Xiao Li asked, “Does it hurt badly?”

Wen Yu gently shook her head. Her face was deathly pale without a trace of blood, only her eye sockets still tinged with red. Her collar had been pulled down slightly to facilitate applying medicine. Her collarbone, illuminated warmly by the firelight, was covered only by a thin layer of flesh—a fragility that could be called exquisite.

And that most vulnerable section of her snow-white neck was completely exposed without reservation in the sight of the person before her due to her slightly tilted head posture.

Xiao Li looked at that inch-long wound on the side of her neck. The hand pressing on Wen Yu’s shoulder tightened slightly. Then he put away the medicine, tore a strip of cloth from Wen Yu’s inner garment sleeve, and wrapped it around.

His clothes inside and out were all soaked with blood—terribly filthy. He could only use Wen Yu’s own.

His rough fingertips touched the delicate skin on her neck. Wen Yu still trembled slightly from enduring pain. The firelight scorched their soaked clothing. In this intersection of cold and heat, when Xiao Li lowered his eyes to look at her, the two people’s breaths were almost entangled.

Those feelings surging wildly in his heart yet always suppressed, after tonight’s shared brush with death, were like underground spring water filled to overflowing by the storm. Even with the utmost restraint, they would still seep out from collapsed corners.

Xiao Li said, “Don’t do such things again in the future. Don’t you still need revenge? If you die, you can’t avenge anything.”

Wen Yu’s breathing was filled entirely with the strong bloody scent from him. The soaked clothing wrapped around her body felt cold, yet whether enveloped by his breath or because of being warmed by the firelight, she also felt faintly hot.

Those feelings he had never spoken aloud had all been laid bare before her tonight in those few words “I care.”

Wen Yu couldn’t pretend to be deaf and blind. When she raised her eyes and met Xiao Li’s gaze, she felt her own vision was as if strangled.

Her eye sockets still ached. Those eyes, still faintly red from crying, just by looking at someone, could make them abandon their armor.

Perhaps life and death most easily destroyed that defense line called reason in the mind. Enveloped overwhelmingly by the other’s breath, for an instant Wen Yu also wanted to forget who she was.

But such thoughts only fleetingly appeared before she became clear-headed.

Wen Yu averted her eyes, looking at the firelight as she said weakly, “With the Wen clan fallen to this state, that I can still have you, Guard Cen, and Tongque risk your lives to protect me—this is my fortune.”

“My life is not much more noble than yours. That day when Tongque was wounded, I threatened the soldiers with my life not to harm her. Today when you were trapped because of me, how could I watch you die before my eyes?”

She once again brought up Cen An and Tongque, making tonight’s act of slashing her own throat to save him no different from saving Tongque that day.

That sticky web-like covering over the two people vanished completely.

Xiao Li looked at her lowered long lashes. After finishing bandaging her wound, he withdrew his hand, only saying, “Seems my judgment isn’t bad—I followed a good master.”

Hearing these words, Wen Yu felt a slight stab in her heart and said, “I’ve never viewed you as a servant. Both you and your mother have shown me kindness. When I reach Southern Chen in the future, I will only treat you as an honored guest.”

Xiao Li used a thin branch to stir the burned ash in the fire pile. The firelight outlined his profile. He seemed to smile slightly, saying, “I’m a rough person—I can’t be an honored guest. Being a vanguard soldier is fine.”

After speaking, he looked at his robes still dripping blood and said, “Rolled in the mud several times—I’m quite filthy. I saw a stone pit outside that’s collected quite a bit of rainwater. I’ll go out to wash.”

Wen Yu watched his departing back. Complex emotions churned in those cold, shattered eyes. After much struggling, they ultimately returned to a deathly still silence like stagnant water.

National enmity and family hatred had long since destroyed everything about her.

This life of hers had long ceased to be lived for herself—she lived for revenge.

—

After Xiao Li walked out of the cave, the mouthful of stagnant blood he’d been forcefully suppressing in his throat finally spilled out.

After that taut string in his mind relaxed, he finally felt pain all over his body, especially his chest. Every breath felt like tearing at the flesh and blood inside.

He estimated the death warriors had probably broken his ribs when they pressed him to the ground and kicked him.

He used the back of his hand to wipe away the blood traces at his lips.

Still, it was fortunate that ribs were broken. If it had been arms or legs, perhaps he and Wen Yu truly would have died there tonight.

After Xiao Li leaned against the stone wall to ease his breathing somewhat, he walked to the washbasin-sized water pit, scooped up several handfuls of water and carelessly poured it on his face, washing away the blood traces. He scooped another handful to rinse his mouth, and along the way also washed once over the wounds on his body wrapped in bloody mud, before wringing out the clothing that had been filtered of most blood stains in the water and roughly tearing his inner garment into strips.

The blade wounds the death warriors had carved into his body were all extremely long, with flesh turned outward. That bit of wound medicine hidden in the scabbard simply wasn’t enough.

Borrowing the faint firelight filtering through the vine covering at the cave entrance, Xiao Li sprinkled the remaining wound medicine on several of the most serious wounds, then wrapped them with the torn inner garment.

He put on his outer robe and hastily fastened it, picked up his blade and walked along both ends of the stone crevice, searching for other exits.

But tonight’s rain was heavy and the night sky pitch black. Under concealment of broken cliff rocks and tangled shrubbery, what the naked eye could see was truly limited. He only discovered at a depression in the mountain rock a spring eye where underground spring water emerged. That water flowed along broken stones on one side into a mountain ravine.

Xiao Li breathed slightly easier. This spring water was clean and drinkable.

He removed the bronze water flask hanging at his waist that had been dented in the fighting. He originally wanted to fetch some water to bring back for Wen Yu, but feeling its heavy weight inside, he remembered this flask contained the cold medicine prepared for Wen Yu.

Back at the inn, he had intended to take it to the kitchen to warm for her. Who would have thought they’d encounter pursuing soldiers, so it had remained on him all this time.

Fortunately this medicine hadn’t been lost. After tonight’s drenching rain, Wen Yu’s cold would certainly worsen. With this flask of medicine, she should be able to pull through.

Xiao Li placed the flask beside the spring eye and scooped two mouthfuls of cold spring water to drink himself.

When mountain wind whistled sharply through the stone crevice, something struck near his feet.

Xiao Li took out his fire starter for a closer look and discovered it was a wild hawthorn berry. On the ground were quite a few such fruits blown by the wind, though many had already rotted. Earlier it had been too dark for him to notice.

In the night darkness he couldn’t see clearly where that hawthorn tree grew. He thought that tomorrow after daybreak, he could come look for it.

Holding the fire starter, he picked up some fresh hawthorns just blown down from the tree, washed them at the spring eye, and brought them all back.

When Xiao Li parted the vines at the cave entrance, Wen Yu, who had been weakly leaning against the stone wall, opened her eyes and asked, “Where did you go? Why were you out so long?”

Xiao Li placed the hawthorns cushioned on leaves plucked from the vines beside her, saying, “I simply washed off the bloody smell outside, and after bandaging wounds I looked around. It’s too dark to see clearly—I haven’t found an exit yet. However, at the left end of the stone crevice, there’s a spring eye for underground spring water. There should also be a hawthorn tree growing on the cliff wall nearby. I picked up some blown down by the wind. Make do with eating some. Tomorrow I’ll go out and look again.”

Wen Yu’s gaze fell on those gashes torn in his outer robe by blade edges. She said, “You also have several wounds on your back. How did you bandage them yourself?”

She raised her eyes to look at him, sorrow showing in eyes bright as lightning outside the cave: “Has the wound medicine run out? You didn’t apply any medicine at all, did you?”

Hearing this, Xiao Li seemed somewhat amused yet helpless as he pulled open his collar, revealing his robust chest wound with cloth strips inside: “Why would I lie to you? If you’re not reassured, by all means help me unwrap and rebandage it.”

Water dripped from the tips of his hair. His dark eyes looked at Wen Yu, half-jokingly saying, “I would welcome it.”

Wen Yu felt slightly annoyed in her heart. She turned her face away, no longer looking at him, but did dispel her misgivings that he hadn’t applied medicine.

This sudden roguish manner of his made her somewhat unaccustomed.

But she also vaguely understood why he was acting this way.

That gradually clarifying affection of his had been blocked back by her single statement that threatening with her life to save him was no different from saving Tongque.

If he continued as before, perhaps that guilt in her heart would only accumulate heavier.

By putting on this frivolous appearance, perhaps he was also trying to tell her that he understood that rejection and would withdraw his feelings, no longer bringing her any trouble.

She should be glad, yet her heart harbored a bitterness she herself couldn’t quite describe.

While she was lost in thought, Xiao Li placed that water flask beside her, saying, “This is the medicine I had the medical hall apprentice brew for you yesterday afternoon. It comes in handy now. Drink the medicine in a bit, and your wet clothes… you’d best take them off too. I’ll dry them for you, otherwise your cold will only worsen.”

Wen Yu clutched the felt cloak draped over her, not immediately responding.

Xiao Li seemed to know her concerns and said, “I’ll go outside the cave. Call me when you’ve changed.”

Though cold rain wasn’t pouring into the stone crevice outside the cave, water would still drip through gaps in the leaves. Moreover, the wind was strong outside. With his injuries far more severe than hers, he was only holding up by virtue of his build.

With them now trapped here, if he also fell ill, they would truly only be able to wait for death in this place.

When he stood up, Wen Yu said, “No need to go outside. Just turn your back.”

Xiao Li turned his head to look at her, smiling slightly as he asked, “You trust me this much?”

Wen Yu was silent for a breath before saying, “A person who entrusts his life to me—why would I not trust him?”

That feigned frivolous smile on Xiao Li’s face suddenly became somewhat difficult to maintain.

He lifted his foot to walk outside, only saying, “Call me when you’ve changed.”

Cold wind rushed into the cave when he lifted the vines at the entrance, causing the firelight to flicker unsteadily.

Wen Yu lowered her eyes to look at the water marks spreading on the ground from her soaked hem, knowing he was unwilling to overstep propriety by even half a measure. She lost focus shallowly for an instant before removing the cloak from her body and shedding her wet clothes.

Xiao Li held his blade leaning against the stone wall outside the cave, letting cold wind fill his robes.

Every wound on his body ached, yet that mass of beating flesh and blood in his chest still rolled as hot as magma, clamoring with unwillingness, churning with ambition and desire that could scorch all his skin and bones.

He gazed through this darkness as black and seemingly endless as if it had no end, looking sideways toward Southern Chen beyond countless towering mountains and steep ridges.

He clearly understood what that hatred was that twisted his entire heart into something savage.

He was jealous.

Jealous of that Prince of Chen whom he had never met!