The thick smoke was choking. Looking up, all she could see was fire. Looking straight ahead, the walls were covered in flames, and the ground was ablaze. The fire spread like the hand of a demon slowly crawling toward her, and a feeling of suffocation engulfed her.
Dressed in exquisite clothes, she transformed into a little girl, standing amidst a sea of fire.
Chang Lili gasped and opened her eyes. Her mother-in-law's kind face filled her vision as she stroked her forehead with concern: "You're awake, little girl. How are you feeling?"
She remained unconscious for a day and a night. As fresh air filled her lungs, she snapped out of her nightmare and realized how wonderful it was to be alive.
"Grandma, I'm back?" She remembered that she was in prison, beaten to the point of near death.
The mother-in-law lovingly touched her face: "General Meng saved you. Are you still in pain?"
To avoid worrying her mother-in-law, she forced a nonchalant smile and said, "It doesn't hurt."
She then recalled that she had indeed seen Meng Yuxiu in a blur. At the time, she thought he was as handsome as a god, and he had carefully held her in his arms with unprecedented tenderness.
Chang Lili blushed and her heart raced. She licked her dry lips and tried to get up, but as soon as she moved, she suddenly felt a sharp pain all over her body and gasped.
"Slow down, girl, you need to take good care of your injury," the mother-in-law said with concern.
Chang Lili rubbed her shrunken belly and said with a bitter face, "Grandma, I'm hungry."
It seems the fever has subsided. The mother-in-law said happily, "Don't worry, I'll go and make you something delicious right away."
A maid entered and said, "Miss Chang, you're awake. The general has asked me to take you to have lunch with him."
Chang Lili stared at the maid in shock, feeling that Meng Yuxiu was acting like a weasel offering New Year's greetings to a chicken. She asked in surprise, "Is he so kind? Isn't he busy with his work in broad daylight?"
"Lili," her mother-in-law looked at her with a mixture of helplessness and indulgence, "General Meng kindly rescued you and even invited you to dinner. Don't let his kindness go to waste. Get dressed and go quickly."
Chang Lili reluctantly said "Oh," put on her coat, and followed the maid.
As she walked out of the simply furnished courtyard and through the long corridor, Chang Lili felt that the maids and servants kept glancing at her and whispering among themselves.
"It's definitely not something nice to say." Chang Lili glared back at those gazes, muttering under her breath.
In the dining room, Meng Yuxiu seemed to have been waiting for a long time. When he saw Chang Lili coming over, he actually stood up politely.
Chang Lili was flattered and cautiously stopped, refusing to go forward.
"What are you up to? Why are you suddenly acting like a hypocrite?" She frowned and stared at Meng Yuxiu.
He didn't speak, but the servant behind him said, "General, look at this! It's like a dog biting Lü Dongbin! You kindly rescued her from prison and saved her life, but you were still impeached by other officials. And what about her?"
"Shut up, don't mention these things again," Meng Yuxiu said sternly, frowning.
Chang Lili asked, "What the hell is this? Why is he playing the bad cop when he's supposed to be the good cop?"
She recalled the way the servants in the mansion looked at her, and the fact that Meng Yuxiu had indeed forcibly rescued her. These things... didn't seem fake... Thinking about it carefully, he had actually been helping her all along.
The wariness in Chang Lili's eyes dissipated, replaced by a hint of guilt, and she looked at Meng Yuxiu with embarrassment.
Their eyes met, and Meng Yuxiu smiled slightly: "Don't worry about it. You are now a member of my household. I can't just let those people cause trouble in my household, or others will think that my General's Mansion is easy to bully."
Chang Lili chuckled awkwardly, "Hehe, really?"
But she felt that a stern general like Meng Yuxiu wouldn't care about face at all. If it wasn't for face, could it really be for her...? As she thought about it, she covered her face and then covered her nose. She thought to herself, "I'm actually not bad looking."
Meng Yuxiu seemed to have guessed her thoughts and noticed her shyness. His face darkened, and he said seriously, "Let's sit down and eat."
Chang Lili, who had been maintaining a rare girlish reserve, widened her eyes upon seeing the dishes on the table. She rushed to the table, pointed at the several large soup bowls, and asked, "You invited me to dinner, but... what are all these?"
Meng Yuxiu slowly and deliberately raised his hand to introduce the dishes to her one by one: "Black fish soup, pig's feet soup, pigeon soup, black chicken soup."
"And then?" Chang Lili asked, looking around, but no one served any food.
"What? You don't like these?" Meng Yuxiu looked at her in surprise. "I've heard that you eat everything."
Suppressing her anger, Chang Lili glared at him and said, "You don't have to prepare a whole table of soup to entertain me, do you? Do I look like a soup bowl?"
“You are covered in wounds now. Although the wounds are not deep, don’t you young ladies care the most about your appearance? I specially asked the imperial physicians in the palace to prepare this soup for you. It can help the wounds heal faster, nourish the body, and will not leave scars.” Meng Yuxiu said as he ladled a bowl of soup for Chang Lili and handed it to her.
It has to be said that the soup smelled really good. Chang Lili sat down at the table without hesitation and began to drink it with relish.
Meng Yuxiu is a decent man, but with his power, wealth, and good looks, Chang Lili dares not dream of marrying him now.
Although she is no longer a virgin, as long as she maintains her appearance, it won't be difficult for her to marry an ordinary man and live a simple life, as long as her mother-in-law is at ease.
So, under Meng Yuxiu's watchful eye, she drank about three bowls of soup without any hesitation, and even finished off a lot of the meat in the soup.
After she finished eating, she patted her stomach and asked Meng Yuxiu, "Hey, aren't you going to eat?"
"I don't need to eat such nourishing food. I already had a simple meal," he said, waving his hand to signal the servants to clear the leftovers from the table.
So he specifically invited her to drink the soup, which made Chang Lili feel embarrassed.
"Thank you so much." She said shyly, regretting that she hadn't restrained herself earlier and had been wolfing down her food.
Meng Yuxiu remained silent, a hint of worry appearing on his otherwise rugged face.
Chang Lili rubbed her eyes, making sure she wasn't seeing things, and asked, "You wouldn't... really have been impeached and now being punished by the Emperor, would you?"
“Of course not, His Majesty would not punish me for such a trivial matter,” Chang Lili said in surprise. Meng Yuxiu continued, “It’s because one of my friends was ambushed, but the culprit has not been caught yet. I can’t even tell what weapon caused his wounds. If I knew, the wounds were so peculiar, and if I could identify the weapon, it wouldn’t be difficult to find the culprit.”
"You still have friends?" Chang Lili asked instinctively. Feeling Meng Yuxiu's cold gaze, she quickly raised her hands in a gesture of surrender. "What I mean is, the friends you can make must be outstanding individuals, but outstanding individuals are really too few."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
