Chapter 46
dark.
Cold.
And... the endless pain that felt like the soul was being repeatedly ground between an ice blade and a branding iron.
Gu Linzhi's consciousness slowly and painstakingly regrouped within this boundless abyss of pain. He felt as if he were sinking to the bottom of a icy abyss. Every weak heartbeat sent a rip-like pain through his body. Every time he tried to breathe, he inhaled a cold despair mixed with the smell of blood and decay.
The senses are slowly returning.
The sense of touch returned first—cold, rough wood beneath me, covered in a thick, musty blanket that still couldn't keep out the chill. The shackles seemed removed, but my limbs felt torn apart and reassembled, weighing me down to the point where even lifting a finger was incredibly difficult. The wound beneath my left rib cage no longer gushed forth toxins, but it still felt like a cold crater, releasing a constant numbness and dull pain that penetrated deep into my bones.
Then came the sound—the sound of dripping water. Monotonous, clear, with a certain rhythm, coming from a corner not far away. And... the extremely faint, almost imperceptible sound of breathing. Not his own. Another person's breathing. Soft, long, with an inhuman calmness, somewhere in this small space.
Finally, his vision—with immense difficulty, he pried open his eyelids, which felt like they weighed a thousand pounds. His vision blurred at first, leaving only endless darkness. Gradually, a faint light emerged from the darkness. It wasn't the unsettling flickering torches of the Imperial Prison, but a bean-sized oil lamp placed on the ground in the distance, emitting a dim yellow glow. The light was so weak that it barely revealed the outline of a low, narrow, cellar-like space. Rough earthen walls surrounded it, and the air was stagnant, filled with dust, mold, herbs, and... the faint, yet remarkably distinct, cool fragrance of wisteria.
Wisteria fragrance...
This realization was like an icy needle, instantly piercing Gu Linzhi's chaotic consciousness! Imperial prison... poisoning... the death of the imperial guards... explosions... falling wisteria petals... all the fragments of memory seemed to be connected by an invisible thread, rushing back with a roar!
He wasn't dead. He was brought out from the depths of the Imperial Prison and brought to this place.
And here, there is the cool fragrance of wisteria.
Who is it? The answer is almost there, yet it is shrouded in a deeper fog and a deadly chill.
He tried to move his stiff neck, the bones making a teeth-grinding creaking sound. His eyes struggled to scan the limits of the dim light.
In the deepest shadow of the corner, a vague outline sits quietly.
Even in the dim light, her moon-white dress shone with an incongruous, icy gleam. She had her back to him, her figure erect and distant, like a statue carved from ice and jade. Her long, black hair flowed freely, held together with a simple jade hairpin, a few strands cascading down, obscuring the side of her face. She seemed to be concentrating on something, her head lowered. The faint light highlighted the exquisitely cool curves of her slender neck and shoulders.
Su Wanwan. Or rather, the Purple Owl of the Snow Spider Pavilion.
It was indeed her.
Gu Linzhi's heart beat heavily in his numb chest, sending a sharp pain through his wound. He made no sound, his eyes, gradually regaining focus but still cold, fixed on the figure. Wariness, suspicion, scrutiny... and a complex, suppressed emotion, one he couldn't even articulate, swirled in his eyes.
Why had she saved him? In the Imperial Prison, the precise hidden weapon that killed the Ti cavalry, the perfectly timed explosion that caused chaos, the falling wisteria petals... all of this was her doing. She had rescued him from certain death, only to bring him to this unknown, hidden place. What did she want from him? Or, rather, what did the Beidi Snow Spider Pavilion behind her want?
At this moment, Su Wanwan in the corner seemed to have finished what she was doing. She moved very slightly and then slowly turned around.
The dim light illuminated her face. It was still that exquisitely beautiful, yet bloodless. Her icy-gray eyes were like two frozen wells, reflecting the faint flickering light of the lamp, yet reflecting no warmth at all. Her gaze rested calmly on Gu Linzhi's face, seemingly unsurprised that he had regained consciousness.
In her hands, she held several slender golden needles that gleamed coldly under the light, and a small roll of almost transparent silk thread with a jade-white luster - ice silk.
"Awake." Her voice was cold and ethereal, like ice beads falling on a jade plate. It was remarkably clear in the dead silence of the cellar, yet devoid of any emotion, as if she were simply stating a fact. "Half an hour earlier than expected."
Gu Linzhi moved his lips and wanted to speak, but his throat felt like it was being rubbed by sandpaper, and only a hoarse and broken sound of air flow came out, accompanied by a violent cough and pain in his ribs.
Su Wanwan stood up, her moon-white skirt brushing against the fine dust on the ground, and walked silently to the simple wooden bed where Gu Linzhi lay. She looked down at him, her ice-gray eyes lingering for a moment on his pale and gray face and the wound under his ribs.
"The golden needles can only contain the poison, 'Zhenyuhong', for three days. The cold pond herbs have also exhausted their potency." Her words were calm and almost cruel, like a doctor reading out an irreversible diagnosis. "The poison has seeped into your heart meridians. You have... less than six hours."
Six hours later, she announced the death in the calmest tone.
Gu Linzhi stared at her intently, his eyes devoid of any fear of death, only a cold sharpness and mockery tempered by pain and poison. He gathered his strength with great difficulty, croaking out a few words: "...Why...save me?"
Su Wanwan's icy-gray eyes flickered ever so slightly, a movement so subtle it seemed almost an illusion. She didn't answer the question, but leaned forward instead.
An icy breath, with the cool fragrance of wisteria, instantly approached. Gu Linzhi's body instinctively tensed, but he was powerless to resist.
Su Wanwan stretched out her almost transparent white hand, her fingertips icy cold, and gently lifted the heavy felt blanket covering Gu Linzhi, revealing the wound under his ribs, which was simply bandaged but still had a faint trace of the blue poison mark. Her movements were not gentle, but extremely precise and neat.
"If you don't want to die faster, don't move." Her voice was still cold, with an unquestionable command tone.
Before she finished speaking, the slender golden needle in her hand, with a hint of cold light, pierced into a blood spot near Gu Linzhi's wound with incredible precision!
"Ugh!" Gu Linzhi groaned, his body trembling violently! A mixture of extreme cold and needle-like pain instantly exploded from his acupoints, sweeping across his body! Compared to the heart-burning and bone-chilling pain he had experienced by the cold pond before, this pain was even sharper and deeper into his bones!
Su Wanwan's fingers were as steady as a rock, oblivious to his painful reaction. After the needle had penetrated, her fingertips began to twist, lift, and thrust with remarkable stability. As she moved, the sharp pain coursed through Gu Linzhi's meridians like a living thing, forcibly drawing the poison dormant near his heart, causing it to slowly and painfully converge on the wound!
This was no longer suppression, but... drainage?! She was trying to forcibly extract the toxins that had seeped into her heart meridians?!
Gu Linzhi's forehead was instantly covered in cold sweat, and he clenched his teeth tightly, not letting himself make any more sounds. He stared at Su Wanwan's face, which was so close to him, watching her ice-gray eyes reflect his expression distorted by severe pain, watching her eyes that were focused to the point of being almost cold and without a trace of emotion.
What kind of existence was this woman? The Purple Owl of the Snow Spider Pavilion, a sharp weapon of the Northern Di, was now using this almost self-mutilating method to drain the poison from his mortal enemy?
Just when the severe pain from the golden needle drainage reached its peak and Gu Linzhi's consciousness was about to collapse again -
Su Wanwan suddenly stopped moving.
Her fingers holding the golden needle remained steady, but Gu Linzhi clearly saw that her ice-gray pupils suddenly shrank! As if she had sensed something extremely unexpected, even... dangerous!
Her gaze suddenly became as sharp as a knife, fixed on the deep wound under Gu Linzhi's ribs - the poisonous vein that was forcibly pulled by the golden needle, slightly swollen, and dark blue in color!
Her fingertips even trembled ever so slightly! Although it was only for a moment before being suppressed by a stronger controlling force, Gu Linzhi caught it!
What was that? What did she find?
Before Gu Linzhi could think about it, a gleam of extremely resolute coldness suddenly flashed across Su Wanwan's eyes! Her empty left hand stretched out like lightning, and the scroll of ice silk flowing with a jade-white sheen automatically slid into her fingertips like a living thing!
"laugh--!"
An extremely subtle but hair-raising cutting sound was heard!
Su Wanwan actually used the extremely sharp ice silk thread to swiftly cut the inside of her left wrist! A long, thin wound appeared instantly, and bright red blood immediately oozed out!
But she seemed completely insensitive to the pain. Her icy grey eyes held only a cold, almost paranoid focus. She quickly brought her bleeding wrist over the wound under Gu Linzhi's ribs, letting the few drops of scalding blood drip precisely around the acupuncture point where the needle had pierced.
Something strange happened!
The moment those few drops of crimson blood came into contact with the dark blue poison veins on Gu Linzhi's skin, they seemed to have encountered a red-hot iron, making a very slight "sizzling" sound and quickly turning black and drying up at a speed visible to the naked eye! It was as if some substance in the blood was being madly devoured and neutralized by the poison!
At the same time, Gu Linzhi felt the sharp pain and coldness in his ribs, like a thousand ants gnawing at him, suddenly eased a little! Although the pain was still unbearable, the deadly numbness approaching his heart seemed to be temporarily suppressed by this strange "blood sacrifice"!
Using blood to draw poison?! Her blood... can restrain the poisonous feather red?!
Gu Linzhi's heart was filled with a huge wave of emotion! He looked in disbelief at Su Wanwan's rapidly pale face, at the tiny wound on her wrist that was still bleeding, and at the bottomless coldness in her ice-gray eyes that seemed to contain endless secrets.
Su Wanwan paid no heed to her own blood loss. She quickly retracted her wrist and expertly pressed her fingertips against the wound to stem the bleeding. Then, she grasped the needle that had pierced Gu Linzhi's body again and continued the unfinished process of twisting and draining it. This time, however, her movements seemed more cautious, more solemn.
The cellar fell into complete silence. The only sounds were the subtle twirling of the golden needle, Gu Linzhi's suppressed breathing, and the crackling of the bean-sized oil lamp.
An unknown amount of time passed before Su Wanwan finally and slowly withdrew the needle. The needle tip released a tiny drop of poisonous blood, as thick as ink and emitting a pungent, fishy odor. She casually dropped the needle into a nearby earthenware jar filled with murky liquid medicine, making a soft, sizzling sound.
Gu Linzhi collapsed onto the wooden plank, as if he'd just been pulled from the water. He was drenched in cold sweat, and every breath carried the exhaustion of someone who'd survived a catastrophe. The sharp pain and numbness in his ribs remained, but it no longer spread like the maggots in his tarsal bones that it had before. He seemed... to have been dragged back a step from the brink of death.
Su Wanwan stood up, her face even paler than before, as if the last trace of blood had been drained from the icy jade. She silently gathered the golden needles and ice silk, her movements still methodical, yet revealing an indescribable fatigue.
"Why?" Gu Linzhi's voice was still hoarse, but much clearer than before. He stared at her intently and asked the question again. This time, his tone was filled with deeper inquiry and incomprehensible confusion.
Su Wanwan paused slightly as she packed her things. She didn't look up, her icy gray eyes cast down, her long lashes masking all emotion. A suffocating silence reigned in the cellar.
After a long moment, just when Gu Linzhi thought she wouldn't answer, she spoke so softly, almost imperceptibly. Her voice was still cold, but it seemed to carry a hint of distant fatigue, as if separated by a layer of eternal ice, and... mockery?
"Your life..." She paused, as if weighing her words, or as if simply stating a cold fact, "...is now...worth more than mine."
Valuable? Valuable to whom? To Beidi? Or to...herself?
Instead of answering the question, this sentence brought deeper confusion and chill.
After saying this, she fell silent. After putting her things away, she walked to a crude wooden shelf in the corner of the cellar and lifted a coarse porcelain bowl filled with a dark brown medicinal concoction that exuded a strong, bitter smell. Holding the bowl, she walked back to Gu Linzhi's bedside.
"Drink it." She handed the bowl of medicine to Gu Linzhi's mouth, her voice unquestionable, but her eyes were no longer looking at him, but fell on the swaying oil lamp next to her, as if the jumping flame was more worthy of attention than Gu Linzhi's life or death.
Gu Linzhi looked at her pale, almost transparent profile, at the small wound on her wrist that had stopped bleeding but was still visible, and at the thick, inky-black medicinal juice in the bowl that exuded an ominous aura...
He didn't move, but continued to stare at her with those cold eyes.
Inside the cellar, the atmosphere froze once again. Only the oil lamp, burning tirelessly, cast the two silent figures facing each other against the cold, rough earthen wall, twisting and stretching them like two trapped beasts, tightly entangled by fate and secrets, unable to separate.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
