Chapter 84 Rainbow After Rain

The next day, dawn broke.

The chirping of birds in the woods and the glistening dew on the tender green grass woke Shang Yuji, who was caught in the middle of it all.

The people on either side not only held her tightly, but also moved so close that they trapped the heat in the blankets, preventing it from dissipating.

After Jiang Xiqu and A Cuo woke up one after another, Shang Yuji was finally freed.

A-Cuo looked at her with some surprise at the woman leaning on Shang-Guniang's shoulder and the arm tightly embracing her in her sleep, and sighed:

"It's very easy to fall asleep next to Miss Shang."

I slept soundly through the night, and it felt so refreshing not to wake up for so long.

Before she could grasp the meaning behind her words, Jiang Xi's mind went on alert, and she instinctively pulled Aji into her arms, saying, "No!"

Shang Yuji was still somewhat tired when she woke up today because she was startled by her own guess last night.

She casually comforted the two of them. Jiang Xi went silently and carefully tied her long braid, then used a hairpin to coil it into a circle and secure it at the back of her head.

After tying her hair up, he slowly hooked his free hand around her fingertips. Shang Yuji looked up at him, and he said softly, "Yunxiao, if you're unhappy, just hit me. It'll make you feel better if you vent your anger."

Shang Yuji asked in confusion, "How did you know I was unhappy?"

Jiang Xi looked dejected and said, "Yun Xiao went to bed very late yesterday, and she doesn't look well when she wakes up today."

He leaned in, wrapped his arms around her, gently patted her back, and softly hummed, "Let all the sadness fly away, let all the unhappy things fly away!"

"I fell asleep, and you just fell asleep?" she realized.

"Um……"

The hand patting her from behind kept moving. Shang Yuji explained, "I thought about some things before going to bed last night, and the more I thought about them, the more confused I became, so I didn't sleep well."

Upon hearing this, Jiang Xi quickly released her arms, leaned back, and glanced at her face with some nervousness: "Does your head hurt? I can rub it to relieve it."

Shang Yuji chuckled: "Since the mother Gu didn't transmit the pain to you, it naturally doesn't hurt."

“It’s different.” Jiang Xi shook her head and said seriously, “Maybe it’s just that the pain came too late, and Yun Xiao has been in pain for a long time; or maybe it doesn’t share the headache? If that’s the case, what if it doesn’t care about other pains?”

She immediately covered the lower half of his face with her hand, afraid that he would scare himself more if he thought about it: "It doesn't hurt, my head doesn't hurt."

"Ugh... other... ugh... it hurts, ugh?" The words, which were blocked out, barely escaped.

Surprisingly, she still understood: "It doesn't hurt anywhere else."

Several Gu worms crawled or flew back to their original positions, and A-Cuo remained oblivious to the fact that the two of them turned around and immediately stuck together.

They are very close, so she would be surprised if they ever turned on each other.

Jiang Xiqu's still-warm fingertips, which had just left the covers, gently pressed against the skin under her left eye. She frowned slightly and said, "It's a little bruised."

Shang Yuji said helplessly, "Staying up late makes it easy to get dark circles under my eyes."

She pointed to the area under his eyes: "You too."

"Okay..." He tried to rub it, but it really wouldn't go away. Frustrated, he said, "Why doesn't this Heart-to-Heart Gu separate this bluish-black color?"

The rubbing made it a little itchy, and Shang Yuji squinted her left eye. After hearing his complaint, she couldn't help but smile: "If you have to manage all this, wouldn't it be overwhelmed?"

Jiang Xi ignored the workload of the Heart-Connecting Gu and withdrew his hand to press the red mole on his left cheek.

Shang Yuji stopped him: "It's no use urging it to start work; this might not be within its jurisdiction."

"Then Yunxiao, can you tell me why you're unhappy?" Jiang Xi vaguely sensed the sorrow on her face, so light, like an intangible mist, wispy and delicate.

Even though Aji tries to hide it, sometimes when she's quiet, her sorrow will show.

It was an indescribable feeling; he felt his heart grow even heavier, sinking into the lake without causing the slightest ripple, but instead continuing to fall.

Shang Yuji fell silent, lowered her eyelashes, and sighed deeply: "As expected, I couldn't hide it from you. I'm just a little... timid when near home."

She patted his cheeks reassuringly: "Alright, hurry up and get ready. Don't worry about me, give me some time to calm down."

Jiang Xi couldn't help but turn around, and Shang Yuji urged, "Don't worry, it's alright."

They put their belongings back into the carriage and the three of them set off again.

·

The closer Shang Yuji got to his destination, the less he needed a map.

Some details along the roadside are different from my childhood memories, but overall they haven't changed much.

Finally, the three of them stopped the carriage and horses at the foot of the mountain. Looking up at the hillside, she asked Jiang Xi to carry her up the mountain using his light-footed skills.

Shang Yuji simply jumped onto Jiang Xi's back and locked his arms around his throat: "Go up."

Stepping onto the treetops, A-Cuo followed behind.

With the aid of light-footed skills, places that took half an hour to climb as a child can be reached in less than the time it takes to drink a cup of tea.

They took out incense and paper money from their bundles and lit incense and burned paper money in front of the small earthen mound.

Shang Yuji introduced, "Grandma Qian, this is my good friend, Miss A-Cuo from the Southern Xinjiang region. We met by chance on the road and came to see you together."

A-Cuo bowed and said, "Greetings, Granny Qian."

She then pointed to another person: "This is Jiang Xiqu, my current husband. Although he is a bit dull, he is a very good person."

Jiang Xiqu said timidly, "Hello, Granny Qian, I am Jiang Xiqu, Yunxiao's husband. Yunxiao is very, very good. She is smart, capable, and kind. She didn't abandon me because she thought I was stupid..."

They talked on and on, racking their brains to say everything they could.

A mountain breeze carried the fragrance of grass and trees, brushing against her hair as it swayed. She chuckled softly and invited the two to sit down at the table.

Perhaps it was the cool mountain breeze that carried away her sorrow, and Shang Yuji, unusually, began to tell a story.

She pointed to the babbling brook on the other side of the mountain, and slowly moved upwards, where a village could be vaguely seen behind the trees:

"That was my childhood village. Because many people in the village had the surname Shang, it was called Shangjia Village."

"I was only five years old when I met Granny Qian. She had come from a famine and later settled down in the village by cultivating medicinal herbs."

"At first, I thought she was a strange old woman who was blind in one eye, who stayed in the house all year round and did not go out. She did not communicate with others, was aloof and taciturn, as silent as the herbs she grew."

"Later I learned that her husband and son had been conscripted and died."

The meager plot of land, bought with the lives of two people, was submerged by the flood.

Even the eyes that could distinguish herbs were blinded during the famine.

"Actually, she was a good mother-in-law. When I was little, there were many people in my family, and I often ate little and went hungry. One day, I was so hungry that I stole some apricots from her house, but I was caught red-handed. However, Grandma Qian didn't scold me. Instead, she told me to finish eating them before I left."

"After visiting her a few more times, I got to know her and even learned some skills in identifying medicinal plants and cultivating herbs from her."

There were no expensive herbs in the village, and she only learned to grow common medicinal plants. Fortunately, she was good at growing herbs, and after picking them, she would process them before selling them. When she was still in the Jiang family, she told the pharmacy owner that she would only sell to her family, and the pharmacy owner would give her more money.

"...Then my family became so poor that we couldn't even afford to eat. My parents sold my eldest, second, and third older sisters, and I knew it was my turn."

"A few days before I was sold, Granny Qian came to me, gave me twenty-three copper coins, told me to use them sparingly, and also told me..."

"After the rain comes sunshine, a rainbow will always appear."

At this point, Shang Yuji became much more relaxed: "I was originally the fourth child in my family, and everyone in the village called me Shang Fourth Sister."

In Shangjia Village, there are many people named Siya; she is just one of them.

"But after Granny Qian finished speaking to me, I started calling her Shang Yuji."

At that moment, she didn't know what she was thinking, but she felt that Granny Qian's words pierced through the gloom that had enveloped her, and she was instantly clear-headed.

From that moment on, she was no longer the ordinary Shang Siya from Shangjia Village, but the newly born Shang Yuji.

Coincidentally, in her previous life, she was also named Shang Yuji.

It seems that fate always forms a cycle at some point, and then it surges in like a noisy torrent, incomprehensible yet impossible to resist.

A cool hand covered the back of her hand, then tightened its grip little by little. Jiang Xi's eyes welled up with tears, and she whispered, "Aji, don't be sad..."

A-Cuo didn't know how to comfort people. After moving closer, he hesitated and asked, "Do you want me to go and kill them?"

Shang Yuji opened her arms, put her arms around their shoulders, and moved closer to her, laughing heartily: "No need, I'm very happy to have met you both. We must look forward to life, Grandma Qian is right—"

"After the rain, a magnificent rainbow always appears on the horizon!"

Don't let temporary pain cause you to neglect your caring family and friends.

She was already very lucky to have Granny Qian in her childhood.

She went all the way to the capital, became a maid in the Jiang family, and then helped Jiang Xi escape from the Jiang family. Everything after that was going well.

·

The capital city, the residence of the eldest princess.

Zhou Chaoyun was puzzled as to why the person in front of her wanted to see her.

If she were more perceptive, she would have known that she and her second brother had a falling out, yet she still dared to come to their door alone.

Did Zhou Ao give her the order?

It can't really be about building relationships, as she said.

The woman before him lowered her head and sipped the finest Baihao Yinzhen tea from Guanli Town, then gracefully set down her teacup. Her every move was befitting a noblewoman from a prominent family.

The angle of her lips as she smiled, the gentle voice she spoke, and even the eye contact she made—all of these were like a spring breeze, leaving no room for criticism.

Zhou Chaoyun took a sip of tea, acknowledging her praise of the tea's quality.

What does it resemble?

Her smile was so perfect it was measured with a fine line, and it carried no hint of aggression.

Of course, there was no genuine joy either.

...It looks just like a harmless, exquisite doll.

However, communicating with her, avoiding anything related to the court, and simply chatting about interesting things that happened, is truly a pleasant experience.

This kind of talent is perfect for lobbying work; he would be an excellent person even in the Ministry of Rites.

Gentle and refined, with a silver tongue.

Lan's Yuanzhi.

It's a pity, she was the second brother's legal wife.

You can't fool them.

"Your Highness, Your Highness?" A gentle call brought Zhou Chaoyun's attention back.

"how?"

Lan Yuanzhi smiled faintly: "Your Highness, it's getting late, I should return to my residence."

She lowered her head slightly, seemingly with a hint of shyness, and said softly, "I wonder if I will be able to bother Your Highness again next time."

"..." Zhou Chaoyun stared at her lowered eyelashes, and before she could finish her questioning, he chuckled and said naturally:

"If my sister-in-law wishes to come, I would certainly welcome her."

-----------------------

Author's Note: Zhou Chaoyun: I met a very talented person, and she said she wanted to go home with me. What? Who said she's taken? No one can steal her away! After all, the flower language of a talented person is something you have to be quick to get! [Hugs]