Chapter 76 Baili Xunzhou felt he had encountered…

Silence reigned all around. The courtyard walls were already silently swarming with Swift Feather Camp soldiers, a dense barrage of arrows aimed at Fu Ciyan. Any movement from him would be met with a hail of arrows. At the courtyard gate, Baili Xunzhou's forehead was covered in a thin layer of sweat, his chest heaving rapidly. Having learned that Fu Ciyan had come to see Feng Mian, he had rushed back, only to find Fu Ciyan sitting at a table with Feng Mian, his hand outstretched in her direction. He was terrified, his heart pounding in his chest.

Bai Lixun said sternly, "Put your hand down and stay away from her."

Fu Ciyan remained calm and composed, seemingly unconcerned about being targeted by tens of thousands of arrows. He readily withdrew his hand and leisurely flicked his sleeve. "It's just breakfast, Your Highness, why make such a fuss?"

Feng Mian leaned back slightly, her hand, hidden in her sleeve, slowly gripping the dagger she held for self-defense. Baili Xunzhou wouldn't have brought his troops in without a reason. Although she didn't sense any danger from Fu Ciyan, she believed he had his reasons.

"How long are you going to keep up this act?" Baili Xunzhou narrowed his eyes, his dark pupils burning with anger. "Don't you know? The people of the Alna tribe are searching for you extensively."

The previously languid man suddenly turned his head, his icy gaze fixed on Baili Xunzhou, his voice cold and sarcastic: "Is that so? What do you want with me?"

Seeing that he still looked like he wouldn't shed a tear until he saw the coffin, Baili Xunzhou slightly turned his head to the side and gestured for two soldiers to bring forward a prisoner from the Alna tribe.

"Take a closer look, is it him?" Baili Xunzhou's voice carried a chilling coldness.

The prisoner raised his blood-stained face, glanced at Fu Ciyan, and then hurriedly lowered his head, saying in broken Dayong dialect, "Yes, the person Your Majesty is looking for is him!"

Fu Ciyan suddenly moved, and Baili Xunzhou immediately drew back the bowstring. But Fu Ciyan simply got up, straightened his robes, and then calmly strolled towards Baili Xunzhou.

The two Swift Feather Camp guards swiftly jumped into the courtyard the instant he moved, protecting Feng Mian, Liu Ying, and Wu Liu behind them.

A few steps away from Baili Xunzhou and the prisoner, Fu Ciyan stopped and stared at the prisoner with interest, speaking to Baili Xunzhou: "Didn't you ask him why their king wanted to see me?"

Suddenly, the prisoner banged his head on the ground with a loud thud and shouted, "You are the most trusted strategist under the King, but you have been missing since you entered Dayong. The King is worried and has ordered us to search for you in secret!"

A long string of words, powerful and uninterrupted, struck the ears of everyone present, leaving them all momentarily stunned.

Feng Mian was first shocked that Fu Ciyan was connected with the Alna tribe. Then he wondered why, if the king of the Alna tribe valued Fu Ciyan's safety so much, his soldiers, even if they confessed his identity under torture, should not have added fuel to the fire by shouting about how much the king valued him at this moment when they were being pointed at by thousands of arrows.

It sounds like they're afraid he won't die fast enough.

His speech suddenly became so fluent, as if he had memorized it beforehand.

"Ah, it actually has a brain." Fu Ciyan expressed his surprise softly and without any emotion.

He turned his gaze to Baili Xunzhou, "What does Your Highness think? Are you going to kill me now?"

Bai Lixunzhou: "..."

I have a feeling that his two sentences just now were meant to mock him for not having a brain.

He had been blinded by concern, but now that Feng Mian was safe, he calmed down and realized something was amiss. However, he still held his bow and arrow, and said coldly, "This is just idle talk. Come back to the Swift Feather Camp with me first, and we'll talk things out slowly."

Two Swift Feather Camp soldiers stepped forward in response, approaching from the left and right, and reached out to twist Fu Ciyan's arms behind his back and take him away.

"Unfortunately, I've come today to say goodbye."

Fu Ciyan's casual gaze suddenly sharpened.

Just as the soldier on the left was about to touch his shoulder, he slightly turned his body, took half a step forward, and his right hand shot out like lightning to block the soldier's outstretched arm, while his left hand smoothly pulled away the sword at the soldier's waist.

As Fu Ciyan gripped the hilt of his sword, he pivoted on his right foot, spun around to avoid the soldier's lunge from the right, and thrust the sword backward with his left hand, knocking him away.

In a flash, Baili Xunzhou fired an arrow from his hand. The sound of metal piercing the air rang out. Fu Ciyan leaned back to dodge, and the sharp arrow tip grazed his cheek, leaving a small scratch.

Baili Xunzhou drew an arrow and nocked it with a backhand motion, shifting his feet to aim at Fu Ciyan again. Fu Ciyan, in turn, thrust his longsword at Baili Xunzhou.

"stop!"

At the critical moment, another person burst in, panting heavily. Gu Chunwen shouted with all his might, "General Feng, stop!"

With a snap, the arrow clashed with the longsword, and the moment the arrow broke in two and fell to the ground, the scene fell silent.

Who is General Feng?

Gu Chunwen, whose usual composed and elegant demeanor was now somewhat disheveled, took two steps forward and stood in front of Baili Xunzhou and Fu Ciyan, looking at Fu Ciyan, "Young General Feng, how long are you going to keep up this pretense?"

Feng Ciyan stared at him for a long time, then casually tossed aside the sword in his hand and laughed: "How did you guess that?"

At this moment, he had completely shed the air of a frivolous scholar. His back was straight as a sword, and although his tone was still somewhat nonchalant, he could no longer conceal the imposing aura he had gained from his battlefield experience.

"Your likes and dislikes are too obvious."

In the ensuing silence, everyone was still processing the news that "Fu Ciyan's surname is actually Feng," and their minds were still reeling. Only Gu Chunwen slowly and methodically explained his deductions, which helped to clear everyone's confused thoughts with each word he spoke.

"Ever since we met, you have shown special concern for the princess, but it is not out of a man's admiration for a woman. Rather, it is the concern of an elder. On the way back, when you mentioned the General Who Protects the Nation, I thought you were just an old acquaintance of the Feng family."

But when he returned, he looked through old letters with his teachers and tried to find a family with the surname Fu that had close ties with the Feng family. Suddenly, he remembered that General Feng Cixu, the Grand General of the State, had a younger brother who was twenty years younger than him.

"This younger brother was the posthumous child of the General's concubine. He grew up under the General's care and was always by his side. But after the General passed away, he disappeared without a trace. At that time, the young general was just beginning to show his talent, so not many people paid attention to him, and no one mentioned him again."

Gu Chunwen stared intently at Feng Ciyan. "Judging by your age, you're exactly twenty-five now, the same age as you. Am I right?"

“There’s only one mistake.” Feng Ciyan lowered his eyes, a hint of cold weariness in his voice. “I’m no longer some young general.”

The implication was that he was acknowledging that he was the younger brother of General Feng Cixu, who had been missing for eleven years.

“You…” Feng Mian was shocked. She subconsciously took two steps forward, but then hesitated and stopped. She stared in disbelief at the young man not far away. She felt that everything around her had taken on an unreal and ethereal quality. Her throat felt as if something was blocking it, and she could not utter a word.

He is his father's younger brother, so...

Feng Ciyan turned his head to look at her, his eyes, which bore a resemblance to hers, now filled with tenderness.

"Xiaoman." He called her by her childhood name for the first time, but it didn't feel awkward at all, as if he had recited it a thousand times in his heart. "You should call me Uncle."

Feng Mian was speechless. She only knew that her father's parents had died early, but no one had ever mentioned that he had a half-brother. She thought that her father's line of relatives had long been severed.

No wonder she felt Fu Ciyan looked familiar when she first saw him. Looking at him again now, she realized that his features resembled those of her father and herself.

Her disheveled figure was framed between heaven and earth. In a daze, Feng Mian seemed to cross the river of time and space and look into her father's eyes again, which made her involuntarily redden her eyes.

"You...you...you...you..." Even more shocked and astonished than Feng Mian was Baili Xunzhou. His hand holding the bow and arrow froze; he didn't know whether to put the arrow down or nock it.

His gaze darted back and forth between Feng Ciyan and Feng Mian several times, and he had to admit that if you looked closely, there were indeed some similarities between their eyes and brows.

"Since you...you and the Alna tribe..." Baili Xunzhou was filled with shock and doubt. What had Feng Ciyan been doing all these years that made the Alna tribe so eager to find him?

I have so many questions to ask that I don't know which one to ask first.

Feng Ciyan glared at him, annoyed. "Did a bird peck your tongue?"

Bai Lixunzhou: "..."

He was furious, but Feng Ciyan's status was no longer ordinary. He had transformed into Feng Mian's uncle. Seeing that Feng Mian's gaze towards Feng Ciyan had become bright and watery, how could Baili Xunzhou possibly talk back to his "elder"?

An internal conflict was averted when Gu Chunwen "revealed his identity." Everyone present was given a military order by Baili Xunzhou not to leak any information, lest the Alna tribe sneak over.

Feng Ciyan claimed he had urgent business to attend to and needed to go to the capital immediately, but refused to explain to Feng Mian what that urgent matter was. Feng Mian, having just reunited with her uncle, had many questions to ask and immediately took his arm, preventing him from leaving.

Feng Ciyan, ultimately soft-hearted towards his niece, sighed and said, "If you keep me here like this, it will seem foolish of me to insist on leaving today and even fight with Baili."

"Times have changed. Let's see who dares to laugh at you for this."

Baili Xunzhou silently looked away, on the verge of tears, feeling that the position he had finally secured with Feng Mian had been quickly usurped by someone else.

That shameless dove even started acting like an elder, making things difficult for the poor little magpie at every turn. Baili Xunzhou felt like he had encountered an "evil mother-in-law."

"The tea is too hot. Is this how Your Highness usually drinks tea?"

Everyone sat around the table, and it was inconvenient to call a maid to stand by. So Baili Xunzhou took it upon himself to pour tea for the "elders." But the elders would make things difficult for him, sometimes making the tea too cold and sometimes too hot. If it weren't for Feng Mian's sake, Baili Xunzhou would have liked to throw the tea in his face.

"Uncle, if it's hot, let it cool down for a while before drinking it." Feng Mian couldn't stand it anymore and pulled Baili Xunzhou, who had gotten up again to serve tea, back down to sit. "The young master has never served anyone before, why are you making things difficult for him like this?"

With Feng Mian's protection, Baili Xunzhou immediately felt refreshed, and even his tolerance towards Feng Ciyan increased. It's clear that all mother-in-law/daughter-in-law conflicts stem from the inaction of the person caught in the middle!

"He doesn't even pour you a cup of tea normally?" Feng Ciyan frowned, finding another point to attack.

Baili Xunzhou: ? Who are you comparing yourself to? Can you even compare the two of you?

Feng Mian patted Baili Xunzhou's hand reassuringly under the table, changing the subject: "Uncle, why didn't you acknowledge me from the beginning?"

If Gu Chunwen hadn't been careful, and Feng Ciyan had left today, how would she have known she had a little uncle in the future?

Feng Ciyan changed the subject, touched the wound on his cheek that would have healed in a stick of incense, and deliberately sighed, "Alas, Your Highness's archery skills are truly amazing. I dodged so quickly, but I was still scratched. If I had been any slower, I'm afraid you would have strung my head up like a candied hawthorn."

Bai Lixunzhou: "..."

Is it his fault?

Feng Mian upheld justice, saying, "This matter cannot be blamed on the Crown Prince. If you hadn't concealed your identity and hadn't had an unclear relationship with the Alna tribe, would the Crown Prince have pointed an arrow at you today?"

"Stop beating around the bush. Why didn't you acknowledge me in the first place?"