3 Chapter 3: Breaking the Fire Scene
◎In the clear eyes, only Yuliu is reflected◎
Yuliu's life creed is to enjoy life while it lasts and make money happily.
That day, Yuliu was "taken" by Yumei all the way to buy everything from clothes, shoes and socks to red hairpins and jade rings, from earrings and jewelry to the four treasures of the study, and she bought everything inside and out.
By the time they returned to Yuqing Courtyard, Yumei was still a little dazed: Fortunately, she had brought enough banknotes today, otherwise she might not have been able to afford the golden rabbit cage!
It was a chilly spring day. As the sun set in the west, the spring breeze wasn't gentle, but rather had a bit of a biting chill. Yuliu was aware that even her body was a bit cold after going out this time. She twisted her delicate white fingertips, coughed lightly a few times, and asked softly, "Yumei, how long will it take us to get back to the courtyard?"
Yumei lifted a corner of the carriage curtain and could vaguely see the willow tree planted in front of the courtyard. She took off her Liuyun cloak and tied it on the willow tree. She also put the hot water bottle that was warming on the side into her hand to replace the one that was gradually cooling down. After doing all this, she stopped the carriage and helped her get out of the sedan chair while asking with concern, "Young lady, how is your body...?"
Yuliu's eyes were filled with mist. "Oh... This is an old problem I've had since my mother's womb. Just take a few doses of medicine and it will be fine."
While they were talking, the two walked through the hanging flower gate and into the vermilion lacquered corridor. The maid who had been waiting in the inner courtyard since early morning was quick-eyed and immediately stood up from the stone table in the outer room and trotted to Yuliu in three or two steps.
"Fangyue." Yuliu lowered her eyes and said softly, "Why are you running so fast? Be careful not to fall."
Fangyue, with her hair neatly combed into twin buns, looked very well-behaved. Her jade-like face was a bit rosy, perhaps from running or perhaps just nervousness and shyness. She hesitated for a moment before saying, "Today... the veterinarian from Tongjitang came by."
When Yuliu came, he noticed that the blood bag had disappeared long ago. He was not surprised to hear this. He nodded and led the two of them to continue walking slowly towards the inner courtyard.
The small house in the backyard where she lived was not big, and she walked through the corridor in a moment.
Fang Yue followed slowly behind, carefully observing Yu Liu's expression. Seeing nothing unusual, she bravely continued, "But something unexpected happened today. When the doctor arrived, he found a patient at the gate of the mansion. It was quite serious and difficult to treat casually, so he went to Tongji Hall to find another doctor."
...Have you called another doctor?
Upon hearing this, Yuliu paused and looked quietly at the palm-carved wooden door in front of her. A strange feeling of unfamiliarity surged in her heart, as if something had silently deviated from her expectations.
She frowned slightly, subconsciously feeling a little unhappy, but quickly raised her hand and gently stroked the end of her brow with her fingertips to hide the emotion, and asked softly, "Where are the injured people being placed now?"
"The one who came is Li Shengshou. I heard that he worked in the palace in his early years, specializing in tending to the Fourth Prince's illness. He said that this man has lost too much blood and his body temperature has dropped sharply. He must be placed in a place with a heater, so..." Fang Yue lowered her head, her voice getting smaller and smaller. In the end, she simply shut up and pointed at the wooden door.
As soon as Yuliu heard this, he understood the cause and effect of the whole thing.
This holy hand who once served the Heavenly Family, no matter what the reason for leaving the palace, is naturally superior to others because of this experience. He wants to place the person in the main room with the best environment to save him, and Fangyue, as a servant, can't stop him.
Yuliu didn't really care about the distinction between men and women. But when she thought of the bloody streak in the weeds, she couldn't help but frown slightly.
It was his blessing that he survived such a severe injury, but it must have been hers.
But now that things have come to this, we can only act according to circumstances.
Yuliu took a deep breath and pushed open the quietly closed wooden door. The first thing that caught her eye was a long-handled ink-wash screen. The front hall's screen was embossed with birds flying overhead and trees and grasses on the ground, a vibrant interplay of movement and stillness. In front of the screen sat a single red beech round table depicting the Eight Immortals.
However, today there was someone sitting at the round table that was empty in the past.
Li Shengshou was wearing a medical gown with bleached fur edges from washing, and his beard was also a bit gray. He was obviously quite old, but he looked in good spirits. The red sandalwood portable medicine box on the table had some wear and tear on the corners, probably because of its age. When the old man saw Yu Liu, he immediately stood up and said, "Miss Yu, I..."
Yuliu waved her hand gently and got straight to the point: "Li Shengshou, I roughly know everything. How is he doing?"
"Not very good. He's been badly injured, nearly breaking a bone. It's a miracle he's still here. He's lost a lot of blood, so he needs to be placed in the main house's warm room." Li Shengshou said as he picked up the prescription on the table and handed it to Yuliu. "I just wrote this medicine. You have to boil it as much as you can and let him drink it."
Yuliu's eyes fell on the yellowed rough paper. She didn't take it, but just asked, "When will he wake up?"
The elms and willows are measuring.
Her every move in this mansion must be known to the Fourth Prince. If such a patient of unknown origin is really of sensitive identity and is rescued by her, she will be in trouble.
Li Shengshou hesitated slightly. "Drink this medicine. If you can wake up tonight, then there's still hope. If you can't make it through tonight... then even the Great Luo Immortals will be powerless to save you."
"Is he so badly injured?" Yuliu was slightly surprised when she heard this. After a moment's reflection, she thought, life and death are determined by fate, success and failure are determined by heaven. It's only one night, so she can still endure it. So she said with relief, "Yumei Fangyue, take the Holy Hand to get the medicine. Bring it back when it's ready."
When Yumei heard that she was also sent away, she frowned and said dissatisfiedly: "Miss, it's just to get some medicine, one person can go, I..."
"That's right. Then you can go get the medicine by yourself." The person Yu Liu really wanted to get rid of was Yu Mei, her spy. Yu Mei fell for his trick and immediately looked relieved. She readily continued, "Fang Yue, please take the trouble to count the things we bought today. When Yu Mei is done, let her help you."
In the Yuliu mansion, although Fangyue was young and a little timid and shy, she was the most obedient. When she received the order, she immediately took her leave and went to work.
Even though Yumei wanted to say something more, she was looked at with doubt in Yuliu's pure and clear eyes. She couldn't bring herself to stay and see the injured person, so she had no choice but to lead Li Shengshou to get medicine.
The footsteps gradually faded away, and everyone retreated. Yuliu stood alone in the conference hall quietly for a while before moving to the side room.
The ear room was indeed very warm, it could even be said to be a sunny place. There were flames jumping on the walls, charcoal basins burning on the table, and fires burning everywhere in the whole room.
As soon as Yuliu lifted the door curtain, she was hit in the face by the surging heat wave, and her mind went blank for a moment.
Open your eyes again.
The scorching flames tore the trajectory of light, and the surrounding scenery was distorted and illusory. The jumping flames suddenly surged, and thick smoke filled the air, devouring everything in the room and rushing straight to the beams. There was only a loud bang, and burnt beams and large chunks of painted walls kept falling down, landing in front of Yuliu's eyes, at her feet, and even penetrating her body.
But she had no actual sense of touch at all.
It was like turning into a void spirit, crossing the long river of time and space, and tracing back to a certain time and moment and an event.
The chaotic sound of footsteps, the helpless and panicked screams, the weak and helpless cries of children, and countless fearful and distorted faces turned into strange and twisted black figures in the flames that shot up into the sky, rushing towards the only exit.
——It is the door where Yuliu is standing.
Although Yuliu was not beyond her reach, the visual impact of such a scene was strong enough, so she moved aside to avoid the exit leading to the light and stay away from the chaotic escape scene. In this way, the tiny sobbing sound in the distance became particularly prominent.
When she looked in the direction of the sound, she found that the crying came from a little girl huddled under a half-broken wooden table. She was thin and had tattered hair. Her clothes were stained with what might have been smoke and ashes or footprints of someone fleeing. She looked like a dirty kitten.
Why is she crying?
Why didn't she run away?
Yuliu looked at the small figure from afar, one hand still stubbornly grasping the person in front of her, coughing and crying hoarsely: "Wake up..."
“Wake up!”
The voice is clear and the tone is gentle.
But the moment the words fell into Yuliu's ears, they began to ripple and spread out with her as the center, sweeping through the noisy embers and hellish fire around her, and turning everything back into a small cluster of flames jumping in front of Yuliu's fingertips.
That was the charcoal fire burning beside the bed.
Yuliu was confused for a moment.
She leaned down so close to the charcoal brazier that she could even feel the flickering sparks with her fingertips. It seemed that if she came to her senses a little later, she would reach out and grab the tiny flame.
She had no idea when she was half-kneeling here.
The pink and white fingertips curled up slightly, and a belated fear rose silently in her heart.
"woke up?"
A warm breath fell on the top of Yuliu's head, and the voice was gentle, overlapping with the last faint sound in the illusion.
Yuliu's gaze slowly focused, falling on the hand that was stretched out at an angle and held on her wrist.
The knuckles are distinct, and the veins on the clean back of the hand are slightly protruding.
They are a pair of very beautiful hands.
His gaze lingered on the cold, white, slender hand for a moment before Yuliu moved his gaze upwards little by little along the direction of the arm.
She slowly turned her head.
Then it bumped into a pair of deep eyes.
The pupils are extremely black and you can't see the bottom of them at a glance, but the eyes are very clear.
Only Yuliu's figure was reflected in the clear eyes. She could even clearly see her own slightly widened eyes through the other person's eyes.
Yuliu unconsciously followed the frequency of his blinking, slowly lowered her eyes and then opened them, and following the rhythm of his breathing, slowly adjusted her breath which was just disordered due to heart palpitations.
The two of them just looked at each other quietly for a moment.
However, under the other party's subtle guidance, Yuliu miraculously recovered from the lingering fear and regained her composure.
The other party seemed to have noticed something and half-helped Yuliu, who was kneeling on the ground, to stand up. Then he restrained and politely released the force of his hand and put it back into his sleeve, slightly folding it.
Only then did Yuliu notice that he was wearing a plain, coarse cloth smock. Having just treated his injuries, he should have looked as spotless as his clean hands and elegant face. But she found she couldn't ignore the several stains on his cuffs from sparks, and the awkward wrinkles and faint ash on the fabric at his knees.
——These were all the infections he had gotten when he was half-kneeling beside her while trying to stop Yuliu from touching the fire.
When Yuliu saw these stains, it felt like finding flaws on a beautiful jade, which was glaring and piercing.
Yuliu looked away and saw that he was broad-shouldered and tall like a pine or cypress. When she stood in front of him, she was completely enveloped by his shadow. His breath gently fell on her hair as he spoke. "I'm sorry, I was worried that you might get hurt by the fire, so I tried to stop it. I hope you won't blame me."
Yuliu was slightly surprised when she heard this.
During the time when the illusion appeared, she was completely unaware of what was happening in reality.
She didn't know how she sat down by the charcoal fire, nor how she felt when she reached out to grab the flames, but Yuliu always felt that no matter what, if other people saw this act of self-immolation, they would probably think she was possessed by a ghost.
Keeping your distance is the best way to deal with it.
Just like Yuliu and I disappeared today.
And this person who was supposed to judge life and death in the dark night, somehow miraculously woke up and prevented her from being hurt, but he was self-disciplined and did not ask any questions.
【Author’s words】
Today I updated 10,000 words, my eyes are full of stars and I need your praise QWQ
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