She curled her lips: "Not bad."
He wrapped the cloak around her, his eyes fixed on her hair.
Her hair was a little loose, and her hat was nowhere to be found. Further down, her outer garment, faintly stained with blood, was draped roughly, its belt tied haphazardly...
He abruptly withdrew his gaze and wanted to reach out to touch the shoulder, but in the end he paused.
"Has His Majesty given you any trouble?"
Xiao Nanhui looked at the hand hanging on his shoulder, and the empty corner of his heart suddenly emitted a heavy echo.
At this moment, she suddenly wanted to reply to him: Yes, the emperor did make things difficult for her.
But then what? What will happen then?
She was silent for a moment, and the words on her lips turned into another one.
"Why didn't godfather come to Tingfeng Tower to keep the appointment yesterday?"
Xiao Zhun obviously didn't expect her to ask this question, and he hesitated before answering.
"I... never liked eating fish."
Xiao Nanhui stared at the person in front of him in a daze, and after a while he suddenly smiled.
It wasn't really a laugh, it was more like a sigh.
He could say that the ritual process was complicated and he needed to arrive early as Qinghuai Hou, or he could say that the military affairs of the Subei Camp were urgent and he couldn't get away for the time being.
But he didn't say anything, he just said that he didn't like eating fish.
They really look alike.
Even the embarrassed look on their faces when they lie are almost exactly the same.
In the past, she was obsessed with this similarity, as if she were a part of him, witnessing some unshakable bond between them. But now, she would be stung by this similarity.
The expression on her face caught Xiao Zhun's eyes, and he couldn't bear to look at it anymore, so he could only turn away.
"Let's go home."
As the man said, the short three days in Jiaosong County were nothing more than a grand drama in the hands of the royal family. Now, he just hoped that this drama would end quickly.
"Godfather."
She suddenly spoke in a low voice, but it seemed abrupt and urgent in this deserted ancient bridge.
Xiao Zhun paused and did not turn around.
She stared at the back and suddenly felt like words were stuck in her throat, choking and unable to speak.
That sentence had been stuck there for a long time, so long that it seemed to have grown into her flesh and blood.
But today, there was a surge of anger in her chest and abdomen, and she felt that if she didn't use a knife to dig out the doubts in her flesh and blood, she would suffocate and collapse.
Xiao Nanhui took a deep breath and asked the question she thought she would never ask.
"Did godfather ever like Nan Hui?"
As soon as Xiao Nan replied, Xiao Zhun felt as if he was pricked by a needle. A slight blush appeared on his face, and he didn't know whether it was out of shock or embarrassment.
Looking back at his reaction, Xiao Nan felt his heart sink deeper into the abyss.
Her confession in the main hall is still vivid in my mind, and Su Wei’s words in the side hall are still ringing in my ears.
In the countless speculations she had made in the past, she had also thought: She had been by his side for many years, and her thoughts hadn't been there for just a day or two, so how could he not notice? But if he noticed and didn't respond, what would she do?
Xiao Nanhui spoke again, his voice already bitter: "Have you ever...liked me?"
Xiao Zhun could no longer remain silent, and after a while he spoke, "I was only nineteen when I picked you up, and you were only six or seven years old. I thought of your miserable life, so I kept you in my mansion as my adopted daughter and taught you skills in the hope that one day you would not be bullied and would be able to gain a foothold in this world. Apart from that, I have no other thoughts. I do have selfish feelings for your name, and if you don't like it, I can erase it after you get married. I am unmarried and have no children, so I don't know what the relationship between father and daughter should be like, but I treat you as an elder and have never been dishonest..."
Xiao Zhun said a lot, but only two words remained in Xiao Nanhui's heart.
Never.
"That means I've never liked it."
Xiao Nanhui suddenly spoke, interrupting Xiao Zhun's confession.
For this belated answer, she waited for many years, wasted many years, and delayed her progress.
She remembered what Yao Yi had said to her, and now thinking about it, it was exactly the same.
She appears strong, but in reality she is weak. Her love for Xiao Zhun has never made her stronger, but has only sapped her courage year after year. Bai Yun's appearance is like a huge rock falling from the sky, forcing her to pull herself out of the vortex she has been wasting her life growing up in.
Can the differences between people be made up through acquired efforts?
She once thought it was possible, but the moment she saw Bai Yun shoot the arrow from Tingfeng Tower, she knew it was impossible.
The black-feathered arrow shot in a hurry passed through the carved window lattices of Tingfeng Tower, passed through the smoky sky above Yue River, and finally penetrated the overlapping crowd and the canopy on both sides of the emperor, reaching its destination accurately.
To shoot arrows like that, one needs to be gifted.
But she had no talent, all she had was hard training day after day. Even so, she still couldn't match the other's archery skills. The same was true between her and Xiao Zhun. Even though she had spent more than ten years together, it couldn't compare to the few memories of their youth.
Biting her lips, the expression on her face gradually calmed down, only her voice was still trembling.
"Foster father, do you know that when I was with Your Majesty in Suyan, I once almost fell off a cliff and died?"
Xiao Zhun was speechless.
He knew that many things had happened during her time in Lingxi, but he had never thought about the twists and turns, let alone how those twists and turns would change the person in front of him.
"The Bai family has a highly skilled swordsman named Yan Zi. He once injured me with his sword energy, while I was wearing the Light Armor at the time. The armor blocked the fatal blow for me, but the next second I was on the cliff of the Tianmu River Ancient Road. The weight of the armor caused me to fall, and it almost took my life."
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