In the blink of an eye, more than half a month has passed.
That night, rain began to fall from the sky without anyone noticing, just as the saying goes, "One autumn rain brings one chill."
Inside the window, a solitary red candle flickers in the wind. Outside, a light rain falls obliquely, and puddles drip silently from the eaves, quickly spreading into ripples on the ground, like sighs or attempts to hold on.
Listening quietly to the incessant sound of rain pattering on banana leaves outside the window, Yi Shangyun lay on the couch, tossing and turning several times, unable to fall asleep. So she got up to change her clothes and extinguished the candle.
It was accompanied by a creaking sound.
She gently pushed open the door, stepped over the threshold, and then gently closed it again. Turning around, she stood under the eaves, gazing intently at the silent night, where the only sounds seemed to be the patter of rain.
A cool breeze swept by, and she blinked slightly, instinctively tightening her clothes. Then, with her long, black hair flowing freely, she glanced around the courtyard and locked onto a spot. She then walked to the pavilion in the corner of the courtyard, sat down, and gazed at the raindrops drifting in the night sky.
In the distance, bright lights streaked across the exquisite corner towers, casting a hazy, yellowish glow over the high walls of the deep palace, making the entire magnificent palace appear mysterious and serene.
The woman in the pavilion seemed to be mesmerized as she looked at the scenery. She slowly rose up, her delicate eyebrows barely visible, her nose exquisite and graceful, her lips naturally red like cherries, her skin like solidified cream, her cheeks like rosy clouds, and her slender waist, which could be encircled by one hand, leaning gracefully against the carved wooden railing of the pavilion.
Amidst the shimmering water, a breathtakingly beautiful face faintly appears.
All around was a tranquil night. Gradually, fine, silvery raindrops shrouded the world like a light veil. The autumn wind stirred a slender, elegant bamboo grove in the corner. The fine rain gathered into beads and slid down the graceful leaves like broken crystal threads, sometimes intermittent, sometimes continuous.
All of this is just like the tangled thoughts and helplessness that have been swirling in her heart for so long. It is a heart-wrenching song, like a thick layer of fallen flowers on the ground, which cannot be dispersed even if the wind blows hard.
Loneliness fills the sky, and raindrops pelt my face. A heart full of tenderness is locked between my brows, but alas, our love was deep yet our fate was shallow, and we are separated by death. Gradually, we walk further and further away.
After an unknown amount of time, she frowned deeply, withdrew her melancholy gaze, sighed heavily, and murmured to herself, "Your Highness, Yun'er misses you so much, Yun'er really misses Your Highness!"
Boundless and desperate longing is a knife, a knife laced with deadly poison, especially on a rainy night like this, it blooms and spreads wantonly, each cut piercing the heart, each cut threatening to kill. Only those who have experienced it know this pain.
After speaking, her nose tingled, and tears fell so easily, just like countless days and nights before, the longing causing her unbearable pain: "Your Highness, do you know how many times I've truly wanted to go with you? Perhaps, then in another world where there will be no more torment and pain, I will meet Your Highness again, and we will..."
But at this moment, she herself clearly didn't believe her own thoughts and ideas.
So she sniffed, wiped her teary eyes with the back of her hand, and said, “Your Highness, there is someone who told Yun’er that Yun’er’s true identity is the legitimate princess of Dongning Kingdom who was lost in Xiqin for many years. At first, Yun’er did not believe it at all, but in recent days, Yun’er has carefully reviewed everything that has happened in the past and up to the present. Perhaps, he was not lying.”
She paused, then continued, "Actually, Yun'er doesn't care who she is at all. Yun'er just wants you to come back to life. As long as I can see you from afar every day, Yun'er would be willing to die in this life."
Her emotions spiraled out of control again, and her voice trembled along with her entire body: "Your Highness, Yun'er was truly wrong. I'm so sorry, Your Highness. Yun'er shouldn't have believed what the Princess Qin said. Yun'er shouldn't have doubted Your Highness's heart. Yun'er should have only trusted Your Highness. Yun'er made a thousand mistakes, I shouldn't have gone to Beilie with Tuoba Ze, which led to Your Highness's... Your Highness, come back, come back to Yun'er's side. Without Your Highness, Yun'er really can't, really can't. Come back, come back! Don't Your Highness's words count? Come back..."
After saying that, she buried her face in her hands and cried bitterly on the stone table in the pavilion...
Lost in her emotions, she didn't realize that at that moment, a maid carrying a hexagonal palace lantern was slowly walking towards the pavilion from the other end of the corridor.
The maidservant approached the pavilion, picked up a palace lantern, and shone it on the light. She was immediately shocked and exclaimed, "Ah! It's you, Miss?! How could you be out here alone in this stormy night? What if you catch a cold? If His Highness the Third Prince finds out, he'll skin us alive!"
It turned out that the person who came was Qiaolan, the maid whom Mei Zhixuan had specially left in this courtyard to serve him personally.
She vaguely heard someone sobbing inside the house, so she went out to check, and sure enough, it was true.
As soon as he saw the face of the person in front of him, he hurriedly dropped the lamp in his hand, quickly took off his cloak, and rushed to Yi Shangyun's side to put his cloak on her.
Upon hearing this, Qi Liaoyi Shangyun still refused to raise her head, only trembling and weeping uncontrollably with her frail body...
Qiaolan went over and gently patted her back, still puzzled, and asked tentatively, "Miss, what's wrong? You've lived in this courtyard for so long, and I've always seen you lost in thought. What's wrong with you tonight? What happened? Please tell me, and I'll try to think of a solution for you..."
Before she could finish speaking, Qi Liaoyi suddenly sat up, turned around, and tightly hugged Qiaolan's waist, crying bitterly, "Yan'er... Yan'er... my good Yan'er, it's all my fault, it's all my fault. Why didn't I realize my feelings sooner? I shouldn't have backed down in the face of my love, I shouldn't have, I shouldn't have! If it weren't for me, he wouldn't have been so eager to attack Beilie, and he wouldn't have died from the poison of the water spirit. Even if he had died, there wouldn't have been a body left. Look at what I've done, Yan'er, Yan'er, hit me, scold me, kill me! I was wrong, I really know I was wrong..."
Qiaolan felt her body stiffen instantly, and she froze, feeling a jolt of fear in her heart.
Clearly, at this moment she was being treated as someone else, the one she kept calling out to, the one she seemed to trust implicitly, "Yan'er."
She must have been holding it in for a long time, which is why she was in such a dazed state of mind and behaving like this.
However, once she came to her senses, Qiaolan immediately realized that this woman came from the distant Western Qin Kingdom.
Continuing to think along the lines of what she just said, "In the Western Qin Kingdom, who else could be the one who decides to start a war, besides the high and mighty Emperor Jing?"
As she thought and thought, Qiaolan's big, round eyes widened in disbelief as she murmured to herself, "Could he be... the King of Western Qin?"
Instantly, she lowered her head, still gently stroking her heaving back with one hand, and exclaimed in even greater astonishment, "Heavens! Could it be that the person Jinlan spoke of, who is even less esteemed than the incomparable Princess Yongle, and who has caught the eye of the all-powerful Spirit Sky War God, Prince Qin, is... is the woman who is currently holding me in a daze, crying like a child, heartbroken and in unbearable pain..."
For a moment, Qiaolan stared at her blankly, stunned.
After a long while, Qiaolan saw that she was still crying as if she couldn't catch her breath. Both of them were servile people who walked on thin ice every day and could be struck by disaster at the slightest carelessness.
Perhaps out of sympathy for her shared ailment, he silently tried to comfort her, and slowly said, "Qiaolan knows that there must have been many things you couldn't say in your heart all this time, and now there's no one left to say them to. This is the fate that Heaven has already ordained for each of us, and no one can escape it. It's just that Heaven is jealous of talent, and who would have thought that the King of Western Qin would die so young..."
Although she knew in her heart that he was no longer in this world, hearing others say the same thing, for some reason, Yi Shangyun became furious. Suddenly, she shoved Qiaolan aside, stood up, and said angrily, "Shut up! Who said His Highness Prince Qin is dead? He won't die, he absolutely won't die, he won't die..."
Qiaolan still wanted her to wake up completely from her dream, so she raised her voice and said earnestly, "Who on the Lingkong Continent doesn't know that the King of Western Qin has passed away? It's fortunate that he's dead, otherwise, the Western Qin Kingdom, which always tries to excel in everything, would have long become the target of all the countries on the Lingkong Continent. The Northwest War, which resulted in the destruction of Northern Lie, was of great significance. Girl, even if you continue to deceive yourself, it won't help. The dead cannot be brought back to life. It's important to accept the situation and move on. The most important thing is to find a way to get out of the shadows and start a new life!"
Yi Shangyun gritted her teeth and listened to Qiaolan's words. She stared at her blankly for a long time, then fell silent and did not argue at all, seemingly pondering something in her heart.
Finally, she slowly turned around and headed back towards her room, silently thinking to herself, "Your Highness, that person told Yun'er that Your Highness was trapped and suffered an accident because Emperor Jing of Western Qin deliberately set a trap and failed to send reinforcements in time. Yun'er swears that she will use every means at her disposal to make that dog emperor pay an extremely heavy price for this!"
"No one can stop my determination for revenge, Your Highness... wait for me!" She quietly clenched her fists and whispered her vow.
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