The hand on her belly stiffened slightly, and the person behind her said coolly, “Why are you like a cat, can’t have your belly touched?”
“That’s normal, many people feel ticklish when their belly is touched,” Feng Yue explained casually, then smacked her lips and closed her eyes while leaning into his embrace.
Yin Gezhi fell silent, his eyes open in the darkness, somewhat bewildered.
The next morning, Feng Yue rose early to pay her respects to Matron Xun.
“This servant will go to the place you mentioned to look for Ahu,” Feng Yue bowed respectfully and said earnestly, “If I learn any news, I will surely report back.”
“Good, good,” Matron Xun nodded, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “It’s enough that you have such intentions.”
Mere intentions weren’t enough – action was necessary. Even if just for that plate of sesame balls, she had to make the trip to that village.
So after bidding farewell to Young Miss Yi – enduring her attempts to make her stay – Feng Yue happily bounded onto the carriage.
“Your bottom doesn’t hurt anymore?” someone said coldly behind her.
Hearing this, Feng Yue immediately let out an “Aiyou!” and clutched the carriage shaft, holding her lower back as she crawled inside with great difficulty.
Snorting, Crown Prince Yin followed her up. He glanced at her sideways and said, “Your acting is too fake.”
“Of course – how could I possibly act as well as you?” Feng Yue pursed her lips.
The person sitting beside her fixed her with a calm gaze.
Sensing murderous intent, she quickly turned her head, instantly blooming into a smile like a spring flower: “This humble one means that in every aspect, Your Highness far surpasses me – you’re the example I follow, the direction I strive toward!”
Letting out a light snort, Yin Gezhi turned his head away and sat ramrod straight, saying, “Just do what you need to do, no need for extra words.”
Though he said that, he enjoyed hearing such praise! Feng Yue pursed her lips and lifted the curtain to look outside. When they reached Flaunting Street, she immediately called for the carriage to stop and darted away like a rabbit, vanishing in an instant.
Watching this, Yin Gezhi truly couldn’t understand how the etiquette instructors could think well of such a wild girl who ran like the wind.
Feng Yue ran extremely fast, still sneaking into Dream Return House through the back courtyard, and immediately asked upon finding Madam Jin: “What’s the situation?”
Madam Jin was cracking melon seeds. Seeing her, she showed no surprise and pulled her into the room, stuffing her hand with five-spice seeds. Then, sitting on the soft couch, she said, “Big trouble is coming to Wu.”
“I know,” Feng Yue nodded. “I’m asking about the situation with General Yi.”
“By the time he receives the news, it’ll be half a month later. Half a month is enough time for our Crown Prince to cut off all his limbs,” Madam Jin said. “Why are you worried? None of this concerns us. Let’s just enjoy our melon seeds. Would you like the tea-flavored ones?”
Seeing her so relaxed meant nothing disadvantageous to them had occurred. Breathing a sigh of relief, Feng Yue looked outside: “Why is business so good again?”
“Isn’t it because He Chou returned?” Madam Jin said. “The title of flower courtesan still carries weight, so naturally there are many coming to see the excitement. I wanted to give her a few days off to rest properly, but who knew that girl would insist on receiving clients after talking with Duanxian for a while.”
Duanxian? Feng Yue frowned: “Wasn’t she supposed to stop taking clients?”
With her revenge complete, why wasn’t she going off to live a good life? What was she still doing in this place?
“She said she wanted to wait for you to return. She’s been resting these past few days, don’t worry,” Madam Jin said as she stood up, opened the door, and reached out to grab Duanxian like catching a chick, pulling her inside.
“Owner,” Without any powder or rouge on her face, Duanxian looked somewhat aged, but wearing normal clothes, she appeared quite gentle. Especially the way she looked at Feng Yue – full of unspoken words and gratitude, completely different from her previous sarcasm and mockery.
“Enough, don’t call me that.” Pointing to a stool nearby for her to sit, Feng Yue crossed her legs lazily and asked her roguishly, “You’ve had your revenge, why aren’t you leaving? What do you want?”
“…I, I wanted to see you once more,” Duanxian clutched her clothes, looking at her as tears welled up while she spoke: “To thank you for your great kindness.”
“Oh, come on.” Reaching out with a handkerchief to cover her face, Feng Yue pursed her lips: “We’re more comfortable sniping at each other. Don’t come at me with all this ‘great kindness’ and ‘eternal gratitude’ talk – how vulgar!”
“But…”
“No buts. I just gave you a place to make money and a chance for revenge,” Feng Yue said. “You earned the money yourself and took your revenge – it has nothing to do with me. No need to thank me. Though if you want to, you can use your savings to buy me some snacks.”
The handkerchief covered her eyes, and Duanxian didn’t try to pull it away, just letting Feng Yue press it there as her mouth trembled and two streams of tears flowed down.
“Ugh…” Frowning in disgust, Feng Yue simply covered her nose as well.
“All the silver I earned, I’ll leave it to you,” Duanxian said, struggling to breathe. “It’s useless to me anyway, I don’t have any family left.”
Pausing slightly, Feng Yue frowned, looked at her for a while, and said, “Don’t tell me that now that you’ve had your revenge, you can’t go on living, so you’re planning to thank me, give me your inheritance, and then kill yourself.”
Duanxian: “…”
The owner was truly impressive – how did she know everything?
“Give it a rest,” Rolling her eyes, Feng Yue said, “There are still many things you can do in this world. Now that you’ve finally gotten your revenge, are you in such a hurry to go to the underworld to see Li Xun again, to be fried in the same pot of oil with him?”
“Why would I be fried in oil?” As she listened, Duanxian became unhappy: “Besides revenge, I haven’t done anything bad.”
“Fine then. You won’t be fried in oil – you’ll just reincarnate after him.” Feng Yue shook her head. “Trading all these years of careful planning just to end up on the same path as him – isn’t that a waste?”
Thinking about it, it did seem quite reasonable. Duanxian reached up and removed the handkerchief. Her face was covered in tears and mucus as she looked at Feng Yue: “Then where should I go, what should I do?”
“Sleep with the men you want to sleep with, see the sights you want to see, eat the food you want to eat.” Feng Yue waved her hand. “Those of our Dream Return House who stop taking clients get rewards – all expenses for traveling and sightseeing can be claimed from Madam Jin.”
Hmm… what?! Madam Jin, who had been watching the show while cracking melon seeds, widened her eyes: “All the money is with you!”
“I know, I’ll give it to you later. I’m too busy to manage it anyway, look how excited you are.” Feng Yue pursed her lips, pushing Duanxian toward the back door: “The world is vast – how can you face having walked through this life without properly enjoying it?”
“But…”
“No more buts.” At the back door, Feng Yue opened the bolt and smiled brightly at her: “A person without hatred is the freest – fish leap in the vast sea, birds soar in the high sky.”
As she spoke, she applied slight force, pushing Duanxian out of Dream Return House’s back door.
Everything around seemed to slow down. Duanxian opened her eyes wide, slowly turning back to see Feng Yue smiling happily at her, waving her hand as she slowly closed the door.
Her throat tightened. She steadied herself, and opened her mouth toward the closed door, but couldn’t say anything.
Having closed the door, Feng Yue was in high spirits, bouncing back to Madam Jin’s side.
Spitting out melon seed shells, Madam Jin took her hand to examine it, shaking her head: “You don’t know how to take care of yourself. You didn’t let these injuries heal properly? Your hand still has such a large bruise.”
“As long as the bones don’t hurt,” Feng Yue said. “I can’t even feel it when I work.”
Frowning slightly, Madam Jin sighed: “You need to care for yourself more.”
“I have been,” Feng Yue smiled roguishly. “I’ve done quite a few things that are good for me.”
At this, Madam Jin’s expression turned serious. She pulled her up to the third floor and closed the door.
“We’ve carefully examined everything you sent. Among them, letters in this handwriting appeared most frequently. We’ve had people trying to identify whose handwriting it is,” Madam Jin took out a piece of paper and pointed, saying: “But if it’s someone we don’t have access to, without handwriting samples, we can’t identify them.”
Taking the paper to look at it, Feng Yue asked: “What’s the content of the correspondence?”
“That’s what’s interesting,” Madam Jin smiled. “There’s nothing important – it’s all poetry and prose, doesn’t look like message passing, more like greetings between friends.”
Greetings between friends? Feng Yue raised an eyebrow and looked at the original document.
“In the painted tower one night of wind and rain,
Three strikes of the palace water clock before sleep came.
Clearwater and bland medicine coat the tongue and mouth,
Beef and mutton gruel hard to swallow down.”
What was this?