“Stop!”

A voice full of vigor came from outside the ancestral hall.

A middle-aged man in official robes strode into the ancestral hall, with Lu Jinxiu and several maidservants following behind.

Lu Jinxiu, seeing the situation was dire and fearing something terrible might happen, had hurriedly summoned Third Master of the mansion, Xie Jun’s younger brother Xie Zhu.

If there were people in this mansion whose opinions Duke Changning still had to consider, one was Grand Madam Xie bedridden with illness, and the other was Xie Zhu. After Xie Jun’s retreat from public life, Xie Zhu represented the Xie family’s face in official circles. He was benevolent and loyal, a renowned Confucian teacher in Li Du Mansion.

As soon as Xie Zhu entered, he saw Xie Queshan’s back torn and bleeding, and closed his eyes in distress. Blood is thicker than water after all—bones and tendons are connected when striking bone. Though they cursed him daily, seeing their own nephew in such a state still softened their hearts.

“Third Uncle.”

“Third Master.”

Everyone bowed to Xie Zhu.

“Elder Brother, enough is enough.”

Xie Jun maintained his stern expression without answering.

“He is ultimately a person of Great Qi. If he dies in the Xie family, how will you explain it? Elder Brother, would you destroy the entire Xie family for a moment’s rage?”

Xie Jun closed his eyes and took a deep breath looking upward: “What sins have we committed…”

Xie Jun didn’t even glance at Xie Queshan and turned to leave directly.

Xie Zhu looked at Xie Queshan with heartache: “You have such a spirit of facing death unflinchingly, yet you serve those Qi people… How did it come to this?”

Xie Queshan kept his eyes downcast, acting as if he heard nothing. He tried to stand up but staggered and fell back. Xie Zhu wanted to reach out to help him, but Xie Queshan avoided his touch. Xie Zhu sighed, said nothing more, and also left.

The ancestral hall that had just been full of people instantly emptied completely. No one wanted to be involved with Xie Queshan’s messy affairs.

——

Only after all the commotion had faded away did Nanyi dare to crawl out from under the table. She gripped tightly the dagger Xie Queshan had given her, its bright blade pointing toward him as she slowly approached.

Their safe distance was gone. She was forced to don a hard shell again, showing him her beast’s fangs, performing her bravery and fragility.

Xie Queshan merely glanced at her flatly, neither dodging nor avoiding, showing no reaction, as if she and the threat she posed didn’t exist.

He tried to move his muscles and bones slightly, roughly putting his clothes back on. This series of movements caused piercing pain throughout his body.

He suddenly wanted to confirm something, so dragging his battered body, he slowly walked toward the ancestral tablets. Ignoring Nanyi, he finally stood before a shelf on one side of the ancestral hall and took down the family genealogy placed there.

Turning page by page, he finally reached his generation. The three characters “Xie Chao’en” had been prominently crossed out with vermillion ink.

Xie Queshan laughed. This wasn’t surprising.

Every person standing in the ancestral hall today was a blood relative connected to him. He wasn’t born alone in this world, yet had forced himself to live as a lone wanderer.

“Aren’t you afraid I’ll kill you?”

Xie Queshan didn’t turn around, still staring at that page in the genealogy: “Do you dare kill me?”

Nanyi approached Xie Queshan with the dagger. This sharp blade gave her some courage: “Were you the one who exposed my illegitimate daughter identity?”

“Yes.”

“You’re truly shameless!”

Xie Queshan turned to look at Nanyi. People bully the weak and fear the strong—seeing him covered in wounds, she now had the courage to offend and despise him. But Xie Queshan wasn’t angry either.

“The whole world knows I’m shameless.”

Nanyi glanced at the genealogy. She remembered the three characters for Xie Hengzai. Next to Xie Hengzai was a name crossed out with vermillion.

“Is that your name on there?”

“Yes.”

“Since you escaped, why come back to suffer?”

“Fool—” Xie Queshan sneered, “Haven’t you realized? Escaping is completely useless.”

Nanyi froze.

She was accustomed to running away, being pursued, then escaping death. Her choices were very limited, and she had never thought about whether escaping was useful or not.

But she realized Xie Queshan was right. Each time she ran away only trapped her in deeper quicksand. Even if she left the Xie family today, she couldn’t escape the aristocratic families’ wrath or Li Du Mansion.

“Running away means completely exposing your back to the enemy.”

The ancestral hall fell into deathly silence, with dim candlelight flickering in their eyes.

Nanyi’s voice was full of confusion and hesitation: “Then if not running away, should I just wait to die?”

“Right, you can only wait to die.”

Xie Queshan suddenly stepped forward, grabbed Nanyi’s wrist, and forcibly pulled her hand forward an inch. Her blade tip pressed against his heart.

Nanyi was startled and instead tried desperately to pull her hand back.

“You clearly drew your dagger against me, yet you don’t dare kill me. You can only ever be a cowardly woman.”

He seemed to be provoking her anger.

“I dare not do what even the Xie family doesn’t dare!” Nanyi glared at Xie Queshan angrily. “But Xie Queshan, I’m not afraid of you anymore.”

Xie Queshan’s expression turned fierce. He twisted Nanyi’s wrist and pressed her entire body against the standing cabinet. In an instant, the dagger in her hand was at her own throat.

This series of movements indeed exhausted what little strength he had left. Xie Queshan held Nanyi’s wrist with one hand and braced against the cabinet shelf with the other, veins bulging on his hands as he struggled to support his form. The bloody taste from his mouth faintly brushed against her face.

“You’re an interesting plaything, so I spare your life, but you seem to have forgotten your place.”

With the blade pressed against her throat, Nanyi couldn’t help but be afraid, yet she still met Xie Queshan’s gaze and stared back at him.

“Do you dare kill me in the Xie family ancestral hall?”

They confronted each other for a long time, neither moving.

“I’m not afraid of you, because you’re not much better off than me. We’re both stray dogs.” Her words contained trembling, yet each word struck his face.

Xie Queshan released his grip and stepped back several paces, looking up at the rows of ancestral tablets. Light and shadow fell in his eyes, seemingly with flickering tears that flashed and vanished.

“Get out.”

Nanyi left, and everything returned to silence.

Xie Queshan gazed at the empty spirit wall. Finally unable to support himself, his form swayed and he slowly slid down to sit.

A bitter smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

…

Night had fallen, and all of Li Du Mansion was shrouded in peaceful moonlight.

The night watchman’s wooden clappers sounded in the streets, carried far by the wind—even the ancestral hall in the deep courtyards of Wangxue Manor could hear them.

Xie Queshan remained in the ancestral hall. He sat on the ground and took a set of tools from his sleeve—actually a miniature set of paper, ink, brush, and inkstone. The ink was specially made colorless ink. Tiny characters fell on the paper, and the water traces quickly disappeared, leaving no marks on the letter paper.

After finishing the letter, Xie Queshan sealed it in a wax pellet, then used a sleeve crossbow to shoot it beyond the high walls.

The subtle movement attracted no one’s attention, as if nothing had happened, yet everything was quietly occurring in the shadows.

The night watchman found the wax pellet outside the high wall, nonchalantly tucked it into his robes, and continued beating his clappers on his rounds.