Perhaps because lychees are warming by nature, after eating seven or eight of them, the cold, prickly look in Ning Yin’s eyes finally softened somewhat.

He caressed the wine cup in his hand and glanced at the space behind her: “Why has the young miss come here today without any servants?”

Wasn’t she afraid that while he was still angry, he might crush her beautiful, fragile neck?

Yu Lingxi focused on peeling the lychees, thought for a moment, and answered honestly: “If you were still angry and the servants saw me coaxing you, wouldn’t that make me lose face?”

As she spoke, she brought the peeled lychee flesh to Ning Yin’s lips.

Ning Yin narrowed his eyes and took it in his mouth. Yu Lingxi rubbed her fingertips, which were sticky with lychee juice, feeling somewhat sweet and tacky.

She hadn’t brought a handkerchief, and the stickiness was uncomfortable, causing her to slightly furrow her brow.

Ning Yin watched her for a long time before rising to fetch a clean cotton cloth from his room, which he wrapped around her fingertips to wipe them.

He lowered his gaze while wiping with casual movements. His knuckles were cold, white, and slender, his touch not heavy, yet it gave a tingling sensation.

Yu Lingxi uncomfortably curled her fingers, which Ning Yin noticed and found amusing.

When she teased others, she was bold and straightforward. Now he was merely touching a few of her fingers, and she couldn’t bear it?

He was restraining himself from biting them.

His gaze was deep, but his voice remained detached: “Does the young miss want me to find someone to investigate the cause of that woman’s death?”

“That’s right.”

Yu Lingxi looked at the black hair falling over his shoulders as he bent down to wipe her fingers. “The poison she ingested couldn’t be identified even by the imperial physicians.”

Ning Yin smiled ambiguously, clutching the cloth he had used to wipe her hands in his palm. “The young miss may leave now.”

Yu Lingxi raised her autumn-water eyes to look at him and hesitantly asked: “So, you agree?”

Ning Yin stood with his hands behind his back, watching her without speaking.

Yu Lingxi took his silence as agreement and quickly rose, saying: “I’ll await your news tomorrow.”

She walked a few steps, then seemed to remember something and turned back, taking the cotton cloth from Ning Yin’s hand and saying: “I’ll have this washed and return it to you.”

With that, she smiled brightly, picked up the food box, and cheerfully departed.

Ning Yin watched her graceful figure disappear beneath the flower gate, his tongue capturing the lingering sweetness of lychee on his lips, and he laughed softly.

Now it was sweet.

Yu Lingxi returned to her room, uncertain whether Ning Yin could successfully find the medicine peddler from the black market and trace the source of the poison.

To be safe, she needed to gather other clues.

After pondering for a moment, Yu Lingxi summoned Hutao and instructed: “Take Doctor Chen to the Zhao residence to see if Hongzhu has awakened. If she has, bring her to me… Remember to be discreet, don’t arouse suspicion.”

Hutao knew that her mistress was deeply concerned about Zhao Yuming’s sudden death. Without asking unnecessary questions, she cleverly acknowledged the order and went to make arrangements.

Early summer was rainy and humid. After a busy half day, Yu Lingxi reclined on her couch to rest.

Falling into a drowsy sleep, her dreams were filled with enclosed dark chambers and the stiff, pale face of her previous life lying on an ice bed.

Ning Yin stood beside the ice bed, his snow-white inner robe spattered with specks of black blood, his eyes cold as he called to her: “Lingxi, come here.”

She was startled awake, cold sweat soaking her undergarments.

Yu Lingxi hadn’t had such a vivid dream in a long time. After a moment of shock, she got up and drank two cups of cold tea to calm herself. Just then, Hutao, who had been out, returned.

Seeing Hutao’s furrowed brow, Yu Lingxi knew things hadn’t gone well.

Sure enough, Hutao said with a troubled face: “Young miss, Hongzhu is gone.”

Hutao explained that when she hurried to the woodshed at the Zhao residence, the door was half-open, with no one inside, only a few spots of not-yet-dried blood on the straw mat.

“This servant searched secretly for a long time but found no trace of Hongzhu. I don’t know if she ran away or if someone dragged her out and buried her.”

Hutao felt somewhat guilty, “If this servant had gone just a quarter-hour earlier, perhaps…”

“It’s alright, it’s not your fault. Have the guards secretly search for Hongzhu’s whereabouts. A person who hasn’t been freed from slave status can’t run far. As long as she’s still alive, she must leave some trace.”

Yu Lingxi comforted Hutao with a few words while becoming increasingly convinced that Zhao Yuming’s death was far more complex than it appeared on the surface.

With Hongzhu’s trail temporarily blocked, they could only wait for news from Ning Yin.

……

Wind rose in the night, bringing a light, pattering rain.

The next day, after the rain stopped, Yu Lingxi accompanied Madam Yu for breakfast and then walked with her beneath the corridor.

Speaking of the matters at the Zhao residence, Madam Yu had many thoughts: “Yesterday afternoon, your cousin’s coffin was taken out of the city and hastily buried, without even a proper funeral. Who would have thought that such a timid and quiet child harbored such deep thoughts, leading to such an end.”

Yu Lingxi calmly said: “It shows that those with improper intentions will inevitably entrap themselves.”

“How true! It’s also the fault of her parents for being too utilitarian and lacking familial affection, which shaped the child into this kind of person.”

Madam Yu sighed, “Yuming taking her own life on the day she was to enter the palace to serve the Crown Prince is a great disrespect. No matter what, your uncle cannot escape punishment for ‘failing to properly raise his daughter.’ Tomorrow he will be demoted and sent to the miasmic lands of Lingnan.”

Having spent two years by Ning Yin’s side and witnessed many forms of punishment, Yu Lingxi naturally knew what being sent to Lingnan meant.

It was called demotion but was essentially exile. A barren land teeming with snakes, rats, and poisonous insects, where survival itself was a challenge.

In her previous life, the Zhao family had first kept Yu Lingxi as a decorative vase, caged in the back courtyard waiting to be sold, then forced her into a bridal sedan to be sent to the Regent’s manor, which everyone viewed as hell, all for the sake of power and profit.

In this life, despite all their schemes and calculations, the Zhao family ended up with nothing. Dying in the poverty and decline they feared most was indeed karmic retribution.

Just as she was thinking this, she spotted Ning Yin standing outside the side gate in the distance.

Upon seeing Yu Lingxi, Ning Yin’s footsteps slightly paused, and he gave her a slight bow with cupped hands.

Yu Lingxi understood, found an excuse to bid farewell to Madam Yu, and walked toward the garden pavilion.

After waiting in the pavilion for not even half the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, she heard familiar, steady footsteps behind her.

Yu Lingxi turned and saw that Ning Yin’s hair tips and boots were damp. Surprised, she stood up and asked: “You didn’t return all night?”

The rain had stopped at the end of the hour of Mao today, so the dampness on him must have been from the night.

Ning Yin neither confirmed nor denied. Yu Lingxi handed him the freshly washed and folded cotton cloth from yesterday, her brows lightly furrowed: “Where did you go?”

“To open a coffin,” Ning Yin replied, taking the cloth with an unchanged expression.

Yu Lingxi paused, looking up to meet Ning Yin’s unfathomably deep gaze.

She was stunned for a moment before realizing whose coffin he meant by “opening a coffin.”

“The young miss need not worry; such dirty work as digging up graves and opening coffins is naturally done by others. I don’t need to do it personally.”

Despite his words, he still unfolded the fragrant white cotton cloth and carefully wiped his long, pale fingers one by one.

Yu Lingxi, however, was thinking of something else: since Ning Yin had gone to open the coffin and examine the corpse at night, did that mean he had found a medicine peddler who could test for poison?

Thinking of this, a glimmer of hope rose in her heart, and she asked: “So, did you discover anything?”

Ning Yin glanced at her and said: “Dissecting a corpse and examining the bones takes at least three days, at most five.”

Yu Lingxi responded with an “Oh.”

That’s fine—she had waited this long, so a few more days wouldn’t matter.

Her gaze fell on Ning Yin’s wet hairtips, and she pointed at them, saying: “Your hair is still wet.”

Following her gaze, Ning Yin looked at a strand of his black hair that reached his chest and casually rubbed it with the cloth.

It was the same in her previous life. After bathing, he was always impatient about drying his hair and wouldn’t allow others to touch it, leaving it dripping wet. Water from his hair would drip onto his chest, following the contours of his waist and abdomen to dampen his undergarments. The whole person looked like a handsome water ghost who had run out from the bottom of a lake, emitting a damp, cold air.

In bed, Yu Lingxi would always shiver from the cold water dripping from his hair.

Bringing her thoughts back to the present, she saw that the young man, unable to dry that strand of hair, had already lost patience and was using more force.

Using such a rough method to treat such beautiful hair was truly wasteful.

Yu Lingxi secretly sighed, stepped forward to take the cotton cloth from his hand, and said: “Let me.”

In her previous life, she hadn’t dared to touch his hair; in this life, she had touched enough of it.

She wrapped his hair tips with the cloth, gathered them in her palm, and pressed them to absorb the moisture. Her manner was natural and straightforward, without shy affectation or flattering ingratiation.

Ning Yin made a hissing sound and narrowed his eyes, saying: “How is the young miss so skilled in serving others?”

Yu Lingxi’s eyelashes trembled, and she thought to herself: You’ve discovered it again?

“In this world, only you have this privilege.”

Yu Lingxi suppressed the heat rising in her body and said with a snort, “Having received my care, you must work for me and find out the results I want.”

The curtains around the water pavilion gently billowed. Ning Yin lowered his eyes and smiled, his eyes reflecting flickering, rippling light.

“Done,” Yu Lingxi returned the cloth to Ning Yin.

Ning Yin stood without taking the cloth, glancing at his shoulder and saying matter-of-factly: “My clothes are also wet.”

“That’s enough, Wei Qi.”

Yu Lingxi stuffed the cotton cloth into his hand and glared at him, saying, “Go back and change your clothes yourself. Don’t catch a cold.”

Just as she was speaking, they suddenly heard Hutao’s voice from a distance.

Yu Lingxi pulled her thoughts back, disregarding Ning Yin, and stuck her head out of the pavilion, asking: “Hutao, what’s the matter?”

“Young miss, why are you still here?”

Hutao’s face was full of anxiety as she hurriedly said, “The eldest miss is looking for you. She says something has happened!”

Her sister rarely sought her out unless it involved major family matters.

Yu Lingxi felt a sinking feeling, and the unease of the past few days was finally validated.

She darkened her gaze and said to Ning Yin: “Regarding Zhao Yuming’s matter, continue your investigation and tell me as soon as you have results.”

With that, she hurried toward the front hall without lingering.

She was in such a rush that she completely failed to notice Ning Yin’s calm, playful expression, showing no surprise at all about the upcoming storm in the Yu household.

He stood in the water pavilion for a moment, reached out to hook a strand of hair, and rolled it between his fingers, frowning slightly and sneering.

“Why such hurry? It’s still wet.”

A thunderclap suddenly rumbled across the clear ground, ink-black clouds rolled, and fierce winds made the trees throughout the courtyard rustle loudly.

With her sleeves filled with the rushing wind, Yu Lingxi pursed her lips and pushed open the door of the side hall.

Yu Xinyi immediately stood up and called out: “Suisui.”

She was still wearing the armor of the Imperial Guard, evidently having rushed back from the palace without time to change. Her expression was unusually serious.

“What happened?” Yu Lingxi closed the door, shutting out the wind and rain from the courtyard.

Yu Xinyi didn’t know how to begin, but Yu Lingxi had already guessed the issue and asked softly: “Is it… something happened to our brother?”

Yu Xinyi suddenly raised her head, and Yu Lingxi knew she had guessed correctly, her heart immediately sinking.

“I just received an urgent confidential letter from Father. There’s a problem with the disaster relief grain that Yu Huanchen was escorting.”

Yu Xinyi no longer concealed anything and, taking Yu Lingxi’s hand as they sat down, said in a grave voice, “Three thousand dan of life-saving grain has all been replaced with empty husks.”