No choice

Before leaving Yunchuan Temple, Gui Yao finally walked into the temple. What caught her eye were still the three magnificent golden Buddha statues, which did not appear dim at all even on a cloudy day.

She felt that the Buddha statue looked extremely compassionate.

She was so happy that she couldn't take her eyes off him. Gui Yao knew that this might not be right, but after bowing three times, she still put her hands together and raised her head with a pair of bright eyes.

What do you want?

The distant mountains and the flowing water were so beautiful only when she passed by the mountain road on the outskirts of Xianyu City. She was too hurried before, or she was too bored sitting in the carriage, which was far inferior to the vague leisure she felt now. She was surrounded by three small animals on her left side, and the donkey cart staggered a little. The breeze blew on her face, and she felt a little cold.

Gui Yao hugged a pillow that Ren Beixi had found from somewhere.

"How long will it take?" she asked.

Ren Beixi sat astride the donkey cart, holding the hilt of his sword with one hand and making a flower. Hearing this, the darkness in his eyes had not yet disappeared: "Half an hour."

The donkey cart might have been arranged by the man in advance. Gui Yao hadn't thought about it so carefully. Before leaving, she was just wondering how to take the two dogs and a bird with her when Ren Beixi carried them to the back of the donkey cart. When she woke up from her doze, they had already traveled for a long time.

Gui Yao muttered to herself, "When will I be able to control who's voice I'm reading? That horse next to me is so noisy."

System: "Sure, control it however you want."

Are you so easy to talk to?

So Guiyao started to think seriously.

"Now I can read minds without speaking, so why not add an automatic switch? A few years ago, I couldn't sleep because of the noises of insects."

System: "I didn't think it through."

Gui Yao blinked, then suddenly realized she couldn't hear the horse anymore. She raised her head and stared at the black horse from a distance, then began to experiment in her mind: Hear it? Can't hear it? Hear it? Don't want to hear it! Ah, it worked!

She was tired of sitting, and the two dogs beside her were tired too.

The golden pheasant flapped its wings in the middle of the donkey cart, and finally stepped on its little feet to find the soft feathers on Da Huang's body to snuggle up and rest.

Ren Beixi said in a deep voice, "Are you sleepy?"

Gui Yao hesitated and moved to the front of the donkey cart, put the pillow on her elbows, and half of her body lay on the man's back. She rubbed her face against him, but found him too hard, so she hugged his arms with both hands and found a good position.

"Sleepy..." she said muffledly into his chest.

The man's big hands protected the soft flesh on her waist, and he hummed "hmm" in a low voice. He slowed down the pulling of the rope with his right hand. The donkey's pace slowed down with his deep and shallow breathing, and finally became so slow that it was imperceptible. Only the slight arc in his palm was left to judge that his wife in his arms was asleep.

He raised his eyes and saw his subordinates riding horses through the forest in the distance on the mountain road.

As Li Fuyin wrote in his letter last night: The embankment has been repaired.

It was discovered in recent days that all the straw that stabilized the embankment was replaced by the old leader of Huxia Village six years ago. At that time, his subordinates were purged by the new creditors, and no one knew about this matter. It has been concealed until now. If it had not been discovered this time, the disaster would have been more difficult to deal with in the future.

Huang Shiyu is a useful person.

He had been stationed in the north for many years and did not know about Xianyu City, so when he drafted the report to the capital, he also included a request for reward on his behalf. If he was willing to stay and assist Li Fuyin in protecting Xianyu City, that would be great.

Xianyu City was almost considered a fiefdom of the general's mansion during the time of the previous emperor. But now, most people in the capital are requesting the new emperor to take back power. In the power struggle, all the royal family members are indifferent, let alone the ministers. To write the word "loyalty" means to cut off the hearts of another group of people.

He had known about this when he secretly returned to Beijing two years ago.

Ren Beixi was dressed in black and waved his hand to put the sword he was playing with back to his waist.

Perhaps because they were walking back to the same path, he frowned and lifted the sleepy Guiyao into his arms, unable to help but pinching her cheek.

"Come down the mountain with me, or carry me down."

Seeing Gui Yao nod and shake her head, a smile slipped through his thin lips.

It took half an hour to walk back to the foot of the mountain until dusk. The ground of Xiaohe Village was still a little damp. The things that needed to be cleared out were put back one by one in each household. Ren Beixi didn't see many people, so he went back to Gui Yao's room through the small path. The benches at the door of Gui's house gave off a damp smell that was a bit unpleasant.

Some wet marks left by the water before it receded can still be seen on the wall.

Ren Beixi did not comment, but just hugged Gui Yao tighter in his arms. He brought his free right hand closer and tapped lightly. Qiong Yue, carrying a sword on his back, appeared from the side.

Qiong Yue raised an eyebrow.

Not far away, Xiao Hui jumped down the hill carrying a bed board. "The general is back! Look! We prepared a clean bed board for the lady. We dried it in the sun all day yesterday. I guarantee it's clean and good to use."

Seeing his guards acting like this, Ren Beixi only said in a deep voice: "Well done."

After the bed was in place, he locked the two of them outside the door.

"Why does this chicken pretend to be dead every time it sees you?" Xiao Hui carried the chicken and walked out to the yard.

Qiong Yue said calmly: "It's stupid."

After saying that, he picked up the bird and walked towards the field.

He silently stared at the red-bellied pheasant that was being fed specially by Qiongyue, and then stared at Dahuang who was happily going to the village chief's house. If Guiyao was awake, he would definitely tell her how much he missed Miaomiao. This was the first time he had been separated from Miaomiao for so long.

The big black dog covered his paw and thought for a long time, and finally chose a road with as little mud as possible to go to the village entrance.

The system watched for a long time while Ren Beixi fetched water for Guiyao to wipe her face and hands, and then wiped her feet. He found the clothes that had been collected before, rinsed them with water and hung them outside to dry. He also kept cutting a big watermelon that had just been picked from the field for her. Wow, the watermelon was just edible and couldn't be soaked for another day.

Gui Yao: ...Do you know that I can actually hear what’s in your heart?

The system ran away in disgrace.

Gui Yao raised her hands and stretched, then took a bite of the watermelon from the hand handed to her by Ren Beixi. After that, she put on her straw sandals, not caring about getting them dirty, and ran to the village entrance. The river water had already dropped to the bottom of the bridge. She was about to return to the village chief's house, but she found someone riding a horse on the distant hillside.

When Huang Shiyu received the news, he rushed to Xiaohe Village.

He dismounted, the clothes on his body were obviously chosen carefully, which suppressed a lot of the evil spirit around him. He tied the horse skillfully at the door and touched his dark face with his right hand. People say that people are homesick when they are close to home, but he is now a different person. His round eyes are much clearer, and the pair of shoes he is wearing are the ones his father asked him to take with him when he returned home three years ago.

He called her name.

Gui Yao waved at him as he ran over: "The waters of Yang do not flow to Chu. It's what the Book of Songs says. Let's just think of this flood as carrying away a lot of bad things."

"What is the Book of Songs?" Huang Shiyu asked casually.

Gui Yao was slightly startled, but quickly changed the subject: "Do you know what Jiuzhong said?"

Huang Shiyu nodded solemnly. He looked up at the sky and finally heard two dog barks. He lowered his head and wanted to move forward, only to find that it was Dahuang who had bitten his trouser leg. Dahuang jumped up and pounced on his legs, and its muddy paws left two marks on the clean cloth.

Guiyao pointed at Dahuang and told it to move back.

Although it is just a temporary reunion, it is already very reassuring.

Guiyao held Dahuang's body with her legs and followed the determined Huang Shiyu back to the village. The buds in the melon field were drowned, but when the watermelons were opened, they still had thin skin and bright red fillings. Every year, the watermelon field of the village chief of Xiaohe Village had the best harvest, and this year was no exception.

The villagers of Xiaohe Village have gone up the mountain to avoid the flood in the past two days, and now they are gathered in front of the village chief's house to eat melons.

As they were chatting about the past, the child wearing a watermelon rind next to them suddenly pointed ahead and said, "Brother Dahuang! Brother Dahuang is back! Mom, look, it's the hero of our Xiaohe Village! Brother Dahuang."

In the distance, the red of the setting sun was completely blocked by the mountains, but it seemed to fall on Huang Shiyu's dark cheeks.

He hadn't laughed in a long time, and could only pull out the expression he had when he was taking care of Hua Nian, scratching his head dryly: "I... I'm not a great hero."

Gui Yao went to Ren Beixi in the corner, and looked at him with her pretty little face, as if asking: Why are you hiding here?

Ren Beixi simply said, "If you believe it, it exists. If you don't believe it, it doesn't exist. Jiuchong is not someone who can easily change his fate. I always feel that there are still things that I haven't understood."

"I don't think so. Jiuchong may be eccentric, but he doesn't seem like a bad person." Gui Yao pondered. "Isn't the Imperial Preceptor in the capital also well-known? When I first arrived, I heard rumors that our new emperor wasn't the most favored prince. But when the previous emperor was on the throne, the Imperial Preceptor only mentioned this one of the previous emperor's princes. This is enough to show how far-sighted the Imperial Preceptor is."

Gui Yao tilted her head and looked at the pensive Ren Beixi for half a second. She forgot that the person next to her was General Ren, an important official of the dynasty.

She took Ren Beixi's left hand, tiptoed, and looked far away in front of the village chief's house.

I saw my uncle walking out of the room.

He said something to Huang Shiyu with an anxious look, and Huang Shiyu's smile gradually faded. Then there was a loud "bang" and he slammed open the broken wooden door and walked into the inner room.

Gui Yao subconsciously pushed the crowd aside and walked in.

"What's wrong?"

"What happened? Aren't we all home now? Uncle, uncle, are you talking?"

Everyone's expressions were so sorrowful that Guiyao's breath got stuck in her throat. She ignored her uncle's attempts to stop her, and her straw sandals' footprints stepped on the muddy spots on the wooden door. What she saw was the back of Huang Shiyu kneeling on the ground.

His clothes no longer fit him.

Gui Yao stared blankly at the village chief lying on the bed, and rested her knuckles on the side of his neck, silently, still silent.

Didn't we say everything was fine? Didn't we agree that Huang Shiyu no longer believed in fate, and that no disasters would happen when he returned to the village? Gui Yao leaned weakly against the wall, looking back at Ren Beixi at the door. The trembling pupils under her long eyelashes seemed to silently question her.

destiny.

What exactly is destiny!

Gui Yao's mind was always trying its best to find a way to break the deadlock. After a while, her eyes stopped at the story Huang Shiyu told her a few days ago. If she went to the banquet and never went home, her father could extend his life by more than ten years. If she went home, something strange would happen.

But now the message has changed to returning home without any problems, so the ten-year extension of life will no longer be effective... right?

If I believe, it exists. If I don’t believe, is it still there?

The system's voice echoed in Gui Yao's mind: "Congratulations, host. The completion rate of the Xiaohe Village side quest, Song Mo Wuhen, has reached 100%. The main quest will be released soon."

"Go to Beijing."