She was crying for him.

A shallow layer of wind and sand brushed across faces. Xu Hexue confirmed this in his heart yet remained silent, merely bending down to lift her up, following that blurred light, walking closer step by step.

Qingqiong and Fan Jiang father and son watched him place Ni Su on horseback. Then his form transformed into flowing mist, in a flash condensing into shape behind her. His pale finger bones gripped the reins, gently stroking the horse’s mane. It exhaled once and obediently walked forward.

That was General Yujie.

The name inscribed on that broken stele behind the father and son.

Xu Hexue rewrapped the loosened gauze around Ni Su’s face. “Yongzhou’s wind and sand are fierce. If you keep crying, your face will hurt badly.”

Ni Su’s emotions still could not calm. One hand held the broken spear, the other clutched his sleeve. Even her eyelashes were wet. “May I hold your hand?”

She looked up with tear-filled eyes toward him. Xu Hexue’s bloodless lips pressed slightly together, yet he could not speak words of refusal. He silently enfolded her hand clutching his sleeve within his palm.

Her palm had scrapes. Xu Hexue’s force was very light, but merely this very light touch made him suddenly confront his selfish desires directly.

Actually, he also missed her warmth very much.

But he said nothing, gripping her hand so cautiously and restrainedly, riding the horse forward.

“I dreamed you returned to the Nether Capital to find your teacher. Then when I woke, you were gone.” Ni Su’s voice already carried a trace of hoarseness.

“Mm.”

Xu Hexue’s throat bobbed lightly. “But I did not see him.”

He originally thought that by stopping Dong Yao, his teacher would detect something suspicious. As long as the false evidence in Dong Yao’s hands did not reach His Majesty, his teacher would be safe.

But he could never have anticipated his teacher harbored a death wish.

The sky was dim, wind and sand unceasing. Even in summer, Yongzhou nights remained cold. His gaze fell on her black-haired coiffure. He couldn’t help but tell her: “Ni Su, I will never see my teacher again.”

The day the executioner’s blade fell, he and his teacher lost all chance of reunion.

“When you return, you’ll be able to see him.”

Ni Su suppressed the sourness at the tip of her nose. Looking up, she only then discovered tonight had neither stars nor moonlight.

Xu Hexue followed her gaze, yet remained silent for a long time.

He would not return.

“When I wasn’t there, why did you still come to Yongzhou?” Accompanied by light hoofbeats, his voice was cold as withered leaves, falling upon her ears without any living warmth.

“Your matters are not yet finished. I knew you would return. I wanted to come here to wait for you, to treat your wounds, and also—” Ni Su looked toward the distant continuous mountain ranges crouching beneath the dark blue sky, farther still the vast plateaus, all dark, sunken shadows. “I wanted to know your past.”

Xu Hexue’s brows and eyes remained calm, perpetually soaked with deathly cold intent, but his palm pressed against the back of her hand grew more rigid. “I should have told you earlier. You need not have come here.”

Since his death, all manner of past events had turned to dust.

“Was it that night? When you told me you truly wanted my trust—” Ni Su looked at his chin. “At that time, you very much wanted to tell me, didn’t you?”

The glass lamp lightly struck the saddle. Xu Hexue lowered his eyes to meet her gaze, tacitly acknowledging.

“You want to say you’re sorry?”

Ni Su saw his lips move slightly, yet she spoke first. “Because when you met me, you didn’t tell me your name was Xu Hexue, didn’t tell me you were that General Yujie?”

“But I am very grateful you didn’t confess honestly from the start.”

Xu Hexue gazed at her. She suddenly leaned over, her back pressing against his chest. He remained motionless, like a jade mountain standing alone, his garments billowing wildly in the wind.

“I should thank you for your concealment.”

Ni Su thought—if she had known from the beginning who he was, she would certainly have regretted lighting that basin of fire at Great Bell Temple. “Because of your concealment, I could not be like them, scrutinizing you and profaning you amid the world’s gossip and slander.”

That broken stele stood on the mountain peak, never for commemoration, but for those in power to use his death to admonish Great Qi’s subjects. For sixteen full years, Yongzhou common people’s resentment toward Xu Hexue stemmed not only from their being slaughtered by barbarians sixteen years ago because of his supposed defection, losing close relatives, but also because someone constantly reminded them never to forget a traitor’s fate for even a moment.

Yongzhou was a border city, the northern territories’ throat. Not only must the fortifications be solid as metal and stone—the people’s hearts must be equally solid.

Yongzhou common people’s hatred and contempt for traitors served those in power as means to solidify hearts and unite against common enemies.

Ni Su leaned against his frost-cold embrace. “I first came to know you as a person, then came to know your name. This way is very good.”

Night was profound, wind and sand flying.

No matter how deliberately Xu Hexue tried to avoid it, he still could not force himself not to listen to her every word, every sentence. Not listening meant not sinking into depravity.

But he did not succeed.

In the prolonged silence, his heart trembled unceasingly.

When he regained awareness, he parted his lips about to say something, but saw her leaning in his embrace, those eyes already closed. The glass lamp illuminated beneath her eyelids a patch of weary pale blue. She still held the shawl-wrapped broken spear.

As if it were her treasure.

She had also wielded her dagger to protect it.

Xu Hexue looked at her face, half concealed by the face covering, those eyes red and somewhat swollen. Her forehead had a scraped area, looking fragile and pitiful.

Ni Su slept awhile. From outside the city to within, she smelled the fragrance of baked flatbread. Half-asleep she mumbled something she herself didn’t know, until the person holding her lightly touched her eyelids with cold fingers. She opened her eyes in confusion to see such a face very close to hers.

Refined bone structure, clear translucent eyes.

A section of cinnabar-red collar neat and clean, the round-necked outer robe emanating a soft lustrous sheen like clear frost.

Ni Su stared at him dazedly.

“Get down.”

He dismounted first.

Ni Su, still groggy, extended both arms toward him.

Xu Hexue froze, looking at her for a moment. He said nothing, reached out to encircle her slender waist, and lifted her down from the horse.

Ni Su did not live beneath the well with the Qingqiong father and son. Below was not spacious, and as a woman sharing space with them would be inconvenient. When she came to Yongzhou, Qingqiong had cleaned out the house where their family originally lived.

Ni Su lay on a clean, neat bamboo bed, gripping Xu Hexue’s sleeve. Before long she fell asleep again.

Xu Hexue sat on the bed’s edge. Qingqiong and his father looked over from the corner. Fan Jiang had only seen General Yujie once before, on the execution platform. At that time his hair had been disheveled, his face impossible to see clearly. Fan Jiang also couldn’t bear to look.

He had heard General Yujie was very young, but didn’t know he was this young. It seemed he was about the same age as his child Qingqiong when he…

Xu Hexue suddenly turned his face. Before he could speak, he saw Fan Jiang trembling, pulling Qingqiong down with him as they both knelt with a thump.

“General Xu! I know you were wronged!” Fan Jiang was somewhat agitated. “Back then it was your Vice General Xue Huai who rescued my wife Ashuang from the barbarians. When Ashuang was being drowned in the well, it was also you who went to save her…”

Xu Hexue actually had forgotten many things, but he quietly listened to Fan Jiang ramble about the past without interrupting, seeming to have some impression. “I don’t think I managed to save her.”

“Ashuang said you did save her, only she couldn’t think things through at the moment and jumped into the well herself.”

Fan Jiang choked up. “General Xu, these years our area has been managed by the two commanders from the Qin and Wei families. Your tombstone was erected by them. They fear we might sell intelligence about the city to barbarians for petty profits. All these years they’ve used you to admonish us. Even if I wanted to tell people about your injustice, no one would believe…”

Barbarians from time to time harassed the border city. Though the disturbances weren’t major each time, some tried to infiltrate the city to gather military intelligence. Regarding this, Qin Jixun and Wei Dechang maintained twelve-fold vigilance, not only exhausting themselves on military defenses but also employing various methods in educating Yongzhou’s common people.

Xu Hexue understood the reasons. His pale countenance showed no emotional fluctuation whatsoever, only saying: “Rise. You need not kneel to me.”

“This matter has nothing to do with you. You need not offend them on my account.”

Fan Jiang was helped up by Qingqiong. Seeing Xu Hexue sitting on the bed’s edge, his figure alternately dense and faint, he exclaimed in alarm: “General Xu, you…”

Reminded by the Earth Lord, Xu Hexue had hastily returned from the Nether Capital to the mortal world. His damaged soul was extremely fragile. At this moment he was also barely maintaining his form. He lowered his eyes to look at Ni Su’s hand tightly gripping his sleeve edge, then withdrew a jade hairpin from his coiffure and said to the father and son: “Please help me buy some wound medicine.”

After a pause, recalling Ni Su’s unclear murmur on horseback earlier, he added: “If possible, also buy a baked flatbread. Keep any remaining silver for yourselves.”

“We dare not take the General’s money. I’ll go at once!”

Fan Jiang approached leaning on his crutch, carefully receiving the jade hairpin from Xu Hexue’s hand.

During the day, Ni Su had already expended much mental energy removing the stillborn. These days she also suffered from Yongzhou’s climate and could not rest well. At Sangqiu’s broken stele, confronting those people, she had endured cold wind too long and felt increasingly dizzy and listless.

Xu Hexue opened the medicinal ointment Fan Jiang bought back, lightly dipping it with his fingertip, applying it with extremely gentle movements to the wound on her forehead. Then he pried open one by one her fingers clutching his sleeve, about to apply medicine to the scrapes on her palms when the candle in the glass lamp burned out and his vision suddenly returned to complete darkness.

Qingqiong huddled in the corner eating flatbread with his father, a pair of deep black pupils constantly observing Xu Hexue’s movements. He applied medicine for that young woman with utmost care and caution, but Qingqiong saw him gripping Ni Su’s wrist suddenly stop moving.

He set down half the flatbread and approached the bedside.

Xu Hexue heard footsteps. When he raised his eyes, Qingqiong finally noticed they held no divine light, empty and unfocused.

“General Xu…”

Qingqiong spoke.

“I remember you, on the street in Yun Jing.” Xu Hexue groped about, applied ointment, and continued treating the wounds on Ni Su’s palms.

“I’m sorry, General Xu.”

Qingqiong lowered his head. At this moment he wore no cloth wrap, his head completely bald. “If I hadn’t delivered the letter to Minister Zhang, perhaps he… wouldn’t have died.”

“But if I didn’t give the letter to him, I didn’t know who else to give it to.”

He only heard from his father that Mother wanted him to deliver the letter to Minister Zhang—he was General Xu’s teacher, and only he would feel indignation on General Xu’s behalf.

“This doesn’t fault you.”

Xu Hexue shook his head. “My teacher did not harbor a death wish only because of your letter.”

Qingqiong didn’t know what else he should say. Feeling somewhat awkward, he simply sat to the side watching Xu Hexue apply medicine to Ni Su. Seeing his fingers miss the wound, Qingqiong couldn’t help but remind: “A bit to the left, General Xu.”

Xu Hexue made an “mm” sound, moving his finger slightly left, dotting ointment on Ni Su’s palm.

Hearing Ni Su cry out in pain in her sleep.

He stopped.

After a long moment, holding her hand, he bent down and gently blew on it.

This extremely inexperienced comfort stopped her sleep talk.

Qingqiong had no body hair anywhere, but at least had some sparse eyelashes. Witnessing this scene, his eyelashes blinked once. Feeling somewhat uncomfortable, he scratched his head and averted his gaze.

“On this journey, Miss Ni bought me so much good food to eat. I’ve even gotten a bit fatter than before. She also administered acupuncture for me. My body doesn’t hurt as much as before, and I’m not as cold either…”

Qingqiong spoke slowly, but he secretly glanced at Xu Hexue. This General showed no sign of impatience whatsoever, seeming to listen quietly. So Qingqiong rambled on about many things.

Finally, he added: “Miss Ni is truly a very good person.”

Xu Hexue groped about to straighten Ni Su’s sleeves, but touched the shawl-wrapped broken spear beneath her sleeve. His eyes half-lowered, throat bobbing lightly:

“Yes, she is very good.”