this, someone unexpectedly approached An Jiu, shielding her tightly.
It seemed that to possess, one must first have a connection.
“Are you my antidote?” Xiao Che’s fingers caressed the frantic scrawls on the pages, a long-forgotten warmth igniting in his bloodstream.
It was a thrilling sensation, challenging the great fear within him.
Whether he wanted to admit it or not, he could not erase the deep-rooted fear in his heart. What if An Jiu could not help him regain his memories? What if her appearance did not change his circumstances at all? Then what should he do? What should he do?
She was like a glimmer of hope, just her presence enough to sustain him. But he could not live in ambiguity forever – he would have to confront it, see if it was the truth or merely a bubble.
Xiao Che closed the book, leaning forward to touch the beam of moonlight before him. His ten long fingers intertwined as if trying to catch the light, but only managing to stir the white frost on the ground into fragments.
An Jiu, I have arrived. Do you know?