Chapter 42 Night Rain
Qiandeng lowered his eyes and sipped tea silently.
Liuli looked at the raging wind and rain outside and asked, "Does Mr. Yan have an umbrella? The county lady needs to go back first, lest it gets darker and harder to walk."
Yan Penglai shook his head: "I have nothing. Apart from the necessities, there is nothing else in the house."
Liuli thought so too. This young man was like an immortal. He even took leave from the office on rainy days. He just came back in the rain. How could he lend them anything?
She could only stand up and hurried out along the corridor, saying, "Please wait a moment, my lady. I'll go back and get two umbrellas and come pick you up later."
They were the only two left in the house. It was raining heavily, and dusk had already arrived, leaving the room dark. They sat around the tea stove, looking at each other dimly illuminated by the firelight, feeling rather uncomfortable.
"I thought that in such weather, Mr. Yan would stay in the Taibu Office and wait for the rain to stop."
Yan Penglai pursed his beautifully shaped lips, hesitated for a moment, then lowered his eyes and whispered, "Here... there are people and things I'm concerned about."
He didn't say who it was or what it was about, but his slightly lowered eyes seemed to explain everything.
Qian Deng's heart moved slightly, and he always felt that because of his words, the current situation was a little strange and ambiguous.
Outside, the rain was coming down in heavy and light waves. After a burst of thunder, the rain started to get heavier, hitting the pool and making a noisy sound.
Liuli hadn't returned yet, and Qiandeng felt a little weary. She hugged her knees, gazing at the rippling pond, and chatted with Yan Penglai. "I heard Mr. Yan is from Mianchi. I wonder what the scenery is like there? Is that where Lin Xiangru shone so brilliantly during the Mianchi meeting?"
Hearing the name Mianchi, Yan Penglai looked dazed and replied, "That's right. My home is right next to Mianchi. Not far away is the meeting platform where the Qin and Zhao soldiers buried their weapons, and there's also a palace that has been abandoned for many years."
"Then why is it called Mianchi?"
"The pond is full of water striders and flies. In the summer, when I take my siblings to play by the pond, we always get bitten all over."
Qian Deng casually asked, "Does Mr. Yan have any younger brothers or sisters?"
Yan Penglai nodded, his voice a little hoarse: "Yes, my brother is five years younger than me, and my sister is seven years younger than me. They are both very well-behaved."
Qian Deng wanted to ask about their situation, but then he remembered that the only relative listed on the candidate husband's profile seemed to be his father. Those who were not listed must have passed away.
No wonder he is so cold and aloof by nature, spending all day practicing Taoism. It must be because he lost his mother at a young age that he developed such a character.
Facing this man who, like herself, had lost all his family, she softly comforted him, "The dead are gone. I believe your mother and siblings will live peacefully and comfortably in the other world."
Yan Penglai smiled at her and said softly, "Yes, I will."
This cold and aloof man smiled in front of her for the first time. Qiandeng felt a bright light in front of her eyes, and her mind was shaken and she felt a little dazed for a moment.
But he quickly suppressed his fleeting smile, and the two of them looked at the wind and rain outside and fell into silence again.
Maybe it was the fatigue brought by silence, or maybe it was the sense of security brought by the wind and rain, Qiandeng just felt all kinds of sleepiness surging in her heart, making her yawn involuntarily with her hands covering her mouth.
Next to her was the face that was praised by thousands of people in Chang'an and even the Tang Dynasty. It bloomed luxuriously in her close proximity, but because of sleepiness, it seemed a little blurry in her eyes.
"Today..." Qian Deng, struggling to stay sleepy, chatted with him about other things. "I came across an old work by Master Yan. Master Yan has a heart to help the people and the talent of Zijian and Jiang Yan, so why did he hide his name and live in seclusion?"
Yan Penglai was stunned for a moment, hesitant. "The county lady knows about this? You are always smart and perceptive. I know I can't hide this from you, but... if this matter were to become known to others, it would definitely not be a good thing for Jintang. I hope the county lady would consider this."
Qian Deng was surprised. How could this have anything to do with Jin Tang?
"Lord Yan is so talented, and although Jin Tang is not a bad person, he entered the Imperial College..."
At this point, a ray of clarity emerged from her hazy mind, and she suddenly remembered how Jin Tang entered the Imperial College.
Princess Gao hired someone to do the ghostwriting and let him sneak in.
Could it be that the article that even Cui Fufeng praised so highly was actually written by Yan Penglai?
Qian Deng paused for a moment, then slowly uttered, "Killing people to survive, destroying others to preserve oneself, is not what a gentleman would do."
"Yes... This was the last article I wrote. I never wrote again after that."
"I see..." Qian Deng's voice was calm, as if he was just chatting with him casually.
It turned out that the breakup of Ci'en Temple came first, and Jintang was admitted to the Imperial College later.
When Princess Gao helped Jin Tang to cheat, the person she looked for was Yan Penglai, who claimed to have broken off relations with him.
I felt a little angry, but my eyelids were heavy.
She had slept uneasily last night and even the night before. She had been feeling tired every day, but she had not expected to be so sleepy at this moment in the storm.
Liuli has been gone for such a long time, and the front and back yards are not far away. She should be back by now, but why is there still no movement...
There was the sound of gurgling water in her ears, the dark sky around her, and the warm glow of a fire in front of her. Qiandeng felt that the rain that covered the sky and the ground had blurred the world before her, making it difficult for her to open her eyes and she fell into a deep sleep.
Sleep made her body soften unconsciously. Yan Penglai watched as she closed her eyes and became drowsy. Her body slowly tilted downwards and was about to fall onto the blue brick floor.
Yan Penglai hesitated and raised his hand, gently supporting her shoulders to maintain her balance.
Qiandeng sensed something was wrong, but his body was limp and out of control. After mumbling something unconsciously, he never woke up.
Listening to the rustling sound of heavy rain outside and feeling the warmth of her skin through her soft spring clothes, Yan Penglai knelt stiffly beside her, supporting her silently without moving.
For a long time, she couldn't open her eyes or sit up straight, and there was no sign of waking up.
And he finally moved his numb body and slowly sat cross-legged beside her.
The dim night enveloped them, with only silvery-white raindrops occasionally breaking through the gloom, faintly flashing a light.
They sat in the open pavilion, she leaned on his shoulder and fell into a deep sleep.
He looked at the small pond in front of him as night gradually fell, holding the Gan Nan Buddhist beads in his hand, slowly counting them one by one, trying to suppress the unspeakable tremors in his heart.
"Yan Langjun..."
"County Lady?"
He heard a faint voice and responded blankly.
When I looked down, I found that she had not woken up.
The fire in front of her flickered slightly, casting a fluctuating light on her face.
They were so close that her hair, her eyelashes, the corners of her lips, and the scar on her brow were all cast into his eyes by the firelight, shining with a dizzying brilliance.
Yan Penglai, who thought he had long since cut off worldly ties and was untainted by the slightest dust, stopped muttering Buddhist and Taoist scriptures at this moment, forgetting the mysterious void that he had silently recited thousands of times, and just stared at the face blooming in front of him.
He heard Qian Deng's mumbling, vague and faint, but every word was like engraving in his heart, causing him immense pain.
"Four years ago, in front of my ancestors' spirits, why did you give me such a fate..."
The warmth from her cheek seeped in through his still damp clothes, spreading along his shoulders and wandering through his blood, until it reached the deepest part of his heart and the darkest part of his mind.
Yes, her fate was decided by him when she first entered the Taibu Bureau.
He pinned the fate of "no relatives and bad luck to her husband" on her, and since then, her fate has been determined.
The warm blood stirred his heart, and like the pond in front of him, the ripples became more and more dense, swaying and turbulent, unstoppable.
He tensed his body, closed his eyes, and the Gan Nan Buddhist beads in his hand fell.
The gods, Buddhas, and immortals could not save him. The aged red string snapped, and the round Buddhist beads rolled across the blue brick floor, drifting to an unknown corner and falling into the pool below, never to be found again.
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