“After receiving orders from the teacher, I was to go immediately. However, just as I was about to leave, subordinates came to report that Zhou Yinzhi had visited the Grand Princess’s quarters, spoke for a while, and seemed to have given her something.” Dao Qin knelt on one knee below the steps, head bowed, his fingers gripping the knife handle so tightly it seemed he was desperately trying to endure something. Yet his eyes still reddened as he said hoarsely, “After telling them to continue keeping watch, I went to find Zhou Yinzhi. But when I arrived, when I arrived…”

When he arrived, Zhou Yinzhi was already inside You Fangyin’s quarters, holding a knife and taking her hostage.

How could he not know how important You Fangyin was?

With a hostage in hand, Zhou Yinzhi stood on invincible ground. Although Dao Qin’s martial skills were considerable and he repeatedly attempted to make a move, because You Fangyin was in the other’s grasp, dangers kept arising. He feared injuring her.

Those who are wary of harming what they value inevitably have their hands tied.

The other party had climbed to the position of Deputy Commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard—he was no mediocrity. In a split-second exchange of blows, Dao Qin nearly had his head sliced off by a single strike. Fortunately, he retreated in time, receiving only a cut across his face.

However, this retreat also gave Zhou Yinzhi an opportunity.

In that moment, this man’s cruelty and unscrupulous nature were displayed to the fullest—

Without the slightest mercy, he thrust his blade into You Fangyin’s back.

The blood-stained embroidered spring saber pierced sharply through her body.

Dao Qin’s entire body went ice cold in that instant. All he could do was rush forward to catch You Fangyin, frantically pressing on her wound while trying to call for a physician to save her. Meanwhile, Zhou Yinzhi took this opportunity to escape, scaling the courtyard wall of the back garden and disappearing without a trace.

The wound on Xie Wei’s waist and abdomen had not yet fully healed. He should have been quietly recuperating in his room, yet at this moment he stood in the kitchen, slowly placing a small dish of newly made peach pastries into a food box.

Outside the door was the afternoon.

The sunlight shone lazily, yet one couldn’t feel even half a trace of warmth from it.

Jiang Xuening had remained alone in her room for an entire day without emerging.

On the night You Fangyin met with misfortune, she had forcefully held that gradually cooling and stiffening body without letting go. No one could persuade her or pull her away. In the end, it was Yan Lin who returned and directly knocked her unconscious first before sending her back to her room.

The entire residence was in chaos.

Most bewildering was that after immediately ordering the city sealed, there was no trace of Zhou Yinzhi. Only at midnight, after examining the soldiers who had been on duty at various city gates, did they root out a group of people who had already been won over and bribed by Zhou Yinzhi. It turned out that after leaving the general’s residence, Zhou Yinzhi hadn’t delayed for even a moment, heading straight out of the city to flee for his life.

Someone was dead.

The murderer hadn’t been caught.

The next day, news from Shu and Jiangnan finally arrived belatedly, reporting that half a month earlier, the Ren family salt business and related merchant associations in Jiangnan had all been imprisoned on charges of participating in treason. Those who resisted were killed first as a warning to others. However, first, the other side had moved too quickly and struck too ruthlessly, leaving hardly anyone who dared send messages out. Second, Zhou Yinzhi had ordered the city surrounded and guarded, with strict defenses controlling the official roads, nearly cutting off all news heading northwest. Third, the distance was vast—unless using the court’s postal relay system for urgent message transmission, ordinary news would take at least a month to reach Xinzhou.

Zhou Yinzhi understood all of this deeply.

He left the confiscation work to the Embroidered Uniform Guard and officials while he himself came to the capital alone, performing an excellent show of false compliance. He waited for an opportunity to strike at You Fangyin, seizing the seal in order to claim the vast wealth stored in various banks and remittance houses.

Such thunderous and decisive methods—on the surface it was Zhou Yinzhi, but behind him there must certainly be imperial support.

Yet when Jiang Xuening awoke and heard the report, she only numbly said, “I understand.”

She drove everyone else out, simply closing the door. She didn’t want to see anyone or hear any news. Even the meals sent to her door had already gone cold, yet she had never been seen to emerge even once, much less touch half a chopstick of food.

Xie Wei didn’t raise his head to look at Dao Qin. He merely lowered his eyelids and said, “Before Zhou Yinzhi struck, he calculated that between pursuing and killing him or saving You Fangyin, you would certainly abandon the former and choose the latter. That this person’s heart is more vicious than yours is not surprising.”

However, Dao Qin didn’t see it that way.

The knife wound on his cheek was still fresh. He could barely hold back his reddening eyes: “If this subordinate had gone earlier, or later, Miss You might not have fallen victim to his poisonous hand. It was I who fell into his trap, had my hands tied, and thus harmed Miss You…”

Although Dao Qin had followed Xie Wei for a long time and seen many things, he had rarely done anything to wrong others in his life—much less to such a young lady.

After all, he still had some youthful spirit.

Anger and guilt surged forth together, weighing him down so that he couldn’t lift his head. He actually shed tears. Then, without care, he forcefully wiped them away, his movements containing only a suppressed fierceness that made him appear particularly wretched.

Xie Wei glanced at him and sighed softly, but said, “You did nothing wrong. Don’t kneel anymore.”

Jian Shu beside him also couldn’t stand seeing this rare cowardly appearance.

He stepped forward to forcefully pull him up, frowning as he scolded, “What’s there to cry about? Can crying bring her back?!”

Xie Wei simply said, “Capturing the murderer to offer as sacrifice to the deceased—that is the way to make amends.”

Dao Qin refused to rise, only saying through gritted teeth, “Dao Qin is willing to die in service!”

Xie Wei closed the lid of the food box. Without bothering about how the two of them fussed, he picked up the food box and slowly walked past them, only saying flatly, “Wait for some time. Let Miss Ning give the orders.”

However, after taking just two steps, his footsteps involuntarily stopped.

He turned and asked, “How has Lu Xian been these days?”

Jian Shu was startled. After a moment, he said in a low voice, “Looks like nothing’s wrong. He’s been buried in his room all day handling military expense accounts. Yesterday, an accountant came to say that several entries had been calculated incorrectly.”

Xie Wei fell silent and asked no further questions.

He carried the food box toward Jiang Xuening’s courtyard.

His injury had not recovered, so his steps were neither large nor quick.

When he reached the corridor outside the courtyard, he happened to see Shen Zhiyi.

This princess who had been rescued but temporarily could not return to the capital wore plain-colored light clothing, standing quietly under the flower rack just sprouting spring buds, gazing toward the courtyard. In her eyes seemed to be a misty, rain-like bewilderment.

Xie Wei’s steps thus halted.

He also glanced toward the courtyard before saying, “Will Your Highness not go and see?”

Shen Zhiyi saw him and, after a long silence, said, “I dare not.”

Xie Wei said, “Miss Ning came to the frontier to save Your Highness. You Fangyin followed Miss Ning here. Now she is gone because of this. Your Highness feels terrible inside, so you dare not meet her, is that it?”

Shen Zhiyi actually heard a trace of barb in these words.

She stared at Xie Wei.

Yet Xie Wei remained very calm, as if matters of life and death didn’t weigh on his mind at all. He simply said, “If Xie were in Your Highness’s position, I too would toss and turn unable to sleep. However, standing here can’t change anything. If Your Highness has nothing pressing, the spring cold is still biting—best not to stand here catching the wind, lest you harm your health.”

He walked down the steps.

Shen Zhiyi watched his retreating figure, uncertain whether that trace of hostility was her imagination. Yet at this very moment, she actually didn’t want to concern herself with what identity Xie Wei truly possessed.

So she asked with unusual directness, “Is Teacher Xie jealous of me?”

Xie Wei didn’t smile, nor did he answer. Lowering his eyelids, he simply continued forward.

The maids all served anxiously outside, guarding against Jiang Xuening suddenly summoning them from within.

The food on the table had long grown cold.

Yet the door remained tightly shut with not half a sign of opening. Inside was even more quiet than ever.

Actually, the door wasn’t locked, nor was it barred from inside.

It was simply that no one dared disturb her.

When Xie Wei arrived, without even needing to glance at those maids, he understood the situation. Carrying the food box, he walked forward and slowly pushed the door open.

In broad daylight, the room was very dim.

A somewhat dazzling light gradually expanded with the creaking sound of the opening door, falling onto the cold floor.

From some dark corner came an icy voice: “Get out.”

Xie Wei heard this but didn’t get angry. After entering, he turned back and closed the door again.

He carried the food box, tracing the source of the voice to find her.

Jiang Xuening leaned against a wall, sitting on the floor in a dark corner, her arms loosely half-embracing her drawn-up knees. When she heard the approaching footsteps, a deep, heavy hostility suddenly flashed across her expressionless face. She raised her eyes, about to lash out.

However, what met her gaze was Xie Wei’s figure.

Her cheeks were pale to the point of near transparency, her body seeming so thin it could blow away with a single gust. Her bloodless lips appeared fragile. A pair of eyes, however, had a startling darkness due to her gaunt cheeks—like knife light in the night, sharp enough to pierce into one’s heart.

Jiang Xuening looked at him: “What are you doing here?”

Xie Wei set down the food box on the table, took out that small dish of peach pastries and placed it before her, only saying, “Eat something.”

He had originally wanted to sit in front of her.

But the wound on his waist and abdomen had not yet healed, making it impossible to sit down. He gently reached out, pulling over a chair from beside, and sat down next to her, saying, “Zhou Yinzhi has escaped. I’m afraid we won’t catch him for a while. If you starve to death first, that would be laughable.”

Jiang Xuening noticed his movements, which were slightly more sluggish than usual, and said calmly, “You don’t want your life anymore.”

Yet Xie Wei said, “Miss Ning, sometimes it’s not that people themselves want to stand atop peaks or climb cliffs. It’s that after walking all the way to the end, only then do they realize it’s a cliff. Worldly matters are like the wild wind of flying sand and rolling stones behind you, destroying everything in its path. Either stand in place and let it devour you, or be forced to close your eyes and jump into the abyss ahead. Even if you wanted to, there’s no other choice.”

Jiang Xuening blinked: “Why me? Why her?”

Xie Wei raised his hand. His fingertips touched her cheek, brushing aside a strand of disheveled hair that had fallen, tucking it behind her snow-white ear.

His voice, however, was like mountain ridges after rain, carrying a kind of misty, quiet stillness.

He said, “A person’s life is one of constant loss. If not this way, then that way. You cannot grasp those things already lost—that will make you lose what you still possess now.”

At this moment, Jiang Xuening was so fragile.

As if she would shatter into pieces if dropped on the ground.

His movements were so careful, his passing sleeves barely even disturbing the floating motes of dust in the air.

She felt like a porcelain vase filled with hatred and rage, unwillingness and sorrow. Though clearly tumultuous inside, her exterior appeared ice cold, covered in a layer of deathly ash.

Many things in the world were puzzling.

She gazed at Xie Ju’an, yet most inappropriately recalled past events, then asked, “That day I said you once killed me. Why didn’t you ask me about it?”

Xie Wei looked down at her and slowly said, “I didn’t want to know.”

Jiang Xuening smiled ethereally: “You’re truly clever.”

Actually, that statement wasn’t fair to this life’s Xie Wei. She knew this, but it wasn’t something she could control. Because she was Jiang Xuening who had experienced two lifetimes. Events that had occurred in the past could be erased from others’ hearts but couldn’t remove the scars from her own heart.

Xie Ju’an was always a perceptive person.

Many things—detecting clues, guessing the general picture—didn’t necessarily require breaking through to the very bottom.

As the saying goes, rare is the gift of confusion.

He was different from Zhang Zhe. Zhang Zhe felt that if two people wanted to be together, if there were secrets, it couldn’t last. But Xie Wei was too clever, so instead he was willing to remain confused. Secrets posed no obstacle to him—were even just an insignificant trifle.

He only asked her softly, “Do you want to tell me?”

Jiang Xuening said, “I don’t want to.”

She slowly leaned back, the back of her head resting against the cold wall. She blinked, yet in a trance recalled things from long, long ago. She quietly told him, “Actually, from my youth, from the first time I saw you, I disliked you. You wore white robes, held a zither, looking like a sickly, consumptive ghost about to collapse—a sight that made people look down on you. Yet your conduct was nothing like those other people’s, even more different from mine. What made you most detestable were those eyes. As if you knew everything, understood everything. I even felt you were pitying me. You made me know how different people could be from one another, made me stand on this side of an insurmountable chasm. I was nothing. The closer I got to the capital, the more afraid I became, and thus the more I detested you. Later, I truly thought that if I were given another chance, if I could return to that time, I would take away your knife, smash your zither, throw you in the wilderness, and let the jackals in the mountains devour you.”

A teardrop rolled from the corner of her eye.

Xie Wei slowly extended his hand, drawing her into his embrace, letting her lean against his leg as he said quietly, “You should have done that.”

Her taut body finally began to tremble slightly.

Jiang Xuening ultimately revealed all her weakness before him, yet only stared at some fixed, unchanging point in the void, saying, “You are a very bad, very bad person.”

Xie Wei said, “I am.”

Jiang Xuening cried for a long time.

Xie Wei also listened for a long time, then slowly said, “Sometimes when you can’t be a kind and善良的人, being a very bad person isn’t so terrible either. You must feel that you can become a different person before you can truly become a different person. Break down that barrier you’ve erected for yourself. First believe, then act. Either be crushed, or walk through it. Fortune always belongs to the few, and Heaven won’t favor us so much. Miss Ning, hatred—sometimes it’s a good thing.”

Just as he hoped she could believe they could be together.

To break down that barrier.

Jiang Xuening raised her eyes to look at him. When she curved her lips, there was no lack of mockery, but afterward only deep anguish remained, floating sorrow, as she asked, “Xie Ju’an, is this how you’ve lived your entire life?”

Xie Wei nodded gently: “Yes.”

He lowered his eyelids, thinking—this was how it was before.