Chapter 81 What about me? Am I not good-looking...?
The next day, Chu Jingqi rushed into Canggong Courtyard in a great hurry and stopped Baili Xunzhou, who was about to leave the courtyard. His face was full of urgency, but before he spoke, he still cautiously looked around.
"Stop looking. She left home earlier than me today," Baili Xunzhou said calmly, knowing immediately what he was looking at.
Chu Jingqi hurriedly asked, "How is it? How is it? Did you find out? We can't let that guy surnamed Fu... or anyone else take advantage of the situation!"
Baili Xunzhou held back for a long time before finally swallowing back the words, "That's Feng Mian's uncle."
"I asked, and they said it was official business."
"How perfunctory!" Chu Jingqi frowned deeply. His beloved father, Prince Qin, always dealt with his mother in the same way, claiming it was to avoid unnecessary arguments, but in his opinion, it was just an escape.
“She really has important business to attend to,” Baili Xunzhou defended Feng Mian, unable to bear hearing anyone say anything bad about her.
Chu Jingqi rolled her eyes at him, then her own worries began to weigh on her. She sighed, "Sigh... Mi Tu has been back in the Canglang tribe for so long, and she hasn't sent me a single letter. Xiao Baili, do you think she's been so captivated by the eagles and horses of the grasslands that she's forgotten about me?"
Seeing his dejected appearance, Baili Xunzhou thought that although he had mistaken his rival for someone else's love, he was genuinely worried about him. In return, he should help him solve some problems. So he said, "There are carrier pigeons in the army that you can borrow for now."
Chu Jingqi, who was feeling dejected, almost jumped up on the spot. He suddenly hooked his arm around Baili Xunzhou's neck and pulled him down, saying, "Good brother-in-law, Ninth Brother really didn't misjudge you!"
Baili Xunzhou shrugged and threw him off, saying, "Walk properly."
Chu Jingqi didn't care at all, and muttered to himself as he pondered, "I should choose an auspicious day to send the letter. What do you think I should write in the letter? The people of the Canglang tribe are probably all very straightforward, right? So I can't be too reserved or too literary. What if she can't understand it?"
Baili Xunzhou started to find him a bit noisy and quickened his pace to shake him off, but he caught up with her, grabbed her arm, and pulled her outside: "Come on! I'll take you somewhere!"
"Where are you going?" Baili Xunzhou almost stumbled from being pulled, his brows furrowed. "I'm not an idle, unemployed bum."
"It won't take you too long. I guarantee that one trip will enlighten you and boost your confidence," Chu Jingqi said, patting his chest confidently.
Half an hour later.
A brightly colored Nuo mask with a strange expression suddenly loomed large in front of Baili Xunzhou, and a strong smell of incense mixed with some unknown herbal scent wafted towards him.
Baili Xunzhou frowned, stepped back slightly, and turned to look at Chu Jingqi, who was huddled beside him like a quail. His tone was incredulous: "This is the method you were talking about... that's guaranteed to work?"
This is a low wooden house with countless colorful prayer flags hanging from the roof eaves. The colors are vibrant, but the interior is very dark, with only a few flickering candles and a burning brazier in the center illuminating the space.
The dim light illuminated the tiny dust particles floating in the air, adding to the mysterious and eerie atmosphere of the grotesque Nuo masks on the four walls.
“Extraordinary people do extraordinary things!” Chu Jingqi dodged the pile of tortoise shells and animal bones not far behind him, looking at the diviner in the center, who was dancing with a Nuo mask, with a mixture of anticipation and fear. His voice trembled slightly as he pushed Baili Xunzhou and whispered, “They say marriage is preordained. If you have any questions, just ask! It’s very accurate!”
Baili Xunzhou looked numb. He had never believed in ghosts and gods since he was a child, and he had never heard of or seen such a place of divination. He had wanted to leave several times since he entered, but Chu Jingqi had held him back. He still wanted to get up and leave, but when he saw the diviner solemnly take a piece of ox bone and look at him questioningly, he froze on the spot.
His Adam's apple bobbed, he swallowed nervously, and asked in a dry voice, "Tell me, what are her feelings for me? What should I do to deepen our connection?"
The diviner placed the ox bones over the fire basin while chanting incantations.
The flames licked at the ox bones, making a faint crackling sound. Inside, all was silent; Baili Xunzhou held his breath in tension.
"Zhao is here!"
The diviner's hoarse voice suddenly rang out, sounding neither male nor female, hoarse and mocking, startling Chu Jingqi so much that he shuddered. He hurriedly pressed his hand to his chest and cautiously asked, "What does it mean? Is the divination auspicious or inauspicious?"
The diviner bent down, his fingertips carefully tracing a crack on the bone fragment. After a long while, he slowly spoke in a vague, ambiguous tone:
"Unstable circumstances are not due to a shallow connection, but rather a test. Wait for the clouds to part and the moon to shine. Keep the bedside clean and new, move chests and cabinets to the southwest, place clean water in the southeast, tie a red string to the corner, and a good match will naturally come near."
After speaking, he suddenly knelt silently before the brazier, as if those few words had exhausted all his strength.
Chu Jingqi was completely bewildered, struggling to digest the cryptic divination. He tugged at Baili Xunzhou's sleeve and whispered, "Does this mean that everything you're facing now is a test, and if you persevere, there's hope?"
Baili Xunzhou lowered his eyelashes slightly, revealing no emotion, and simply said, "These are just tales of gods and ghosts; listen and that's it. Do you still want to ask?"
"Ask, of course I'll ask!"
The diviner who had just performed the divination for Baili Xunzhou left, exhausted. A new diviner then divined an auspicious time for Chu Jingqi to send the letter. Only then did Chu Jingqi happily leave with Baili Xunzhou.
Stepping out of the low, cramped door and smelling the fresh air in the quiet alley, the two of them breathed a sigh of relief.
Just as they were about to leave along the winding path they had come from, a wooden door on the side suddenly opened inward, and a woman with her face covered by a veil hurriedly walked out. She bumped into Chu Jingqi unexpectedly, and the light veil hanging down from the veil fluttered up, revealing Madam Zhe's beautiful face.
Her gaze met Baili Xunzhou's for a fleeting moment, then she hurriedly pulled back the veil, covering her face tightly, and whispered "I'm sorry." She then hurriedly left with unsteady steps, her figure quickly disappearing into the depths of the alley.
Baili Xunzhou swallowed back the words "Madam Zhe" that were already on his lips. He watched the disappearing figure, his brows furrowed, wondering why she was pretending to be a complete stranger.
On second thought, he himself did not want others to know that he had just sought divine guidance, so perhaps Madam Zhe also had her own unspeakable secrets.
Chu Jingqi rubbed his temples and muttered, "The divination just reminded me to be careful, and look, it came true as soon as I stepped out! Looks like I'll have to..."
"Let's go." He grabbed Chu Jingqi and strode away, but in his heart he wondered, is it really that effective?
Night gently enveloped the courtyard, and the candlelight under the eaves flickered in the evening breeze, casting long, thin shadows of the trees. Feng Mian pushed open the door to his bedroom, looking rather sullen.
All day long, she didn't receive even a single word of greeting from Baili Xunzhou. According to the gatekeeper, after she left in the morning, he went out with Chu Jingqi and returned to the mansion around dinner time, and then stayed in the courtyard without going out.
He returned so long before her, yet he didn't even send anyone to ask how she was doing or if she wanted to come back for dinner. It was already dark, and he didn't urge her to return home. Her uncle even started making sarcastic remarks in her ear, saying things like, "It seems someone's mind isn't firm."
A feeling of injustice or anger welled up inside Feng Mian, and she strode heavily into the room, ready to confront him, but suddenly froze in place.
The bedroom, while not entirely renovated, had undergone a significant transformation. The rosewood dressing table and chaise lounge that had originally been placed against the east wall had been moved, replaced by a pair of celadon vases standing side by side. The heavy chests and cabinets had all been moved to the southwest corner, and a jar of clear water sat neatly under the south-facing window. Most striking of all were the thin red ropes tied to the four corners of the bed.
"What are you doing...?" Feng Mian was full of doubts.
Baili Xunzhou was just tying the last red rope to the bedpost when he heard this and turned around. The moment he saw Feng Mian, his eyes lit up. "You're back."
His voice carried a subtle lightness.
He tied the red string, clapped his hands gently, walked to her side, and asked in a low voice with a hint of anticipation, "How was it?"
"What do you mean, how?" Feng Mian was increasingly confused.
He stretched out his long arm, gesturing for her to look at the newly renovated layout of the house. "Don't you think the feng shui inside the house has improved?"
He gazed intently at Feng Mian, his unspoken question being whether she felt he was different, whether she felt closer to him, and whether she sensed an unusual attraction between them as their fate deepened.
When did he start caring about feng shui? What strange place did Ninth Brother take him to today?
Feng Mian looked at him hesitantly, then voiced the question that had been on her mind.
Bai Lixunzhou's eyes began to dart around, and he turned his head away without answering. "I just suddenly felt that changing the furnishings would be refreshing."
Feng Mian insisted on leaning over to look at him, forcing herself into his field of vision. "Really? You've never paid attention to this before. Where did Ninth Brother take you?"
Baili Xunzhou pursed his lips, turned away, and refused to reveal a single word.
Strange. Feng Mian squinted at his stiff figure, her gaze falling back to the red rope gently swaying on the bedpost.
Why is it necessary to tie a red string when changing feng shui?
Oh, at the Yue Lao Temple, people tie these red strings when making wishes. Feng Mian suddenly realized, and found it somewhat amusing. It seemed that her uncle's idea was working; Baili Xunzhou was starting to "grasp any remedy in desperation."
Thinking of Feng Ciyan's instructions today, she glanced at Baili Xunzhou a few times, carefully choosing her words, and then casually said, "Today I went to the outskirts of the city with... Xuzhi to pick up Axue."
She uttered the name "Xuzhi" very softly, yet it was like a pebble dropped into a still lake, keenly observed by Baili Xunzhou. He abruptly turned his head, his tone tense, "Who is Xuzhi?"
“It’s Lord Gu’s courtesy name.” Feng Mian casually sat down at the table. “It’s taken from the Book of Rites, meaning ‘warm and benevolent, covering and nurturing all things.’ It suits his name quite well, doesn’t it?”
Bai Lixun felt as if a bucket of vinegar had been poured over his head, a sour feeling rising from the depths of his heart. How could he be addressed with a courtesy name after only one day?
“He’s quite a good match for me.” Feng Mian continued adding fuel to the fire, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he had such a warm and gentle demeanor.
The alarm blared, and Baili Xunzhou blurted out, "You think he's good-looking?"
“My uncle thinks so too.” Feng Mian blinked, her tone innocent. “He has praised Lord Gu’s elegant demeanor to me more than once.”
Before she knew it, Feng Mian forgot to address Gu Chunwen by his courtesy name. Fortunately, Baili Xunzhou was so engrossed in the jealousy that he didn't notice her momentary lapse.
Baili Xunzhou choked up, the words "What about me? Am I not good-looking? My mother often praises my handsomeness" rolled between his lips a few times, but he was too embarrassed to ask them.
He pursed his lips and said in a low voice, "I also have a courtesy name."
"Really?" Feng Mian turned around in surprise. "You've never mentioned this to me before."
Baili Xunzhou's heart condition worsened. He spent his birthday on the battlefield this year, and his coming-of-age ceremony was not held. His father only gave him a courtesy name in the military tent.
At that time, he had no interest in Feng Mian yet. It was enough for them to address each other as "Prince" and "Princess" in a distant manner. Why would he go to the trouble of telling her his courtesy name?
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