66 Chapter 66
◎He may not be dead, he just changed his identity.◎
Xu Qinghe was the only child of the King and Queen of Nan'an. He had no brothers or sisters, let alone an older brother.
From childhood to adolescence, she only called Xie Qi "brother", and even the other two brothers of the Xie family were respectfully called "Xie Big Brother" and "Xie Second Brother".
When it came to Xie Qi, he just called him "brother" with a drawn-out tone and a hint of coquettishness.
Every time Xie Qi heard this, his heart felt like a piece of honey melting.
However, Xu Qinghe only called him that when he was a child. After he turned ten, he realized that it was too intimate, so he stopped calling him that.
So she just now… was treating the present as the past? That was why she rubbed his hand so intimately and called him in such a sweet voice.
Wei Che almost broke out in a cold sweat. The moment she called him brother, he almost thought that the girl recognized him.
For a moment, he didn't know whether he should be relieved that she finally recognized him, or worried about how angry this girl would be when she found out that he had lied to her for so long.
Fortunately, she was just in a dream.
He got up in a hurry, not forgetting to tuck in the corner of the quilt for her before leaving. After he walked out the door, he was blown by the cool breeze of the summer morning, and he felt a chill on his back.
Ever since he rescued Xu Qinghe as Wei Che and flirted with her repeatedly, his true identity as Xie Qi must never be known to her. Otherwise, with this girl's temper...
Wei Che felt a chill on his back again and hurriedly walked away, unwilling to speculate any further on this hypothesis.
More than an hour after he left, Xu Qinghe slowly woke up, only to find that she had been sleeping on her side with her left hand pressed down for a long time, and her arm was slightly numb when she woke up.
She slept too long and even had a slight headache. As she sat in front of the dressing mirror and Nanzhi combed her hair, some vague words floated past her ears.
—What do you want to eat today? I'll buy it for you tonight.
— Didn’t you just eat it yesterday? Are you not tired of it?
——I just like eating Tengluo Pancakes...
——Then let’s eat donkey meat hotpot, brother…
elder brother……
Xu Qinghe suddenly started, opened his eyes, and met his own surprised dark eyes in the mirror.
This morning...she actually called Wei Che brother?
Or in that sweet and lazy tone?
Is she acting coquettishly with him?
The shock in her heart was too much to calm down for a long time. Nanzhi saw her stunned and asked, "What happened to the princess?"
Xu Qinghe shook her head. After a while, when Nanzhi had already started to tie her hair, she suddenly asked, "Nanzhi, who do you think Wei Che looks like?"
Nanzhi replied as she moved, "She looks more like the Duke's wife. The Duke is more heroic than handsome, but the Crown Prince is a handsome man. However, the Crown Prince has a very ostentatious expression between his eyebrows, which sometimes doesn't seem to belong on his face..."
Eyebrows...
Could it be...
Nanzhi's movements became slower and slower, and she whispered tentatively, "My princess, do you want to say...?"
"His eyebrows and eyes...are very similar to those of Xie Qi when he was young." Xu Qinghe spoke directly, looking at himself in the mirror, and seemed to be looking into the distance.
"Sometimes when I look into Wei Che's eyes and listen to his voice, I always wonder... maybe Xie Qi isn't dead, he just changed his identity. He's still here, right beside me, investigating the truth of what happened back then with me."
Nanzhi listened quietly, listening to her slowly telling the story of something that was impossible to happen in such a calm yet nostalgic tone.
Nanzhi couldn't help but feel a lump in her throat as she choked out a sob, "The princess just misses the young general so much that she mistook others for him and thinks of him all the time."
Xu Qinghe also thought so.
It was Emperor Yongshun's confidant who personally went to the southern border to strangle Xie Qi's family. In the end, he personally brought back the remaining bones of Xie Qi after he was burned to death, as well as the Xie family's ancestral bone whistle that was left next to the bones.
Later, the coroner performed an autopsy and found that the characteristics matched Xie Qi's.
He was indeed dead, carrying with him the regret that the Xie family could not be cleared, and perhaps also the resentment of having been abandoned by her.
He was such a brave and capable major general, but in the end he did not fall on the battlefield, but died in such a fire.
Xu Qinghe felt sad and had no appetite for breakfast. Finally, he stared blankly at the bowl of glutinous rice balls with brown sugar and ginger juice on the table.
Nanzhi explained, "Before leaving, Prince Wei specifically instructed the kitchen to prepare a bowl of this for the princess to replenish her energy and blood."
The meatballs were soft and sticky, with a faint aroma of wine. She didn't know what method the kitchen used to cover up the ginger taste that she hated.
Not long after it entered my throat, I could feel the warmth in my stomach, and even the pain in my lower abdomen was much relieved.
Xu Qinghe walked around under the flower stand in the yard, picked a bunch of wisteria flowers as if to kill time, carefully wrapped the flowers in silk, and placed them on the stone table.
Later, he still felt that the quantity was not enough, so he went under the shelf to continue picking.
The idle little maid in the yard wanted to help, but was stopped by Nanzhi.
She probably had guessed what the princess wanted to do.
After picking the flowers and digesting most of the food, Xu Qinghe only asked Nanzhi to put the flowers away without saying anything else. The latter directly ordered someone to wash the flowers carefully, and then followed the princess into the studio.
Xu Qinghe painted another landscape painting.
Under the azure sky, several horses were galloping wildly, their hooves flying in the air, casting faint shadows on the green grass.
There seems to be a gentle breeze in the painting, blowing down the half-human-high grass and trees, revealing several white rabbits hiding inside, preparing to jump and find another place to hide.
Nanzhi only took one look and could see the vitality in the painting, as if it was hiding the breath of spring.
In her eyes, her princess should also be full of vitality, just like she was when she was a child.
When Xu Qinghe finally put down his brush and stood in front of the table looking at the painting, Nanzhi spoke carefully: "Nanzhi has followed the princess since childhood, and now I have some things in my heart that I want to tell the princess. I wonder if the princess is willing to listen?"
Xu Qinghe raised his eyes to look at her and said softly, "I don't want to listen, so you won't tell me anymore?"
Nanzhi smiled lightly: "Then I will wait until the princess is willing to listen."
After looking at the paintings, Xu Qinghe sat on the rose chair, picked up the teacup on the table and took a sip. It was lightly sweet but not greasy, but still warm.
Nanzhi explained, "It's the recipe that Prince Wei found yesterday. It's brown sugar, ginger, and jujube tea. I also specifically suppressed the ginger flavor that the princess doesn't like."
Xu Qinghe drank a few more sips and felt much better. He leaned back in his chair and waited for her to speak.
She spoke softly, "Nanzhi has been with the princess since she was a child, so she naturally knows what kind of person the young general is and how close the princess and he were. Originally, the princess and him were a match made in heaven, but later the princess broke off the engagement to protect him, and the young general was also burned to death."
"Princess, Xie Qi no longer exists in this world, but Xu Qinghe is still alive. Xu Qinghe can devote all her energy to clearing the name of the Xie family, but there is really no need to trap herself in the past for the sake of Xie Sanlang."
"The princess could have had a better future instead of trapping herself in the past of empty memories."
"Princess, do you understand what Nanzhi means?"
When she finally looked at Xu Qinghe, tears welled up in her eyes, filled with concern.
Nanzhi knew that what she said had crossed the line.
As the princess's most trusted maid, she can give her advice on how to find out the truth, but she is not qualified to say too much about the princess's love life.
Therefore, even if the princess wanted to scold her and punish her today, she would be willing to do so. She only hoped that this girl who had suffered a lot of misfortune since childhood could get a good home, instead of being trapped for life because of the deceased General Xie.
However, Xu Qinghe just clenched his wrist through the thin summer clothes, lowered his eyes and remained silent for a long time, and then asked Nanzhi to go down.
The voice was neither sad nor happy, and even Nanzhi could not hear any emotion in it.
When Xu Qinghe was the only one left in the studio, she heard the rustling sound of fallen petals from the wind outside the window, which swept in a few wisteria petals and landed on the landscape painting in front of her.
She reached out and picked up the petal and placed it in her palm, suddenly remembering the first time she ate the wisteria cake made by her mother when she was young. Her mother solemnly told her that she wanted to arrange a marriage for her with Sanlang of the Xie family and asked her if she was willing.
She was barely ten years old at that time, and she was overjoyed when she heard that she was going to be engaged to her favorite and most handsome brother from the Xie family.
But her mother stretched out her long finger and tapped her forehead, scolding her for only being attracted to Xie Sanlang's face.
The little princess shook her head and defended herself, "No, not only is he handsome, he can also take the blame for me. If we get married in the future, and Father and Mother want to punish me again, I will let my brother take the punishment."
Princess Nan'an: "You girl, you keep saying 'get married' and 'brother' all the time. Do you know what 'get married' means? Why are you talking nonsense?"
The little princess took a bite of the wisteria cake, her cheeks puffed up, and she wanted to speak incoherently, but her mother glared back at her, so she had to give up.
After she had finished swallowing the food in her mouth, she said, "I know. It means that I will live with Brother Xie forever, just like my father, the king, and my mother now."
The princess was still smiling, but soon her face became troubled. "Qinghe, Xie Qi will go to the battlefield in the future. Swords and knives are merciless on the battlefield, and countless people have died there. If something happens to him, what will you do?"
In fact, the princess was not optimistic about this marriage, but the marriage was originally proposed by Prince Nannan, and he had his considerations.
He has only one daughter, but she cannot inherit the throne and the military power of the Southern Border Army. He must plan for the future of the entire Southern Border in advance. At least he must find someone to whom he can entrust the military power of the Southern Border Army and who can lead the troops to defend the entire Southern Border for him.
Xie Qi, the youngest son of the Xie family, was the one he chose.
Xie Qi showed extraordinary talent in martial arts and commanding troops when he was young. As long as he was well cultivated, he would definitely become an excellent general in the future.
At first, Princess Nan'an disapproved of this. "You and I are already too busy with the war to care for Qinghe. Now you want to entrust your daughter's life to him just for military power? Swords and guns are blind. If Xie Qi gets into trouble on the battlefield, what will happen to Qinghe?"
Prince Nan'an held his wife, who rarely cried, in his arms and said only one sentence in the end: "Then go ask Qinghe for her own opinion."
After hearing her mother's concerns, Xu Qinghe said calmly, "Then I'll go find someone else. There are thousands of men in the Southern Territory. Can't I find one who can replace Xie Qi?"
Later, she secretly told this to Xie Qi, who then gave her a sullen look: "Xu Qinghe, are you cursing me?"
Xu Qinghe smiled and took his arm, saying coquettishly: "No way, that was all a lie to my mother. You treat me so well, I must be with you forever."
Young Xie Qi was delighted at first, but then he couldn't help asking, "What will you do if something happens to me in the future?"
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