Chapter 90
The address Wen Sixue gave was in Jiangdu. Since this involved time travelers, Yun Zhan didn't dare let Shi Mingyue come along.
Shi Mingyue listened to Yun Zhan and stayed at home obediently.
Yun Zhan got off the bus at the long-distance station. The sky was already a pale orange, like paint diluted with water, spreading layer by layer towards the distant mountains.
"It seems that dusk comes earlier in Jiangdu than in Yuedu."
Yun Zhan squinted. She carried a simple bag on her back and clutched a piece of paper with "No. 34, Yuanmu Village" written on it in her hand. The handwriting was soft from sweat.
The high-rise buildings in the city center quickly receded behind, replaced by blue and white tile walls left over from the last century, the colors peeling off like the edges of old postage stamps.
Yun Zhan stopped in front of a small shop, bought a bottle of mineral water, and asked in a slightly slurred voice carried by the evening breeze of Jiangdu, "Uncle, how do I get to No. 34 Yuanmu Village?"
The owner, who was over seventy years old and spoke with a heavy local accent, pointed clearly into the distance: "Go west, cross two more stone bridges, and then go up the mountain."
Yun Zhan thanked him, and the moment his shoes touched the country dirt road, the smell of asphalt from the city completely disappeared.
Dusk fell on her shoulders, like an oversized coat, dragging her along with every step she took.
The shadow was stretched extremely long, and no other person could be seen in front or behind.
The dirt road gradually narrowed into a field ridge, and mud splashed onto the shoes, making a slight "squeak" sound with each step.
Birdsong drifted from the depths of the bamboo forest, occasionally mingled with the distant crowing of roosters, like echoes drifting from another era.
Yun Zhan passed through the last slender bamboo grove, the bamboo leaves rustling.
Looking up again, a mud house appeared halfway up the mountain. Its walls were dark yellow, mixed with straw fragments, and its roof was covered with small blue tiles laid by hand. A few clumps of wild grass grew along the edge, swaying gently in the wind.
A stone staircase winds its way down in front of the house, its surface polished smooth by the passage of time. Yun Zhan stands at the bottom of the staircase, her shoes covered in mud. The last rays of the twilight fall on the mud wall, giving it a warm, worn-out hue.
"This place is so dilapidated... It's hard to imagine that someone would choose to live in seclusion in such a place."
Yun Zhan frowned slightly. Wen Ran was once a famous socialite in Yue Du, surrounded by jewels and champagne, and a single soft song could make a fortune disappear.
Such a brilliant person would willingly live in seclusion among these mud walls and thatched roofs?
"Maybe this is what love-struck thinking. Isn't she with Song Yuan now?"
Yun Zhan rubbed her forehead, and for some reason, she suddenly thought of Wen Sixue.
"I have a feeling... Wen Sixue is also this kind of person. Is the Wen family a family tradition of being love-obsessed?"
21: "I think so."
Before coming here, Yun Zhan had thought he would see a mansion that had been forgotten by time but still had its splendor, at least with carved gate towers and dilapidated iron railings. But all he saw was a hand-rammed earth wall and a stone staircase that had been washed clean by the rain.
It's truly astonishing.
The wind swept across the eaves, bringing with it the earthy smell of bamboo leaves and damp soil. Yun Zhan stepped forward and knocked on the door outside the mud house.
Yun Zhan raised his hand, his knuckles landing on the wooden door with a muffled, dull sound. He knocked for a while, but there was no response.
"Could there be no one here? There's nowhere to stay around..."
Before the second knock had even finished, a sharp "snap" came from behind, and the carrying pole fell to the ground, splashing up tiny specks of mud.
What are you doing? Why are you knocking on my door?
His voice was hoarse and irritable, as if it had been ground by a rough stone.
Yun Zhan turned around and saw a hunched old woman standing at the bottom of the stone steps. Her white hair was disheveled by the mountain wind, and her brows were furrowed into a deep "川" character.
The old woman instinctively swung the carrying pole behind her, the movement carrying an undisguised sense of shooing her away.
Yun Zhan was choked by this sudden outburst of anger: "You...you're not Wen Ran, are you?"
In Yun Zhan's memory, the girls of the Wen family were all good-tempered, and they spoke softly and gently. They would never be so angry.
Upon hearing this, the old woman raised an eyebrow and a hint of surprise flashed in her cloudy eyes.
She looked Yun Zhan up and down, her gaze as rough as sandpaper, making him very uncomfortable.
"Of course I am not Wen Ran."
She spat, her voice rising with anger and displeasure: "Wen Ran is my wife. What are you, a transmigrator, doing here in this godforsaken place instead of doing your mission?"
The words fell like a stone thrown into a calm lake.
Yun Zhan's pupils contracted slightly. The words "transmigrator" popped out of the other person's mouth, accompanied by the shock of having his secret exposed.
A mountain breeze swept by, ruffling the stray hairs on her forehead and sending a chill down her spine.
"So...you are Song Yuan?"
I have no obligation to answer your question.
"Then how did you know I was a time traveler?" Yun Zhan looked surprised. Why did Song Yuan recognize him at a glance?
"I can see your system."
The old woman stopped looking at her, bent down to pick up the carrying pole, her movements slow but filled with rejection.
She turned and walked towards the mud hut. Just as she was about to close the door, Yun Zhan suddenly gripped the doorframe: "Senior, please allow me to ask you some questions. I'll be leaving soon..."
Yun Zhan gripped the wooden door tightly, his little head peering directly into the house.
"senior..."
"roll."
"I can't leave... I'm sorry to trouble you, senior." Yun Zhan's eyes softened, and his face became pleading.
Song Yuan was old and not as strong as her. Her face turned ashen, and she snorted before letting Yun Zhan in.
Inside the mud walls, the light was like filtered old film, dim and warm with a damp feel.
Song Yuan leaned back in the rattan chair, a faded woven blanket covering her knees. Her fingers unconsciously stroked the raised rattan joints on the back of the chair, her gaze coldly fixed on Yun Zhan's face.
What exactly do you want?
Yun Zhan dared not sit down. She stood in front of Song Yuan and said in a hoarse voice, "My current task is to investigate Mington School."
Yun Zhan met Song Yuan's gaze, his voice gradually lowering: "I know you were once a school board member. I want to get some inside information from you, about bribery, the transfer of benefits, or... even darker industries."
Song Yuan paused, and the rattan chair made a very slight creak.
She raised her eyes, her gaze sweeping over Yun Zhan's face, before suddenly scoffing, "You... have you fallen for the female lead of this world?"
Yun Zhan nodded without hesitation: "Yes, I like the Shi family's daughter."
Song Yuan's smile vanished abruptly, replaced by a cold, sharp curve at the corners of her mouth, like tree bark cracked by the freezing wind.
"Do you realize that your investigation into these things will affect them?"
Song Yuan's voice was not loud, but it carried a hint of mockery: "Since you were able to find this place, you should understand that Mington School was not established by people from this world. It was established by us transmigrators to protect the female lead."
She leaned forward slightly, and the carpet slipped off her knees, revealing the back of her hand with prominent veins.
"Take your eldest daughter, Ms. Shi, for example. Her family has many enemies. It is because Mington School has secretly helped the Shi family that they have been able to prosper for so long."
Song Yuan paused, her voice lowering but growing colder: "When I took office, a time traveler killed eight people from another family in order to protect the Shi family—no one dares to bring up this blood debt to this day."
She leaned back in her wicker chair and scoffed, "You are the truth you seek, the layers upon layers of blood. Do you still want to investigate?"
Yun Zhan did not answer immediately.
Her fingertips, hanging by her side, twitched slightly before falling still again, as if held by an invisible thread.
"I..."
Yun Zhan looked up, and the cracks on the ceiling spread in her field of vision, like a gaping hole forcibly torn open. Inside the gap was the darkness she had vaguely sensed but had never truly faced, layers upon layers of gray behind the gleaming school gate.
A sense of justice surged in his chest, like a bird eager to break free of its cage; but his other hand held a softer rope—Shi Mingyue.
She remembered that person's well-protected smile, and the untroubled profile under the lights of the Shi family home. She had once promised that she would "only like Shi Mingyue" and "only protect Shi Mingyue."
...The prosperity that was once supported by darkness is now being embraced by Shi Mingyue without any suspicion.
She no longer had the right to tear down that facade.
Yun Zhan looked up, his gaze passing through the beam of light cast by the skylight and landing on Song Yuan's wrinkled face: "It's not that I want to investigate, it's the eldest daughter of the Pei family. I'm only here to assist her."
Yun Zhan's voice was tinged with helplessness: "Mington is now in Pei Yanxi's hands, and I believe she will handle those dirty affairs. My task is simply to accompany her in the investigation and not to go any further."
Yun Zhan paused, his voice softening but becoming even more resolute: "As for myself, I have already chosen Shi Mingyue..."
Song Yuan narrowed her eyes, as if trying to see through her seemingly weak resolve.
Yun Zhan did not flinch, letting the scrutinizing gaze brush against his skin, leaving a slight sting.
It's not that I lack a sense of justice; I've just quietly shifted the weight of justice to "let Shi Mingyue continue to smile."
She helped Pei Yanxi investigate the matter, letting those with influence at Mington School put an end to it all, while she simply stayed by Shi Mingyue's side...
Some truths don't need to be revealed by her.
Some darkness doesn't need her to illuminate it.
All she needs to do is guard the lamp that has already been lit.
"You're so naive, Yun Zhan."
Song Yuan approached step by step, her pace slow, but her gaze remained fixed on Yun Zhan: "What is the Pei family? They are the powerful in Yue Du, the beneficiaries of the system. Do you expect someone with such power to uphold justice?"
"It's already good enough that she doesn't continue to get involved in those dirty things for profit, and you still want her to risk her life to investigate? If she really investigates to the end, I don't know how many people will lose their heads."
She stopped half a step away from Yun Zhan, her gaze like a poisoned needle, scraping across his skin inch by inch: "People are all selfish. We engrave 'selfishness' into our genes. Your abandonment of the mission for Shi Mingyue is selfish, my becoming a school board member for Wen Ran is selfish, and the Pei family's daughter investigating Mington School is also selfish. Yun Zhan, what makes you believe her?"
Song Yuan's voice grew softer and softer, but also colder.
She was like a venomous snake, flicking her tongue in Yun Zhan's ear.
"You think the Pei family's daughter is doing this to restore the school? No, she's just clearing obstacles for herself. Once she discovers that the truth will shake her position and threaten her interests, she won't hesitate to push innocent people out as scapegoats. At that time, do you think the Pei family's daughter can save you? No, you'll only be implicated by her and become the next name to be sacrificed."
Song Yuan's words, sharp as knives, pierced Yun Zhan's heart with the bloody truth.
Of course she knew, how could she not know...
However, she had her own plans.
"Although Pei Yanxi comes from a powerful and wealthy family, she has a strong sense of justice and acts with a good sense of proportion. I believe she can handle this well."
Yun Zhan nodded slightly, his tone polite but firm: "Senior, you only need to inform me, thank you."
Song Yuan turned her back and walked into the inner room without saying a word. A moment later, she brought out a thick old book with yellowed pages and worn edges.
She shoved the book into Yun Zhan's arms, her voice as cold as ice: "It's all in here, a thick book, all of it. Go look it up yourself, you damn fool, you can't be reasoned with."
Yun Zhan took the book, but Song Yuan called out to him again: "Do you know Wen Sixue?"
Yun Zhan nodded: "I know him."
Song Yuan brought out a flat wooden box from the inner room. When the lid was opened, a smell of old paper mixed with mothballs wafted out.
He picked up a photograph with two fingers and handed it to Yun Zhan. The paper was brittle and the edges were curled.
In the photo, little Wen Sixue stands under an old locust tree, wearing a fluffy pea-green coat with a white velvet trim around the brim of her hat, making her face look only the size of a palm.
The girl's eyebrows and eyes had not yet fully developed, but they already had the outline of what would become of her later years, with slightly upturned eyes and gently pursed lips, like a mold that had been pre-made by time.
Sunlight filtered through the leaves, dappling her face. She raised her hand to shield her eyes, but her fingertips curved in a shy arc, as if she were about to jump out of the photograph at any moment.
As Yun Zhan's fingertips touched the paper, she suddenly had a disorienting feeling of transcending time and space. The child in the photo overlapped with the gentle and intellectual person in the coffee shop, like two shadows stretched by the years, finally converging at this moment.
It turns out that Wen Sixue was such a lively and cheerful child when she was young.
Yun Zhan looked up at Song Yuan: "So... this is what she looked like when she was a child."
"Wen Ran passed away a few years ago, and she was still thinking about this child before she died."
Yun Zhan frowned: "Why didn't you go sooner? Wen Sixue has been lonely for so many years, and she never went to see her."
When Wen Sixue was feeling down, she endured many difficult years on her own and couldn't contact Wen Ran.
Song Yuan was a little angry: "Wen Ran was diagnosed with a terminal illness several years ago and is unable to walk, so she can't leave Jiangdu at all. She tried calling this child, but the number was always out of service."
Yun Zhan suddenly realized that Wen Sixue had said that she had changed her phone number several times back then in order to avoid debts.
Presumably, that's when they lost contact.
Yun Zhan gently placed the old photo back into the wooden box, his fingertips lingering for a second on the pea-green fuzz.
The missed time cannot be turned back, and she can only bury this regret deep in her heart.
From now on, though mountains and rivers may separate us, Wen Sixue will never lose contact again.
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