Chapter 110 "It's your brother-in-law."
The midday light was gloomy, with dark clouds pressing down on the horizon.
There are no long city walls here. Every few miles, there are a few herders' tents. The tents, made of yak hide, billow in the wind and stand on the grassland, looking like small hills from a distance.
Helan Yi's men dispersed, taking out the tokens and documents they had bribed Rongbei officials to obtain, and moved between the tents one by one, searching in different directions.
At the beginning of the year, Ji An joined the Rouran and served them. Soon after, the Rouran were defeated. He was extremely astute and fled thousands of miles to the Northern Rong before Helan Yi could demand people from the Rouran.
After that, he vanished as if he had disappeared into thin air. It wasn't until several months later that his men found clues and located him in this area.
After searching for almost half a day in the cold wind, a trusted confidant returned to Helan Yi's side. "We just searched the whole place, but we couldn't find any information about Ji An. I'm afraid he's not here, but is still hiding deep in the grasslands?"
Helan Yi felt as if there was a hot coal stuck in his throat, making him cough incessantly. He swayed and was about to fall when his guards immediately stepped forward to support him.
"Cough cough..."
Helan Yi leaned over the horse's back, panting heavily. He pushed away the hand of the person next to him and slowly raised his head to look into the depths of the grassland.
"We must find him. There's one last piece of land in the west. We need to search there."
He was an orphan and a discarded minister, ordered by the emperor of Daqi to hunt me down and kill me. From that moment on, Daqi was behind me, and I was forever homeless.
If his eyes were still healthy, and he had gone to Rongbei, he would surely have been treated as an honored guest by the Khan, and would have been able to face his former master with his own weapons, proclaiming to the whole world how a foolish ruler persecuted a loyal minister and turned against him for the sake of a woman.
But now, he is like a useless person.
Ji An was his bargaining chip in joining the Northern Rong. Without him, he didn't even have the right to negotiate with Rongbei.
The wind, carrying bits of grass, brushed against Helan Yi's cheeks like tiny knives.
He braced himself against the horse's back, but this time his arms went limp, and he had exhausted all his strength to support himself.
He experienced firsthand what it meant to feel an unforgettable sense of resentment and to feel a deep-seated hatred that seeped into his very bones within just one month.
The wound throbbed with a dull ache, and with each breath, it felt as if hundreds of needles were coursing through his veins, causing him to tremble with pain. His symptoms had steadily worsened along the way; he was like an old dog clinging to life, on his last gasps, barely clinging to its breath.
He began to doubt whether he would ever be able to see Ji An.
"General, please rest. There's no rush. Ji An can't escape." The guard advised him to stop, secretly anxious at the sight of him.
Before the words were finished, a clear, sharp cry of an eagle came from the horizon.
Helan Yi suddenly turned his head sharply, looking towards the leaden-gray horizon. An eagle circled over the mountaintop, folded its wings, and swooped down towards the ground.
This was the eagle that Helan Yi had raised in Longxi for several years. When he left the border of Daqi, he took it with him, except for his personal guards.
He had spent many years with it and was extremely close to it, but along the way, he dared not let the eagle get any closer, simply because...
He still vividly remembers the excruciating pain from the sharp claws and teeth of the eagle that was presented to him as a gift, piercing his eyes.
At that moment, he also heard a short whistle. The eagle launched its attack as if on command, the instant the whistle fell. Such skill could only be possessed by Yuan Chaolu; it must have been she who instructed it.
Now, he even deliberately avoids the eagle that has been with him for many years, because seeing it reminds him of that humiliation.
This was the first time Helan Yi had faced it directly in several days. When the eagle landed on his arm and turned its eyes toward him, he could read a message.
His intuition was correct.
He Lanyi gasped, "Someone is following us..."
Jiang Zhao asked, "Who is it?"
Helan Yi said, "Do you remember the groups and troops we encountered along the way?"
"I remember that we tried our best to avoid encountering those groups or herders that looked ordinary, and kept moving forward."
He Lanyi said, "They've appeared too many times. Each appearance is like urging me forward."
Therefore, he had to travel day and night, his mind constantly on edge, like a dog being walked, on the verge of death.
Before he could finish speaking, everything went black, and he collapsed onto the snow. Those around him rushed forward, crying, "General!"
Snowflakes, as fine as goose feathers, fluttered down and landed on him and the ground around him.
**
When the snowstorm subsided, Yuan Chaolu and Xiao Zhuo arrived at the grassland. They reined in their horses on the hillside, their gazes sweeping over the distant, sprawling rows of herders' tents.
The soldier came to the emperor's side and reported on Helan Yi's situation. He said that the others had searched several pastures but had not yet found Ji An. He then asked the emperor for instructions on what to do next.
"Should I send one of my brothers, who is of Erhu descent, down to scout ahead? Or should we avoid alerting them and wait until Helan Yi finds the person before making our move?"
Xiao Zhuo looked down and saw Yuan Chaolu's brows furrowed slightly, as if she had something on her mind. He asked, "What's wrong?"
Yuan Chaolu raised her hand to brush the snowflakes off her face and said, "I've been to this place before."
"You've been here before?"
She looked up again and surveyed her surroundings for a while. “As I walked this way, I felt a sense of familiarity. Many years ago, the herdsman who asked my father to repair the cave lived here. My father, my younger brother, and I stayed here for several months.”
Xiao Zhuo watched as she nimbly dismounted and trotted to a stone tablet in the distance. She raised her hand and wiped away the snowflakes on the tablet, revealing the inscription. She turned around and said, "That's right, this is the place."
Xiao Zhuo rode closer and said, "It seems that your younger brother has come to seek refuge with an old friend of your father's from back then. He is right here."
Yuan Chaolu pondered for a moment, then pulled on Xiao Zhuo's horse's reins. "I know where he is. Come with me."
This is a pasture on the Shuoyu Grassland. It's extremely remote; behind a hillside, a vast grassland is fenced off with wooden railings. After it snows, a thin layer of ice quickly forms on the ground, crunching underfoot.
The wooden door of the shed rattled in the wind, and the shouts of an elderly man could be heard: "Quick! The snow is falling harder and harder, bring the rest of the cattle and sheep back! Don't let them freeze outside!"
The boy in the pasture responded, picked up the whip, and the cattle and sheep turned around at the sound of the whip, squeezing into the pen following the young man's direction.
Once the last yak was moved into the shed, the boy quickly closed the wooden door and secured it firmly with the thick rope.
Back in the tent, the old man came forward carrying a heavy fur robe. "This awful weather, I hope it won't freeze the cattle and sheep to death again. Xiao An, put this on and be careful not to catch a cold."
The boy grabbed the handkerchief and draped it over his shoulders, then hastily wiped his face with it. After wiping away the snow and dust, he revealed a face red from the cold, with delicate eyebrows and a high, straight nose. Though his face was covered in dust from the hard work of farming, it couldn't hide his handsome features.
"Thank you, Uncle Aqi." His voice was clear and bright, typical of a young man. He stepped forward to help the old man sit down and then squatted down in front of him. "Thank you for taking me in these past few days out of kindness. Otherwise, I don't know where I would have a place to stay in this vast world."
Ji An originally wanted to join the Rongbei Khan, but because he had previously served the Rouran, he was not trusted by the Rongbei people. Later, he discovered that his whereabouts were being followed, and he guessed that it was Helan Yi. With nowhere else to go, he eventually sought refuge with Uncle Aqi.
Uncle Aqi's ranch needed help, so Ji An settled down as a ranch helper. He wasn't particularly noticeable, and since his mother was a Hu person, he had the bones of a Hu person and the appearance of a Han person, making it very easy for him to blend in here, and few people paid any attention to him.
As the two were talking, the sound of horses' hooves came from in front of the tent. Ji An immediately became alert, grabbed the iron awl from under the table, and saw that the people outside had arrived at the tent in an instant.
Uncle Aqi told Ji An to hide in the cabinet, then turned around, grabbed a dagger, and asked, "Who is it?"
The person outside did not answer, but lifted the curtain.
As the wind and snow poured in, Ji An peeked through the gaps and saw a man walking out of the tent. He was dressed in a black fox fur coat, handsome and tall, with an air of nobility that was not to be trifled with. He was clearly a young master from an extremely noble family.
The appearance of such a Han Chinese here... must mean he is one of Helan Yi's men.
Ji An gripped the iron awl tightly in his hand.
Uncle Archie stared at the uninvited guest at the tent entrance and asked in a cold voice, "Who are you? How dare you trespass into my tent without permission!"
“I have come to see Ji An,” the man strode in, “and there is no time to explain to him what this is. He should recognize it.”
A dark-colored rope necklace hung from his palm, with a bone whistle, seemingly made of animal bone, dangling from the end.
Ji An pushed open the door and stepped out, his aura tense, like a wolf cub poised to pounce, warily staring at the intruder.
The newcomer's gaze fell upon him, and he exhaled a long, warm breath.
Ji An asked, "Who are you? How do you have my sister's things?"
The other person looked him up and down, his gaze settling on the iron awl in his hand.
Ji An: "Speak!"
The man walked right inside, saying, "He's your brother-in-law."
Upon hearing these few words, Ji An paused in his actions, first stunned, then bursting into anger: "What brother-in-law? I don't have a brother-in-law! Don't talk nonsense..."
Then, as he looked at the bone whistle, he realized something and looked at the person in front of him with suspicion. Out of the corner of his eye, he also saw a shadowy figure. Turning his head, he saw a girl standing in the snow outside the curtain.
The cold wind swirled snowflakes, and her figure was so thin, as if she would be blown away by the wind and snow at any moment. A few strands of hair at her temples fluttered in the wind, brushing against her cheeks, and she looked at him with reddened eyes.
With a clang, the iron awl in Ji An's hand fell to the ground, and the sharp, icy look in his eyes instantly melted away.
His eyes welled up with tears, and his voice gradually choked with emotion: "Sister..."
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