It was a bitterly hot June, and not a drop of rain fell in Chizhou for ten consecutive days.
It was hot and humid during the day, and it only felt a little cooler after the evening. Xiao Nanhui often leaned against the swaying side window of the carriage, enjoying the evening breeze while sorting out his thoughts.
Sometimes, when her mind was free, she would sit in the corner of the carriage and secretly observe him.
He rarely spoke during these ten days.
He brought ten boxes, each filled to the brim with documents and memorials. Fast horses would always catch up with him, sometimes at midnight, sometimes at noon, bringing in a box and taking another, always leaving it completely full.
Xiao Nanhui watched from the side, and gradually became accustomed to it from his initial curiosity.
She once thought that being an emperor was the most comfortable job in the world. He could go out in a sedan chair carried by eight people and never step on the ground. When he came home, he could drink gold and jade and sleep soundly. He could have as many beauties as he wanted and all the rare and exquisite toys as he wanted. No one in the world dared to contradict him. No one would ever look down on him or bully him, and no one would be like her, always on the alert and weeping blood but forgetting to eat.
But now, she suddenly lost interest in the so-called heavenly family. The only thing she still envied was his demeanor, which was the result of years of self-discipline and self-cultivation.
It was an indescribable feeling, like a consistent indifference to the things around her. She could barely describe it with the word "calm", but that feeling was something she would never have.
She is often anxious, uneasy, and ready to strike.
Calmness was too much of a luxury for her.
In addition to keeping company with the ten boxes, he would occasionally stop, estimate the time, and then take out a porcelain bottle from the lacquer box and hand it to her.
Each bottle contained only one pill, and after taking it, the bottle was put into another lacquer box. This cycle repeated twice a day.
He said that it was the life-saving medicine she took after being injured, and to be on the safe side, he asked Hao Bai to prescribe a few more doses.
She didn't ask much, but she was almost certain that it wasn't something you could just casually prescribe. This was because the taste of the medicine was very similar to the Zhidan that Hao Bai had given her in Murhe, except that it smelled more fragrant and tasted a little warmer.
How could that stingy doctor be willing to prescribe such a thing and let her take two pills a day like he did for Shunqi Pills?
Thinking of this, she ate even happier.
As she ate, the memories of that night at Douchen Ridge came to her mind intermittently. She vaguely remembered Hao Bai's furious face swaying above her head, and then he cursed her with some nasty words and gave her a few injections.
Not wanting to become completely devoid of conscience, she found an opportunity to inquire about the whereabouts of the quack doctor. He simply replied that he had been given other things to do and had invited an old friend to keep him company, so he was living a quiet and carefree life.
She was a little skeptical, because since leaving Quecheng, she had been sneezing more and more frequently, and her ears were a little hot. She always had a vague feeling that the doctor was not living a comfortable life, so he cursed her every few days and made her nose itchy.
Or maybe it was just because the weather was so hot and dry that her nose was always dry and itchy.
Finally, at dusk on the tenth day, with a loud thunderclap, raindrops began to hit the hood of the car. Almost at the same time, the man who delivered the box suddenly stopped coming.
Xiao Nanhui guessed that this was because they had entered the territory of Huozhou.
He finally had some free time. Before the sun set, he mixed a sweet, spicy and cool incense and lit it. He leaned against the side window where the sudden rain was hitting, and looked at her quietly.
The carriage was still shaking, and in the darkness there was only a dim red light from the burning incense powder.
And his gaze passed through the swaying darkness, as if passing through long years and unknown hardships, and gently fell on her.
"Why don't you ask me?"
She lowered her head subconsciously.
"You've been busy, and there are many things I haven't sorted out yet..."
"Then ask now."
He pressed on, his voice unusually calm amid the noisy rain outside the window.
What's the problem?
In fact, she could pretend not to know, but she chose to remain silent.
"Don't you want to know whether I know the truth about the Xiao family's massacre? Why don't you ask? Do you not want to ask or are you afraid to ask?"
But he finally asked for her.
Humid air began to seep into the car, mixed with the spicy smell, and there was a coolness that shouldn't be there on a summer night.
She sighed softly in the darkness.
"You know why."
If you have never heard the answer to some questions, then even if there are various speculations, they cannot be considered settled.
But once you know the answer, many things cannot be avoided.
"But you've already found out a lot, haven't you?" He paused, his voice becoming somewhat distant. "As early as when we met in Murhe, I had a hunch that you might be the first person to get close to the truth in all these years. So at that time, I considered whether I should kill you."
Her heart tightened, and she subconsciously felt a little uncomfortable. Thinking back to that moment, she remembered that she had also had murderous intentions, and her heart calmed down a little.
Who can predict the future? At that time, she only thought that he was an enemy of the Marquis's Mansion.
"Do you regret not killing me?"
He was silent for a while, as if thinking about this question seriously, and then he said lightly after a while.
“Some answers will only be known after a long time.”
How long is a long time later?
She felt that these words seemed profound, but in fact they were very empty.
If the infatuated men and women in love in the storybooks said such words, the people who paid for the books would curse.
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